I. V. M. Yeah, he might be back in left ticket for Amritsar.
Here it is. He is taking it in his line. I mean Amritsar means there is some there is some news article I read from news from here Amritsar. As you may know as also a Deafite loyal listeners and videos of India will know that the Khartarpur corridor is now open.
Which is that corridor that allows people to go to that the Guru Dvara inside Pakistan. So that's 4 kilometres inside Pakistan so you can go buy that corridor. So apparently some girl who had her facebook friend lover from Pakistan got that guy to meet her at the Khartarpur. And they attempted to elope to Pakistan with him.
So through the corridor, as the article said in a high Bollywood drama situation but she was stopped and sent back. So I am assuming Narayan is attending similar shenanigans. Easy, we will find out. Narayan, if you are listening to this, I mean after not right now, this is a good reason for you not to skip our recordings because we will continuously host you.
As we should host ourselves because I think we have done all permutations and combinations of hosts. I know there is equal chance that the next recording might happen with all three hosts in the same country or all three hosts in three different countries. Stay tuned for that folks. Anyway, this is a shorty.
We can't ramble on like this like it's a full episode. We will do this next time. Shriekit, what are we shortifying today? We are shortifying.
We decided to... We are shortifying how the US is shorting itself. Pretty much. So this shorty is not so much about the madhouse that is Trump.
We need to dedicate a lot more than a shorty for that. I think it's a lot more than several longies for that. But this is specifically about the impeachment process itself. The reason for this, the reason that if you were to flout some pretentious French for this episode.
I don't think French is pretentious. When you are speaking English it's pretentious, but I don't think in French it's pretentious. On this part, like for a French person, a bit is pretentious. If they use it in French.
I think that's pretentious and potentially libelous in any context. The core of this episode is that we try to understand what this process is. The current process seems to go on forever and continue all the way till probably Trump decides to leave this earth for natural reasons. I just wanted to look into what technically are the rules of this process.
So jumping right in. The process of impeachment itself. Impeachment is not the most popular for nonsense that happens in the US with Clinton and Trump. It's actually the process.
And Andrew Jackson before that. Let's forget. Richard Nixon, Chuck before that. That beat button is going to be kept very busy today.
You are far back. Yeah. So, yes, exactly. Besides these three guys, the impeachment process is actually quite standardized process across many countries.
Especially where it was recently used for the heads of state of Korea as well as Brazil to relieve them of their duties for corruption and related things. So, the process is quite popular across the world. In fact, India itself has an impeachment process for the chief justices and presidents. But what is impeachment?
First first. What is impeachment? I think you started that basic thing. Impeachment, the Christian definition of impeachment is the process by which a legislative body levels charges against a government official.
It's only leveling charges, right? Yes, exactly. The process of leveling the charges is called impeachment. So, as we will discuss, as we move ahead, impeachment itself does not mean removing someone from office.
So, that's two different things. Yeah. Implication of charges. Many people in the US still believe that if Trump is impeached, he will be removed from office, which is not necessarily the case.
He could still be impeached and he could still continue to second term. Sorry if I'm taking away. Not just continue to second term. I mean, that's exactly what happened with the Clinton.
The Clinton was impeached, but still continued, was impeached, but continued on to be president and even got reelected after getting. Correct. So, we can just say that is temporarily impeached from the same term. Pretty much.
Yeah. As the etymology can probably confirm, impeached actually doesn't have anything to do with the fruit. But impeached comes from the old French MP chair or the Latin word impedier, impedier, which is expressing the idea of catching or insnaring by foot, but is foot. So, holding someone by the foot and as analogs, modern French, which is empty share to prevent and modern English, impeached.
So, to kind of stop someone or impeel someone or slow someone down or kind of like put barriers in someone's road is to impeach someone. That's amazing. Are you fan of plastics by any chance? Of course I am.
Okay. So, if Ytter statistics wife is voted out of power, then impedimenta is impeded and impeached. Oh, sorry. It sounded better in my head.
Never mind. Carry on. Most things. Most things.
