Special Counsel Jack Smith’s continuing investigation into the Mar-a-Lago documents case—what I call “NARA-Lago” as a hat tip to the National Archives and Records Administration—is starting to feel like a whodunnit mystery. Video footage with suspicious gaps. Boxes being moved in secret out of storage. Witnesses unwilling to talk. Shady foreign business dealings with piles of money at stake. Lawyers hauled before the grand jury.
I love it how Trump is demanding the return of documents that are "his". The very documents he claimed he didn't possess. "You know those documents I swore I didn't have? I want them back, they're mine."
Trump might not be smart enough to know what secrets are truly valuable, but foreign agents certainly are. And Trump is definitely not smart enough to understand the risk involved or how easy it would be to catch him. This is a guy who *still*, after 4 years, doesn't understand how NATO works. But he *was* able to understand that Putin wanted it weakened.
Trump is scared to death. He has been all of his life. As a friend who was installing artwork in his apartment said: "You could smell fear on him." The fact that he keeps demanding that he be the "president" tells me that he is totally unfit for office and doesn't care about this country because his demands are for him and him alone. I said in 2015 when he slithered down his golden staircase (because I know people who know him): "THIS IS A BAD IDEA!" No one listened. And here we are. And whether you realize it or not, this is costing ALL of us a fortune. I'm SO sick of him.
I applaud Jack Smith and his team for their effort. However, it remains tremendously frustrating that Trump is being treated differently from any other citizen. We all know - had it been any one of us, and had we been caught with so much as one folder of classified information, we would have been in the slammer already.
Heck, doesn't even have to be classified information - I work for a hospital system and handle patient records. If, at any point, I violated the patients' privacy by, say, printing their records and storing them in a file cabinet at home, I would be out of a job, fined, and possibly arrested, and my employer would be potentially facing a lawsuit with scads of financial and reputational damage involved. There would be no polite notes to my lawyers, trying to reason with me to behave and return the documents like a good girl.
I am beyond sick and tired of this obvious display of inequality, when it comes to people like Trump, Clarence Thomas, Elon Musk, etc. compared to the rest of us.
To the discussion on motives, I'd add that Trump very clearly doesn't recognize any sort of distinction between himself and whatever role he occupies in an organization. In his mind, it's all just him. The assets of the Trump Corporation? Those are his personal possessions. The Trump Foundation? That's the column on the financial spreadsheet that he's allocated to "charities". A hotel that's licensed the use of his name? His hotel. And so on and so forth. To me it seems like his whole refusal to give up the documents, alongside the ways in which he used and abused DoJ and other American institutions while in power, is all downstream of this fundamental personality trait that made him unable to recognize any sort of distinction between himself and the Presidency. It also explains his insane hostility to dissent - as the most recent nominee for President, he's "in charge" of the Republican party. Therefore, in his mind, Republicans are supposed to agree with whatever he says *by definition*, and any who don't are traitors and/or fakes. See also voters, American citizens.
Jay, you said, "I’m personally a bit dubious that Trump would outright sell state secrets for cash or deals. He just doesn’t seem smart enough to know what is truly valuable, and in any event, why take that risk when he already can ink multi-billion dollar deals with his Arab friends, simply because he is so powerful and connected?"
I'm not so sure. If you're in it for the "long con", don't you grab anything that looks like it might be valuable to someone at some point in time? I would guess his grifter instincts are well-honed given what we've learned about him. OK, fine, so he has to give them back. Maybe he assigns the job of reviewing his catch to see how valuable they are and with whom he might use them as tokens or bait.
This of course is the impetus for Gym Jordan (R - Buffoon) and the other GOP morons screaming their fictions about "the Biden crime family" and releasing memos and doing all the press oops. Of course Comer (R - Imbecile) gave up the whole game the other day, saying that it's all to hurt Biden politically (like anyone smart & informed didn't already know that).
