Trump has been ranting lately, most notably in his debate with Kamala Harris, that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Missouri are “eating the dogs, the people who came in, they’re eating the cats.” This most recent of Trump’s immigration fables turns out to be balderdash, of course. And, as usual, MAGA enthusiasts have fallen for it, disbelieving the reports exonerating Haitians, apparently dismissing JD Vance’s admission that he, who first reported this imaginary story, had made it all up, unapologetically.
In any event, an enterprising group of Tik Tok users employed AI to discover that Trump had plagiarized his comment about the Haitian-dog-cat controversy directly from one of Adolf Hitler’s speeches. He too was vexed by immigration, especially from Haiti whose citizens yearned for peaceful and bountiful lives in Nazi Germany, and of course, for the wiener schnitzel and beer. Below is the sordid proof of Trump’s plagiarism:
Whether Trump will face disciplinary action, or criminal indictment for his flagrant infringement of Adolf Hitler’s copyright is the question of the day. He certainly has violated Hitler’s rights to ownership of his own words. Plagiarism, as defined, can be considered a violation of copyright law if it infringes on the original author’s copyright, patent, or trademark. In this case, the copyright owner can sue the plagiarist in federal court.
Adolf Hitler. age 135, with his lawyers in Brasília.
Also, in some cases, plagiarism can be considered a felony under state or federal law. For example, if a plagiarist copies and earns more than $2,500 from copyrighted material, he/she may face up to $250,000 in fines and up to ten years in jail. The value of Trump’s use of Hitler’s words could be determined to be in excess of $2,500 as it has brought him value due to the absolute delight that MAGA supporters drew from attack on immigrants (the Springfield Haitians, by the way, are in the United States legally). Also, Trump continues to use the phrase at the drop of a hat.
Whether this event will draw Adolf Hitler out of retirement in Brazil to bring suit, or to make a criminal complaint remains to be seen. He has been understandably reclusive for the past 79 years. It will be interesting to see, because it isn’t wise to aggravate Adolf Hitler. My money’s on Hitler.
At a campaign rally yesterday in Pennsylvania, Trump tried to pander to women voters, disastrously, that he’s not a threat but will be their “protector” in abortion matters, and in general:
“I always thought women liked me. But the fake news keeps saying women don’t like me. [But] You will be protected, and I will be your protector. Women will be happy, healthy, confident and free. You will no longer be thinking about abortion.”
The president who ushered in the overturning of Roe v. Wade, bragged about sexually assaulting women, and was found liable for sexual abuse now realizes that the legacy of the Dobbs decision that his three Supreme Court nominees made possible isn’t polling well. So he’s on the reassurance grift. There is a mind-set demonstrated by his “soothing” words that shows a glaringly stupid lack of understanding of even the grade school basics of what women desire in all aspects of their lives, especially abortion.
For example, his “You will be protected, and I will be your protector”: women no longer accept (if they ever did) that their relationships with men be a “protector/protectee” paternalistic bargain, freighted with exceedingly onerous obligations. For example, Trump (of all men) telling them “Women will be happy, healthy, confident and free” indicates his belief that men (specifically himself) alone by their paternalistic largesse can make women happy, healthy, confident and free. This, from Trump, a serial sex assaulter, adulterer, adjudicated rapist, defamer, and “pussy grabber.” He and the MAGA crowd simply have no overall, historical, cultural, or conceptual understanding of feminist goals. And trying to fake it just digs them in deeper and rightly alienates millions of women, and men.
And there’s this:
More Reassurance from Ohio…
GOP Senate nominee Bernie Moreno (OH), at a town hall event last week but first reported yesterday by NBC4 in Columbus. As you’ll see, Moreno vocalizes the MAGA self-centered view that one’s vote ought to matter only when an issue DIRECTLY threatens one’sown life, not, for example, the lives of all women, including their daughters and granddaughters.
