First, let me say very clearly and categorically that I personally believe it’s morally wrong to take pleasure in another person’s pain or humiliation. Then let me admit that I’m enjoying the hell out of the admission by Comrade Trump’s lawyers that he can’t find anybody or any institution willing to trust him enough to pony up US$464 million for his bond in the New York State fraud case.
There’s an excellent chance Trump will be forced to sell some of his properties, which will be even more humiliating (and I’ll enjoy the hell out of that too). Well, to be more accurate, he might be forced to TRY to sell some of his properties. It may be difficult to find buyers. Trump’s attorneys, in their most recent court filing, admitted they tried to use Trump’s real estate as collateral for the bond. And hey, guess what. Nobody would agree to accept it.
Why? Because…and this just makes the pain and humiliation all the more piquant…the very reason Trump has to post a bond is that he fraudulently misrepresented the value of those properties.
Remember The Maltese Falcon? The movie or the novel, doesn’t matter which, the story is the same. The plot hinges on the supposed existence of a 16th century statue of falcon made of gold and jewels, crafted by the Knight of Malta as tribute to the King of Spain. There’s a lot of intrigue and betrayal, but in the end (SPOILER ALERT) the falcon turns out to be a fraud.
In your mind, replace the falcon with Trump Tower.
What we’re talking about here is Trump’s version of the Maltese Falcon. The court determined that he lied about the value of his properties, and now he’s trying to use those properties as collateral. Nobody wants to buy this corrupt motherfucker’s fake falcon.
This has to be humiliating and painful for Trump. Incredibly humiliating and deeply painful. Soul-crushing humiliation, gut-wrenchingly painful. We’re talking humiliating and painful at the cellular level.
One year ago today I made the following comment on Facebook:
So…what do you think? When will Comrade Trump be indicted? I’m inclined to think middle of next week. Say a week from tomorrow.
That claim was met with some understandable skepticism. A lot of people believed he’d escape any indictment, that he’d never be held accountable for any of the horrendous shit he’s done. But I was confident he’d at least be indicted. Not absolutely confident; just sort of pretty almost sure. I argued:
I think he’ll be indicted in Manhattan and also probably by the Georgia grand jury. I think there’s a fair chance he’ll also be indicted at the federal level.
And hey, I was right. Well, off by a week, but on March 30, Trump was indicted in New York on 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree. His trial is scheduled to begin in 11 days. Three months later, Trump was indicted in the Southern District of Florida on 37 federal criminal charges related to his handling of classified government documents (three more criminal charges were added a month later). Two months after that, Trump was indicted in the US District Court for the District of Columbia on four federal criminal charges related to election interference. And two weeks later, the Fulton County, Georgia Superior Court finally indicted Trump on 13 criminal counts related to interference in the 2020 election in Georgia (six of those charges have been dismissed for being vague BUT the judge has stated they can be refiled if they’re worded differently; the underlying RICO case is still solid).
That was a year ago. Today I’m going to predict Trump will almost certainly be convicted in Manhattan and Georgia. I’ll also predict that unless SCOTUS interferes, Trump will go down in both federal jurisdictions—DC and Florida. In each case, the publicly available evidence against Trump is overwhelming. In each case, the arguments presented (so far) by the defense are awfully weak.
Let me just remind folks that I’m basically a criminal defense guy; my first instincts are almost always to support the defense. I firmly believe in forcing the State to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt, even in cases in which the accused is blatantly guilty. And although I fucking hate Trump, I reluctantly appreciate the ridiculous arguments his lawyers have used to delay his various criminal trials. It pisses me off and frustrates me, but that’s their job. That said, it’s bullshit that courts cooperate with Trump’s lawyers to delay his trials.
Anyway, that’s where I stand. I firmly believe Trump will be convicted in both State courts and probably in both Federal courts. I could be wrong, of course. Weird shit happens in criminal trials.
For me, the big question now is this: will he serve any time behind bars? I’d love to say “Yes, he absolutely will.” But I’m pretty skeptical about it. He deserves to be in prison, but people rarely get what they deserve. And to be honest, that’s worked out pretty well for me.
