Here’s Turtler’s explanation:

There was and is only:

A: Formal impeachment.

and

B: Removal for incapacity.

A I think would have been preferable, but I have heard conflicting reports such as that they did not have the votes and it was felt it would take too much time to get them. So they went for an approach involving B, where the vote threshold was lower, and which basically involved reading Yanukovych’s willful withdrawal from Kyiv into a foreign country as equivalent to him being comatose or the like.

This was dodgy and playing fast and loose with the rules, I’ll freely admit that, and I also believe that going for a formal impeachment (even if it would take a few more days) was probably the better option legally. But fortunately or unfortunately parliamentary systems like what Ukraine has and elsewhere generally give their parliaments much more leeway in making and interpreting the law than the US Constitution does (indeed this was something the American Founders pointed out as a problem), and that includes in Ukraine.

First, the authority to remove the President by the Verkhovna Rada is spelled out in Article 85, No. 10: “removing the President of Ukraine from office in accordance with the special procedure (impeachment) established by Article 111 of this Constitution;”
There are a total of 37 statements of the authority of the Verkhovna Rada.
At the end of this Article there is this statement: “The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine exercises other powers ascribed to its competence in
accordance with the Constitution of Ukraine.” The limiting principle is that is must be in accordance with the Constitution. That would preclude making up a new category for removing a President.

Article 91
The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopts laws, resolutions and other acts by the majority of its constitutional composition, except in cases envisaged by this Constitution. This would limit the ability of the Rada to create a new method of removing a President as the reasons a President can leave office early is clearly spelled out in Article 108.

Article 108
The President of Ukraine exercises his or her powers until the assumption of office
the newly-elected President of Ukraine.
The powers of the President of Ukraine terminate prior to the expiration of term in
cases of:
1. resignation;
2. inability to exercise his or her powers for reasons of health;
3. removal from office by the procedure of impeachment
4. death.

I assume Turtler is trying to stretch “removal for incapacity” into the inability to exercise his or her powers for reasons of health.

Article 110 addresses the conditions for the use of this situation:

“The inability of the President of Ukraine to exercise his or her powers for reasons of health shall be determined at a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and confirmed by a decision adopted by the majority of its constitutional composition on the basis of a petition of the Supreme Court of Ukraine – on the appeal of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, and a medical opinion.”

To use this method, it would require a majority vote, a petition to the Supreme Court of Ukraine and a medical opinion. Other than a majority vote to remove Yanukovych, the other two requirements weren’t met.

As has been discussed earlier, the procedures of Article 111 specified in the constitution for impeachment were not met.

Article 112 specifies who and under what conditions a person would be selected to perform the duties of the President in the event of pre-term termination.
“In the event of the pre-term termination of authority of the President of Ukraine in accordance with Articles 108, 109, 110 and 111 of this Constitution…”

Once again the methods of pre-term termination are delineated to the Articles covering death, resignation, health or impeachment.

Turtler goes on the say:

But fortunately or unfortunately parliamentary systems like what Ukraine has and elsewhere generally give their parliaments much more leeway in making and interpreting the law than the US Constitution does

The problem with this is Ukraine is not a strict parliamentary system. The legislature (Rada) doesn’t select the President, he/she is elected by the voters. It seems obvious on the face of it the Constitution would have to spell out that the legislature had the authority to remove the President with a simple majority vote– otherwise every time there was a disagreement the President would be removed.

Finally Turtler gets to the reason used by the Rada to remove Yanukovych.

Moreover, Yanukovych was very pointedly refusing to conduct his constitutional duties (such as appearing before the Rada to answer questions)

Yanukovych fled Kyiv after threats of violence when the Maidan rioters rejected the agreement worked out by Yanukovych and opposition leaders brokered by Europeans and demanded Yanukovych’s resignation by the next day.

It seems bizarre that the President fails to answer to the Rada and is removed from office the same day.

I agree with Turtler that Yanukovych should have been impeached (though it’s possible they couldn’t have met the 3/4 threshold for removal) even if that would have lengthened the process by a few days.

But the demands by the Euromaidan rioters no doubt influenced the Rada to immediate action.

So I disagree with Turtler the process for Yanukovych’s removal was not unconstitutional and that the justification of it being extra-constitutional is just trying to rationalize the removal forced by the irrational and emotional demands by the Maidan rioters.