“You know, the left has a lot of single issue voters. Sadly, by the way, there’s a lot of suburban women, a lot of suburban women that are like, ‘Listen, abortion is it. If I can’t have an abortion in this country whenever I want, I will vote for anybody else.’ … OK. It’s a little crazy by the way, but — especially for women that are like past 50 — I’m thinking to myself, ‘I don’t think that’s an issue for you.'”
As for Trump’s conclusion, “[Women] will no longer be thinking about abortion,” the absurdity of that in every way spotlights his utter lack of understanding of women’s daily lives. Women walk through life with targets on their chests and backs, at all ages, placed there by men like Trump and Moreno.
Yesterday, during MSNBC’s coverage of the Trump transformation from “first criminally indicted former president” to “first criminally convicted former president,” Jen Psaki – with the general agreement of the polite panel (except the always reliable Joy Reed) – advised viewers that she wasn’t about dancing in the street over the news of Trump’s 34 count conviction. Apparently, that would be too impolite and incivil. Being an aging baby boomer I am delighted by impolite, and a schadenfreude admirer regarding enemies of the state, so, I took a pass on Psaki’s advice. One needs to celebrate a victory, especially since Trump has for decades avoided such a comeuppance. So, here’s my attempt at schadenfreudish happy feet:
The following is so-called boilerplate guidelines for New York state judges for their jury instruction for the felony charged against Trump, FALSIFYING BUSINESS RECORDS IN THE FIRST DEGREEPenal Law § 175.10 (Committed on or after November 1, 1986). It is sourced through New York’s official Criminal Jury Instructions & Model Colloquies site which points out:
“The Criminal Jury Instructions are a set of model charges intended as a guideline for trial judges. The instructions are, of course, based on statutory provisions and prevailing case law.”
NOTE 1:It is not the complete instruction that Judge Marchan will present to the jury. But under NY Criminal Cases, it is a guideline for a case charged under Penal Law § 175.10, the felony charge facing Donald Trump. In fact, Judge Marchan is instructing the jury as I write this
NOTE 2: As the trial is in a state court, Judge Marchan may or may not advise the jury regarding the federal election law that is included in this case. Recall, however, that NY election law is implicated in this case. The presence of the federal election law in this state case is, by the way, unusual or perhaps unprecedented in a NY case of this type and its appropriateness is debated by legal scholars.
NOTE 3: The jury is not provided a copy of the jury instructions in New York. They may ask the judge specific questions as needed, however.
NOTE 4: Although this issue was actively discussed by analysts prior to the jury instructions, he jury can’t choose to convict Trump on the misdemeanor falsifying business records crime in New York, Penal Law 175.05(1) – SECOND DEGREE FALSIFYING BUSINESS RECORDS: DEFINITIONS AND ELEMENTSbecause Trump’s lawyers didn’t request that the jury instructions include “lesser included offenses,” which would have allowed the jury to weigh misdemeanors. New York law says that judges can submit lesser-included charges to the jury “if there is a reasonable view of the evidence which would support a finding that the defendant committed such lesser offense but did not commit the greater.” The law further says that, in such situations, if either side asks for a lesser-included option, then the court must give it. Moreover, complicating things, in Trump’s case, the two-year statute of limitations had passed for the falsifying business records statute. Yet, some analysts opined and NY judicial precedent exists that – if the Trump lawyers had timely requested it (as set out above) – the two-year SOL would have been waived).
So, why would Trump’s legal team have decided against seeking this this waiver? If his lawyers believed Trump faced a near-certain felony conviction, the jury would have had an “escape route” from having only a felony to consider. And the misdemeanor would, as a first offense, likely resulted in no jail time. Politically, a misdemeanor conviction would strike many – Trumpists and some non-Trumpists – as a mild injury to Trump, if any at all. My guess is that Trump himself nixed the idea – being a consistent and (stupidly) confident risk taker, he would have bridled at accepting any conviction on any charge. If Trump’s convicted in the days ahead, his legal team’s decision here will be considered a game changer, and if we learn that Trump vetoed their plan, finally, where it counts, Trump would have been hoist on his own petard.
