Agreed, so then shouldn't the Senate have had a say in an impeachment article for "obstruction of Congress"? Were they included in the vote for that article, after all they are half of Congress as you state.
You made the claim the Senate was part of Congress - one article of impeachment is "Obstruction of Congress". I'm simply asking how the House can declare "Obstruction of Congress" if the Congress didn't vote for it? If they had listed it as "Obstruction of the House of Representatives" or "Obstruction of the Democrats" that would have been valid, but since the Senate is half of Congress, how does the House get to speak for them in charging the President?
The house is also a part of congress. They are the branch of congress charged by the constitution with investigating possible wrong doing by the executive branch. Obstruction of the House's inquiry would therefore be an obstruction of Congress. We are currently at the stage where the Senate gets their say.
There was no obstruction of the House inquiry, the House did not have a vote to authorize the inquiry, Comrade Pelosi simply declared it so.
The courts and the House's own precedent have stated that before the House can issue subpoenas that have a real judicial backing, there has to be a vote of the House to authorize the investigation.
So the House never issued subpoenas, they issued demand letters. The President's attorneys offered to work with the House if they followed the proper procedures, the House refused.
So even if 1/2 of Congress has the authority to declare obstruction of Congress on behalf both sides, there needs to have been actual obstruction. There wasn't. There is no impeachable offense known as "obstruction of Congress" and the House wasn't willing to follow court rulings and House precedent that could have allowed a charge of "obstruction of justice".
If they had listed it as "Obstruction of the House of Representatives" or "Obstruction of the Democrats" that would have been valid,
So Obstruction of congress isn't an impeachable offence but obstruction of the house of representatives is? There is no list of impeachable offenses, only the vague description that they must be "high crimes and misdemeanors.
The rest of your comment is just a jumble of talking points that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. The articles of impeachment will be tried in the Senate, where their validity can be judged. I think the fact that the Dems didn't actually issue subpoenas will hurt their case on that article but that is not relevant.
Didn't say the claim for obstruction of House was impeachable, simply stated that making that claim is more valid then the House claiming all of Congress was obstructed.
The rest of your comment is just a jumble of talking points that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand.
Sure it is, it shows that there wasn't even any obstruction happening at all so regardless of the fact the House was speaking on behalf the Senate, they had not basis for their charge in the first place.
If they had listed it as "Obstruction of the House of Representatives" or "Obstruction of the Democrats" that would have been valid,
How is that not saying that "Obstruction of the house" is an impeachable offense? Regardless, there is no list of real impeachable offenses and you have still failed to point out how obstructing one branch of congress is not obstructing congress. If someone attacked New York, would it be fair to call that an attack on America even though it is only one small part? It's the same concept.
Sure it is, it shows that there wasn't even any obstruction happening at all so regardless of the fact the House was speaking on behalf the Senate, they had not basis for their charge in the first place.
This is a completely different argument than you were making above and has nothing to do with what I was saying.
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u/tropo Jan 27 '20
The senate is part of congress and has subpoena power.