The Trump indictment by Jack Smith is a watershed event
We’ve known for quite some time that it was coming. And yet – I don’t know about you, but for me the fact that the shoe finally dropped has nevertheless been profoundly shocking and disturbing. That’s why I’ve written so much about it, and plan to write a great deal more about it.
Regular readers here know my history with Trump. During the 2016 campaign I very much distrusted him and did not want him to become the nominee, in part because I thought he would lose against a candidate – Hillary Clinton – who seemed very beatable. But then he won, I paid attention to his actual presidency, and I was mostly pleased with what he did as president and made that quite clear. At the same time, I was outraged at the unrelenting assault mounted by the left on his presidency, his legitimacy as a president, and on anyone who would work with him or support him. Trump’s enemies wrapped themselves in the mantle of righteousness, with a form of stolen valor from WWII by calling themselves the Resistance. And of course, by inference, Trump was the Nazi.
Now they continue to wrap themselves in that mantle as they use the tactics of tyrannical regimes around the world to indict Trump in a venue where the deck is stacked against him, in the continued aim to destroy by lawfare what they could not destroy in 2016. That destruction is not just of Trump as a person, of the lawyers who advised him (the as-yet-unindicted co-conspirators), but of his supporters and anyone who might work for him in the future. The left goes after Trump this way, realizing that half of America wants him back in office and agrees with him for the most part, and huge numbers of Americans think the 2020 was either outright fraudulent or at least unfairly rigged. It is a big F-you to those Americans. And worse, it’s a big warning, as was the prosecution/persecution of the J6 defendants: cross us, and we’ll destroy you, too.
The media has prepared the way, and continues to do their bidding, so that many people are truly unaware of what this means for America. The left counts on the ignorance of those people, their indoctrination, and most of all their lack of knowledge about how the safeguards in the American legal system are meant to work.
Sorry to be such a downer.
A bit more upbeat is this interview with one of Trump’s lawyers. Also, see this from Alan Dershowitz and this from Jonathan Turley.
I believe the problem is that all these niceties of law will mean nothing to the DC judge and jury trying Trump, just as they mean nothing to most of Trump’s enemies. They use them when they see they might benefit from them, and discard them when they don’t.
After reading this post I immediately went over to CNN, MSNBC etc… nothing at all about any of the Biden corruption. Until, and if ever, the state run media is destroyed, 50+% of our fellow citizens will continue to support this. Even if they are motivated by their raging hatred of Trump, at least they could see how bad the Biden crime family is also. The state control of the media is the keystone. I don’t know how we can remove it so the arch starts to fall.
physicsguy:
Thing is, it’s not even “state control.” It’s voluntary ideological alignment and at this point an entrenched elite devoted to the Cause and to censorship. Perhaps government threats and coercion are involved too, I suppose.
Eventually, somebody we know will say, “I don’t care, just as long as they get Trump.”
To which we might reply that they have forfeited any call for justice and equity if they get crosswise with the law no matter the issue, no matter how far into the future. Any calls will be met with mocking laughter.
Seventy percent of Republicans and somewhere near 40% of Democrats believe the election was stolen. Molly Ball even explained it in Time Magazine in 2021.
A second odd thing happened amid Trump’s attempts to reverse the result: corporate America turned on him. Hundreds of major business leaders, many of whom had backed Trump’s candidacy and supported his policies, called on him to concede. To the President, something felt amiss. “It was all very, very strange,” Trump said on Dec. 2. “Within days after the election, we witnessed an orchestrated effort to anoint the winner, even while many key states were still being counted.”
In a way, Trump was right.
We all know what happened if not exactly how.
The fury directed at anyone who questions the result is a “Tell.”
The Military Industrial Complex got him.
Lawfare is legal, hence the name, and if Republicans also won’t use it where and when they can, then it will continue to intensify and in a few years dissent from Leftism will be actually illegal, and it would make sense now to start preparing to live in that environment.
I think it’s pretty obvious that the choices are:
a) retaliate with lawfare in kind,
b) fight back illegally and possible violently,
c) surrender.
