An excuse Trump could have used that didn't occur to him

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I thought that was supposed to be a counter-argument?

The Presidency is, by its very nature, an undemocratic office. One person cannot hope to represent the country, and that's before you get into issues like the electoral college. I would argue that it is entirely democratic for parties to choose representatives who fit with their values and ideals. If you're going to have a Presidency, and you're going to be giving candidates the endorsement of your party, then you should be checking whether those candidates have been doing anything that might bring your party into disrepute, or actively arguing against your ideals. If you can't pass vetting then stand as an independent.

If that seems undemocratic, then my personal solution, as I have said many times, would be to abolish the Presidency, reform Congress to make it more representative, and make whoever can command a majority in Congress into the Prime Minister.

As far as I'm concerned the parties can use whatever nomination process they want. The parties have chosen more and more democratic primary methods of doing that because they are popular. The republican logic the last cycle such at it is, was it was better to have the republican voters choose their candidate and have him succeed or fail on his merits than to choose a candidate the voters might like less. Simply put it is better for the Republican party (at least short term) to have Trump run under their standard, than for an independent Trump to run against say a Cruz nominee.

From the perspective of the party it is difficult to argue with that logic. Of course this is what comes of party over country.

Okay lets put it this way. Even if Trump is being hypocritical in investigating Biden and not investigating the rest of the candidates, you can't exactly say he is hypocritical in his own favor: it would have been in his favor to investigate everyone else too, wouldn't it.

Now, if you are going to say "well, the way its in his favor is that others don't provide a serious competition and Biden does" I can reply to it "well, the reason Biden is more of a threat to a country is that others don't have a real chance of getting in the office and Biden does".

Do you see what I am getting at? Any "point" that Trump investigates Biden because he competes with him personally can be answered with a "counterpoint" that the reason he investigates Biden is because of the way his presidency would affect the country.

You can't really "prove" that its one motive rather than the other since the two go hand in hand: if someone has greater chance of becoming a president then

a) that person is greater threat to Trumps future presidency
b) If that person happens to be corrupt he would be greater threat to the country

So Trump critics say his motive is a, while Trump proponents say its b. But you can't really prove whether its one or the other, can you?

Trump has been practically performing fellatio on Putin, and very likely had received help from Russia to reach the White House. I don't buy that Trump is concerned about the country. The only time Trump has had a problem with corruption is when he's been left out of it.
It's long been known that Biden is the candidate Trump fears the most, and so, yes, that's the reason why Trump intended to knock him out of the race.

In this case, you are using your prior knowledge about Trump in order to interpret his present behavior. But in this case your real evidence against Trump is the old evidence, not new evidence. In the absence of the old evidence, the new evidence wouldn't necessarely call for the interpretation you are giving.



Why would Biden be a candidate Trump fears the most? Because Biden is the candidate most likely to win. But wait a second. If Biden is the candidate most likely to win, wouldn't it serve country's purpose to investigate Biden's corruption more than anybody else's? If some of the other candidates are corrupt but they wouldn't win anyway, their corruption won't hurt the country. But if Biden is corrupt and he wins then yes his corruption hurts the country.

So the point I am trying to make is this. The only thing you KNOW about Biden is he is most likely to win. From there you can say

a) Since Biden is the most likely one to win, he is the biggest threat to Trump, personally
b) Since Biden is the most likely one to win, he is the biggest threat to the country, in case he happens to be corrupt.

So how do you know which motivates Trump the most: a or b?

You couldn't tell, unless you have prior opinion of Trump.

Trump's prior history is a Rosetta Stone for determining his present and future behavior.
Trump's past behavior demonstrates how he could care less about fighting corruption, or even caring about the country.

I get what you're saying.

There IS a kinda logic to it. Yes, a sitting president COULD say "I am just saving the country from potential danger by....thoroughly investigated this person who potentially could become our next head of state. But it would still look bad. And it will still backfire. Because it would justify others investigating Trump himself. If a potential POTUS is a possible danger, then a sitting POTUS would be an even greater possible danger.

That's what he's been saying.

He even runs tv advertisements about it.

Biden's statements/Hunter Biden making millions for doing "consulting", both make TRUMP's efforts seems more plausible.

I'm no Trump supporter by an means -- I consider him wholly unfit for any political office. That said, I think that the investigation mess was more likely to have from Rudy Giuliani and his cohorts.

The problem for Trump is in becoming a willing participant in the scheme instead of refusing to have any part in it and shutting the scheme down. Also, it's a problem for his handing over the foreign policy for a foreign country to his own personal lawyer. Giuliani wasn't acting on behalf of the United States -- he was acting primarily on behalf of himself and also on behalf of Trump.

This would certainly fit in with John Bolton's comments that Giuliani is a hand grenade who is going to blow everyone up and that he didn't want to have anything to do with whatever drug deal that Giuliani and Mulvaney were cooking up.

The problem is that it might give Trump an excuse, but it doesn't offer him any defense at all. He is, a co-conspirator.

Even if it did offer some kind of defense, does anyone ever believe that Trump could do anything that doesn't portray him as being firmly in charge?