Anyway, so that's the point is now this impeachment process. And in the US, what we're going to focus on today's episode very as quickly as possible is that how it works in the US context, because we're looking at why this impeachment process in the US is so long. And that mainly focuses on this phrase which says treason, bribery and high crimes and misdemeanors. So now what that means is that the Constitution has this where has this enshrined in it, which says that dominant officials, elected government officials can be removed from office for treason, bribery or high crimes and misdemeanors.
Now, treason, bribery, pretty clear for everyone. Treason going against the state and a bit during the state, bribery, taking money or taking some benefit or misusing the power of your office. That's treason and bribery. High crimes and misdemeanors is where stuff starts sounding like out of the old.
Sorry. So, basically high crimes and misdemeanors. Now, the world high crimes by itself is not like pirate language, but it actually means it was legal and common parlance in the 17th and 18th century, which was when the Constitution of the United States was written. And it's activated by or against those who are special duties acquired by taking an oath of office that are not shared by common persons.
A high crime is one that can be done by someone in a unique position of authority, which is political in character, who does things to circumvent justice. So basically a high crime is someone who is in a high post, someone who has special powers or special abilities or has been elected to an office which gives you special powers to oversee everyone else. And that person committing a crime to certain in justice is what is called a high crime. Oh, it's like high in position.
High in position. High crimes are not accepted by someone who is not necessarily a crime by somebody who is like intoxicated. Yeah. Murder is not high crime, but anything that is like by someone who is in position of power, even like...
Oh, that's interesting. So, like, yeah, so legally stealing an office tape if you are like president of the United States, that could constitute a high crime because... Technically, okay. So, what is high?
I wonder... Is a high crime in itself. But, yeah, so I mean, high crime technically not stealing an office tape, high crime would be something where someone misuse their office to kind of being in a high position, you have used it to commit crime. That is a high crime.
Okay. Okay. Using office tape to kill somebody, like Andrew Jackson would do. Potentially.
Just leave it at that. But anyway, the second word is something that's very important as well. Mischief. It sounds pretty like petty.
But it's also very important because the impeachment process is not technically not legal proceeding. It's not like a crime where you go to a court and stuff like this. This is to move an elected official. And because they are to remove an elected official, the standard of what is considered impeachable or enough to remove someone from office is higher than what it would be for regular as people.
So, for someone to be removed from society or removed from a particular position, you have to have broken a specific rule. But a misdemeanor is also where someone who is in a position of superiority has to be upheld to a higher moral and ethical standard. So, it's almost... there's that the phrase that says he says wife must be a well suspicion, which says that...
which means that someone who is in the public eye needs to be above and beyond in their cleanliness rather than someone who is not really. So, that is where the misdemeanor angle comes in. Now, with these particular things, these are the broad definitions of this particular crime. But as it comes to the process itself, it starts...
just a quick reference to houses, which is the house which is democratically elected members of the House of Representatives and then the Senate, which has also an elected officials, but they are only two per state in the US. So, there's 100 people and this has got 435 people. Now, the house, which is the people's house, opens the... so, any member of the house can pretty much file a request for impeachment.
In fact, this is not even the first request for impeachment that has been filed by a member in the House against Trump. This is the second one. The first one failed miserably because it was just like, okay, I don't like Trump effectively. Who is that?
I have no idea. Some dude. But he was not exactly... I did not like Trump, but he filed it because of...
I mean, clearly, the other crime is not done, but nothing else because of this. So, as with Trump, it needs to be amazing or nothing. Huge. So, this process, when it began with a particular person, he presents...
opens it with his own initiative and presents a list of charges under oath. For Trump, for this particular process, it was, in fact, not very methodically and methodically released. It was actually Nancy Pelosi, who is the leader of the House, the House Speaker, who filed the charges on behalf of the entire House against the President with the support of six committees. So, six committees who actually, which were all...
I mean, since the House is controlled by the Democrats, all these committees are also controlled by the Democrats, and so they filed charges against Trump. And by committee, you're talking about the Judiciary Committee, all the way... Yeah, but the multiple committees, like the Judiciary Committee, the Finance Committee, the Intelligence Committee, so multiple committees like this all came together, and so the committee heads, which are all... these are all powerful committees.
