Summary
Barack Obama sharply criticized Donald Trump’s presidency during a speech at Hamilton College, condemning attacks on the press, immigration crackdowns, and threats to civil liberties.
He called it “unimaginable” that Trump’s actions—such as barring the AP and threatening law firms—would have been tolerated under past presidents.
Obama warned that Trump’s behavior, though “goofy,” poses real danger, and he labeled Trump a “wannabe dictator.”
He also referenced former Trump aide John Kelly’s “fascist” remark and urged Americans not to mistake chaos for leadership.
Good, start the campaign now so that if Trump somehow crowbars in a law that allows him to run for a third term Obama can bury him
I don’t see that as a fix. A third term for either would be a higher level constitutional crisis than all the many ones trump has already initiated. Many failed like with his first impeachment for misappropriating federal funds to bribe a foreign official.
Besides the fact that Trump has already telegraphed a possible plan to allow for three terms only if they’re non-consecutive.
I mean thats great but it should not be allowed any more than any presidential law break is allowed. The solution is not to go with it and also do it.
The only reason we have a 22nd amendment is because the shitheels were mad they didn’t get a turn. They could have stopped being shitheels, but that’s just out of the question.
Its something they should have put into the original consitution. They were never supposed to be careers. Given the terms of the various branches they should have maxed 12 years in any federal role besides judicial and that should have had a retirement cut off of 60.
Maybe a hot take but career politicians are something that make sense in a democracy that is properly functioning. If a politician is sure that they won’t have to go work in industry after they are out of office they are less likely to feel the need to bend to the will of the oligarchs. But that is not how it has worked out so the idea itself seems much worse than it inherently is.
Which is also why term limits (in many cases) are low-key a terrible idea, despite sounding great on the surface.
I feel like something where you have an age cutoff would be good though we shouldn’t have people that would be retired in any other position be hoarding the power from people that are younger.
Maybe link it to social security? Not sure what the best method to do it would be considering that medical advances hopefully mean that people will live longer and healthier lives.
not to me. Sure there are some great folks but the population is large and there are equally great folks out there. We need being a politician for a bit to be an accessible thing. We definitely need guardrails for quid pro quo but if guaranteed lifetime political is the solution its not a solution. Our system should work if everyone is one termer. Heck I would like every election to have a recall ballot were the electorate can vote to recall any position they vote for. If it cresta 50% of the electorate then the position goes up for election at the next election.
Everyone assumes Obama would easily win. I don’t think that’s a foregone conclusion. It would just make the third term fully legitimized.
I mean… Are we also forgetting that Obama himself was not exactly the best president ever? If we’re keeping any part of this system we probably don’t want an establishment Democrat who bombed a LOT of people running the country when we need a transition away from regressive, non-people centered (aka non-solution focused, non-evidence based, non-need-meeting, etc) policy and systems to using methods that are responsible and effective and center harm reduction/prevention and meeting needs as priority goals and establishing a way of doing things that better represents (and identifies and acknowledges and strives to meet) the actual needs of people.
Crowbars in a law? Why not just do it? Who will stop him?
No thanks.