A pair of Donald Trump tweets Monday show beyond all doubt that he has no idea what’s in our Constitution and fashions himself a Sun King on the make, a wannabe dictator.

Trump asserted, wrongly, last July that thanks to our Constitution “I have an Article II, where I have to the right to do whatever I want as president.”

He has said that again and again as this video compilation shows.

Of course, Article II of our Constitution strictly limits what any president can do, basically requiring limiting him to carrying out the will of Congress, the Article I branch of our government. But Trump doesn’t understand that, or he doesn’t care.

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That ignorance was on full display late Monday morning when Trump tweeted this:

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/04/wannabe-dictator-investigative-journalist-explains-how-trump-just-asserted-unlimited-presidential-power/?utm_source=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=4287

Now Trump, to be fair, does have some authority to close and open facilities, but his role is very restricted. He can shut down national parks, for example. He could close the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which would be understandable considering the way he slithered out of the draft by claiming bone spurs he says he no longer recalls.

But opening up city halls, courthouses, shopping malls, downtown furniture stores and schools?

Trump didn’t shut any of those down. Trump has zero authority to declare them open for business as usual. Governors, and in some cases mayors, hold those powers under outer constitutional system.

How about ordering people to stay at least six feet apart? Notice that the five o’clock follies at the Trump White House, a substitute for his campaign rallies, are always about “recommendations.” That’s because our Constitution does not empower Trump to force — and, should you disobey him – to enforce physical distancing except on federal property.

The people who should be screaming from the rooftops about Trump’s claims of unlimited power and trampling on the powers of the states are the federalists, as in the rightwing Federalist Society. That’s the prominent pseudo-guardian of our liberties that influences, if not outright picks, Trump’s federal court and federal agency board nominees.

When Obama was president, the 70,000-member Federalist Society was oh so worried about Obama creating an “imperial presidency,” that it held conferences to inform members and alert the public to imagined presidential power plays.

So, what has the society said about Trump’s actual claims of unlimited power during the pandemic? Not even a passing mention at its website to Trumpian assertions of unlimited constitutional powers.

Board co-chair Steven G. Calabresi, a Northwestern University law professor, is not just silent on Trump as imperialistic president, he has been promoting cockamamie theories supporting Trump. The other co-chair, Leonard A. Leo, stays silent. Ditto Eugene B. Meyer, the society president and CEO.

What’s scary about Trump’s assertions of power is not that he lacks such power. It’s that Trump has no idea that he lacks it, and his Republican Party enablers cover their ears and look the other way.

Actually I had that figured out already, but I wanted you to discover it yourself... sort of have your epiphany.

So your statement was, "It is no longer a valid question when the asker has taken, and is still taking, both sides."

Can you show me in Robert's Rules, or the manual of logical thinking, or the rules of debating, or whatever book you want to pull out, where that "rule" is stated? From my perspective the question still stands... and you still have not answered.

FWIW, since you like to think of yourself as a teacher/tutor/mentor I will tell you that I had a "real" teacher (i.e., not you) in school who prodded students to think by always asking them questions. One of his favourite techniques was to push and push for a student to make their argument against his position. Being "the teacher" and being "smarter that the students" he often convinced the students that he was right. But as soon as the student acquiesced the teacher would flip sides and start arguing against what he had just led students to conclude as correct.

But please, I beg of you, do not adopt this technique in your "teaching;" it takes a professional to pull it off successfully.

Here is a quote from his speech today:

"I will be speaking to all 50 governors very shortly and I will then be authorizing each individual governor of each individual state to implement a reopening, and a very powerful reopening plan, of their state at a time and in a manner as most appropriate."

At the end just before leaving the podium he said that he would be closely watching governors and that he would "come down on them very hard" if they do not do a good job.

I suppose you can call that "consultation" if you choose. It sounds more like attempted coercion to me.