Listen now | 0:00 Intro 0:41 Jack’s experience with presidential power 2:09 Unpacking Trump’s Pentagon and DOJ purges 11:10 Which legal battles could Trump win? 19:51 The Trump-Musk chaos: bug or feature? 27:20 How Trump is putting “unitary executive theory” into practice 36:51 Is a unitary executive unconstitutional? 50:50 Heading to OvertimeRobert Wright (Nonzero, The Evolution of God, Why Buddhism Is True) and Jack Goldsmith (Harvard Law School, In Hoffa's Shadow, https://executivefunctions.substack.com/). Recorded February 24, 2024.Twitter: https://twitter.com/NonzeroPods
While Jack Goldsmith's stepfather may have murdered Jimmy Hoffa, his statements in this conversation are measured and largely correct, although tinged by both conservative bias and his obvious affection for the Unitary Theory of Presidential Power. However, Goldsmith in a larger sense, misses the forest for the trees.
Trump is of course the perfect example of why the Unitary Theory should be buried in the deepest recesses of the Earth. Trump's has adopted this anti-democratic theory because it allowed him to seek the seizure of absolute power in the United States. And he is close to getting it. I have said since before the election that Trump's only real goal is dictatorial power.
Trump assembled a team before taking office that allowed him to grab power in every governmental agency such that no one could possibly effectively oppose him. Everyone who opposes him or could oppose him is being systematically removed from the Government. Since Trump controls all of the law enforcement capabilities of the federal government, can easily intimidate State prosecutors, and also commands the military, he effectively has absolute power, subject only to the US Supreme Court (on which he has majority support) and a terrified Congress where the Republican members don’t dare to speak against him.
The Unitary Executive Theory is a convenient justification for all of Trump’s tyrannical ambitions. So it is a little silly for Goldsmith to sit and try to parse the precise intellectual boundaries of the Unitary Theory. For Trump there are no boundaries. Anyone who publicly disagrees with or opposes him will end up fired, deported, ostracized or sitting in a jail cell. In less than two months, Trump has seized all the important levers of power in the US. It took his German predecessor, inspiration and muse almost a full three months to do that in 1933. And Trump has done it without the need for or help from any “Enabling Act”. He has done it through sheer force of Will and intimidation.
In his book In Hoffa's Shadow, Jack pretty thoroughly debunks the speculation that his father (long Hoffa's right hand man) was involved in Hoffa's disappearance.
While Jack Goldsmith's stepfather may have murdered Jimmy Hoffa, his statements in this conversation are measured and largely correct, although tinged by both conservative bias and his obvious affection for the Unitary Theory of Presidential Power. However, Goldsmith in a larger sense, misses the forest for the trees.
Trump is of course the perfect example of why the Unitary Theory should be buried in the deepest recesses of the Earth. Trump's has adopted this anti-democratic theory because it allowed him to seek the seizure of absolute power in the United States. And he is close to getting it. I have said since before the election that Trump's only real goal is dictatorial power.
Trump assembled a team before taking office that allowed him to grab power in every governmental agency such that no one could possibly effectively oppose him. Everyone who opposes him or could oppose him is being systematically removed from the Government. Since Trump controls all of the law enforcement capabilities of the federal government, can easily intimidate State prosecutors, and also commands the military, he effectively has absolute power, subject only to the US Supreme Court (on which he has majority support) and a terrified Congress where the Republican members don’t dare to speak against him.
The Unitary Executive Theory is a convenient justification for all of Trump’s tyrannical ambitions. So it is a little silly for Goldsmith to sit and try to parse the precise intellectual boundaries of the Unitary Theory. For Trump there are no boundaries. Anyone who publicly disagrees with or opposes him will end up fired, deported, ostracized or sitting in a jail cell. In less than two months, Trump has seized all the important levers of power in the US. It took his German predecessor, inspiration and muse almost a full three months to do that in 1933. And Trump has done it without the need for or help from any “Enabling Act”. He has done it through sheer force of Will and intimidation.
In his book In Hoffa's Shadow, Jack pretty thoroughly debunks the speculation that his father (long Hoffa's right hand man) was involved in Hoffa's disappearance.
So much better than sleeping through Paul Bloom
Curious what Trump would have to do to set off Jack’s fascism alarms
For anyone who thinks the United States is a nation under the rule of law, I have a simple rebuttal: Israel and the Leahy Law.