in so doing they offered a clear answer to george mason's question, shall any man be above justice? as mason explained, some mode of displacing an unfit manuscript is rendered indispensable by the fallibility of those who choose as well as by the corrupt ability of the man chosen. unlike in britain, the president would answer personally. to congress and thus to the nation for any serious wrongdoing. this decision raised to the question, what conduct would justify impeachment and removal. the framers knew that threats to democracy will take many forms. they feared would be monarchs but also warned against fake populists, charismatic demagogues and corrupt left or crafts. in describing the kind of lead leader, alexander hamilton offered an especially striking portrait. it bears repetition. "when a man unprincipled and private life desperate in his fortune, bold in his temper, when such a man is seemed to mount the hobbyhorse of popularity, to join in the danger to liberty, bringing it under suspicion, to flatter and fall in with all the nonsense of the zealots of the day, may justly be

up, george mason's university law school professor discusses cyber threats and cyber -- private sector targets. then, the editor of the economist will be on to talk about what's to come in 2020. watch washington journal, join the discussion. >> next, economic and foreign-policy scholars talk about china's economy and technology innovation. the brookings institution hosted this event.

you mentioned george mason.eorge mason thought we should include maladministration as a justification. he set if the president had a bad presidency, ineffective, we should be able to impeach him. james madison said that is too far. you basically make a parliamentary system where a vote of no-confidence by the senate means the president is out. delegates agreed. that is too far we don't want to make it such an easy lobar. that's where they came up with the phrase high crimes and misdemeanors. they did not define it for us. they did not tell us what they meant by that. during discussions they gave us clues. corrupting an election, they did talk about that. being in service to a foreign power. that something they raise in the concerns. something they talk about a lot. we do hear some echoes from back then in today's debate. theously an issue with allegations regarding president trump. host: let's go to homestead, pennsylvania. good morning. i had caller: caller: just a couple of points i wanted to make. as far as t

. >> joining us at the table, ofeel jaffer is the founder the national security institute at george mason university's law school, also vice president of a firm called iron net cybersecurity. good morning. jaffer. we will get started talking about cybersecurity. guest: it was started by keith alexander. we do cyber defense, so we look --behavioral threats on not just one company, but an ecosystem. host: let's talk about cyber defense. we saw the commentary piece you wrote, iranian cyber attacks are coming. considering where we are in this situation, what are you expecting in the area of cyber attacks? a the it looks like escalatory -- de situation. we responded with the death of emstom soleimani -- qass soleimani and then they had a debate internally. how big do we go. my assessment was they would come back with a response, but it would not be so big as to provoke further response from the united states and that is exactly what we saw. we saw them come back with a missile attack on u.s. facilities, but done in a way either intentionally or partially intentionally to avoid a big u.s. respo

in so doing to offer a clear answer to george masons question, shallin any man the above justice? ason himself explained, some mode of displacing an unfit magistrate is rendered indispensable by the fallibility of those who choose as well as by the corrupt ability of the man chosen. the britain the president would answer personally to congress and thus to the nation for any serious wrongdoing. but this decision raised a question, what conduct would justify impeachment and removal? as careful students of history the framers knew a threat to democracy can take many forms. they feared would be monarchs but also warned against fake populists, charismatic demagogues and corrupt kleptocrats. in describing the kind of leader who might minister the nation, alexander hamilton offered and especially striking portrait. mr. schiff read this in his introductory remarks and there's reputation when a unprincipled and private life desperate in his fortune, bold in his temper, note to scoff at liberty, , when such a man is seen to mount the hobbyhorse of popularity, to join inn the cry of danger to

in so doing they offered a clear answer to george mason's question shall any man be about justice? as mason himself explained, some mode of displacing an unfit magistrate is rendered indispensable by the fallibility of those who choose as well as by the corrupt ability of men chosen. unlike in britain, and the president would answer personally to congress and thus to the nation for any serious wrongdoing. but thisdecision raised the question, what conduct would justify impeachment and removal ? as careful students of history, the framers knew that democracy can take many forms. they feared would be monarchs could also ward against a fake populace, charismatic demagogues and corrupt kleptocratic. in describing the kind of leader who mightn't menace the nation alexander hamilton offered a striking portrait. he mister schiff read this portion in his opening remarks and it bears repetition. when a man unprincipled in private life, desperate in misfortune, bold in his temper, noted to have stopped in private at the principles of liberty and such a man is seen to melt the hobbyhorse of po

