Tom Rinaldo
Tom Rinaldo's JournalIt's not what Trump can finally do to break the spell he has over his cult. It's what we can do.
This was supposed to be a Red Wave election. An off year cycle with a new Democratic president and Democratic congressional majorities. The opposition party is supposed to do well. History says the Republicans are supposed to rack up big victories nationwide this year. More important, that's what the Republicans themselves said, along with the entire spectrum of the media, right to left. Add to that a level of inflation that hasn't been seen in generations, and the fact that Biden's approval numbers remain solidly negative. Until recently Republicans were confidently expecting to retake the House and Senate. Even now they still fully expect to retake the House and still hold out hope for the Senate.
The entire nation was conditioned to expect big Republican victories. If Democrats win instead, especially if we do so soundly, Trump's "so much winning mystique" will be trashed. Not among the hard core of his hard core, true, but Republicans can't govern by commanding the loyalty of the hard pit of that rotten fruit alone.
Women turning out to vote in record off year election numbers, spurred on by the fight for reproductive freedom; youth turning out to vote in record off year election numbers, spurred on by the knowledge that only Democrats are willing to fight against catastrophic climate change; voters of all ideological stripes who revere the institutions of our democracy who fear that they are hanging by a thread, collectively we all hold the power to drive a stake through the heart of Trumpism. And nothing else does.
Even if Trump somehow legally declassified those documents before leaving office...
...which is highly dubious, and impossible for him to have done alone with some secret classifications, all that gives Trump at most is a possible defense against criminal charges. HE STILL RECKLESSLY ENDANGERED NATIONAL SECURITY by declassifying materials that by any sane measure needed to be kept secret. And for what purpose? It's not like he was trying to be a whistleblower for the public good. He didn't declassify and release anything. He was hoarding state secrets in his home, whether or not it was technicality legal for him to do so. WTF?!? And Republicans in Congress seriously argue that is defensible, outside of the most narrow legal interpretation???
It's not like Trump did it by mistake. He's had that stuff in his home for a year and a half while the National Archives begged, pleaded, then demanded, and finally moved to seize them from him when all else failed. Even if a good lawyer can somehow keep Trump out of jail, how can anyone now argue that he deserves another term in office?
No "conspiracy theory" about what Trump has been up to with our enemies seems implausible now
The more malevolent the motives and behavior that can be attributed to Trump, the more likely it seems that it is true. The fact that my imagination about Trump's evil intentions can't keep pace with new revelations about his ongoing plots is truly terrifying for our nation; I thought I had a pretty good imagination.
This man was President of the United States two years ago. He might be again (though I doubt it.) I was around for Nixon, Reagan, and George W. Bush. I thought each of them, for different reasons and to different degrees, presented a threat to our Democracy. Not in the same dimension. Not in the same universe. They were garden snakes at worst relative to Trump's King Cobra. The fight is on to save democracy. Nothing is preordained, but I think we are winning.
Somehow I think threatening the lives of FBI agents won't play out well for those who do
There is nothing quite like crazies threatening violence against you to get the attention of the most powerful law enforcement organization in the country. There are always dozens of matters competing for the attention of the FBI. Countering conspiracies to attack the FBI is just one of those things that seems likely to rise to the top of the to do list of a lot of FBI agents who might tend to take it personally. And they won't be waiting for folks to come knocking on their doors.
Trump tried to decapitate the leadership of the DOJ, and we know why. Trump DID decapitate the DOD
Unlike his failed attempt to replace the top team at the Department of Justice (after he caused Barr to resign that is) Trump succeeded in replacing several layers of leadership at the Department of Defense, after he lost the November's election. Why did Trump clean house at DOD? What did he gain by doing so? What was his plan?
The January 6 Committee pulled back the curtain and revealed the extent of Trump's plot involving the Department of Justice, but very little has been said or revealed about Trump's plotting at the Department of Defense. We know that the National Guard did not defend the capital for the first four hours that it was under attack. I've heard some lame excuses given about "appearances" that, to be charitable, can't begin to explain a delay of longer than 30 minutes. Clearly Trump didn't call out the Guard. No he didn't "fail to", or "choose not to." He refused to do so. Trump withheld security aid to a co-equal branch of government. That is a deliberate act, but while the Jan 6 Committee remains focused on that, what was up with Trump's extensive housecleaning at the DOD during the final months of his presidency? There was noting passive about that.
Full scale coup attempts almost always involve the compromise of key elements of national security forces, and the leadership thereof. Questions are beginning to bubble up about some in the Secret Service, but what is known, or more to the point not known, about the acts and non acts of the new leadership Trump installed at the Department of Defense? Again, why did Trump put them in place? Does anyone seriously believe that it had nothing to do with the pending coup attempt?
The most powerful office in America can't be a "Get out of jail free card."