Putting Trump in prison would be socially cataclysmic. But I believe, in the long run, it would be healthy for US politics.
A couple weeks ago — the day before Valentine’s Day, in fact — the House GOP impeached the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. Why? Did he commit any ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’? Nope. Is he even suspected of committing any HC&M? Nope. Did the Republicans actually think there was any way in hell the Senate would act on this? Nope. So why did they impeach him?
Because: 1) Donald Fucking Trump wanted somebody — preferably Biden, but anybody in the Biden administration — impeached. 2) They want to use scary brown immigrants as an election issue. 3) Pure malignant spite and the desire to hurt people. 4) They hope it’ll give their base the appearance that they’re doing something. 5) They wanted to say ‘Fuck you’ to Joe Biden and his entire administration.
These are all bad reasons to impeach anybody. That pisses me off. But what pisses me off just as much — and maybe more — is that there are people who absolutely fucking deserve to be impeached. People who are totally impeach-worthy. People whose past behavior has earned an impeachment and whose future behavior actually threatens the future of representative democracy in the United States. People like this fucking guy:
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States Clarence ‘Deep Pockets’ Thomas
Right now, we have the most openly corrupt and partisan SCOTUS in US history — and ain’t nobody more openly corrupt and partisan than Clarence Thomas. He’s had his hand out since Day One. This avaricious sumbitch would steal the sugar out of a cake. Hell, he’d do it while you watched and dare you to call him on it. He barely tries to hide it. For decades, he’s received ‘gifts’ from billionaire ‘friends’ whose business interests depended on favorable SCOTUS opinions. These are ‘friends’ he made after he was tapped for SCOTUS; it’s not like they’re his old high school buddies. He’s accepted these gifts, he’s failed to report them as he’s required to do, and he’s ruled on their cases. That’s some serious grifting, right there.
Then, of course, there’s all the awful shit his wife has pulled. I’m talking about her encouraging and promoting the January 6th Insurrection, which is truly bad its ownself. And when her shit came up before SCOTUS, did Clarence recuse himself like any ethical jurist would? Nope. He not only sat on the case, he was the ONLY justice on the bench that voted in a way that protected his wife.
There is absolutely no sustainable argument for Clarence Thomas to remain an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States. I mean, there are other assholes on SCOTUS we could do without, but Clarence is the bull goose grifter and the most obvious and deserving candidate for impeachment.
I can say, with absolute confidence and mathematical certitude, that if Clarence had been appointed by a Democrat and had been writing liberal decisions, the Republicans would have held a decade worth of hearings by now. If Congressional Republicans are willing to impeach Mayorkas over bullshit, why aren’t Democrats willing to impeach this grasping, covetous bastard? What in the stonewashed fuck is wrong with Democrats? Why won’t Democrats at least TRY to do what’s right?
You don’t have to answer that. The answer is pretty obvious (SPOILER: they’re comfortable political cowards who’ll mewl and grizzle about how unfair it all is, but won’t fucking act).
Look, I’m not asking Democrats to act like Republicans. I mean, they’re assholes. They’re willing to lie, fabricate, mislead, obfuscate, and deceive in order to score petty political points. Democrats don’t need to do that. They can just present verifiable facts to support a legit impeachment inquiry.
Seriously, the US would be better off if Democrats would just TRY to impeach this asshole. It would be a worthy effort even if the Senate failed to convict him. So c’mon, give it a shot, Democrats. What have you got to lose?
So far two states, Maine and Colorado, have decided Comrade Donald Trump is ineligible to be on their state ballots. Colorado’s decision was judicial; it came from the state’s Supreme Court. Maine’s decision was administrative; it came from their Secretary of State. Two states, two different processes. In each state, the decision to remove Trump from the ballot was made by a body authorized to make those decisions.
Republicans, of course, are pissed off (SPOILER: Republicans are always pissed off.) And yet, these results are entirely consistent with the way Republicans WANT elections to operate.
Here’s a crazy thing: the US doesn’t have a unified federal election system. What we have instead is a patchwork of 50 different federal election systems. Voters in Alabama, for example, have a different set of laws and rules than voters in Utah, even though they’re voting in the very same election.
