The world won't be righted, so to speak, for quite a long while.

Which is a very large possibility if the investigation truly sees how deep this goes.....

Unless that's empty at the same time we somehow pull off a Trump-Pence impeachment two-fer, which would somehow take us to Orrin Hatch.

No chance it plays out like that, though. I think Republicans will resist removing Pence, which means we're stuck with him until 2020, but hopefully he'll be a lame duck with a Democratic Congress after 2018 and we'll also play his tangential role in the Russia scandal if he runs for re-election.

At Thanksgiving I told everyone (all Dems) that Mueller will nail Pence and possibly Ryan and McConnell. My sister perked up and asked, "Does that mean President Pelosi?".

I think it should go to Hillary since it is rightfully hers.

Ain't no way it would ever happen...but I'd love that.

ain't pretty... in order...

Pense
Ryan
Hatch
Tillerson
Mnuchin
Mattis
Sessions
Zinke
Perdue
Ross
Acosta
Hargan
Carson
Chao
Perry
DeVos
Shulkin
Duke

is if Dems control the house. That would require waiting until AFTER the election next year. IF that were possible, I say the new DemMajority vote Hillary Speaker, and THEN impeach the Republican Ticket.
THAT would be justice done.

I almost want Turtle gone more than traitor don. Evil, soulless man.

https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2017/08/03/tangled-web-connects-russian-oligarch-money-gop-campaigns

GOP campaigns took $7.35 million from oligarch linked to Russia

Party loyalty is often cited as the reason that GOP leaders have not been more outspoken in their criticism of President Donald Trump and his refusal to condemn Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. Yet there may be another reason that top Republicans have not been more vocal in their condemnation. Perhaps it's because they have their own links to the Russian oligarchy that they would prefer go unnoticed.
Donald Trump and the political action committees for Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Lindsey Graham, John Kasich and John McCain accepted $7.35 million in contributions from a Ukrainian-born oligarch who is the business partner of two of Russian president Vladimir Putin's favorite oligarchs and a Russian government bank.
During the 2015-2016 election season, Ukrainian-born billionaire Leonard "Len" Blavatnik contributed $6.35 million to leading Republican candidates and incumbent senators. Mitch McConnell was the top recipient of Blavatnik's donations, collecting $2.5 million for his GOP Senate Leadership Fund under the names of two of Blavatnik's holding companies, Access Industries and AI Altep Holdings, according to Federal Election Commission documents and OpenSecrets.org.

Ryan and McConnell are pretty actively participating in the cover-up. Mueller has surely taken note.

The tendrils of decay run deep..

I don't expect them to so careless that they let Trump pull them into his roiling cauldron.
They have more political saavy than that.

...all of them require cooperation from Republicans, which will never happen.

I just wish we could literally CLEAN HOUSE of All the "lifers"in office...we really do need a clean slate!

Trump will leave office in one of the following ways:

He loses in 2020 or 2024
He isn't allowed to run for a 3rd term
He resigns
He dies in office
He is impeached

There isn't a viable mechanism to have Hillary Clinton be President unless she runs a third time (which isn't going to happen).

There is a distinct line of succession.

Also you are mistaking what you hope and believe to be true (much of the West Wing going done) for what is actually inevitable.

They are the only things holding the republic together at this point.

... Except it just seems like somehow we need to put some more checks/balances in place to prevent this from happening agaiin. And that there has to be some other mechanism to safeguard when an entire branch of Govt is so corrupt...

Like I said, I'm not as well versed in the procedures, but it just seems like we need some additional safeguards.

This depth of corruption boils down to something rotten in these individuals, something that has no loyalty to the country, to its citizens, to our system of government, or to the very idea of democracy. This is all so far beyond the bounds of legality and decency, I don't know how we could even begin to legislate a correction. The R's define lawlessness and corruption.

i have never seen a betrayal of the social contract on such a wide scale in my lifetime, let alone experienced it firsthand. i was thinking of writing a similar polemic, but your first paragraph captures my sense of the zeitgeist quite nicely.

unfortunately, we have no constitutional means of remedying the distorted election that landed us in this stupid orange hellscape.

looks to me like the optimal outcome for us is if Mueller carries his investigation to completion, implicating everyone in Trump's inner circle, McConnell, Ryan, and much of the RNC leadership, resulting in charges against many of them at both federal and state levels.

re-writing our constitution is pretty damned serious stuff, and right now the republicans hold most of the state governments. we should at least wait until after 2018 to contemplate such things.

also, i am not nearly as certain of a Democratic sweep next year as many here seem to be. public perceptions may have shifted marginally and the vast majority dislikes Trump and his circle of sarcastic assclowns. however, the fundamentals of our election hardware have not changed, and after a year of Russian puppetry at the highest levels of government, i think it very likely our electoral systems are at least as compromised as they were last year. of course, i will be happy to be proven wrong next year.

I don't think we need to "re-write" the Constitution...but there sure as hell need to be some amendments made.

And yes, it's unfortunate that we have to worry about the party in power, because our "statesmen" are more concerned with loyalty to Party than the ACTUAL State of the Union!

The person who won the popular vote. Only the person who wins the Electoral vote is declared President. If that person leaves office the order of succession is followed.

It is this way and will be this way until an Amendment changes it.

There was fraud or miscount of the EC?

Remember the popular vote has no standing, Constitutionally. The states pick their Electors by any method they wish and the votes of those Electors determine who wins the election.

In joint session of Congress. Not a single objection to any vote was raised. There isn't going to be any change, redo or nullification.

We are stuck with the outcome.

I gotta run to the store, but will definitely be back soon to continue the conversation!

I'll tell you, having DU sure makes this HELL easier to handle

And giving Nucking Futz a BILLION $$$$ bonus (tax break) for playing golf 100 dfays in under 300 days "on the job" .....

there are no provisions in the Constitution for overturning an election. The succession act keeps voters from selecting a new President until 2020-as scheduled.