If others here don’t think it’s obvious yet that these are the three choices, then maybe a few dozen or hundred more Republican politicians in jail will help. There’s quite a few making their way through the courts right now, we won’t have to wait long. For example, they’re still trying to convict Rick Perry for “threatening to veto $7.5 million for the state public integrity unit run by the Travis County district attorney’s office and trying to push District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg to leave office after a drunken-driving conviction” back in 2014.
What you’re seeing in the big media is the tip of the iceberg.
Richard Aubtry:
“I don’t care” would be a tacit acknowledgment that there might be something not-so-legal about all of this. I believe the vast vast majority of people who support what’s happening have also convinced themselves that it’s not only perfectly okay in terms of our legal system but actually required by it. So they wouldn’t be saying “I don’t care.”
Bush 41’s election in 1988 was the last time the Democrats did not question the legitimacy of the vote. Kinda hard to do that when it’s a 40 state blowout.
I myself found it disturbing as well, but I was not shocked or surprised by it. I have become somewhat enured to this regime’s ceaseless lawfare against Trump and his supporters and allies. I doubt that I’m capable of anything like suprise when it comes to the depths that the current “Justice” Department will sink too, or the lengths that the media will go to in its absurd attempts to justify such lawless depravations while simultaneously suppressing any and all discussion if the far greater villainy of first family.
I fully expect Trump will ultimately be convicted in a corrupt DC court by a stupid and hateful DC jury. I’m past expecting anything good or tolerable to occur. The Democrats are incapable of shame, and unfortunately seems to extend to their voters.
After the LeftProgs destroy the ‘Rule of Law’ they certainly should welcome the ensuing anarchy, where none of us will consider that there are any ‘laws’ which we should obey, but only power centers to avoid. Are they all prepared to live in their castles?
The “Military Industrial Complex” got him. That leaves out the complicity of the Medical Establishment (CDC, FDA, etc. during the Covid19 madness). Leaves out the complicity of the Intelligence Community. Leaves out the complicity of the media. Leaves out the complicity of the civil service (bureaucracy). Leaves out the complicity of teacher unions. Leaves out a few others?
Yep the Military Industrial complex; it’s sort of like the main tool of the Spanish Inquisitiors (see Monty Python).
More like a mob of interests united by the leftist mantra; the ends justify the means.
It’s all straight out of Langley.
OM –
I have remarked elsewhere (maybe here too) that the best way to understand the Fed Gov is to see it as a group of mafia crime families. They each have their own area of specialization, compete with each other from time to time, and act together when they see it as necessary to protect the interests of the mob in general.
Garland way out in front for title “Weasel of the Year”.
They successfully get DJT with this Kangaroo Court they won’t stop.
First Trump cohorts will get drug into Court but it could get quickly to anyone against their power.
It always seems to me that so many people think this because they figure “I’m on the right side of things so it’ll never come back to bite me in the rear.” Of course this is so incredibly historically illiterate. You might be on “the right side” but are you a member of the right faction of the right side? It’d be like being in europe in the 1500 and thinking “Do whatever you want to the jews because I’m christian” and then getting persecuted yourself because you’re catholic and your area is protestant.(Or being shia in a sunni area, being a Leninite after Stalin took over, or the french revolution, etc etc.)
Sarge, yer givin’ the mafia a bad name…
(Fortunately, they’re more forgiving than the Democatic Party….)
neo
I suspect, then, that people who, faced with the legality issues and not understanding them, will say, “I don’t care,” as a way of getting out of the discussion.
However, whether they actually would prefer an illegal act to “get” Trump if the legal way won’t, or if they just don’t follow the discussion, “I don’t care,” has an explicit meaning. Hence the response. And as to the folks I know who might say it, given their passions on other lefty causes, the first interpretation would likely be correct.
Now, “I don’t care,” might be applied to a detail as in whether what Trump was waving around was actually classified in its contents, or if its very existence was classified, and if it makes a difference if he showed the details to people or only demonstrated its existence.
They may insist that the FBI’s footage of piles of boxes means something. Some are dumb enough to believe it… because they WANT to believe it and there is no way reality will be allowed to intrude.
Or…whatever other thing Trump did which, should someone else have done it would not be charged, is proof of a terrible crime.
Whatever the case, the forfeiture stands.