Does that make any sense at all? Nope. But that’s how the US Constitution set things up when it was written back in 1787. Of course, in 1787 there were only three states: Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. Another eight states were added in 1788, and other states gradually dribbled in over the next hundred years or so. Instead of bodging together a single set of election laws to cover EVERY state, Congress just kept saying, “Welcome to the monkey house, you do what you think is right when it comes to electing folks.”
And hey, modern Republicans have loved that idea. It allowed them to control election results by deciding who can vote, where they can vote, and when they can vote. Which is a nice way of saying it allowed them to decide who they didn’t want to vote. (SPOILER: they don’t want Black folks to vote. Or Democrats.) Combine that with massive partisan gerrymandering, and you have a recipe for minority rule.
But now, that States Rights approach has kicked them in the balls. Republicans are relying on SCOTUS to save them—which is a fairly safe bet, considering that Trump appointed three of the Justices and a fourth is married to a woman directly involved in the insurrection.
Am I implying SCOTUS is corrupt? No, not the entire Court. I AM stating my opinion that there are a number of SCOTUS Justices who are openly corrupt and base many of their decisions on political ideology rather than the law. To me, the question isn’t whether or not they’re corrupt, but who they’re corrupt for.
Right now, there are a lot of big GOP donors who are, for a number of reasons (none of which involve ethics or morality), reluctant to donate to Trump. Trump is a problem for the GOP. He’s warped the Republican Party to the degree that somewhat less hateful politicians are afraid to acknowledge, for example, that the Civil War was about slavery. It’s possible—maybe not likely, but certainly within the realm of possibility—that the corrupt members of SCOTUS will take those GOP donors into consideration and will refuse to accept Trump’s appeal of the decisions in Maine and Colorado.
It seems unlikely, but refusing to accept Trump’s appeal would effectively remove Trump from contention and make way for a more ‘palatable’ hate-mongering Republican candidate. It would also allow SCOTUS to claim they’re NOT ruled by conservative partisan hacks. (SPOILER: they’d still be ruled by conservative partisan hacks.) Refusing to accept Trump’s appeal might, in fact, be the only way this SCOTUS can redeem a meager shred of dignity and integrity. In fact, it might act as a sort of historical counter-balance for overturning Roe.
Let’s face it, this SCOTUS is the most fucked up Court in modern history. Legal scholars and historians might say, “Yeah, they fucked up by overturning Roe, but at least they drove a stake of holly through Trump’s black heart.”
I had a ‘plate of shrimp’ moment this week when Sidney Powell got in the car.
Okay, that sentence probably needs some explanation, doesn’t it. I mean, it’s got two wildly diverse idiomatic phrases: ‘in the car’ and ‘plate of shrimp.’ Let’s start with the former and I’ll include an editorial note at the end to explain the latter.
In the car — it’s an out-of-date phrase used by police and criminal lawyers. It meant ‘cooperate with the authorities.’ “Will this guy get in the car?” “Can we keep him in the car?” “Motherfucker is thinking about getting out of the car.” Like that. If somebody is in the car, they’re cooperating with the State. They’re along for the ride.
I wrote about this almost six years ago in regard to Lt. General Michael Flynn, who was Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor for 22 days. Flynn was forced to retire from that post for lying (to the FBI and to VP Mike Pence) about conversations he’d had with the Russian ambassador to the US. It’s not a crime to tell a lie, but it IS a crime to lie or conceal material facts to a federal investigator in connection to a federal crime.
So Mike Flynn got his ass charged. And hey, he got in the car. He agreed to plead guilty to a single count of lying to the FBI and to testify truthfully in the Mueller investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. In exchange, he’d get a lenient sentence. Accused criminals get in the car because it’s to their advantage.
But Flynn didn’t stay in the car.