If I’ve mis-interpreted anything Turtler said about the “removal for incapacity”, I’m sure Turtler will respond.

I never really liked Zelensky either.

I’m moderately fond of him – certainly more than most other MAGA fans – but I never entirely trusted him and stuff like his conduct on the Burisma/Shokin issue did not inspire confidence. But I’ve generally been supportive of Ukraine before and beyond Zelenskyy, hence my issue with people portraying supporters of Ukraine as having just learned whatever the MSM put up. That’s not true for me, my stances began forming about 20 years ago during Ukraine’s own Orange Revolution and solidified there.

All the pro-Ukrainian propaganda 3 years ago gave off such March 2020 vibes that it very much turned me off.

I can understand why, and given the revelations about USAID funding for Zelenskyy PR it makes sense. They were probably funded in much the same way. In my case I largely came to my conclusions years before then, so I mostly sighed and rolled my eyes at the propaganda onslaught even if it and I agreed on points and superficially agreed on even more.

Not that that means Putin is a friend, of course.

Indeed, and this is my big issue. Putin’s not even a friend, and lacks the decency to be a consistent or open enemy (then again not many are any more given what a steal the Lucy with the Football reaction is). I came to that conclusion around 2008 with the war in Georgia and its aftermath.

My take is that yes, Trump genuinely wants the war to end – perhaps he is thinking it should end at any cost, which would be a mistake IMO. He made it very clear that when he came into office a second time, ending wars would be a priority. Perhaps the dream of being the president who ushered in an era of peace is overriding his better judgment.

Agreed, that’s also what I fear. Zelenskyy supporting Kamala/Biden and screwing the Burisma/Shokin investigation after Trump asked for looking into it also hurt. I do also sometimes think Trump believes so much in his reputation for making a deal he does not ask as much if a deal should be made.

I am also responsible, I admitted and still admit that the crisis in the US and creeping authoritarianism here were such I felt they needed to be dealt with even if Ukraine were to be thrown to the wolves. It’s something I stand by even if I am not proud of it, and so far at least at home it seems to have promising signs. But that doesn’t mean I like or trust Putin or whoever succeeds him to make or keep a deal.

A: Formal impeachment.

and

B: Removal for incapacity.

A I think would have been preferable, but I have heard conflicting reports such as that they did not have the votes and it was felt it would take too much time to get them. So they went for an approach involving B, where the vote threshold was lower, and which basically involved reading Yanukovych’s willful withdrawal from Kyiv into a foreign country as equivalent to him being comatose or the like.

This was dodgy and playing fast and loose with the rules, I’ll freely admit that, and I also believe that going for a formal impeachment (even if it would take a few more days) was probably the better option legally. But fortunately or unfortunately parliamentary systems like what Ukraine has and elsewhere generally give their parliaments much more leeway in making and interpreting the law than the US Constitution does (indeed this was something the American Founders pointed out as a problem), and that includes in Ukraine.

Moreover, Yanukovych was very pointedly refusing to conduct his constitutional duties (such as appearing before the Rada to answer questions), had let us say “significant suspicions” of having violated the constitution beforehand, and while claiming to be at fear for his life (which I’m sure was true to some point) pointedly left Kyiv on false pretenses and was not so fearful he was unwilling to make multiple stops to steal baubles (including luxury goods) from places including official Presidential residences. And given the rapidly evolving situation I can’t fault the Rada for concluding it needed to arrange for new elections ASAP by declaring Yanukovych incapable of performing his government duties.

The big issue I see is that this was never written into the constitution as a “lessons learned” afterwards, meaning that there was no attempt to pre-empt this problem from appearing again.

I’m not sure how to do that on an iPad. It keeps those sort of things hidden. Let me try a few things.

OK, here it is in text, but it’s not clickable.

https://spacenews.com/trump-orders-50-billion-cut-from-2026-defense-budget-shields-iron-dome-initiative/

Ok, now it’s clickable. It wasn’t before the edit.

Indeed. The same media scum who gaslighted us about the Wu-Flu, were now screaming that our most important issue was Poor Little Ukraine, while the Bidenite neofascists were destroying *our* country!

I wasn’t born yesterday.