I wasn’t surprised. I was raised in Chicago. It’s the same, corrupt machine politics that city has functioned under for nearly 100 years. It was already in DC and many other cities locally and it was an easy transition to the national level under Obama.
It was primarily Democrat machine politics until the rise of Jesse Jackson and Operation P.U.S.H. in the ’70s, when the racial component was added.
The only way to slay this hydra is to starve it of money. Very difficult to do, but not impossible. We live in a very unstable political era in the U.S. and I don’t see it stabilizing soon.
Naomi Wolfe’s Substack article is interesting:
https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/happy-indictment-day?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2
She seems to be getting mugged by reality.
Her being declared a non-person by the Left coming in 4… 3… 2…
I forgot the AMA, and other “professional nonpartisan organizations,” now part of the mob.
Glenn Greenwald on Twitter
@ggreenwald
·
2h
Politics is fun and easy when you start by announcing that all your political adversaries are Nazis, racists and fascists and then work backward from that premise.
Sitting around all day calling everyone “racist” is also personally rewarding: it’s how others know you’re not.
—–
Greenwald is beginning to get it. He’s thinking like Krauthammer. Nazi, racist, fascist are just a compilation of some of the more fun ways of saying “evil”.
He also seems to be moving to my point that the more they hate, the more morally superior they consider themselves.
greenwald is a lefty like dos passos was, perhaps emma goldman, the anarchist who still spoke out against Soviet terror,
I have had the experience of trying to tell people about the mounting evidence of Biden corruption, but having them tell me that such is impossible. The reasons cited were:
1. No mention of the scandals in traditional (non-Fox) media.
2. Conditioning to assume Democrat honesty and Trump dishonesty.
I have come to the conclusion that no amount of pro-Trump argument will work. I do believe that if Biden corruption can be shown, it may allow people to consider that perhaps the Trump collusion narrative was also born of corruption.
Thus I think the only answer is an impeachment inquiry on Joe Biden. In addition, Trump and all Republicans must switch to a 100% Biden corruption message and forget any talk of the stolen 2020 election – it is a waste of time and actually impedes communications.
My basic tactical advice is to give the media nothing else to talk about except Biden corruption. If they ask about Trump indictments, talk Biden money laundering. If they ask about gun control, talk Biden money laundering. If they ask about abortion, talk Biden money laundering! Starve the media beast until they talk Biden money laundering!!
When the banking transactions come out, hopefully they will be cornered.
“I believe the problem is that all these niceties of law will mean nothing to the DC judge and jury trying Trump, just as they mean nothing to most of Trump’s enemies,….” And here’s your mental block. They are not “niceties”. They are the foundation of freedom and Natural Rights. You are faced with a Force Majeure. A Black Swan. A group is attempting to enslave you. What will you do?
JackWayne:
You completely fail to understand my sarcasm.
Ray van Dune takes what I mentioned initially and provides a way to remove that “keystone”. Will the GOP do it? Of course not. The Ds are playing for blood. They took BHOs advice to bring a gun to a knife fight. The GOP is using a rubber knife from an action figure costume.
The problem is wrapping one’s self in partisan politics to the point that anyone, and I mean anyone, that is not with you is the enemy … no … worse … evil.
I’ve experienced it. I’ve had a close family member, Democrat, tell me I should be in prison for supporting Trump.
I’ve been Democrat and Republican and now agnostic, I used that word purposely. I come from strong Southern Democrat routes. My uncle, a WWII and Korean Marine veteran, was a strong Democrat civil rights/union leader in North Texas. What may be considered ironic, but not really if you take into account his free speech views and at the same time his anathema to racism, he wanted me to watch the truly racist film “Birth of a Nation.” I feel it was a test to see if I was racist. Yes, I did watch it.
When I went to a state university in North Texas, I switched from liberal Democrat to conservative Republican. This was in the early 1990s.
I fully supported W as governor and then President. I was in a the US Navy Reserves in the 1990s and after 9-11. I have medals from both eras.
I am saying this because in some ways I am like Trump, once Dem then Repub. Now, I see the crap of both parties.
Yes, this is a watershed event, but I feel W’s Patriot Act is the penultimate event. It lead to Obama’s actions in making the United States government a political weapon.