Here is the NY state jury instruction boilerplate, emphasis added:
“The (specify) count is Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree.
Under our law, a person is guilty of falsifying business records in the first degree when, with intent to defraud that includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof, that person:
Select appropriate alternative: [direction to judge]
makes or causes a false entry in the business records of an enterprise; or alters, erases, obliterates, deletes, removes or destroys a true entry in the business records of an enterprise;or omits to make a true entry in the business records of an enterprise in violation of a duty to do so which he or she knows to be imposed upon him or her by law or by the nature of his or her position; or prevents the making of a true entry or causes the omission thereof in the business records of an enterprise.
The following terms used in that definition have a special meaning:
ENTERPRISE means any entity of one or more persons, corporate or otherwise, public or private, engaged in business,
BUSINESS RECORD means any writing or article, including computer data or a computer program, kept or maintained by an enterprise for the purpose of evidencing or reflecting its condition or activity.
INTENT means conscious objective or purpose. Thus, a person acts with intent to defraud when his or her conscious objective or purpose is to do so.
In order for you to find the defendant guilty of this crime, the People are required to prove, from all of the evidence in the case, beyond a reasonable doubt, each of the following two elements:
That on or about (date) , in the county of (county) , the defendant, (defendant’s name),
Select appropriate alternative: [direction to judge]
made or caused a false entry in the business records of an enterprise; or altered, erased, obliterated, deleted, removed or destroyed a true entry in the business records of an enterprise; or omitted to make a true entry in the business records of an enterprise in violation of a duty to do so which the defendant knew to be imposed upon him/her by law or by the nature of his/her position; or prevented the making of a true entry or caused the omission thereof in the business records of an enterprise; and, That the defendant did so with intent to defraud that included an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.
If the affirmative defense does not apply, conclude as follows:
If you find the People have proven beyond a reasonable doubt both of those elements, you must find the defendant guilty of this crime.
If you find the People have not proven beyond a reasonable doubt either one or both of those elements, you must find the defendant not guilty of this crime.
If the affirmative defense does apply, continue as follows:
If you find that the People have not proven beyond a reasonable doubt either one or both of those elements, you must find the defendant not guilty of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree.
If you find that the People have proven beyond a reasonable doubt both of the elements, you must consider an affirmative defense the defendant has raised. Remember, if you have already found the defendant not guilty of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree, you will not consider the affirmative defense.
Under our law, it is an affirmative defense to this charge of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree that the defendant, at the time he/she engaged in the conduct constituting the offense, was a clerk, bookkeeper or other employee who, without personal benefit, merely executed the orders of his/her employer or of a superior officer or employee generally authorized to direct his/her activities.
Under our law, the defendant has the burden of proving an affirmative defense by a preponderance of the evidence.
In determining whether the defendant has proven the affirmative defense by a preponderance of the evidence, you may consider evidence introduced by the People or by the defendant.
A preponderance of the evidence means the greater part of the believable and reliable evidence, not in terms of the number of witnesses or the length of time taken to present the evidence, but in terms of its quality and the weight and convincing effect it has. For the affirmative defense to be proved by a preponderance of the evidence, the evidence that supports the affirmative defense must be of such convincing quality as to outweigh any evidence to the contrary.
If you find that the defendant has not proven the affirmative defense by a preponderance of the evidence, then, based upon your initial determination that the People had proven beyond a reasonable doubt both of the elements of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree, you must find the defendant guilty of that crime.
If you find that the defendant has proven the affirmative defense by a preponderance of the evidence, then you must find the defendant not guilty of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree.”
A rather sensible trial strategy may be pursued by Trump’s beleaguered lawyers in his hush money trial, just begun in New York City this morning with jury selection. No, not the obvious one: somehow convincing Trump to not take the stand in his own defense. The perhaps sensible idea has to do with the judge’s charge to the jury for their deliberations and an upcoming court discussion of what may actually be offered into evidence against Trump himself, for example, whether uncharged behavior in the present case can be used against Trump, like his comments about E. Jeanne Carroll, or about Judge Engoron that led to gag orders.