It occurs to me, that he OWED people like Putin for $$$$$$$. This and his grifter instincts are why he entered and (with assistance) won in 2016. After becoming President, he started to understand how lucrative his position could be financially and begin to foster relationships with other “unfriendly” foreign actors. Wanting to keep his very lucrative and supremely ego boosting position, Trump went all in with “deals”. Now when Trump lost “bigly” in 2020, he also owed bigly. Much like a 2nd grade mobster, failing to make good to his overlords. As a last minute Hail Mary, of anything he might use to appease his bosses and to still hold onto some power in his negotiations, he grabbed anything he could. He knew enough to surmise that highly classified and top secret documents, belonging to the United States Government, could be of potential value to his debtors (aka: our enemies). He may have already made some deals with Putin or the Saudis.
Of course, I can only speculate, but this certainly is in line with Trump’s modus operandi.
No doubt that tfg is a narcissist. He also may have borderline personality disorder and disassociation. I worked for a psychiatrist during college, and asked a million questions (dang, that was quite a while ago!). It was hard to imagine these disorders until tfg hit the political stage and the patterns were in plain sight. It’s informative in that he is not just full of himself, but that he has a fluid sense of himself and the world around him. He never will believe that he has done something wrong. Never. There is no coherent human underneath all the bluster. He will never see himself responsible. Never. We need to watch him, hold him accountable, but don’t try hard to understand him.
I don't believe that Trump would not have sold them to the highest bidder. Even a dummy knows when someone is offering them money, and Trump is a whore for it. He would sell his own children for money. He certainly has dragged them into his Sh--! For one, he will know the value of something to someone else, by them naming a price when asking for him to get it for them. Saudi Arabia is looking complicit in that regard. It also might explain their less then cordial relationships with Biden. Perhaps they know that there is no proof positive tying the Saudi Ruler to the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. Who knows what was learned, but we see the giving of billions to Trumps son-in-law and that looks like the kind of gift that Harlan Crow gave Clarence Thomas. From Saudi lips to Putin's is what I would be concerned about also. From Trump's lips to Putin's. Of course, right now, I like many others, just have my suspicions.
You didn't go out on a limb in your assessment of Trump's character and motives. He's never really ever been about the money, except as a means of power and leverage. He's had the need from early on to massage his ego and feed his narcissism; that's been obvious to those of us, particularly New Yorkers, who've been on to him for over half a century. What's saddened me for decades is that so many of our fellow citizens have been falling for it for so long despite the fact that it's been so obvious.
I love it how Trump is demanding the return of documents that are "his". The very documents he claimed he didn't possess. "You know those documents I swore I didn't have? I want them back, they're mine."
Trump might not be smart enough to know what secrets are truly valuable, but foreign agents certainly are. And Trump is definitely not smart enough to understand the risk involved or how easy it would be to catch him. This is a guy who *still*, after 4 years, doesn't understand how NATO works. But he *was* able to understand that Putin wanted it weakened.
Trump is scared to death. He has been all of his life. As a friend who was installing artwork in his apartment said: "You could smell fear on him." The fact that he keeps demanding that he be the "president" tells me that he is totally unfit for office and doesn't care about this country because his demands are for him and him alone. I said in 2015 when he slithered down his golden staircase (because I know people who know him): "THIS IS A BAD IDEA!" No one listened. And here we are. And whether you realize it or not, this is costing ALL of us a fortune. I'm SO sick of him.
I applaud Jack Smith and his team for their effort. However, it remains tremendously frustrating that Trump is being treated differently from any other citizen. We all know - had it been any one of us, and had we been caught with so much as one folder of classified information, we would have been in the slammer already.
Heck, doesn't even have to be classified information - I work for a hospital system and handle patient records. If, at any point, I violated the patients' privacy by, say, printing their records and storing them in a file cabinet at home, I would be out of a job, fined, and possibly arrested, and my employer would be potentially facing a lawsuit with scads of financial and reputational damage involved. There would be no polite notes to my lawyers, trying to reason with me to behave and return the documents like a good girl.
I am beyond sick and tired of this obvious display of inequality, when it comes to people like Trump, Clarence Thomas, Elon Musk, etc. compared to the rest of us.
If there is smoke, there is fire. Thank you for walking us through the very thick smoke, Jay.
"The cover up is always worse than the crime."
You'd think these bozos would have learned that from Nixon....