coming up this morning, george mason university law professor iranian cyber threats against the u.s. government and private sector targets. an editor of "the economist" will be on to talk about their annual issue looking at what is to come in 2020. be sure to watch c-span's "washington journal" live at 7 a.m. eastern saturday morning. join the discussion. >> washington journal mugs are available at c-span's new online store. check out the washington journal mugs and see all the c-span products. this weekend, book tv features three new nonfiction books. 7:00 p.m. eastern, national constitution center president and ceo jeffrey rosen and supreme court justice ruth bader ginsburg talk about his new book, "conversations with rbg about her life and career." >> my mother wasn't home. she took the time before the ceremony to tell me the secret of a happy marriage. it helps sometimes to be a little deaf. [laughter] followed.dvice i have -- followed in every workplace, even in my current job. [laughter] eastern, a breitbart editor argues the mainstream media benefits the political left in his

coming up saturday morning, george mason university law professor discusses cyber threats against the u.s. government and private sector targets. an editor of the economist will be on to talk about their annual issue looking at what is to come in 2020. e sure to watch washington journal live at 7:00 a.m. eastern saturday morning. join the discussion. >> at the end of this week's house session, steve scaliseand steny hoyer talked about next week's agenda and limiting military action against iran and what's ahead for impeachment. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from louisiana seek recognition? mr. scalise: i rise to ask unanimous consent to speak out of order for the purpose of inquiring the schedule to the majority leader. without objection. mr. scalise: i ask unanimous consent to revise and stepped my remarks. i would be happy to yield to the gentleman from maryland, the majority leader. mr. hoyer: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent that when the house adjourns today it meet on monday next when it shall convone at noon for morning hour debate and 2:00 p.

morning, saturday george mason university law professor discusses cyber threats against the u.s. government and private sector targets. an editor of the economist will be on to talk about their annual issue looking at what is to come in 2020. be sure to watch washington journal life at 7 a.m. eastern saturday morning. join the discussion. >> right now, we are in sort of a twilight zone in between. part of it is because the constitution is more specific about impeachment than it is about most things. it doesn't say everything and it leaves a lot of discretion in how the articles will be presented, to whom and how. in the past, it has gone pretty quickly. in the clinton trial, it went so quickly that the senate wasn't even in session. this is something for the leaders of the two houses to wrangle about. i'm not sure i would use the word leverage. it's a tactic that the speaker is using. >> historian emeritus of the u.s. senate donald ritchie on the history of senate impeachment trials. watch sunday night at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span's q&a. >> at the end of this week's house session,

that would be a huge issue. >> liz: george mason university, great to have you happy new year if we getthing more on carlos ghosn, because the headlines are trickling in we'll get it to you. apple kicking off the new year on the high note as hunger and air pods reaches new heights. look at shares second from the top for the dow 30 hitting a brand new record up $5.74 and it's about to hit $300 a share, but tech titan practically doubling over the past year up 90% since january 1 of last year the surge holding strong even after this crazy story, a seven-year-old in georgia rushed to the hospital after swallowing his christmas gift. yeah, a new set of apple's much coveted air pods, you can actually see the air pod right here in this tweet of the child 's x-ray. it's in the left quadrant there, the air pod is right on the right side of your screen. the boy's left side and his shocked mother sharing the image to help warn other parents of this danger. [laughter] all of us leaving one to wonder will air pods continue to be the product we are hungry for in 2020? up next, tech gurus on the tren

law instead they adopted the power of impeachment in so doing they offered a clear answer to george mason'squestion show any man be above justice as mason himself explained some mode of displacing an unfit magistrate is rendered indispensable by the fallibility of those who choose as well as by the crypt corruptibility of the man chosen unlike in britain the president would answer personally to congress and thus to the nation for any serious wrongdoing but this decision raised the question what conduct would justify impeachment and removal as careful students of history the framers knew the threats to democracy can take many forms they feared would be monarchs but also warned against fake populists charismatic demagogues and corrupt kleptocrats in describing the kind of leader who might menace the nation alexander hamilton offered an especially striking portrait mr shift read this quarter in his introductory remarks and it bears repetition when a man unprincipled in private life desperate in his fortune both in his temper known to have scoffed in private at the principles of liberty when su