“Trump’s enemies wrapped themselves in the mantle of righteousness,”
Funny you should say that. When Cyrus Vance was DA in NY, he hired two pricey NY lawyers to get something on Trump and one of the lawyers said that it was righteous. These Trump haters could give lessons in self-righteousness to the Pharisee in the parable.
When nation-states embrace injustice and tyranny…it always ends the same. From just about 2600 years ago:
“From childhood we have watched as everything our ancestors worked for —their flocks and herds, their sons and daughters — was squandered on a delusion.” – Jeremiah 3:24
Seems about right to me. YMMV
BACK TO RETOOL my New Civil War warning shot, a T-shirt slogan. TexasDude writes:
“I’ve had a close family member, Democrat, tell me I should be in prison for supporting Trump.”
Tell your relative that I think he ought to get shot.
T-shirt reads “KILL MORE [Dem Party symbol inserted here] President LINCOLN DIDN’T SHOOT ENOUGH SLAVE-DRIVING TYRANTS”.
THAT means his get his attention to self-reflect.
But “What if we’re the baddies” NYTimes Brook piece has gotten weekend long meme workout.
It needs to be deployed at Trump rallies– But “What if we’re the baddies?” — NYTimes.
It’s a first-rate taunt for social celebrations, and it easily segues into my declarative denunciation because our reply is obviously “Of course you’re the baddies” Banana Republic Baddies!
–“SLAVE DRIVING TYRANT” Baddies.
Is TJ impersonating a FBI confidential source/agent provocateur? 🙂
There is no reason to be “A bit more upbeat”. The trials and the ’24 election will be the defining moment for the country for the next 100 years or more. A Dem sweep will mean a packed court, an all-powerful administrative state, DC and Puerto Rico a State, Unlimited mail-in ballots with no ID (and throw in internet voting as a possibility) and a completely open border with a 1 year wait for full citizenship.
We are in the third most precarious times for the country after the Civil War and the Great Depression. It will take fearless people to overcome the Democrat evil.
“worse, it’s a big warning, as was the prosecution/persecution of the J6 defendants: cross us, and we’ll destroy you, too.” neo
Eliminate the rule of law, make crystal clear that the choice offered is truly between serfdom or having their lives destroyed… and you leave but one alternative to those ‘choices’… be prepared to destroy them when they take action to destroy you.
“So much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire, by people who don’t even know that fire is hot.” George Orwell
I have a very good friend in his late 80’s and he was part of the Republican leadership in Midland, Texas in the 1970’s, a geologist at the time and later he became a financial advisor until he retired about six years ago. A smart sharp old guy who could not bring himself to vote for Trump the first time because of Trumps financial history, later when Trump was elected he appreciated some of the things Trump did however Trump’s inability to shut his mouth and play a smart long game within the party annoyed my friend a lot.
Trump did a fine job of working the audience and then he did a terrible job of trying to win the audience over when the opposition within the government started tearing him apart. Trump held the cards to fire the head of the FBI and lots of others however Trump ignored his lawyers and kept trying to win a game of words and wits without understanding how you build a government bringing along strong leaders of his party in both houses, rebuilding bridges he had burned on his way to office. The office of president is not a part of a TV show where wit is more important than wisdom. I give Trump a grade of D for the way he ran his term as the leader of the nation and ended up having the silly January 6th gathering that the opposition used as a made for TV event of the attempt to overthrow the government, as I told my conservative son the week before January 6th, “What in the world does he think he can do and this will not end well.” and thus it did not end well for so many people.
Having said all of that I think Trump did a good job with putting some decent Judges on the Supreme Court, that was my only reason for voting for him in the first place and now I wish he had just settled back into retirement instead of becoming the Joker in the deck of cards, a wild card that can have unexpected consequences. I know he draws a big crowd but I also know we have some devious folk who turn out to riot and burn down cities without any consequences and that reminds me of Germany in the 1920’s which should and never ever could happen here, or maybe not.
I am a bit afraid that Humpty Dumpty fell off of the wall and all the King’s Soldiers and all the King’s men could never put Humpty Dumpty together again. Kind of like the fools who are willing to break a few eggs to make an omelette. We are probably already living in different times with a strange shift in power and consequences, that has happened in the past and we have no idea how to deal with a real breakdown in a nation.
