The heartless action of the Trump Administration, authorized by President Donald J. Trump himself, to separate refugee children from their parents, is, in and by itself, grounds for immediate impeachment and removal from office. This imperative is not a partisan political issue. It is a lawful and moral one. Trump has shamed himself and he has shamed his country.
Yes, it’s true that the Trump administration has unquestionably violated the basic principles of the1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and a number of subsequent international agreements and conventions on human rights, Trump has also violated specific provisions of the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child. (which the US still hasn’t signed). Trump’s cruelty to children has clearly violated the spirit of the US Constitution protecting the rights and freedoms of all “persons.” Needless to add, Trump has undermined and misrepresented America’s ideals, beliefs and moral values in the eyes of the entire world.
But more than this, the worst violation of all, is that Donald Trump, as “Commander-in-Chief,” has personally and without remorse, committed an unforgivable “crime against humanity.” No less an authority on this subject than jurist Ben Ferencz, prosecutor at the Nazi war crimes trials at Nuremberg at the end of WW II, has concluded that “The Trump family separation policy is a crime against humanity.”
According to the Nuremberg charter principles and final judgment defining what is a “crime against humanity,” the crime specifically includes such offenses as arbitrary deportation and forcible transfer or separation of persons. These principles and obligations, including the duty to prosecute perpetrators of such crimes, apply to all offenders, including a head of state, without possibility of immunity, time limitation, excuse or pardon.
Donald J. Trump may be ignorant, but ignorance of the law is no excuse. Having committed himself and our nation to the disgraceful role of heartless, systematic perpetrator of a high crime against humanity, Trump has shown himself to be incapacitated and unfit for office. The time has come for immediate impeachment and removal from office.
Once out of office, Trump can be investigated and indicted, under criminal and civil law, for lesser offenses, such as alleged tax evasion, money laundering, bank fraud, accepting “emoluments” from foreign sources, pandering to a foreign enemy, undermining US national and international policies and alliances, hush money payments, short-changing contractors and housing tenants, and lying to Congress and the American people. But Trump’s crime against humanity ranks first, and must be dealt with first.
Tony Piel, Sharon, Conn.
I love the insightful and informative Letters-to-the-Editor writer Jim Sawyer of Edmonds, Wash., and almost all your writers, especially Heather Digby Parton, she is a laser. The exception is Ted Rall. I resolved never to read him again, after one of his smears of Hillary Clinton with right-wing talking points and conspiracy theories. Unfortunately, I read his latest piece of garbage, “The Russia-Trump Collusion Conspiracy Theory is a Dead Letter” [9/1/18 TPP]. This article is full of lies and The Progressive Populist cannot allow Rall’s lies to stand.
Ted Rall states “…the intelligence community … says whatever Russian hacking occurred did not affect the outcome of the election.” The intelligence community report, rendered Jan 1, 2017, states they “did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of the 2016 election. The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political processes or US public opinion.” CIA Director Brennan has confirmed that publicly numerous times.
Rall answers “where’s the evidence of Russian meddling?” with ignorance. He claims the “evidence” is anonymous sources and that “details of how Russia accomplished said meddling are absent.” All Rall had to do was read the Intelligence Community Report and/or the charging papers in the Special Council investigation’s indictments to find the evidence. Both detailed the evidence of meddling; Mueller detailed with explanations including who did what, how they did it, and what it means. Rall can also listen to Putin’s answer when asked at the Helsinki press conference whether he meddled in our election to help Trump and he said, “Yes, I did, Yes, I did.”.
The evidence in plain sight of Trump’s collusion and conspiracy with Russia is also numerous and vast. During the campaign, to name a few:
• 75+ meetings between representatives of the Russian government and representatives of the Trump campaign;
• The Trump Tower meeting, the emails, the communications, the twisted stories, the Trump statement, the lies, the cover up;
• Trump asking Russia to find Hillary’s emails and Russia hacking her in response;
• Trump signing a letter of intent during the campaign to allow Michael Cohen to seek financing for a Trump Tower in Russia;
• Cambridge Analytica’s work in coordination with the Russian influence campaign to influence voters in specific states and counties.
Since the campaign, we have only to look at Trump’s Helsinki performance which, as Brennan said, was “nothing short of treasonous”.
Rall stupidly asks why “Russiagate keeps getting a big national yawn.” Is he kidding? The entire right-wing media, all the Republicans in Congress and across the states, and all the Republican campaign donors who want their tax cuts, deregulation and planet killers are zeroed in on making Russia’s cyberwar on America, and the Trump campaign’s collusion and conspiracy, a non-event and the resulting investigations “a witch hunt and a hoax”.
No one asks Rall to believe that the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting was “to encourage Russian hackers to break into the DNC, steal Hillary’s emails” and “funnel them to WikiLeaks.” The Intelligence Community Report states, “In July 2015, Russian intelligence gained access to Democratic National Committee (DNC) networks and maintained that access until at least June 2016 … By May (2016), the GRU had exfiltrated large volumes of data from the DNC.” The only sources I can find for Rall’s “disgruntled pro-Bernie DNC employee” as the hacker are right wing conspiracy websites.
Lastly, no one is asking anyone to believe that Trump “supervised a ridiculously complex Machiavellian conspiracy.” Trump did not supervise the conspiracy, Trump participated in it, enthusiastically, and so did many of his people during the campaign and during his time in office.
Rall ignoring the evidence in plain sight proves, once again, that he does not do the minimum research necessary to be a writer in The Progressive Populist.
Fran Friend Alexander, Seattle, Wash.
It was amusing to read Ted Rall’s article denying Trump’s collusion with Russia the day after the conviction of Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen’s guilty pleas. Rarely have I seen a non-Republican commentator so divorced from reality.
Rall’s counter-arguments amount to nothing more than a series of baseless assertions. In Ted’s world, Trump did not want the presidency, but campaigned relentlessly for it anyway. He would have us believe that a man who built real estate and media empires would somehow be incapable of leading a conspiracy. Perhaps the most ironic piece in this attack on a “conspiracy theory” was a veiled but obvious reference to the Seth Rich conspiracy theory regarding the DNC leaks that made the rounds on conservative websites a year or so ago.
If Rall wants to defend President Trump, perhaps he should start publishing his column in Breitbart rather than The Progressive Populist.
M.P. Gallen, Philadelphia, Pa.
The GOP caters to corporations and the super-rich. Not many votes there, so they cobble together a voting block of racists, gun-lovers and abortion-haters. Racists and gun-lovers are a stable constituency, but abortion-haters have to be incited to stay engaged. The GOP has fed them with numerous regulations to make abortion difficult. They now dangle the prospect of Judge Kavanaugh spearheading an outright outlawing of the practice by overturning Roe.
But are the GOP strategists really focused on reducing abortion? I have to say NO. The best way to reduce abortion is to expand use of contraceptives, but the GOP opposes this. Instead, they encourage abstinence only, which has proven to be a failed way to prevent pregnancy. Further, a recent study concluded that countries where abortion is illegal have much higher rates of abortions than ones where it is legal. Basically, all the GOP focuses on is insuring there will be plenty of abortions so they will maintain their stable of abortion-hating voters.
Lee Knohl, Evanston, Ill.
You know, regarding John McCain’s passing, it’s really sad that Trang Trong Duet, the North Vietnamese colonel who was in charge of the “Hanoi Hilton” prison where John McCain was held and tortured for five and one half years, has expressed more admiration for the courage and character of Sen. McCain than has our own illustrious president.
Mike Eklund, Mercer, Wis.
From The Progressive Populist, October 1, 2018
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