and it was because the definition of the impeachment is narrowed that george mason pointed out and then to eliminate that and now we get a narrowgo definition of impeachment. and they agreed to have enumerated not something that could be interpreted after the fact and to make policy differences or other differences like that all the steps that the framers took in the way they approach the impeachment clause were narrowing, restricting, constrag offenses and not that vague and a malleable approach they had an english system and the view of republican members of the house judiciary committee at the time of the nixon impeachment inquiry summed this upte well as they explained as they explained from the repor report, the whole tenor of the framers discussion, the whole purpose for their departures from english practice was in the direction of limits andl es standards. impeachment power exercised without intrinsic and objective standards is tantamount to the ex post facto law which is expressly forbidden by the constitution and are contrary to the american spirit of justice. what we see in t

and because the definition of impeachment was being narrowed that george mason as the debate suggested, he pointed out in the english system there's a bill of atangar, and we ought to expand it to include mal administration. and madison said no and framers agreed, we have to have enumerated and defined offenses not a vague concept. not something that can be blurry and interpreted after the fact and could be used for policy differences and other differences like that, the subject of impeachment. all of the steps that the framers took in the way they approached the impeachment clause were in terms of narrowing, restricting, constraining, enumerating offenses and not the vague and m maleable approach as in the english system. and i think republican members of the house judiciary committee at the time of the nixon impeachment inquiry sums it up and they explained, and i'm quoting from the minority views in the report, the whole tenor of the framers discussion, the whole purpose of their many careful departures from english impeachment practice was in the direction of limits and of standard

the impeachment clause at the constitutional convention where maladministration was offered by george mason as grounds for impeachment and james madison responded that that was a bad idea and he said so vague a term would be a 10 year to the pleasure of the senate and that evens to deep-seated concern that madison had as part of the design of the constitution for ways that can lead to exercises of arbitrary power. the constitution was designed to put limits and checks on all forms of government power. one of the great mechanisms for that is separation of powers, structural separation of powers in the constitution but also comes from defining and limiting powers and responsibility and a concern that vague terms, vague standards are themselves an opportunity for the expansion of power and arbitrary power and you see that throughout the constitution and in the impeachment clause as well and as governor morris argued in discussing the impeachment clause, few offenses, few offenses ought to be impeach bowl and the cases ought to be enumerated and defined and that is why we see the debates of the

it was because the definition of impeachment was being narrowed that george mason suggested, he pointed out in the english system there is a bill of attainder it's been a useful tool for the government and while eliminating that and getting a narrow definition of impeachment we ought to expand to include a administration. madison said no and the framers agreed we have to have enumerated in define to make at concept. that is something that can be blurry and interpreted after-the-fact and could be used essentially to make policyy differences or differences like that subject of impeachment. all of the steps that the framers took in the way that they approached the impeachment clause were in terms of narrowing, restricting,, constraining enumerating offenses and not a vague approach in the english system. i think the minority views of republican members of the house judiciary committee at the time of thebe nixon impeachment inquy some this up well and they explained, i'm quoting from the minority views in the court. the whole tenor of the framerss discussion, the whole purpose of their care

so where utilizing this article 5 route, that george mason suggested and the main reason that i favor term limits and the term limit i favor isa real term limit, three house term , six years and two senate terms. it's what we call adverse preselection. there are a lot of people in this room who i think would fallqualify for congress . and if you think about it, say somebody asks me to run for congress. great area let me take a look at it. the reelection right in the us house of representatives is 95 percent. so if you are foolish enough to run for congress against an incumbent. not much of a chance. but this particular district, we have a chance. because the incumbent was indicted towards an open seat. he left, he retired, whatever reason. great, i think i'll run. let me think about it some more. let's suppose i'm a doctor. i'm an accountant, i'm an engineer,i'm a businessperson, i'm an educator . if i win, they win, they go through all the scrutiny and i win, now i'm going to get into congress. how does it work? there's a seniority system. it's a top-down system. i'm a successful eng

another founder, george mason, brought up the case of a former british official in india who had beenused of mismanagement. again, in either of these cases is there any mention of breaking a specific criminal statute. >> alan: let's start with mismanagement. yes that was a criteria in england and that was rejected by the united states. that was one of the elements that was introduced by the framers and it was rejected by votes like -- >> chris: that's not true. george mason is one of the people who came up with high crimes and misdemeanors and heat rejected to include things like misconduct and abuse of power. and then you have alexander hamilton, who talk specifically about on the hamilton matter in. it when clinton being impeached, people who opposed plaintiff's impeachment cited the same quote is saying no, no, no, that shows you have to narrow it, not broaden it. he was saying as the subjects of the jurisdiction, namely high crimes and misdemeanors, treason, bribery, those are crimes that involve public people, they are political in nature, they are abuse of power. hamilton wasn't