My Grandparents were both born right after the Civil War in the 1860’s, my great grandfather was born in 1820 and they had family stories about living in Missouri and Arkansas during Reconstruction which was difficult. My mother’s mom live in our town when I was growing up and she had marched for women’s rights and never missed a chance to vote. She also cashed her Social Security check the day she received, went through town and payed her bills because she did not trust banks or the government, so there’s that.
By the way, her family did own slaves in Virginia going back to the 1720’s and when her family moved to Missouri they took slaves with them before the civil war and even today there are nice black people in Missouri with the same last name, so there’s that. It’s complicated and the racial venom that Obama and his handlers have released on our nation is terrible.
We need a younger President with a good message to bring this nation back together and at this time I don’t see that happening. I would vote for the person and not the party which I have done in the past when I was a Democrat and voted for Nixon who got us out of Nam when I was in the Army voting form overseas. Later I voted for Carter who I thought was a smart man who could do some real good and boy was I fooled by that Cracker Leftist who set out nation back a whole lot.
I have no idea how this current situation will play out, I read a lot of history and I know what happens when things go south and at this time I am glad I live in a small town in Texas. We do have a lot of ex military living here, not far from San Antonio, and at this time we do vote conservative in this part of Texas; perhaps some day we will have to become an independent nation again, I hope not because that would also be a terrible situation for this wonderful country I love.
I am in my late 70’s and surely in this fine nation there are some decent younger strong leaders to step in and start working together to bring us back together before the other commie nations of the world take advantage of us and try to fulfill their destinies, they seem to be buying their way into that fulfillment every day.
We’ve got ’em just where we want ’em. 🙂
Let me explain.
They are overplaying their hand. They are out in the open. This Jan. 6th charge is going to allow Trump’s legal team to bring in all the election fraud evidence. The trial won’t allow cameras, but they can’t keep reporters out. Someone like Jonathan Turley or Andrew McCarthy can bring expert opinion to bear on the court proceedings and report it out. The Jack Smith theory of this case is ludicrous and will be shown to be just that in trial. I believe Trump’s opinion about election fraud will be clearly shown to be justified.
Trump will eventually be vindicated even if it’s by a pardon from the Supremes.
Will Trump be able to campaign? Of course. He can begin his speeches by saying he’s under order to not talk about his trial. Being a law-abiding man, he will instead talk about the crimes and criminal policies of Joe Biden and his son Hunter. He will then talk about what he will do to change those ruinous policies and Make America Great Again. A winning message, IMO
During the primaries, though Trump can’t talk about his case, the other candidates can. And nothing makes a better case for changing the management in D.C. than the injustices of the Biden DOJ against Donald Trump and in favor of none other than Humper Biden. (Thanks to om for that nickname.)
If Trump doesn’t win the nomination, we have several good candidates that I think can win the general. A DeSantis/Ramaswamy ticket would be my idea of a powerhouse. DeSantis has the political experience on the ground in D.C. Ramaswamy brings the energy and ideas of an outsider and businessman. What’s not to like?
These are the times that try men’s souls. But I’m trying to see sunshine where others see gloom and doom. Buck up mates. It’s a long time to the 2024 election. God looks after drunks and the USA. 🙂
Yep, although it would be illegal and immoral, the best thing that judge could do would be to force Trump to shut up about 2020 and start shouting about 2024!
@ Lee Also > Thanks for linking Naomi Wolf’s recent post on the indictment.
She was pickpocketed by reality some time ago, the mugging that followed was not gentle then, but seems to be full-on battery now.
The Left dropped her some time ago as well, but she jumped to the Mugged-Democrat cohort on Substack.
https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/dear-conservatives-i-am-sorry
Dear Conservatives, I Apologize
My “Team” was Taken in By Full-Spectrum Propaganda
DR NAOMI WOLF
MAR 9, 2023
https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/dear-friends-sorry-to-announce-a
It’s Really True: They Know they are Killing the Babies
DR NAOMI WOLF
MAY 29, 2022
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naomi_Wolf
“Naomi Rebekah Wolf (born November 12, 1962) is an American feminist author, journalist and conspiracy theorist”
(I am documenting, not affirming Wolf’s work either way; she’s been accused of all sorts of mis- and malinformation, and Wikipedia is a biased publisher. YMMV. However, critics are correct to point out that Dr. West is a courtesy title for her literature Ph.D. — similar to Dr. Jill’s; they don’t point that out, of course.)
