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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   29463 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 7, 2023

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Ah feck it, while I'm being ranty anyway: this is instructive to compare to what I'm seeing about "Trump's 'we're coming for you' tweet is being investigated" as presumably incitement to violence and death and treason and coup and the rest of it. I was already thinking about "I'm sure you can find plenty of examples of political speeches and speeches by police commissioners and DAs and so forth about 'coming after/coming for/look out you're next' political opponents, crime, etc." so singling out this as a unique example of "no it's a definite threat of physical harm" seems to be leaning heavily on the scales.

Wait, what?

The issue with Trump's "IF YOU GO AFTER ME I'M COMING AFTER YOU" post isn't that it's inciting or threatening violence (it isn't). It's that it's arguably an attempt to intimidate witnesses in a criminal trial. "I'M COMING AFTER YOU" probably doesn't imply anything other than mean tweets in this context, but that's still witness tampering.

Probably it won't get prosecuted because it would be difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump was directing the warning at potential witnesses. But for those of us burdened with less onerous standards of proof, c'mon, of course he was.

I am extremely confident you can't point to a speech or statement from a DA or a police commissioner that can reasonably be characterised as an attempt to intimidate a witness to remain silent.

Under your frame whats the difference between

  1. Charge opposition politician with a crime
  2. Slap gag order on him from making normal political speech
  3. He makes political speech
  4. Declare him guilty of witness tampering

Because him comment is well a very normal political statement.

Also very similar to to General Flynn

  1. Logan Act exists but never used and never a prior challenge to Supreme Court - likely unconstitutional
  2. Flynn does what every new administration does - they talk to foreign governments between winning election and inauguration (And this is necessary to limit policy gaps)
  3. Investigate Flynn for Logan Act violation
  4. He lies or obstructs on this which is a behavior widely done but technically illegal
  5. Drop Logan Act charge and get him for lying to FBI

It just looks like Lawfare to me. And he who controls the justice system wins

I don't agree that "him comment is well a very normal political statement". A normal political statement is something like "I will cut taxes and reduce waste", "My opponent has sold out the American people", "Make America Great Again", etc. "IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU" is not a normal political statement. It's a clear attempt to intimidate.

There is no gag order preventing Trump from making normal political speech. He can continue to campaign, criticise the Biden Administration, etc. What he can't do is attempt to improperly interfere with a court proceeding.

Every politician uses campaign rhetoric like this about attacking their opposition. This doesn’t even reach the Maxine Waters line of calling for specific physical action.

This is just attempting to subvert Democracy by banning your oppositions speech. If he actually interferes with the court then do something. But banning speech and speech alone should be off the table.

Your solution is asking a 95% Democrat voting district to define what is “normal” speech during an election that is already super weird because they’re trying to prosecute the most popular politician in America.

And if he violates a 95% Biden voting (and Hunter Biden colleagues) definition of allowed speech - what’s the legal remedy? Lock up the President while campaigning?

Historically the parallels with Julius Caeser are eery. It’s about to be March on Rome time or meet the executioner.

And if he violates a 95% Biden voting (and Hunter Biden colleagues) definition of allowed speech - what’s the legal remedy? Lock up the President while campaigning?

He's not the President. But yes, lock him up. You don't get a pass to commit crimes with impunity just because your name is on a ballot.

Crime is just the definition of who’s in power, I guess we are on a path to cross the Rubicon.

Your opinion is against long-standing precedence of not lawfaring Presidents.

I don't accept your characterisation of Trump's indictments as "lawfare". My view is much more in line with Kevin Williamson's:

The FBI’s serving a search warrant on Donald Trump’s residence is not — in spite of everything being said about it — unprecedented. The FBI serves search warrants on homes all the time. Donald Trump is a former president, not a mystical sacrosanct being.

If we really believe, as we say we believe, that this is a republic, that nobody is above the law, that the presidency is just a temporary executive-branch office rather than a quasi-royal entitlement, then there is nothing all that remarkable about the FBI serving a warrant on a house in Florida. I myself do not find it especially difficult to believe that there exists reasonable cause for such a warrant. And if the feds have got it wrong, that wouldn’t be the first time. Those so-called conservatives who are publicly fantasizing about an FBI purge under the next Republican administration are engaged in a particularly stupid form of irresponsibility.

There are no fewer than five different congressional committees with FBI oversight powers. I’m not especially inclined to take federal agencies and their officers at their word in almost any circumstance, and so active and vigorous oversight seems to me appropriate here, as in most other cases. But if it turns out, in the least surprising political development of the decade, that Donald Trump is a criminal, then he should be treated like any other criminal.

If that did indeed establish a precedent, it would be a good precedent.

So define Trump as criminal. Then it makes it not lawfare. It’s not unprecedented because we defined Trump as a criminal. Despite the fact we spied on his campaign, invented a fake RussiaGate impeachment, used the Logan Act to target senior officials while in office (which every administration has broken), have a half dozen cases everywhere, changed statute of limitations so we could put him in court on rape (though the accused doesn’t even know what year it happened). But since we defined him as a criminal it’s not lawfare and we aren’t targeting a politician because we defined him as a criminal. It’s not unprecedented him being the first POTUS and 40% chance of being next POTUS because he’s not that he’s just a criminal. And of course all these cases are novel legal theories never used against anyone before. And then we are going to try this case with the current POTUS sons former business partner as judge. And of course instead of filing the cases earlier we are filing them during the election process.

But if it turns out, in the least surprising political development of the decade, that Donald Trump is a criminal, then he should be treated like any other criminal.

Funny how "drain the swamp" and "lock her up" became "you're not allowed to enforce the law on me because I'm a politician".

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