The fact that this should be insanely obvious yet is still being debated is truly frightening. There is no more powerful position in America than the presidency. The potential for calamitous misuse of presidential power is off the charts once fear of prosecution for the misuse of presidential power is taken off the table. The American president will always be a political figure, any prosecution of an ex-President will always come at a political cost with some associated political risk and even the possibility of significant social unrest, but the American judicial system is not designed to show either favor or malice toward individuals based on the extent of their political importance. A retreat from that standard would make the current underlying principles of our democracy henceforth unrecognizable.
The presidency is a repository of power in America in the same sense as Fort Knox is a repository of American wealth. To disable fundamental legal checks on presidential criminal misconduct, regardless of the rational for doing so, is the equivalent to leaving the vaults unlocked at Fort Knox with all security systems deactivated. The potential for criminal behavior shoots off the charts once it becomes known that there are no checks in place against criminality. Unlike any other person in America, an American president wields the unfettered power to grant full pardons for any and all crimes. That completes the circle. If our judicial system de facto holds the president to be above the law, the president can do the same for any individual whose cooperation in his or her criminal misconduct is required. No danger from criminal prosecutions. Get out of jail cards all the way around.
Through whatever combination of threats and rewards a president can muster, and both of course are substantial, a criminal president can assemble a team willing to assist him or her to circumvent and undermine American laws and the U.S. Constitution. Those, starting with the president him or herself, who partake in a scheme to undermine American democracy have much to potentially gain if they succeed, and virtually nothing to lose should they fail, if prosecutors deem them untouchable when it's time to consider criminal charges against them. If that isn't a recipe for disaster, what is?
No point in disarming passengers attempting to board flights
Tens of millions of law abiding Americans are having their freedoms restricted by TSA agents forbidding weapons,on planes. The real problem is that a small fraction of Americans have severe mental illness that causes them to act violently. The practical constitutional solution to gun violence is to increase state and federal support for mental health programs by a few per cent annually while removing all of the arbitrary government restraints constraining the Second Amendment rights of healthy red blooded Americans to carry weapons of war everywhere.
Something it took me a long time to fully appreciate
In order for a society, ours for example, to not totally go off the rails it isn't so much necessary that most people firmly believe in the right things for the right reasons. It is necessary that most people pay at least lip service to the right things, out of fear of negative personal repercussions if they don't. Those negative repercussions can be big like the possibility of being imprisoned, they can be middling like the possibility of losing an election, or they can be relatively small, like the fear of community scorn, but it is the fear of some level of backlash that keeps a lot of people from openly acting deplorably.
That's what kept a lot of racists closeted. That's what led many with authoritarian instincts to vow fidelity to democratic principles. They believed that most of those around them opposed their personal views, or at least they suspected that most might disdain their views should they become known, so they were cautious about how they tried to advance them, if they even tried to at all. That gave the breathing space needed for our society to evolve in positive ways over the last 70 or so years, to slowly become more inclusive from one generation to the next.
Trump blew all of that to hell. It can't be overestimated the amount of damage that's been done by having an openly authoritarian bigot hold the office of the presidency. Trump has empowered hate in America, he's shown that openly appealing to feral fears can be richly rewarded with success. More to the current point though, he has shown, so far at least, that you can get away with all of that. Regardless of whether Trump regains the White House, Trumpism will remain a dangerous and potent force in America if Trump himself is not finally held accountable for the harm he has caused in his life time. Whatever chaos we as a nation might face if Trump ever goes on trial for his crimes, it will be ten times worse if he doesn't.
Republicans wanted pardons for two reasons.
They are guilty of crimes, that's obvious, but more to the point they feared Democrats would behave more like they would once we took over the government. They feared prosecution for their crimes .They expected to be held accountable for them. The worm may yet turn but so far Republicans in Congress haven't even been indicted for ignoring lawful subpoenas. They expected to be punished for their crimes. They would have thrown the book at Democrats if the situation was reversed.
When I was 5 years old we didn't play "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch a Tiger by the Toe"
We said "catch a (N-Word) by the toe" instead, all of us white kids did, and we never gave it a thought. We weren't aware of our racism at the moment, we were just playing a game. This was back around 1955 in Queens County NYC in my case, but my partner who is two years younger has the same memory from her growing up in Orange County California.
Racism too often saturates cultures when it isn't being consciously countered and opposed. I don't remember how the change happened for me but at some point as a kid I began counting out with Tigers instead. I wasn't aware that I was not being racist by using Tiger instead of the N word, it wasn't making a political statement to revise the word used. It just "became" the new standard. Or at least that's how my limited memory of that part of my childhood has it, but in retrospect it's obvious to me that somewhere somehow some people effected that change without me being aware of any "controversy." I still knew absolutely nothing about race relations in America, the change just seemed to happen. The change didn't just happen.
Overt racism became less socially acceptable because some people fought to make it so, and because of that, one small but insidious self perpetuating piece of the unconscious indoctrination of young white children into the mindset of racism was defused for me during my childhood.That is where the war is really won or lost. The front lines today are being fought over "All men (sic) are created equal" vs "The Great Replacement Theory", over "We are a nation of immigrants" vs "our cherished threatened white identity."
And there are always children paying attention.
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