OldTexan,
From your keyboard to God’s ears.
“Don’t let it be forgot
That once there was a spot
For one brief shining moment that was known
As Camelot.”
where to begin to unpack, trump didn’t realize how many tripwires obama had set, neither did we, the danchenko fraud which precipitated fisa, he wanted to focus on first closing the border, to terrorists from 6 countries, well we know now the Uniparty wants all 150 to flood the country, they want our manufacturing destroyed, they don’t care about al Queda, they never really did, or particularly the Islamist foundation behind them, they just wanted a generation of America’s finest to keep dying, in nasty sand boxes, for the good of Iran, they want the end of independent energy, they want to starve and freeze and alternately boil, these are the people who they endorsed, time and again,
I don’t even dignify january 6th with that title, 100 cities burned and there was scarce any concern, from these retromingent jackasses, court houses were mortared for 90 days, hundreds of thousands were killed by fauci’s magic brew,
Aesop —
I checked out the editing history of that “conspiracy theorist” and it first appeared in June of this year. And it’s been going back and forth several times since then. Someone edited it out at one point with the comment, “Seriously, why burn Wikipedia’s credibility to the ground with “conspiracy theorist” allegations for everyone you don’t like? It’s Wikipedia suicide. Please stop.)” The placement of it before the footnotes implies that the source material supports the claim. But they are the same footnotes without “conspiracy theorist.”
I think Wikipedia’s “credibility” crashed and burned a loooooooong time ago.
FWIW, a DPhil is more involved than an EdD (“Dr. Jill”) But I still think calling her Dr. Wolfe outside of ivy-covered university halls is gratuitous.
neo said: “I believe the problem is that all these niceties of law will mean nothing to the DC judge and jury trying Trump, just as they mean nothing to most of Trump’s enemies. They use them when they see they might benefit from them, and discard them when they don’t.”
Yes, but Smith has played his hand very well. His indictment has factual deficiencies and legal deficiencies. Factually, he will have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump knew that he had truly lost the election. On the record, to an objective observer, that would be very difficult. But here, the factual issues are going to be determined by a jury of 90% partisan Democrats in DC. I have almost no doubt that the DC jury will resolve the factual issues against Trump, regardless of the evidence. They will find that he knew that he lost. And once they do, it is very, very difficult to reverse a factual finding on appeal.
(There’s a Greek tragedy angle here about hubris and nemesis. Trump said he could get away with shooting someone on 5th Avenue. Now he’s in a situation where a DC jury is set to convict him despite the evidence.)
On the legal deficiencies, I think Smith is going to more or less dare the Supreme Court to reverse him. I predict a 5-4 decision upholding at least one conviction. Leftists will rejoice, per Naomi Wolf’s substack. Trumpers will be outraged. But a large portion of the populace will just be grateful that Trump is out of public life and won’t care too much that he was railroaded.
The primary fault for that situation will lie with leftists who care more about power than they do about the rights and traditions of our republic. A lot of fault will fall on the silent majority who are secretly happy that Trump is finally out of their lives. But frankly, a great deal of the fault will also fall on Trumpers. Yes, free speech, due process, and all of neo’s other “niceties” have to be upheld even for the most loathsome citizens or none of us really have them. But Trump stresses those rights in the extreme. The system guaranteeing our rights shouldn’t break down, but its not surprising that is has (and it will). Trying to put someone who behaves like Trump in political leadership is kind of like running your engine at the redline constantly. It shouldn’t blow up, but it’s not surprising when it does.