In 2019, Flynn fired the lawyers who’d arranged his plea deal, withdrew his guilty plea, and hired a new lawyer. Sidney Powell. That very same day, Powell asked Trump’s Attorney General, Bill Barr, to drop the charges against her client. In the movies, of course, you see prosecutors say, “I’m going to drop the charges” and those charges just disappear. Poof, they’re gone. But in real life, a prosecutor has to file a motion to dismiss the charges and a court has to agree. Barr filed the motion to drop the charges, but the presiding judge, Emmett Sullivan, was reluctant. So Powell asked the DC Circuit Court of Appeals to force Sullivan to drop the charges. The court said, “Nope, not gonna do that.” So Powell went higher up the food chain. And in 2020, then-President Trump issued a presidential pardon to Flynn.
That’s right. Trump pardoned a guy who’d originally agreed to testify against him. Hell, he pardoned a bunch of guys who were in a position to get in the car and testify against him. If you’re a criminal, it’s good to be POTUS.
Sidney Powell, booking photo
Also in 2020, Powell joined Trump’s legal team and played a major role in his attempt to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 election.
In August of this year, Powell (along with 18 others, including Trump) was indicted on seven felony counts for various types of fraud and election interference under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization law. And hey, guess what.
Sidney Powell got in the car. On Thursday, she pled guilty to some misdemeanor crimes in exchange for testifying truthfully in regard to the RICO crimes. Will she stay in the car? Probably. Unless Trump somehow manages to get re-elected as president. Then it’ll be presidential pardons all around.
Plate of shrimp, right?
EDITORIAL NOTE: Right, plate of shrimp. It’s from a scene in the film Repo Man in which an eccentric mechanic name Miller sort of semi-explains the concept of synchronicity to punk-apprentice-repo man Otto.
Miller: A lotta people don’t realize what’s really going on. They view life as a buncha unconnected incidents and things. They don’t realize that there’s this, like, lattice of coincidence that lays on top of everything. Give you an example; show you what I mean: suppose you’re thinking about a plate of shrimp. Suddenly someone’ll say, like, plate, or shrimp, or plate of shrimp out of the blue, no explanation. No point in looking for one, either. It’s all part of a cosmic unconciousness.
Otto: You eat a lot of acid, Miller, back in the hippie days?
Professor Plum in the conservatory with a candlestick. Sidney Powell in the car with a plate of shrimp. It’s all part of a cosmic unconsciousness.
It’s the first Monday in October, which means the Supreme Court of the United States is back in session. Although it’s not officially on their agenda, SCOTUS-watchers (which, I just want to say, aren’t nearly as cool as the Watchers that kept track of Highlander immortals or Buffy-era Slayers–now those folks had style) say the Court has to wrestle with this crisis-level problem: How to convince the public that the justices take seriously their ethical obligations.
The answer to which, of course, is completely fucking obvious. SCOTUS needs to actually take their ethical obligations seriously. Not just try to convince the public they’re doing that; they actually need to DO that. But that would mean chucking Clarence Thomas out on his ass. And probably Sam Alito too. And maybe finally investigate where their boy Brett K got the coin to pay off all his debts before his SCOTUS nomination process. So yeah, ain’t gonna happen.
But at least the government is still operating. Well, operating after a fashion. I mean, most of us expected to see Congress implode and a whole lot of government functions to stop this morning. Why? Because a dozen or so Republicans are acting like monkeys trying to fuck beach balls. The monkeyfucking cadre has even annoyed some of the less rabid Republicans. Don Bacon of Nebraska said, “We’re tired of fucking around with these whack jobs.”
We all are, Don. We’re all tired of them.
The fact that Congress managed to avoid stepping on a rake is seen as a sort of victory, although it’s not clear for whom. I mean, we’ll have to go through this same bullshit again in a couple of months. It’s not a victory for Kevin McCarthy, who is now solidly in the cross hairs of the monkeyfucking cadre. Matt Gaetz (Jesus suffering fuck, I still can’t believe this bouffant fuckwit is actually a sitting Member of Congress) has said publicly that nobody trusts McCarthy. Gaetz says he intends to press a Congressional motion to boot McCarthy directly in the balls (well, remove him from the Speaker’s position, which is much the same thing).
