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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   27864 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 27, 2024

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It's not word salad. I think it's quite clear. If you know what "writing" is, and you know what it means to "keep or maintain" something, and you know what a "condition or activity" is (perhaps the most vague part of the definition, but still, these are very common ordinary words and it's easy to furnish many examples of conditions and activities), then you understand the definition.

The definition as written may lead to counterintuitive results. For example, if I'm the CEO of a company and I write on a post-it note "we have a lot of money" and I store that in my desk drawer in my office, then that is a piece of writing, and it is kept by the enterprise (on our premises, with security measures to prevent unauthorized access), and it does reflect a condition or activity (the condition of having a lot of money), so it appears that according to this definition, the post-it note would count as a business record. But being counterintuitive is not the same thing as being unclear.

It's not clear because it doesn't clarify the important question, which is: what are the documents Trump is being charged with falsifying? Tax records? Internal memos? Paystubs? Drafts for a contract? Transcripts? Post-it notes?

According to your interpretation, the government could prosecute you for writing on a post-it note in your office, determining that this is a business document, and then alleging that you lied when you wrote it. That's not clear at all!

It's not clear because it doesn't clarify the important question, which is: what are the documents Trump is being charged with falsifying?

The definition of "business record" itself is just a definition of a term. It's not going to include any specifics about what business records a person did or did not create in a particular concrete case. Presumably, that information would have been discussed during the trial proper.

According to your interpretation, the government could prosecute you for writing on a post-it note in your office, determining that this is a business document, and then alleging that you lied when you wrote it. That's not clear at all!

"Unjust" and "counterintuitive" are not the same thing as "unclear".

I was purely addressing the assertion that the definition was "word salad", nothing more. I think that accusations of that sort are thrown around too liberally on TheMotte so I felt that it was important to address. Too often people default to calling something "bad writing" when actually they have a different (and more specific) complaint with it.

The motte seems to agree you can be convicted on any of those.

Perhaps, Trump is actually guilty. I am coming around to this. But in that case a lot of people are guilty.

I am glad I asked this question because I have been wondering for a while what is meant by a business record. And I feel like it’s a key point I haven’t seen people talking about.

No. You have some people coming in with some Nonsense. The key thing is they never proved intent (and the prosecution and judge for FECA wrong).

Pay attention that most of the r people saying he was guilty are the people who were very wrong on most legal issues (ie they lose at SCOTUS).

Intent is a solid reasoning for he’s not guilty. Always tough to prove intent. But by the letter of the law if you can prove intent I guess he’s guilty.

And if you accept Cohen’s uncorroborated testimony. It’s just a really bad verdict.

Literal answer to your question: Trump is accused of falsifying the checks he wrote to his lawyer when he wrote on the checks that they were for legal expenses. He is also accused of falsifying his accounting books for his business when he recorded that the checks paid to his lawyer were for legal expenses.

Edit: sorry, above I said "accused" but the more factual thing now would be to say "convicted." My mind's having a hard time downloading the latest update.

How is payment for signing an NDA not actually legal expenses?

When your political enemy does it.

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