We are in a doom loop. And China is laughing.
when is the last time you saw common sense from a dc jury, in a political case, stevens (they had a trekkie as one of the alternates) the evidence didn’t exist, the chief witness was a pervy degenerate, alaskan version of epstein,) mcdonnell, libby,
lions, and tigers, and bears, oh my, they, the Uniparty
show me an example in the last 20 years, they have not rubberstamped a prog prosecutor, they didn’t try michael flynn but they did concoct a sham plea, then it took three years to unravel it, on the part of sydney powell
Profound. Preaching to the choir.
no just a simple recitation of facts, give me a counter example,
https://twitter.com/realtoriabrooke/status/1688728899973152768
How would a conviction remove Trump from public life?
while they are eating their bugs, and freezing in the dark, its the same play with navalny and khan and the target in malaysian grapevine,
nonapod – If Trump goes to jail, 2024 is his last election as a serious candidate.
miguel cervantes – Examples where the courts slapped down a progressive prosecutor – Chris Christie’s Bridgegate, Bob McDonnell.
I’ve been watching a French TV series, Paris Police 1900. I don’t especially like or enjoy it, but the ugly and sordid picture of France on the verge of civil war in 1899 was certainly striking. It made me wonder if Trump is our Dreyfus. Perhaps that’s not the best comparison, but it does seem like what we have is someone who the government decrees has to found guilty and therefore has to be guilty, whether or not he actually is guilty.
Naomi Wolf’s neighbor greeted her with “Happy Indictment Day.” Doubtless her Bay Area neighbors may feel that way. I wonder, though, if people in the real world are talking that much about all this. The Democrats and the media are making their point, and probably enough voters will believe them to prevent Trump from being elected, but maybe people themselves feel that the less said about all this the better. I certainly don’t notice the relish and excitement that so many people felt during Watergate.
om,
Do you ever actually contribute or only limit yourself to snarky comments about everyone else? Counting down..3..2…1 to the snarky, insulting comment to me.
To Frederick’s point at 3:00 p.m. yesterday – Kim Strassel suggests Obama’s declaring that the Senate in recess to illegally make recess appointments and Joe Biden’s purported “forgiveness” of student loans. She makes a pretty good case. Obama’s legal advisors almost certainly told him that he lacked the power to make recess appointments when the Senate wasn’t in recess. Under the Smith standard, that seems to be enough, even if a few legal crackpots were egging him on. Same with Biden’s student loan escapade. He knew it wasn’t legal. He did it anyway. It affected the operations of government.
I think even better cases could come from election shenanigans. Hillary Clinton’s campaign was using the Steele Dossier to try to flip Trump electors in 2016. Distinguish that from Trump’s antics. How about the signers and organizers of the laptop letter? That one might be a bit harder because the covered themselves with the “all the halmarks of Russian misinformation” weasel language, but it is the same deal.
If Smith succeeds in getting Trump on the J6 thing, it opens up a lot of opportunities for Republicans, with problems, however. First, the statue of limitations on a lot of this stuff may have already run, but that is a minor problem because I suspect that Dems are going to continue acting like Dems. Next, Republicans would have to control the DOJ, because Democrats will never bring these cases against their own. Finally, you would have to find a way to bring these cases outside of DC. As Durham demonstrated, DC juries just aren’t going to convict Democrats even if you have them dead-to-rights.
It occurs to me that the Trump J6 prosecution might end up kind of like Bush v. Gore. The courts might find a result that gets them through the case at hand, but that everyone understands to be effectively non-precedential. There are worse resolutions.
physicsguy:
Good morning to you too.
ee Cervantes stated obvious undisputed facts. Nothing. The choir knows these things. , but re
@Bauxite:To Frederick’s point at 3:00 p.m. yesterday
It’s even easier than that.
Did the official, or the official’s spouse, ever appear at an official event with a visible logo on their clothing?
Did the official ever use one of the powers of their office in a way that negatively impacted an official of the other party?
Did the official ever accept any gifts during a campaign?
Links go to Republicans victimized by lawfare in each of these circumstances.
that complaint came from perkins and coie, the subsequent enablers of fusion gps and crowdstrike, the first link, and william allen the man at the center of that tripe,
was the degenerate,
@Bauxite and Frederick, it’s a fun fantasy I guess. But I have doubts that such things will ever come to pass, even in the unlikely event that Republicans manage to take both the presidency and a majority in the Senate ever again.
@Nonapod:But I have doubts that such things will ever come to pass, even in the unlikely event that Republicans manage to take both the presidency and a majority in the Senate ever again.
Republicans don’t have to control these in order to successfully practice lawfare. In Texas, Travis County (where Austin is) indicts Republicans. Sarah Palin was driven out of office and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars defending complaints largely brought by a self-appointed watchdog (who was probably not acting alone).
