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One has demonstrated that sort of character and commitment in a career as a servant of the law, as attorney and prosecutor.
The other is already convicted of serious crimes, stands charged with more, has a long history of abusing legal process, and openly enjoys a reputation as a scofflaw.
Which of them do you suppose can be more wisely trusted with that immunity?
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Now we must rely on the character of a President, their commitment to the Rule Of Law, and determination to resist any temptation to act illegally for convenience, power, or profit, to protect us from such abuses of this immunity. That is a high standard.
This November we are presented with a choice between two candidates.
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Our elected and appointed leaders have accepted that legal accountability with their offices, although some, like other fallible mortals have run afoul of the law and faced the price of prosecution and/or impeachment.
But what has been accepted and true for 800 years is no longer true in these United States.
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Our Founding Fathers were all brought up and educated in the British tradition of law and rights. They inherited the principle that no one is above the law as an obvious and settled truth, as essentially sacred. And so it has remained, a bed rock feature of our democracy and jurisprudence.
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That rule was put to the test 434 years later, in 1649. Charles I inherited the crown from his father, James I (also the VI of Scotland) whose reign created the United Kingdom. He proclaimed that he was an absolute monarch, not subject to, or obliged to enforce, the laws of Parliament. He was arrested, tried and found guilty on the charge of treason, and beheaded.
Yes, they took it seriously.
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809 years ago in the year 1215, John, King of England, signed a document that set in English law and governance the principle and custom that no one, not even the King, is above the law. That was the Magna Carta, the Great Charter.
You might wonder whether, in an age of absolute monarchs anointed by God who literally owned the countries they ruled, the people and lesser authorities took this radical notion seriously.
IT SERVED ENGLAND AND AMERICA WELL FOR 800 YEARS, AND THEY THREW IT AWAY
SONG OF THE DAY - 09/12/23
https://youtu.be/yYakJpfIyMs
SONG OF THE DAY - 09/11/23
https://cabbagesandkings524.wordpress.com/2023/09/11/song-of-the-day-09-11-23/
Bob Wertzler is retired from almost twenty years in the mental health field in California and Arizona. and many things before and since.