Of course, the saddest thing is that, some (if not many) of his MAGA minions will only believe tfg’s lies-no matter how boldly false or outrageous. Praying and hoping that justice will be served! Thanks so much for this write-up. As you stated, I just wish those involved who are now testifying against tfg would have discovered a conscience or modicum of allegiance to the Constitution before all of the damage done. It seems the entire Republican Party establishment at national, state, and local levels are uniformly a backbone-less bunch.
Jen and Jay, Isn’t that the point of fascism. To have people who “are uniformly a backbone-less bunch”??? Thanks for for your comment, Jen and thanks for your excellent newsletter, Jay.
How can you expect anything more from the Republicans when there are no consequences? It’s incredibly frustrating when the Justice Department works so slowly and enables all their tactics by wearing kid gloves. How many times have Democrats trumpeted , “We’ve got him now!” only to fumble and waste time and money?
"Evil comes from a failure to think. It defies thought for as soon as thought tries to engage itself with evil and examine the premises and principles from which it originates, it is frustrated because it finds nothing there. That is the banality of evil."
The Peter Seller’s movie “Being There” comes to mind, where political insiders in all absurdity consider “Chauncey Gardner” for some high level political post (perhaps it was president? I’m not sure, as that movie was decades ago). He was the gardner, and intellect was not on his side. Of course, audiences were left with what a mess that would be for the country. I didn’t expect it to be a documentary.
I think the ending--the big politicos discussing his potential as a candidate with Chauncey in the background walking on water aka Jesus tells us what would have happened to poor Chauncey, the innocent fool.
“I put lipstick on a pig,” he said. “I feel a deep sense of remorse that I contributed to presenting Trump in a way that brought him wider attention and made him more appealing than he is.” He went on, “I genuinely believe that if Trump wins and gets the nuclear codes there is an excellent possibility it will lead to the end of civilization.”
I was tempted this morning into devoting a bit of commenting on Meadows, but on reflection, why invest any more time on this hapless wretch, whose entire history suggests that when push comes to shove, Mark Meadows will look after the interests of Mark Meadows...QED.
The end comment may be the best summary of all of the reporting, conversing, discussing, observing, speculating, testifying and considering. It is "Beyond Reasonable Doubt" as that will be the dunk, slam!
Putting Trump on the stand would be legal malpractice. So his team will have to defend him by other means, none of which is particularly promising. That’s why his best defense is delay, delay, delay.
“First, after insinuating that the classified documents had been planted, Trump shifted gears and posted on Truth Social a sweeping claim that the documents in the boxes seized by the FBI were “all declassified.”
Juries convict people who throw up much less obviously desperate flip-flops than that.
“There doesn’t have to be a process, as I understand it,” Trump said. “You’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying it’s declassified, even by thinking about it.”
Imagine still, to this day, thinking that Donald Trump’s “understanding” means anything.
Of course he did, same way he told his violent minions on Jan. 6 that he loved them and later insisted it was all the work of Antifa and then later that it was peaceful and beautiful and he would pardon everyone.
He’s Donald Trump. He points in every direction and screams as loud as he can and hopes you’ll let him off the hook just so he’ll give you five minutes’ peace. Just like the domestic abuser that he is.
I just watched the 2000 version of Shaft with Samuel L Jackson. Fun, campy, lots of shooting - typical cool rogue cop stuff. But the ending really struck me. For those who haven't seen the movie - spoilers alert: in the end, after Shaft had located the witness for the prosecution, another judge was appointed to replace a corrupt one, etc., the mother of the man, whose murderer was on trial and kept getting away scott-free because he was a rich white boy, simply walked up and shot him before he entered the court building where the new hearing of the case was supposed to take place.
And when you look into the eyes of this woman, played by Lynne Thigpen, you can see it - she's HAD it. She has no faith in the justice system. She is grateful to Shaft for all the stuff he did to bring about another hearing. She is grateful to the witness for willing to risk her life and testify. But she is DONE. She is taking no chances. So she takes matters into her own hands. She is a good woman. She very obviously had faith in justice at some point. But it's all gone now.