All Republicans need is a venue from which to operate where they are dominant, and of course the will. Democrats don’t control Texas but they control Travis County and they can and do indict governors, senators, district attorneys, etc.
Lee Also on August 7, 2023 at 5:09 pm said:
Naomi Wolfe’s Substack article is interesting:
She’s been coming around for awhile.
It might even trace back to the interview she did when promoting her book claiming executions of gays was common. Only to find out during the interview she didn’t understand the term that was at the core of her claim. Her response wasn’t the usual lie and deflect of the left.
Frederick on August 7, 2023 at 3:00 pm said:
Lawfare is legal, hence the name, and if Republicans also won’t use it where and when they can, then it will continue to intensify and in a few years dissent from Leftism will be actually illegal . . .
The name doesn’t mean it’s legal. That’s a very superficial analysis.
It can potentially be legal, illegal or quasi-legal.
The left used lawfare to unconstitutionally alter election processes in key states in 2020. The result was in contradiction with the highest law of the land, and the fact courts were complicit doesn’t make it constitutional.
Jack Smith’s latest indictments of Trump could just as easily be used against Biden, or Blinken, or Garland, or Jack Smith himself. He’s using novel legal theories that he probably realizes is false, and simply amounts to “we have the power and we can try you!”.
Lawfare isn’t natural for the right, because the right is the side that upholds actual rule of law. If Trump wins in 2024 and turns the tables using the approach Biden is using against him, 1/2 the GOP would oppose it.
Frederick – For the reasons that we discussed the other day, I still think the right would fail, and likely fail miserably, if they try the sorts of things you suggest – i.e., filing frivilious and/or dishonest criminal charges or ethical complaints against Democrats.
On the other hand, if the Trump loses the J6 case, it sets a precedent that (i) an elected official; (ii) violates the fraud statutes; (iii) by influencing the operation of government based on information that the elected official knows to be false. Democrats will look ridiculous trying to argue that those elements are not met with respect to more than a few of their members.
@Bauxite:Democrats will look ridiculous trying to argue that those elements are not met with respect to more than a few of their members.
Who will make them look ridiculous, and to whom? What mass media organization is going to present the narrative that makes Dems look ridiculous? What social media is going to allow its users to spread a narrative that makes Dems look ridiculous? And the half of the country that doesn’t vote ballots for itself, will they be paying attention and even if so will it matter, since their ballots are voted for them by the Dems?
@Don:It can potentially be legal, illegal or quasi-legal…
The left used lawfare to unconstitutionally alter election processes in key states in 2020. The result was in contradiction with the highest law of the land, and the fact courts were complicit doesn’t make it constitutional.
If the courts don’t agree that it contradicted the Constitution, then as far as the legal system is concerned it didn’t. The legal system does not dispense truth or justice, it dispenses law, and how courts rule is part of law.
If the courts get to the wrong answer and won’t change it, the solution has to be found outside the legal system…
And you may not like it that a prosecutor in one Texas county can empanel grand juries until he gets the indictments he wants, and derail Republican political careers while the issues very slowly work through the courts at enormous expense, but that simply is not illegal. Unjust, unfair, wrong, yes, but perfectly legal.
Those laws will not be changed in a peaceful way unless they can be used against the people who are currently deriving enormous electoral benefit from them.
Frederick on August 8, 2023 at 5:48 pm said:
If the courts don’t agree that it contradicted the Constitution, then as far as the legal system is concerned it didn’t. The legal system does not dispense truth or justice, it dispenses law, and how courts rule is part of law.
Courts don’t create law in our system. When they create law or issue rulings outside the law they are replacing rule of law with rule of man (specifically rules imposed by the high priest class of judges).
they have been committing fraud for 23 years gore kerry hillary and their retinue of clowns, they have nudged the supreme court from the riots in 2020, to the non enforcements re threats to the Court, you think this is by accident,
Everybody has an opinion:
Maybe those laws will be changed peacefully or maybe not. The future is like that.
@Don:Courts don’t create law in our system
Never said they did. I said instead how courts rule is part of law. That’s because a ruling by one court can be a precedent used by other courts.