They're not just like, uh, the committee will not be there for this, huh? It's basically these guys, huh? Upon these two, all... It's a very, very...
Yeah, very B-school level joke that was face-side of, very low blow that was. Yeah, clearly. Anyway, so this one, so now, what happens is, when these... they raise the impeachment of things, the committee, which is...
which support the use for this particular allegation that they have put, then commits its own investigation. First, it commits its own investigation, and then after that, vote on it. Yeah. And when it passes that vote, does it go to the Judiciary Committee?
Yeah. Right. And then also then, deliberate on the motion, and then votes on it. At which point, if the vote is successful, they draft what are called, articles of impeachment, which are formal charges against the president, which will be codified as like proper legal allegations that will be codified.
And these articles of impeachment, they're in, are presented in front of the whole house. Right. So the house of representatives, then they are reported to the full house. The house then debates the resolution, and debates each article of impeachment.
Now, each article of impeachment is basically one charge, right? So you can level multiple charges on a person as it happens in the court. These are also to do multiple charges as Trump will face as well as multiple charges. Correct.
So this... and then what happens is the house then votes on this resolution. So they vote on it, and a simple majority. So if more than half people say, we need to go ahead with the impeachment process, or we need to go ahead and impeach the president, then they vote on it, and then that means the resolution passes.
At this point, if the resolution passes, the president is considered impeached. Right. So this is just the house needs to impeach. That's the president.
That's the president. That's the president is considered impeached. He can continue in office. The point is once this impeachment process is complete and the president is impeached, the house then...
basically, and this is the most hilariously archaic term, house then votes to create house managers. Okay. The house managers and a lead house manager is elected to represent the house in the Senate. Right.
Now, this is where they take the case. They gather all the articles of impeachment that have been voted on and all that stuff, formulate it like a case. The lead house manager is like the prosecutor, and they go to the Senate to present it to the Senate as this is what the president is. Now, the Senate process is exactly like a trial.
It is a trial. So the house managers are the prosecutors, the president and his attorneys are the defendant. So the president is allowed to... he appears himself, he is allowed to bring his own lawyers and all that stuff and be the defendant.
And it's presided by the entire Senate. The entire Senate is the judge. Are the judges. And in fact, in case of the president being impeached and not another official, the chief justice himself presides on the trial.
So that's where now the chief justice is there. The trial happens. They go at it. They both present their cases.
And finally, the house votes on it. Sorry, the Senate votes on it. Now, the Senate has 100 people. 100 people, which means this is not a simple majority anymore.
This requires a two thirds majority. So if there are 100 people in the Senate, it requires 67 people to vote. Yes on it. And if in case that process happens, and at any point in this, any vote fails, the president is retained.
The entire case is fall in doubt. So, but if in case the moment the house votes, say 60, 68 people vote on it, or 67 people vote on it, the president is immediately removed from him. Immediately. So they note good stuff in card box and go to it.
He has lost his hand. That's it. So how's the Senate have convicted him and his his mandate is null and wide. So he's immediately removed from office.
And in fact, what happens after that, and usually what would follow is that because he's been committed or convicted of pretty much the highest crimes in the land effectively. Because once he's out of the office president, he can then be charged with civil crimes and civil and criminal districts. So usually a lawsuit encodes follow against that person, which the state will itself. So it will be the US government to fire the suit against Donald Trump, potentially.
So, and then the vice president becomes president, right? Then the vice president becomes president. And he can also be a technology. No, we come to the specifics of this.
And the VP can also be a member correctly. And then the speaker of the house because I don't know how that works out. And the house becomes president. Yes, exactly.
And speaker of the house is a democrat. So, yeah, that's what we do. Yeah, yeah, completely. Yeah, completely.
Yeah, completely. Yeah, completely. Yeah, completely. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. So basically now this whole process, it requires a line. And just to give you an idea of how the speed of the process has been.
I mean, and we are right now on the 10th of December. And we have probably been hearing about impeachment for almost, I don't know, essentially. We've been hearing about impeachment for a long time. But they've been having some speed on this right now.