the impeachment clause at the constitutional convention where maladministration was offered by george mason as a grounds for impeachment. in james madison, responded that was a bad idea. he said so vague a term will be equivalent to a tenure during the pleasure of the senate. and that events a deep-seated concern that madison had and it's part of the whole design of our constitution. four ways that can lead to exercises of arbitrary power. the constitution was designed to put limits and checks on all forms of government power . obviously one of the great mechanisms for that is the separation of powers, the structural separation of powers in our constitution but it also comes from defining and limiting powers and responsibilities and a concern that vague terms, vague standards are themselves an opportunity for the expansion of power and the exercise of arbitrary power and we see that throughout the constitution and in the impeachment clause as well and this is why governor morris argued in discussingthe impeachment clause that only few offenses , few offenses ought to be impeachable and the

george mason noted at the constitutional invention that impeachment was a necessary tool, because the man to practices corruption, could seek to repeat his guilt. in june of last year, president trump was clear if a foreign government offered dirt on his political opponent, he would take it. a statement deeply at odds with the guidance provided at the time by his own f.b.i. director, the former federal elections commissioner chair, andoutitutin some 233 years ago. in no uncertain terms it admonishes that any person holding office of profit or trust, it admonishes against them accepting of any presents from a foreign state. but president trump did more than take the foreign help in 2019, as he had done in 2016. this time, he not only asked for it in the july 25th call, but when he didn't get the help from the ukrainian president, he withheld hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayers-funded military aid, and coveted a white house meeting to increase the pressure on ukraine to comply. later he demonstrated no remorse, and continued to encourage ukraine to conduct the political investi

the election come november and i thank you so much bill for talking to us bill schneider from george mason university will be speaking to you a little later as again we wait for the proceedings to resume on the senate floor u.s. senators about to sign questioning both president trump's lawyers and the democratic impeachment managers from the house who are prosecuting this case the impeachment trial of president donald trump a soon as they get underway there on the senate floor will bring them to you live here on al-jazeera in the meantime let's move on to other world news and the world health organization will meet again on thursday to decide whether the corona virus outbreak constitutes an international emergency as urging all countries to take action against the virus that has left more than 130 people dead in china the u.s. and japan have evacuated hundreds of their citizens out of china and many more countries are planning to follow suit when hey reports. after completing an emergency mission a plane carrying more than $200.00 japanese citizens arrives in tokyo from china they're among

researchers at george mason eniversity in virginia looked at 160,000 people, and found those lyo vapemoke are two times more likely to suffer a stroke than adults who only smoke cigarettes, and nearly three times more likely than nonsmokers. in case you didn't get your fill of sweets over the holidays, we have some good news. it's officially girl scout cookie season. this year, there's a new delight on the menu-- lemon-ups. and not only are they crispy and sweet, we hear, but they have motivational messages like, "i am a leader," and "i am a go- getter," baked right in. well, i'm a thin mint lover but mdo like that message. i'm a go-getter, so as a former girl scout, i'm looking forward to trying them. up next, how a knitting circle is helping the littlest victims of the australian fires. needles. essential for the sea urchin, but maybe not for people with rheumatoid arthritis. because there are options. like an "unjection™". xeljanz xr, a once-daily pill for adults with moderate to severe ra for whom methotrexate did not work well enough. xeljanz xr can reduce pain, swelling and furt

she is from the george mason university in virginia and she gave her initial verdict on proceedings.ular fireworks. senators are essentially debating about the rules so there's nothing particularly exciting happening right now, but the democrats are primarily making their case, their appeal to the public. they want to get the public on their side to try to put pressure on their side to try to put pressure on some republicans who might decide to vote along democratic lines when things come to that, whereas republicans are largely focused on procedural issues and trying to get the matter over as quickly as possible. how important are the witnesses? because it could backfire for the democrats. there has been concern about that. from my point of view i can see that cutting both ways. the democrats would i think benefit from particular witnesses that they would like to call, particularly former chief of staff mick mullaney and john bolton who by the president's account could provide incriminating testimony so the republicans would like to keep them out. if witnesses are allowed and the re