This entire circus with Trump is BEGGING for vigilantism to happen. Sure, based on what we have seen so far, conservative MAGAhats are far more prone to radical behavior. But, after ALL this time. After ALL this evidence. After ALL these years with no arrest and no conviction of the main culprit, I am concerned that someone, somewhere on the liberal side is going to snap. And I can't even imagine the kind of political mess and outright violence that might cause. The worst of it is.... If someone does snap, for all of our desperate attempts to cling to our best behavior and place our trust in the law, a lot of us are going to pray for that person to get away with it. That is the real danger of real villains. They bring out the worst even in the best of us.
We cannot have him be THAT kind of martyr. January 6 would be a small, intimate cocktail party compared to the maelstrom that would unleash. I do not want him assassinated - I want him locked away, doing the full clock in both Federal and state prisons. And all his enablers can go right inside with him, including his spawn.
Oh, I agree with you! That would be the best possible course of events. But I can't help being concerned because of the circumstances I mentioned: the horrific nature of his crimes, the length of time is taking to even get him to trial, the lives lost and mangled, etc.
“Three chiefs of staff, all in agreement here, stacked against a patently absurd, self-serving claim. I’m dubious that even a jury made up of red county folks from Florida will buy it.”
As someone who lives in a rural part of the state, in a tiny college town island of blue surrounded by a sea of red, I am constantly appalled by the continued level of support for and belief in TFG. I believe a there very well may be some Floridians who will believe anything the defense tells them. Hoping those forever red, forever MAGA people don’t make it up part of the jury.
We have seen some MAGA folks make it on to juries elsewhere. They still convicted. The jury room becomes its own mini cauldron of reality, and such folks often are quite susceptible to persuasion once they are faced with a different source of facts and power.
We can only hope that's true because you know there will be a true MAGAT on at least one of these juries. They may have convicted elsewhere but will they vote to convict their God?
I am not discounting it. Fully aware of the risks. At the same time, if there any case I’d want if we had to put one of them in Florida, this would be the one.
I am thinking, Smith/DOJ, took a chance on the Florida Documents case, knowing that the J6 case would be in DC. In the final outcome, it’s the J6 case that could trigger the 14th Amendment clause and disqualify Trump from being President.
Then there’s that pesky Presidential Records Act of 1978 which Trump falsely claims let him remove anything he wanted. The PRA states very clearly that ALL government records must be transferred to the National Archives at the end of a Presidential term of office. But why look it up when the Leader translates it so compellingly? Speaking of the Leader, check out the play of the same name by Eugene Ionesco. QUITE appropriate!
Mark Meadows first helped steal an election in NC against trump for Cruz. Then he was recruited by the RNC to be Trumps right hand man. Trump is the front-man for the Grift, the real problem is the RNC.
It is a bit of a tangent from your excellent discussion of the reality-averse MAGAts, but here's saying I appreciate your wordplay in today's title. A friend here in Colorado named his music group "Heavy Meadow Productions."
And no, his songs are NOT heavy metal. Very progressive, for example
Even more tangentially: a person close to me coined the term (in reflex to Zuckerberg's "Metaverse") "meadow-verse," in which grounded reality - not virtualness - abides, in homeostatic ecological balance.
I'm not in government or law, but my understanding is that declassification involves multiple steps and multiple people, including the agency that issued the document. It's not a one step magic wand (or magic thought) process.
I once had a Top Secret/SCI clearance. When I left my duty station, we had to be debriefed. The joke was that the debriefing consisted of being hit hard over the head with the very thick debriefing book. What I would give to debrief tfg!!
Of course, the saddest thing is that, some (if not many) of his MAGA minions will only believe tfg’s lies-no matter how boldly false or outrageous. Praying and hoping that justice will be served! Thanks so much for this write-up. As you stated, I just wish those involved who are now testifying against tfg would have discovered a conscience or modicum of allegiance to the Constitution before all of the damage done. It seems the entire Republican Party establishment at national, state, and local levels are uniformly a backbone-less bunch.
Jen and Jay, Isn’t that the point of fascism. To have people who “are uniformly a backbone-less bunch”??? Thanks for for your comment, Jen and thanks for your excellent newsletter, Jay.
How can you expect anything more from the Republicans when there are no consequences? It’s incredibly frustrating when the Justice Department works so slowly and enables all their tactics by wearing kid gloves. How many times have Democrats trumpeted , “We’ve got him now!” only to fumble and waste time and money?