In this first of a series of posts, here’s a quick review of the basics first: Trump is charged with New York state law prohibiting falsifying business records, in this case, related to the so-called Stormy Daniels affair. In August 2018, Michael Cohen, Trump’s erstwhile “fixer,” pled guilty to federal crimes related to Trump’s case, although the federal charges differed, and importantly so, as they included two federal campaign finance violations. Today, Trump sat in court – and apparently nodded off – during day two of jury selection, which may take quite some time, consensus opinion is two weeks. Once the jury is impanelled, it’s off to the races with opening statements.
Due to confused and confusing media coverage, many misunderstand the resulting consensus media observation that this trial is primarily about simply falsifying business records related to a payoff to Stormy Daniels. This is why, I believe, so many believe the case is based on minor charges. Some ask, “So what, that he falsified records about a porn star payoff? “Where’s the huge crime that justifies indicting a former president so slight a matter?” The media reporting causes those questions to be not altogether ill-informed.
Confusion at Its Source
So, first, let’s attack confusion, and begin by looking at the New York statutes that underlie all 34 criminal charges. [All emphases added] (The two provisions below are from the New York Penal Laws and are set out in slightly different color blocks for reasons that will be clear later in this posting.)
§ 175.10 Falsifying business records in the first degree. A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the first degree when he commits the crime of falsifying business records in the second degree, and when his intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.
Falsifying business records in the first degree is a class E felony.
§ 175.05 Falsifying business records in the second degree. A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the second degree when, with intent to defraud, he: 1. Makes or causes a false entry in the business records of an enterprise; or 2. Alters, erases, obliterates, deletes, removes or destroys a true entry in the business records of an enterprise; or 3. Omits to make a true entry in the business records of an enterprise in violation of a duty to do so which he knows to be imposed upon him by law or by the nature of his position; or 4. Prevents the making of a true entry or causes the omission thereof in the business records of an enterprise.
Falsifying business records in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor.
Note that the grand jury indictment [See full text] that led to this trial alleged that Trump violated the first of the statutes listed above, NY Penal L § 175.10 (2022), the felony. Nowhere in the indictment was the second above listed misdemeanor statute mentioned, NY Penal L § 175.05 (2022). However, the possible interaction between these two provisions – felony vs. misdemeanor – has caused most of the confusion noted in the introductory section. And as you’ll see, it can be confusing, but not so much as the media has unfortunately made it, at times, appear.
Hopefully Not Making This More Confusing . . .
Section 175.10, in clause one provides: “A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the first degree when he commits the crime of falsifying business records in the second degree . . .” Note that § 175.10, which sets out a felony, references the text of § 175.05, the misdemeanor provision whose full text is set out above in the second colored block. So, consequently, to convict a defendant of the felony (§ 175.10), the prosecution must prove, by necessity, for any of the 34 charges against Trump, at least one of the four misdemeanor elements of § 175.05. And that’s just for starters. (The Statement of Facts [See full text] which was issued by the prosecution at the time of the indictment one-year sets out facts that rely mostly upon documentary evidence that should prove adequate to the first task under § 175.05, the misdemeanor which he is not directly charged with violating, which as we’ll see in a future posting as I watch court action as the issues develop over the week ahead.
Stay tuned for Trump Hush Money Trial Coverage, No. 02.
“[N]o one inside the intelligence community is thrilled about briefing a person who is under indictment for mishandling classified information.” Ken Dilanian, MSNBC, Chris Jansing Reports, March 8, 2024
And That’s an Understatement for the Ages, Mr. Dilanian
Since 1952, presidential candidates have received intel briefings and Trump’s are about to begin. Among the charges against the presumptive GOP-MAGA candidate in the so-called documents case is violating, not only the Presidential Records Act, but the Espionage Act. These intel briefings have never been provided to a candidate of either party who has been so clearly unworthy, and despite the tradition, Trump ought not be anywhere close to classified information.* At the least, if at all, he should be barred from intel briefings until he is the official GOP-MAGA candidate following the nomination convention when he will be the official party candidate, and that privilege I would only grudgingly allow.
