Monica Lewinsky calls for constitutional ban on presidential self-pardons

That's not necessary, obviously Americans would never elect a criminal for President.
This was probably the general thinking before everything went batshit crazy among Republicans.

In a piece in Vanity Fair, Lewinsky offered her vision for a more robust democracy via six new amendments: no presidential self-pardons, mandatory background checks for presidents, no suspensions of the U.S. Constitution, a retirement age for elected officials, elimination of the Electoral College and codification of a woman’s right to an abortion.

There's not a single thing wrong with anything she's saying, except that she doesn't go far enough. Well, also that part about suspension of the constitution I wonder what it means. If you suspend the constitution, then you'd presumably also not care about an amendment that says you cannot do so.

But anyways, for pardons, I would say that there should be a ban on any pardon where the President has a conflict of interests. For example, when Trump pardoned Stone. The President specifically shouldn't be able to pardon anybody who he knows personally or who helped him personally.

There should be background checks for US presidents yes, but also for all congresspersons and Supreme Court Justices. All of their finances should be public information as a matter of course.

These are better ideas than I hear coming from anyone actually in government.

This is great, I heard Republicans really respect Monica and feel she was treated unjustly.

Now that's a name I haven't heard in awhile. She probably doesn't have much of any social capital left, but if she wants to spend her last bit on this, I get it.

You're kidding right? Pardons in themselves are crazy, but didn't know presidents can pardon themselves?

I mean, she's not wrong, but she knows you start by getting 290 votes in the House, right? The same group of people who couldn't get 218 to decide who their own leader was?

Yes, and family or close ties.

How boring American politics once were… even most scandals…

That is one of the few famous people whose opinion on this matters

Self-pardons? What!?

Pardon me, Mr. President

There is a legal argument that it is already the case, the idea being that you can't be the judge of your own case. Obviously, untested.

I disagree with a bunch of her proposals simply for the reason that I fundamentally disagree that America should have an elected president.

I believe the 3 branches of government should be the Judiciary, the States, represented by the Senate, and the People, represented by the House.

The Senate isn't a legislating house, it's a house that has the choice to veto legislation with a 2/3rds or more vote, led by a Tribune who calls such votes when deemed necessary, if the Senate itself doesn't override the Tribune with another 2/3rds or more vote.

Critically, the Senate has 27 representatives from each state, 21 from permanently inhabited territories, and 15 from Indigenous Nations and Labor Unions of 5k or more members, and from County level divisions which have larger populations than individual states. Now every small guy in US politics has their interests served by the Senate.

The house is expanded so that every US State gets a number of reps equal to however many times 50k fits into their population, grouped into districts where 5-9 representatives hail from with a proportionate number of constituents. House is led by a Consul and elected cabinet.

The expanded House and Senate will be a lot to wrangle, but the American people will have a far more functional and personally validating selection of leaders and representatives, and that alone will significantly boost satisfaction with and thereby participation in our democracy.

All everyone wants is for there to be at least someone they feel like hears their deal sitting in office, and with these mega districts, odds are fairly good that at least one sitting representative and one sitting senator will be that guy who gets where you're coming from and assures you your issues are being fought for.

Honestly I get why this is, but I disagree slightly. A President should be able to pardon themselves from crimes committed before they were elected to that term. Otherwise you could run into a problem where a corrupt government/administration could jail it's competitor on bogus charges and then even if elected from a jail cell, that person couldn't serve.

If they did that to the President and Vice President then the speaker of the house would be made President and that's a position that can be manipulated with jerrymandering.

How does she talk with all that presidential cock down her throat,

Good lord, get back in your box, Monica.