story and speak toa let's stay with that story and speak to a professor of political science at george masonank you very much for your time. what are you thinking as your time. what are you thinking as you watch these proceedings? well, from my perspective, it's been a pretty gripping day. i've had it on in the background, checking different news channels through the day but from most people's perspectives it's been a bit dull but there's been a steady presentation of evidence that the democrats have controlled today and they will continue over the next couple of days, with the republicans probably beginning their presentations on saturday. this is much more a political process than a legal one, isn't it, and the result is almost certain to be on party lines? essentially what we are viewing is a partisan elliptical process dressed up partisan elliptical process dressed up to look like a judicial one, but there's nothing particularly judicial going on about the proceedings despite the fact the supreme proceedings despite the fact the supremejustice proceedings despite the fact the supreme jus

president has done is not a great and dangerous offense to the safety republic, in the words of george mason, it is not an under the offense meaning of the constitution and as you heard from conyers, the far from proven. we are not simply transmitting a case , transmitting with evidence to the senate as evidence by the fact that we leaders say he should resign. he should fight this and beat it. announcer: learn more about the bill hment of president clinton this sunday here on american history t.v. next on lectures in history, oston college professor seth jacobs discusses president lyndon johnson and the factors vietnam,him to following the assassination of john f. kennedy. he argues the 1964 residential campaign against barry goldwater influenced johnson's desire to be seen as a strong, confident foreign-policy president. welcome. today's subject is lyndon johnson. member for one reason. vietnam. johnson is the president identified with the vietnam war, although there is a famous quote 1967 where he3, said to a journalist, this is not lyndon johnson's war. this is america's war. if i drop d

suffering he should be very careful with his words well bill schneider is a public policy professor at george mason university he says trump's response is consistent with his policy towards iraq. we are in a tit for tat situation with iran in the united states threatening each other but that's the way trump prefers to operate he believes that strength is the key threats are the way to communicate that strength and so far he's had some success in doing that. he pulled out of the nuclear accord. that accord appears to be breaking down which is exactly what he wants and he's threatening iran that if they resume their income their increased enrichment of uranium there could be serious serious consequences and he's backed up his threats when he killed the stage the attack on the iranian general showing that he was extraordinarily serious about these threats it's got americans very worried about the possibility of a war with iran and one of the effects may be that it's increasing support in the democratic party for one of the contenders bernie sanders who is an antiwar democrat democrats are very worried

when the framers selected this term they meant it to capture as george mason put it all a matter great acting as offenses against the nation and then contemporary terms of framers had three specific offenses in mind, abuse of power, betrayal of the nation to the foreign entanglements and corruption of election. you can think of these as the abcs of high crimes and misdemeanors abuse, betrayal and corruption. the framers believe any one of these standing alone justifies removal from office. the professor of harvard law school explained this well before the house judiciary committee. here's his explanation why the framersva created the impeachmet powers. the framers provided for the impeachment of the president because they feared that the president might abuse the power of his office for personal benefits to corrupt the electoral process and ensure the reelection or to subvert the national security of the united states. that is the standard ass described by professor feldman. it is correct and of course were all three of these appeared at once abuse, betrayal and corruption, that is whe

george mason came up with a broader phase. high crime and misdemeanor. scholars know the word "high" was used in british law where it comes from to describe crimes committed by people in high office. and that is the impeachment clause. there had been moments in our history when it saved american democracy. at other times it hurts other opponents as a weapon. how will it end this time? >> from the moment he stepped on the political stage, we are going to win so big. >> donald trump had been the most controversial and most polarizing figure. just one day after he won the election, americans were taken to the streets. >> thousands are in the streets now. >> impeachment proceedings. >> we began impeachment proceedings. >> some democrats took up the call. >> impeachment. but, to the constant of people in the trump white house, the mueller investigation, the indictment, the convictions, house speaker pelosi, fought the push for impeachment. it divides the country unless there is some conclusive evidence that took us our place. >> three times she had the house

state of the union address in a few tuesdays time bill schneider is a public policy professor at george mason university now he says democrats will be healthy with those rules as they stand but they would likely to get them changed. we want to see more evidence it's possible that could happen but under these rules the senate has to vote on allowing each new witness and there's a majority of republicans in the senate and they have to vote on whether to allow any new evidence to come in that is very unlike unlikely and also says that they can vote on a president what the president is proposing which is just to throw the case out i don't think they would ever do that because that would look very peremptory and unfair but they are allowed to do that under these rules while there are some witnesses we'd like to who have said they would testify by john bolton the former national security advisor no one knows exactly what he'll say you very much involved in white house operations there is this other fellow mr parness who is working closely with rudy giuliani who appears to have a lot to say although