Ever since the whole Ukraine thing broke out. In the entire process, where do you think the impeachment process is at right now? So right now they are as of right now, they are drafting up the articles of impeachment. I think it's gone through the judicial.
Exactly. So it has just just a couple of weeks ago left the intelligence committee, which is where the impeachment process was being celebrated. It entered the judiciary committee. The judiciary committee is now has still not completely drafted the articles of impeachment.
Yeah. They have voted on it, but they have not drafted the article. They will draft the article of impeachment now and then present it in front of the house to be debated. So the process has only start done the first two steps.
Now there is a house to debate on it, then the house to vote on it and then to vote on the Senate. So it is still quite a way to go for the whole thing. They were, that's what Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats are promising that at least for Christmas Trump will be impeached. So that's quite a deadline.
Yeah, exactly. So that is the process of impeachment overall in the US. And right now, at least from this, the key roadblock and from the Trump process, Trump can very readily be impeached because the Democrats have a majority in the house. There's no way in hell pretty much.
That he's going to be doing the presidency. Yeah. Yeah, because no matter what happens, even if the, I mean, they're saying that Mitch McConnell, who is the leader of the Senate, we will not even probably entertain the case of the house inside the Senate, forget much less allow the trial to proceed. But even if he does, there is the Senate has, I mean, the Senate is of course Republican majority.
So for the impeachment resolution to pass, they will need all the Democrats to vote plus all the independents to vote plus about 12 Republicans to vote for impeaching the, for removing the Republican from office, which is not happening this lifetime. Yeah. So that's pretty unlike. So yeah, I mean, that's the best hope that the Democrats have is to just impeach the, the impeach Trump and like leave it at that.
Yeah. And confuse the confused voters even more. Yeah, he's impeached, but he's still there. So what?
And he's still running for president. And that's the thing that happened right against the run despite, despite being impeached. Yeah. Yeah.
Although there are, like, there is, like, I mean, before anything else, even if Trump is impeached, he can literally just point out to the just one Democratic president before had been impeached and ran for office and like one election. And he's like, listen, I'm not even in very bad company here. Yeah. Oh, well, so much for that.
Yeah. So much for that. I sometimes feel that this whole thing, at least we are getting some good jokes out of it. That is true.
I think this entire thing is crafted for entertainment. Yeah, correct. Because this is just beautifully orchestrated, great regular. Yeah, I'm sure there are actually cold bear o's at least one car to this guy.
I think many comedians who like their entire careers to, uh, we owe probably four simplified episodes only. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that's what like, as Kona Kamara said, it's not content either. Do you have anything else to say on the process of impeachment or shall we impeach this episode?
No, just one final point being that I was also looking up that apparently there is no process of impeachment for a prime minister of India. Do you really want to vote against the voters? No, you can just declare a no confidence motion which requires a majority of the house to vote against your own prime minister, which if you are the majority party is not going to happen. So that's it.
Oh, well. Oh, well, exactly. Joy to the world. Sometimes I really struggle to think of which is like, which is comic, which is more comic, comically worse off.
Like when you're describing this entire process, like, I wish India was like this, I wish India had a process like this. Then I look at these guys bringing in those huge power points, slides and all those memes that they print out and bring to like, do we really want that? Some then I think, okay, we have civil debates over here, but then the world is doomed anyway. Hey, if you didn't have, if you don't have like, chapel fights in the assembly, you'd also be like, you'd miss them.
Yeah, correct. What? I mean, they can't, they look at our, our Lok Sabha and say shit, dude. I think they'll fun.
That looks fun. Yeah. And if, yeah, it might as well have a bit of fun at it. And I think we should impeach this episode now.
We'll see if we have gone on, I'll be blabbered on like it's a long episode. Yeah. So that's, that's about that for the impeachment process. So in the absence of Nareem.
Say, say, say, say, say, say, say out of high crimes and misdemeanors. Yeah. And they low crime. And they low crime and say simplified.
Low crime sounds like locus. Okay. No, never mind. Okay.
All right. All right. All right. Thank you.
All right. We'll see you later. Thank you. All right.
Okay. All right. All right. Well, I'll see you guys later.
I'll see you next time. All right. Yeah. Yeah.
All right. Hey.