What’s interesting, though, is the anti-monkeyfuckers are murmuring about possibly expelling Gaetz IF he follows through on his attempt to kick McCarthy in the balls and IF the ongoing Ethics Committee investigation into Gaetz (for being corrupt and doing drugs and getting horizontal with underage girls) finds he probably did all the awful shit everybody thinks he did. One anonymous Republican is reported (by FOX News, if that matters) as saying this about Gaetz: “No one can stand him at this point. A smart guy without morals.”
Nobody trusts McCarthy, nobody can stand Gaetz, and neither of them has any morals at all.
“You let me be Speaker of the House and I’ll supply you with beach balls.”
Speaking of somebody without morals who nobody can stand, Comrade Trump’s civil fraud trial begins today in New York City. It’s a bench trial rather than a jury trial, so it should be wrapped up pretty quickly. I mean, the judge has already ruled that the Trump Organization deffo committed fraud. He also revoked Trump’s New York business licenses, which will likely mean Trump will lose control over dozens of New York properties. Essentially, the trial is to determine how big a fine Trump will pay. The prosecutor is asking for US$250 million. A quarter of a billion here, a quarter of a billion there…it adds up..
By the way, Trump says he’ll testify if called. Yeah, I’m just going to leave that there.
So it’s going to be an ugly few weeks for Republicans. And rightly so. You know, among all the truly awful things the GOP has done in the last couple of decades, one of the worst things is they’ve changed us. By ‘us’ I basically mean people who prefer to be kind and considerate to other folks, even if we disagree with them. People who didn’t take pleasure in seeing other people suffer. The GOP has changed us into people who viscerally enjoy watching MAGA Republicans go at each other like rabid sewer rats.
I don’t like this about myself, but I WANT to see the GOP destroyed. I WANT to see McCarthy lose his Speaker position, I WANT to see Gaetz expelled from the Republican Party, I WANT to see Comrade Trump lose his businesses and his money and his freedom. I WANT to see him convicted and imprisoned. I don’t just want those things to happen; I want to WITNESS them. I want to see them humiliated, afraid, defeated, and lost.
I don’t like that about myself, but there it is. I’ve let those monkeyfuckers change me. I’ll never forgive them for that.
Hey, you guys! Remember five years ago today? Comrade Donald Trump and Vlad Putin got to hang out together privately for a couple of hours–no aides, no note-takers, just Trump and Putin and their respective interpreters. Just a couple of guys, kicking back, kidding around, bullshitting, having fun.
Afterwards, they held a press conference, during which a reporter from the Associated Press, Jonathan Lemire, asked the following question of Trump:
“Dude, Putin says he didn’t have nothing to do with the election interference in 2016. But every U.S. intelligence agency–and I mean every goddamn one of them–says Russia did. So, my question for you sir is, who do you believe?”
That may not be an exact quote. But here’s what Trump said in response:
“[A]ll I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, Dan Coats, came to me and some others they said they think it’s Russia. I have President Putin. He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.”
Which was pretty goddamn lame, really. We all saw Trump shuffling into the press conference looking like he’d been whipped out back behind the garden shed (and not in a fun way). It was either an incredibly pathetic display of craven spinelessness OR a staggeringly stupid level of gullibility. Right? I mean, imagine…
Lord Eddard Stark: “All I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, they said they think it’s Lannisters causing all the fuss. I have Tywin Lannister; he just said it’s not his people. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.”
Elliot Ness: All I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, they said they think it’s Capone’s mob smuggling liquor. I have Capone; he just said it’s not his mob. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.
Janet Leigh: All I can do is ask the question. People came to me, they said I should think twice before taking a shower in this creepy motel. I have Norman Bates, the proprietor of this fine roadside establishment; he just said there’s no reason NOT to take a shower. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why there would be.
Miss Elizabeth Bennett: All I can do is ask the question. That dreadful Mr. Darcy came to me, claiming Dear Mr. Wickham, whose manners are above reproach, is a cad and, dare I say it, a bounder and should not be trusted to keep company with my sister. I have Wickham; he assures me most passionately he is nothing of the sort and has only the purest and most honorable intentions toward sweet, foolish Lydia. I will say this: I see no reason why he should be denied entry to the dance.