* In fact, President Biden, in February 2021, barred Trump from receiving the intelligence briefings traditionally permitted for former presidents.
Trump will not be barred because of the established tradition, not for any statutory command to deliver these briefings. Tradition, though, has its limitations. In the case of the galactically irresponsible Trump. this tradition is unrelated to the danger involved in regard Trump who has his own tradition, that of oten revealing, at his pleasure, significant national security secrets. He has no compunctions whatever and appears to enjoy spilling the classified intelligence beans to anyone he hopes to impress. One of his obvious mega-flaws is a need to be both liked and to be viewed as a person in the know, a dangerous person in any position of importance.
Here are some of the known instances where he offered up secret intel during his presidency and after like M&Ms on Halloween night:
Early in his term, he divulged to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador, intel about an Islamic State plot. “A Middle Eastern ally that closely guards its own secrets provided the information, which was considered so sensitive that American officials did not share it widely within the United States government or pass it on to other allies.”
During Christmas season 2018, Trump visited Iraq’s Al Asad Airbase where he posted video on Twitter of several members of Seal Team Five in their camouflage and night-vision goggles, which, however, revealed their location and un-blurred faces.
In August 2019, he learned in a classified briefing about an explosion at a space launch facility in Iran. He insisted on posting it on Twitter, but was strongly urged to not do so for national security reasons. He did so anyway, telling reporters “We had a photo and I released it, which I have the absolute right to do.” This incident also led to one of Trump’s more infamous and uninformed quotes, to intel staff, “I have declassification authority. I can do anything I want.”
In 2023, then as citizen Trump, revealed to an Australian billionaire, Anthony Pratt, classified intel about American submarines, including nuclear warhead inventory and how closely they could maneuver to Russian submarines.
And these, serious enough, are just the national security failures that are known. It’s not hard to imagine what else he revealed in office, or out. Proving criminal responsibility is now Special Prosecutor Jack Smith’s job, yet the consistent Trump-caused delays in the documents case, often enabled by presiding Judge Aileen Cannon, may prevent a trial prior to the election. In fact, it’s becoming almost inevitable that voters will be denied knowing whether Trump has violated, with apparent impunity, many provisions of the Presidential Records Act and the Espionage Act.
So, Here’s an Idea! Let’s Freeze Him Out of National Security Briefings
Fortunately, presidential candidate briefings are not as complete and informative as briefings that President Biden receives. An ABC News article point out, candidate Trump would “receive an initial briefing from the office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and . . . can ask for a follow-up briefing on any topic. . . In the past, candidates have received no more than three briefings. This election season, [Trump] is expected to have two or three. The briefings become much more frequent and detailed once a candidate becomes the president-elect.” Nevertheless, Trump’s record does not qualify him to receive a single briefing.
As noted, he’s consistently revealed sensitive and top secret information. It’s a certainty that citizen Trump could not now obtain a security clearance. He’s a known national security threat. His financial needs for legal fees make him a candidate for any foreign power to manipulate in order to access, on the sly, national security information. Furthermore, he has not indicated that he even understands the need for secrecy in these matters or that he intends to act differently in the future. Psychologically, he has no compunctions about asserting himself, and does not think that the office of the presidency places any limits on his personal powers. He has a mind for espionage and would be an easy mark. A security clearance would be out of the question even though the candidate briefing tradition does not require one, a practice that needs to be modified.