president has done is not a great and dangerous offense to the safety republic, in the words of george mason, it is not an under the offense meaning of the constitution and as you heard from conyers, the far from proven. we are not simply transmitting a case , transmitting with evidence to the senate as evidence by the fact that we leaders say he should resign. he should fight this and beat it. announcer: learn more about the bill hment of president clinton this sunday here on american history t.v. next on lectures in

jaffer,r guest is jamil law professor at george mason university.s for your time and insight this morning. one hour left in this saturday edition of "washington journal." when we come back, we will look further ahead to the year 2020. we will speak to daniel franklin at the economist. more of your calls. we will be right back. >> this weekend, booktv features three new nonfiction books. saturday, national constitution center president and ceo jeffrey rosen and supreme court justice ruth bader ginsburg talk about his new book, conversations with rbg. >> we were married in my mother-in-law's home. she took me aside just before the ceremony to tell me the secret of a happy marriage. was, it helps sometimes to be a little deaf. [laughter] which is advice that i have everyed assiduously in workplace, even my current job. [laughter] >> at 9:00 eastern, breitbart.com entertainment editor jerome hudson argues news coverage in the mainstream media benefits the political left in his new book, 50 things they don't want you to know. to theink it goes back distr

you mentioned george mason.eorge mason thought we should include maladministration as a justification. he set if the president had a bad presidency, ineffective, we should be able to impeach him. james madison said that is too far. you basically make a parliamentary system where a vote of no-confidence by the senate means the president is out. delegates agreed. that is too far we don't want to make it such an easy lobar. that's where they came up with the phrase high crimes and misdemeanors. they did not define it for us. they did not tell us what they meant by that. during discussions they gave us clues. corrupting an election, they did talk about that. being in service to a foreign power. that something they raise in the concerns. something they talk about a lot. we do hear some echoes from back then in today's debate. theously an issue with allegations regarding president trump. host: let's go to homestead, pennsylvania. good morning. i had caller: caller: just a couple of points i wanted to make. as far as t

george mason. [inaudible] madison said no, that bars to low. obstruction of congress and abuse of power falls into the administration category which means if a president does something you don't like policy wise or dares to challenge his subpoena in the courts you're going to impeach him? is that what has happened here? >> that's exactly what has happened. that's the concern. there's been a abuse of power in other impeachments, but were talking about from a different standpoint. what's happened here. the abuse of power article is simply nancy pelosi telling her caucus just go say whatever you want to say because they don't have an abuse of power. the actual phone call and what they're trying to say is a wrong deed was not a wrong deed. there's nothing wrong with that. so they just said we can't come up with anything so let's say abuse of power. let's just say i don't like the way the president handled the situation so that number from wherever in the country can say i voted for this because the president shouldn't of said this and done it this

george mason and that working at vanity fair after it closed. conde nast believed in hiring the best people no matter what. it didn't matter whether they were gay, lesbian, jewish, catholic, black, it didn't matter. what mattered was talent, didn't matter if we were known, they hired a girl called dorothy rothschild to write captions for vogue. the one that caught frank's i, she kept writing poems on frank's desk to transfer over from little vogue into vanity fair. finally he agreed to take her on. he also wanted to take on someone to make vanity fair articles more substantial so brought on the chap in the middle, a guy called robert benchley, one of the funniest people i ever read about, his own biography is absolutely hysterical. robert benchley was a harvard graduate, editor of the harvard lampoon, he got the job because he was going to get very serious. i open the book with one of the incidents that happened when they were working there and went on to win oscar for a short produced by mgm called how to sleep. it is hysterically funny if you

another founder george mason brought up a case after former british official in india, accused of mismanagement neither of these cases is there any mention of breaking a specific criminal statute. >> let's start with mismanagement. yes, that was a criteria in england and that was rejected by the united states. that was one of the element introduced by the framers and it was rejected by votes like 9-2. chris: that is not true. boring mason is one of the people came up with high crimes and misdemeanors. to include things like misconduct and abuse of power. >> no. chris: then you have alexander hamilton ho talked about specifically about misconduct. >> i will spend some time on the hamilton matter in my talk. when clinton was being impeached people who opposed clinton's impeachment cited the same quote as saying no, no, that shows you have to narrow it, not broaden it. what he was saying is subjects are the jurisdiction, namely high crimes and misdemeanors, treason, bribery, those are crimes that involve public people, they are political in nature. they are abuse of power. hamilton was not trying