Jim Hawkins: All I can do is ask the question. People came to me and some say they think Long John Silver is a pirate and potentiallyy a mutineer. I have Mr. Silver, who despite his severe disabilty has demonstrated a long career as a sailor. He said he is unaware of any treasure map has no plans to mutiny. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why he should.
John McClane: All I can do is ask the question. My people came to me and suggested Hans Gruber might be a terrorist. Others said he may simply be a greedy motherfucker acting under the guise of a radical political agenda. I have Harry Ellis, who actually works in Nakatomi Plaza, he says I should listen to what Hans has to say. I don’t see any reason not to listen.
Here’s what I think (at this particular moment) will happen: the current case Comrade Trump is facing–the documents case–won’t go to trial. I suspect his lawyers will convince him to try to work out some sort of plea arrangement.
I say that because…wait. Just to be clear, I am NOT a lawyer. I’ve banged around the US criminal justice system for many years and I’ve seen a lot of legal/criminal stuff, but I haven’t been to law school and there’s a LOT of stuff I don’t understand.
Okay, that’s out of the way. I say this case won’t go to trial for a very simple reason: I don’t see any defense to the charges. You can read the indictment yourself, but in very simple terms, Comrade Trump is accused of a) hanging on to documents he wasn’t legally allowed to have in his possession, b) lying about having those documents, c) hiding those documents from the people looking for them, d) getting other folks to lie about those documents, and e) getting other folks to help hide them.
If the facts are against you, bang on the law. If the law is against you, bang on the facts. If the facts and the law are against you, bang on the table.
So the case comes down to some pretty simple questions and answers. So let’s ask the questions and get the answers.
Was Trump authorized to have possession of those documents? Nope.
Did he have possession of them? Yep.
Did he have reason to believe those documents ‘could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation’? Yep.
Was he asked to return them? Yep.
Did he return them? Yes, some of them. And he hasn’t been charged in regard to those particular documents.
Did he return all of them? Nope.
Did he lie about returning all of them? Yep.
Did he get other folks to lie about returning all of them? Yep.
Did he hide them from the folks who were trying to find them? Yep.
Did he get other folks to help him hide them? Yep
The only question that MIGHT be in dispute is that first one. Comrade Trump claims the Presidential Records Act authorized him to keep those documents. Does it? Nope. This is what the Act says:
Upon the conclusion of a President’s term of office, or if a President serves consecutive terms upon the conclusion of the last term, the Archivist of the United States shall assume responsibility for the custody, control, and preservation of, and access to, the Presidential records of that President.
The moment Trump ceased to be POTUS and President Uncle Joe took over, Trump lost custody and control of his presidential authority over the records. Claiming the Presidential Records Act can be interpreted differently is a weak argument, but Trump’s lawyers apparently intend to offer it in court–and with Judge Cannon presiding, it may be allowed.
But will it work? Will a jury buy it? Highly unlikely. Why? Because the National Archives repeatedly TOLD Trump IN WRITING about his legal obligation to surrender control over his records. They repeatedly asked him to return documents he’d retained illegally, and gave him multiple opportunities to do so. The fact that he DID return some but still chose NOT to return others is evidence that he understood what the National Archives repeatedly told him–that he wasn’t authorized to keep those fucking documents.
But he kept them anyway.
So as far as I can see (and, again, I’m NOT a lawyer), Comrade Trump’s ONLY defense is that he was too fucking stupid to understand the repeated warnings given to him and his lawyers about returning classified documents EVEN THOUGH he understood it enough to return some of them.
If that’s the only defense he’s got, Trump’s choices are limited. Either go to trial and hope like hell for a MAGA-infected juror who’ll vote to acquit despite the evidence OR come to some sort of plea arrangement. He might offer to plead guilty to a lesser offense in exchange for…something. No prison time, probably. Maybe in exchange for not being indicted on a Seditious Conspiracy charge in the January 6th insurrection.
I’m not saying I LIKE this as a result. I’m just saying I think this is what’s going to happen.
Obviously, Trump won’t enter into a plea negotiation soon. He’ll delay it as long as possible, as long as he can continue to raise funds off his pending trial. But eventually, in my opinion, he and his lawyers will start talking about a plea arrangement. The case against him is just too strong.
gregfallis.com 