From Hanna Arendt regarding Nazis:
"Evil comes from a failure to think. It defies thought for as soon as thought tries to engage itself with evil and examine the premises and principles from which it originates, it is frustrated because it finds nothing there. That is the banality of evil."
The Peter Seller’s movie “Being There” comes to mind, where political insiders in all absurdity consider “Chauncey Gardner” for some high level political post (perhaps it was president? I’m not sure, as that movie was decades ago). He was the gardner, and intellect was not on his side. Of course, audiences were left with what a mess that would be for the country. I didn’t expect it to be a documentary.
I think the ending--the big politicos discussing his potential as a candidate with Chauncey in the background walking on water aka Jesus tells us what would have happened to poor Chauncey, the innocent fool.
Oh, that’s right!
Didn't see the movie but did read the book in the 1970s. Very disturbing especially in today's contexts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Being_There_(novel)
It’s just absolutely absurd that anyone could support this man. The Art of The Deal, Ha! The Art of Deception is what he should have authored.
Too bad he didn't write it, and the ghostwriter was not paid. He has said many times what a mistake that job was. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-tells-all
“I put lipstick on a pig,” he said. “I feel a deep sense of remorse that I contributed to presenting Trump in a way that brought him wider attention and made him more appealing than he is.” He went on, “I genuinely believe that if Trump wins and gets the nuclear codes there is an excellent possibility it will lead to the end of civilization.”
He's going to flip on Trump like a well done hamburder. I'm here for it, with a full bottle of ketchup.
I think he will flip as far as he dares.
He's slip enough to not do time but still try to remain a viable candidate for something. All they know is feeding at the public trough.
🤣🤣🤣
I was tempted this morning into devoting a bit of commenting on Meadows, but on reflection, why invest any more time on this hapless wretch, whose entire history suggests that when push comes to shove, Mark Meadows will look after the interests of Mark Meadows...QED.
So many hapless wrenches in the Republican Party now.
The end comment may be the best summary of all of the reporting, conversing, discussing, observing, speculating, testifying and considering. It is "Beyond Reasonable Doubt" as that will be the dunk, slam!
Let us all hope those words prove true.
Putting Trump on the stand would be legal malpractice. So his team will have to defend him by other means, none of which is particularly promising. That’s why his best defense is delay, delay, delay.
Is now and how he'll try to beat this.
“First, after insinuating that the classified documents had been planted, Trump shifted gears and posted on Truth Social a sweeping claim that the documents in the boxes seized by the FBI were “all declassified.”
Juries convict people who throw up much less obviously desperate flip-flops than that.
“There doesn’t have to be a process, as I understand it,” Trump said. “You’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying it’s declassified, even by thinking about it.”
Imagine still, to this day, thinking that Donald Trump’s “understanding” means anything.
Didn't he at one time float the idea the boxes of the contents were set there or altered during the raid? Like the FBI brought in papers?
Of course he did, same way he told his violent minions on Jan. 6 that he loved them and later insisted it was all the work of Antifa and then later that it was peaceful and beautiful and he would pardon everyone.
He’s Donald Trump. He points in every direction and screams as loud as he can and hopes you’ll let him off the hook just so he’ll give you five minutes’ peace. Just like the domestic abuser that he is.
Yes, there's quite a list of conflicting arguments he has thrown out to the world.
I just watched the 2000 version of Shaft with Samuel L Jackson. Fun, campy, lots of shooting - typical cool rogue cop stuff. But the ending really struck me. For those who haven't seen the movie - spoilers alert: in the end, after Shaft had located the witness for the prosecution, another judge was appointed to replace a corrupt one, etc., the mother of the man, whose murderer was on trial and kept getting away scott-free because he was a rich white boy, simply walked up and shot him before he entered the court building where the new hearing of the case was supposed to take place.
And when you look into the eyes of this woman, played by Lynne Thigpen, you can see it - she's HAD it. She has no faith in the justice system. She is grateful to Shaft for all the stuff he did to bring about another hearing. She is grateful to the witness for willing to risk her life and testify. But she is DONE. She is taking no chances. So she takes matters into her own hands. She is a good woman. She very obviously had faith in justice at some point. But it's all gone now.