To the discussion on motives, I'd add that Trump very clearly doesn't recognize any sort of distinction between himself and whatever role he occupies in an organization. In his mind, it's all just him. The assets of the Trump Corporation? Those are his personal possessions. The Trump Foundation? That's the column on the financial spreadsheet that he's allocated to "charities". A hotel that's licensed the use of his name? His hotel. And so on and so forth. To me it seems like his whole refusal to give up the documents, alongside the ways in which he used and abused DoJ and other American institutions while in power, is all downstream of this fundamental personality trait that made him unable to recognize any sort of distinction between himself and the Presidency. It also explains his insane hostility to dissent - as the most recent nominee for President, he's "in charge" of the Republican party. Therefore, in his mind, Republicans are supposed to agree with whatever he says *by definition*, and any who don't are traitors and/or fakes. See also voters, American citizens.
This appears to be obstruction casserole, with a crumbly obstruction topping, and a dollop of obstruction garnish.
Jay, you said, "I’m personally a bit dubious that Trump would outright sell state secrets for cash or deals. He just doesn’t seem smart enough to know what is truly valuable, and in any event, why take that risk when he already can ink multi-billion dollar deals with his Arab friends, simply because he is so powerful and connected?"
I'm not so sure. If you're in it for the "long con", don't you grab anything that looks like it might be valuable to someone at some point in time? I would guess his grifter instincts are well-honed given what we've learned about him. OK, fine, so he has to give them back. Maybe he assigns the job of reviewing his catch to see how valuable they are and with whom he might use them as tokens or bait.
Great article! Thanks! I keep hoping he goes to jail!
LOVE "NARA-Lago😍
This of course is the impetus for Gym Jordan (R - Buffoon) and the other GOP morons screaming their fictions about "the Biden crime family" and releasing memos and doing all the press oops. Of course Comer (R - Imbecile) gave up the whole game the other day, saying that it's all to hurt Biden politically (like anyone smart & informed didn't already know that).
It occurs to me, that he OWED people like Putin for $$$$$$$. This and his grifter instincts are why he entered and (with assistance) won in 2016. After becoming President, he started to understand how lucrative his position could be financially and begin to foster relationships with other “unfriendly” foreign actors. Wanting to keep his very lucrative and supremely ego boosting position, Trump went all in with “deals”. Now when Trump lost “bigly” in 2020, he also owed bigly. Much like a 2nd grade mobster, failing to make good to his overlords. As a last minute Hail Mary, of anything he might use to appease his bosses and to still hold onto some power in his negotiations, he grabbed anything he could. He knew enough to surmise that highly classified and top secret documents, belonging to the United States Government, could be of potential value to his debtors (aka: our enemies). He may have already made some deals with Putin or the Saudis.
Of course, I can only speculate, but this certainly is in line with Trump’s modus operandi.
No doubt that tfg is a narcissist. He also may have borderline personality disorder and disassociation. I worked for a psychiatrist during college, and asked a million questions (dang, that was quite a while ago!). It was hard to imagine these disorders until tfg hit the political stage and the patterns were in plain sight. It’s informative in that he is not just full of himself, but that he has a fluid sense of himself and the world around him. He never will believe that he has done something wrong. Never. There is no coherent human underneath all the bluster. He will never see himself responsible. Never. We need to watch him, hold him accountable, but don’t try hard to understand him.
I don't believe that Trump would not have sold them to the highest bidder. Even a dummy knows when someone is offering them money, and Trump is a whore for it. He would sell his own children for money. He certainly has dragged them into his Sh--! For one, he will know the value of something to someone else, by them naming a price when asking for him to get it for them. Saudi Arabia is looking complicit in that regard. It also might explain their less then cordial relationships with Biden. Perhaps they know that there is no proof positive tying the Saudi Ruler to the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. Who knows what was learned, but we see the giving of billions to Trumps son-in-law and that looks like the kind of gift that Harlan Crow gave Clarence Thomas. From Saudi lips to Putin's is what I would be concerned about also. From Trump's lips to Putin's. Of course, right now, I like many others, just have my suspicions.
You didn't go out on a limb in your assessment of Trump's character and motives. He's never really ever been about the money, except as a means of power and leverage. He's had the need from early on to massage his ego and feed his narcissism; that's been obvious to those of us, particularly New Yorkers, who've been on to him for over half a century. What's saddened me for decades is that so many of our fellow citizens have been falling for it for so long despite the fact that it's been so obvious.