Moreover, he held this classified information in secret at his Mar A Lago and Westminster New Jersey homes in violation of the Presidential Records Act (PRA). Shockingly, he’s spoken of the PRA as having allowed him to take anything he wants. In plain words, the PRA forbids what Trump believes it permits. Attorney Joyce Vance recently wrote, “Trump insists he designated the documents as personal records under the PRA so his possession of them was authorised and he can’t be prosecuted for it. But he’s never been able to explain how the PRA trumps laws about handling classified and national defence [information]. It doesn’t.” In other words, the PRA does allow certain personal records to be retained by an outgoing president, like note for a memoir. As the National Archives explains:
“In 1978, Congress passed the Presidential Records Act (PRA), which states that any records created or received by the President as part of his constitutional, statutory, or ceremonial duties are the property of the United States government and will be managed by NARA at the end of the administration. The Presidential Records Act (PRA) changed the legal status of Presidential and Vice Presidential materials. Under the PRA, the official records of the President and his staff are owned by the United States, not by the President.” Emphasis in original.
Trump’s admitted openly to taking highly secret documents from the White House. He also has a track record of sharing national security information with others. The tradition allowing national security briefings for candidates must bow before a person so manifestly unreliable, dishonest, and irresponsible as Donald Trump. He must be denied intelligence briefings until, God forbid, he’s President-Elect. Perhaps President Biden will make it so as he did in the matter of briefings for former presidents.
On tonight’s Jenn Psaki’s show, I just heard Nancy Pelosi speak about Trump’s recent Putin-related comments:
Seemingly inviting Russia to invade NATO countries, i.e., those who “don’t pay their dues,” and saying he’d let Russia do “anything they wanted to them,” and
His lack of quick response to Russian activist Alexei Navalny’s death due to “unspecified reasons” which Pelosi reckons was an assassination. Then his belated comments, three days after his collapse in a Russian prison, was his usual self-serving attempt to equate Navalny’s death with his own legal problems:
“The sudden death of Alexei Navalny has made me more and more aware of what is happening in our country,” Trump posted on his Truth Social network. The former US president and presumptive Republican White House nominee added: “It is a slow, steady progression, with CROOKED, Radical Left Politicians, Prosecutors, and Judges leading us down a path to destruction.”
Pelosi, as is true of most everyone, stipulates that “Putin has something on Trump.” After reciting that mantra since 2016, I think there’s another explanation: Trump is simply being Trump. It’s no secret about his “bromances” with nearly all world authoritarian leaders. For example, why don’t we wonder “what does Hungary’s Viktor Orbán have on Trump?” Or, “what does Kim Jong Un have on Trump?” All this is not completely irrelevant, but, I believe, only partially true, if at all.
Trump doesn’t need any authoritarian to have something on him. He’s simply an unapologetic authoritarian personality, dyed in the wool at his monstrous father’s directions and via Roy Cohn, a verifiable monster. It’s baked in; Trump is dictator simpatico. He has, as well, survived and thrived despite serious legal, media, and political attacks for decades, emboldening him beyond all concern about his omnipotence. He’s likely always admired those who exercised unquestioned dominance over individuals, industries, and countries. So, of course, he admires Putin. He has no control over himself, in everything that makes a person human, he’s so close to his authoritarian dream and life force, presently leading the GOP, not like a dictator but as a dictator. Next in his sights is our country in full, so mammoth is his evil.
Being humans, we try en masse, I think, to bring some gestalt to the chaos Trump has caused and will continue to accelerate as the election cycle grinds on. We still, after nearly eight years of Trump’s historically rapacious performance as the first truly psychopathic American president, are shocked. At times I startle at the thought that, yes, Donald Trump, was president, and, shockingly, appears at least in light of his apparent omnipotence, to have a path to another four years of destruction. But this is no standard nightmare from which I, or we, can hope to awaken, relieved that it was just a dream. Wondering and wasting time wailing at the wailing wall will not cause Trump and his crowd to magically disappear. We must snap out of it, and very soon begin to fight without apology, if not without fear.