This entire circus with Trump is BEGGING for vigilantism to happen. Sure, based on what we have seen so far, conservative MAGAhats are far more prone to radical behavior. But, after ALL this time. After ALL this evidence. After ALL these years with no arrest and no conviction of the main culprit, I am concerned that someone, somewhere on the liberal side is going to snap. And I can't even imagine the kind of political mess and outright violence that might cause. The worst of it is.... If someone does snap, for all of our desperate attempts to cling to our best behavior and place our trust in the law, a lot of us are going to pray for that person to get away with it. That is the real danger of real villains. They bring out the worst even in the best of us.
We cannot have him be THAT kind of martyr. January 6 would be a small, intimate cocktail party compared to the maelstrom that would unleash. I do not want him assassinated - I want him locked away, doing the full clock in both Federal and state prisons. And all his enablers can go right inside with him, including his spawn.
Oh, I agree with you! That would be the best possible course of events. But I can't help being concerned because of the circumstances I mentioned: the horrific nature of his crimes, the length of time is taking to even get him to trial, the lives lost and mangled, etc.
“Three chiefs of staff, all in agreement here, stacked against a patently absurd, self-serving claim. I’m dubious that even a jury made up of red county folks from Florida will buy it.”
As someone who lives in a rural part of the state, in a tiny college town island of blue surrounded by a sea of red, I am constantly appalled by the continued level of support for and belief in TFG. I believe a there very well may be some Floridians who will believe anything the defense tells them. Hoping those forever red, forever MAGA people don’t make it up part of the jury.
We have seen some MAGA folks make it on to juries elsewhere. They still convicted. The jury room becomes its own mini cauldron of reality, and such folks often are quite susceptible to persuasion once they are faced with a different source of facts and power.
We can only hope that's true because you know there will be a true MAGAT on at least one of these juries. They may have convicted elsewhere but will they vote to convict their God?
Don’t ever, *ever* discount the Trumpiness of a potential jury of red county Florida men/women.
I am not discounting it. Fully aware of the risks. At the same time, if there any case I’d want if we had to put one of them in Florida, this would be the one.
I am thinking, Smith/DOJ, took a chance on the Florida Documents case, knowing that the J6 case would be in DC. In the final outcome, it’s the J6 case that could trigger the 14th Amendment clause and disqualify Trump from being President.
Then there’s that pesky Presidential Records Act of 1978 which Trump falsely claims let him remove anything he wanted. The PRA states very clearly that ALL government records must be transferred to the National Archives at the end of a Presidential term of office. But why look it up when the Leader translates it so compellingly? Speaking of the Leader, check out the play of the same name by Eugene Ionesco. QUITE appropriate!
Trump wants to say he is free and clear under the PRA, which he is not, but in any event it is not among the charges here.
I understand that, but he is using this to garner more supporters and more donations!
Well, of course. How could Trumpy do any fund-raising by telling the truth?
Mark Meadows first helped steal an election in NC against trump for Cruz. Then he was recruited by the RNC to be Trumps right hand man. Trump is the front-man for the Grift, the real problem is the RNC.
“The real problem is the RNC.” That’s a mantra and a T shirt if I ever saw one!
Brian Tyler Cohen would say it a little differently...GOP unconstitutional behavior is not a bug, it is their feature.
☯️🇺🇸☮️
It is a bit of a tangent from your excellent discussion of the reality-averse MAGAts, but here's saying I appreciate your wordplay in today's title. A friend here in Colorado named his music group "Heavy Meadow Productions."
And no, his songs are NOT heavy metal. Very progressive, for example
https://youtu.be/K0Zkv7lgVDw
Even more tangentially: a person close to me coined the term (in reflex to Zuckerberg's "Metaverse") "meadow-verse," in which grounded reality - not virtualness - abides, in homeostatic ecological balance.
I'm not in government or law, but my understanding is that declassification involves multiple steps and multiple people, including the agency that issued the document. It's not a one step magic wand (or magic thought) process.
I once had a Top Secret/SCI clearance. When I left my duty station, we had to be debriefed. The joke was that the debriefing consisted of being hit hard over the head with the very thick debriefing book. What I would give to debrief tfg!!
Your understanding is correct.
I could claim that Trump is Toast by saying he's toast - even by THINKING he's toast.