inaudible] he's taught at the university of virginia and writing programs at johns hopkins university, george mason university as well as american university, and he's the author of the explorer king: a narrative on the adventurer clarence king and math brady: portraits of -- matthew brady. we are honored to have bob wilson speak today on barnum: an american life. welcome, bob. [applause] >> i have so many microphones going on here, i -- and now this is on too. thank you, kathy, for that lovely introduction. thank you for everything you do for the barnum museum. thank you for having me here at the barnum museum. and thank you for everything that you and the people who work with you have done to help me in writing this book, researching and writing this. book. i also want to thank adrian st. pierre, the curator here, and really just throughout the years of working on the book offered me encouragement, lots of good information and helped me a lot with the photographs in the book later on. i'm also really pleased to be able to tell you that the great barnum scholar of this time or any time, arthur sax

one of the framers i always trying to invoke on this issue is george mason. the others are important, but the abuse of power is what they were concerned about most when the constitution was approved. we didn't have federal criminal statutes. it was a nebulous abuse of power, but the gestalt, the core of that abuse of power is this. the president of the united states should not use his office to benefit himself personally. and what president trump did is he used the office, he used $400 million, roughly, to try to get a country whose fledgling and under attack by russia, to get them to do the dirty work for him using our taxpayer money. i can't think of a more consummate abuse of power than what president trump did. >> although they argue and i'm quoting here, that the actions that he took in his calls, both of them, the one in april as well as the one on july 25th as well as the surrounding and related events, quote, were constitutional, perfectly legal, completely appropriate, and taken in furtherance of our national interest. >> you know what? i wonder if t

this morning, george mason university jamil john for talks about iranian cyber threats -- jaffer talksbout iranian cyber threats.

george mason as the debate suggested he pointed out in the system. a bill that has been a useful tool for the government, but they are eliminating that and now we are getting a narrow definition of the p. trent. it's expanded to include the administration and addison said no and framers agreed we have to have integrated and defined offenses, not the vague concept intoto something that can be blurry and interpret it after the fact that it can be used essentially to make the policy differences and other kind of differences like that the subject of impeachment. all the steps they took i that n the way they approach the patent clause or in terms of narrowing, restricting, constraining, enumerating and not the approach as it had been in the militia system. i think the minority view of the republican members of the house judiciary committee have the time of the nixon impeachment inquiry sum this up very well because they explained, and i am quoting from the minority views in the report, the whole tenure of the framers discussion, the whole purpose of the d

than what happens when the invitation comes from within our framers understood death threat to george mason noted at the constitutional convention that impeachment was a necessary tool because the man who has practiced corruption and by that meanes procured his appointment in the 1st instance could seek to repeat his guilt in june of last year president trump was clear that if a foreign government offered dirt on his political opponent he would take it a statement deeply at odds with the guidance provided at the time by is own f.b.i. director. the formal federal elections commission and chair and our constitution written some 233 years ago 'd in no uncertain terms in admonished is that any person holding office of profit or trust it admonishes against them excepting of any president from a foreign state but president term did more than take the foreign help in 2019 as he had done in 2016 this time he not only asked for it in the july 25th call but when he didn't get the help from ukraine and presidents in the form of the announced bill in best a geisha and he withheld hundreds of millions o

well earlier we spoke with bill schneider he's a public policy professor at george mason university he says democrats blame the president for the heightened tensions with iran they think that the president acted in a risky full hearty manner that he didn't heed of course did not consult congress these days presidents rarely do before taking military action and they want to make sure that the president at least is symbolically required to inform congress before anything like this ever happens again in the near future especially with regard to iran palosi has put together correct me if i'm wrong he is utterly unique in the annals of u.s. political history so does it mean that in the future if mr trump wants to do something similar or who have a follows mr trump wants to do something similar they've got to tell congress we are doing it or have they got to go to congress and explain the strategy as well well that's what congress wants but you know what this ain't going to happen. it has passed the house which is a democratic majority but it won't pass the senate which has a republican majo