Once again we enter the one-year countdown until our next presidential election, and, as always, this is a crucial one. Trite as that observation may be, trite is not always wrong. At 74, I’m old enough to recall the 1959 election and every one since. Each of those was labeled crucial by many. Yet, “crucial” is a moveable feast: what were the perceived stakes then, in each presidential election? In hindsight, FDR’s election in 1932 was crucial for the nation. Abraham Lincoln, elected in 1860, became crucial for the Union of the States. George Washington, elected to serve in 1789 was a crucial election, perhaps most importantly because he refused to accept the mantle of king, and calmly retired to Mount Vernon.
Mostly and realistically, the crucialness of an election is a post facto consensus. For one example among many, especially during the conservative resurgence since 1980, people still argue, for instance, that Herbert Hoover’s laissez faire policies would have brought us out of the depression more swiftly and satisfactorily. Liberals see Ronald Reagan’s two terms as a wrecking ball to all we believe in; conservatives sanctify him, calling his elections crucial to the birthing of the Tea Party and the MAGA movement. We need not talk about Nixon, he was always obvious.
The point is that we ought to belay the crucialness game. It’s hindsight alone that generally makes the case whether the previous election was crucial. On the whole, most presidential elections have had but a modicum of cruciality. In hindsight, few presidencies threatened to utterly unhinge our governmental and constitutional foundations, although admittedly, FDR gave many a Republican a scare during that worldwide period of enthusiasm for socialism, ever more an honest threat then to many in the gilded class than now. Nixon frightened the Democratic party into an uncharacteristically fighting stance. The Bush-Cheney alliance accelerated the decimation of even the concept of truth.
Belay Waiting for Hindsight
And then there was Trump. Among the despicable and degenerate presidencies, his was the worst we’ve faced as a nation, and we barely survived him. Pardon me if I don’t waste time demonstrating that he swung a wrecking ball to all we hold dear. And far from just retiring to Mar-A-Lago, like Washington did to Mount Vernon, he is now more than ever before front and center, bringing fear and trembling to the majority of Americans, from old-fashioned conservatives to card-carrying socialists. Despite his very real legal jeopardy in courtrooms throughout the land, he confidently speaks openly about his policies for his next attack on his own country: martial law using armed services troops on our soil; presidentially ordered selective prosecutions; destruction of the civil service system; frightening cabinet picks; wildly disturbing pardons; historical revision. What else? Do we need mention the whole that would likely be worse than its parts?
As a looming dictatorship of the Kleptocrats, i.e., government by thieves, Trump’s enabler’s plan to steal not only wealth in all its material forms, but moral, intellectual, and cultural wealth. Moreover, they plan – are already planning – to use our legal, electoral, and constitutional systems to do so, and in so doing, to destroy those systems and install authoritarian rule, in a way they will maintain was “lawful.” And by and large, the opposition, particularly the moribund and reticent Democratic party, treats this election surprisingly lightly, as if an historically unprecedented malevolent threat were simply another presidential election. This despite Trump’s first term presidential record of abuse at every turn.
We don’t need to wonder if this election is crucial. No waiting for hindsight is required. Drop the debate about it. Use time, especially air time, more productively. We’ve already witnessed Trump and company at work; they openly showed their cards to the entire nation. He earned two impeachments, 90 some odd criminal charges for actions he feels entitled to, and near universal disdain here and abroad for using the nuclear option against our electoral college, and his own Vice President. If this was the warm-up act, imagine the main event. Despite my admission that hindsight plays an important role in labeling presidential elections crucial, we don’t need hindsight to label this election crucial.
We’ve been to the circus and we saw the elephants.
In a stunning move, former Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows has accepted an immunity from prosecution deal from Jack Smith, the chief prosecutor for the January 6th case, ABC News reported just minutes ago. Meadows’ role in the attempt to steal the 2020 election and in the January 6th insurrection was at the highest level since he had daily contact with Trump and coordinated plans and actions with other accused co-conspirators. As you’ll see in the ABC News article cited above, Trump will have great difficulty claiming that he “barely knew” Mr. Meadows. . . but this has not deterred him before; nevertheless, perhaps the gag order will.
