{"id":94974,"date":"2023-08-05T17:54:19","date_gmt":"2023-08-05T22:54:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=94974"},"modified":"2023-08-05T17:54:19","modified_gmt":"2023-08-05T22:54:19","slug":"94974","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=94974","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Everybody Keeps Indicting Trump, Without Regard for Consequences<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Having already said what I had to say about the most recent indictment of the former president (\u201cBanana Republic, U.S.A.\u201d<\/a>), I thought perhaps readers might want to know what liberals are saying about it.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s surreal arraignment day in Washington augurs ominous days ahead<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

That\u2019s the headline on an \u201canalysis\u201d by CNN reporter Stephen Collinson, and this might be the first time I\u2019ve ever the verb \u201caugur\u201d used in a headline. \u201cPortend,\u201d maybe, but \u201caugur\u201d? No, can\u2019t recall ever seeing that one, and it might help to know that Collinson is not American. He\u2019s from England, where I suppose schoolboys at posh academies are taught to use references to the ancient Roman practice of\u00a0augury<\/a>, but I digress . . .<\/p>\n

As former President Donald Trump left Washington after answering charges of trying to subvert democracy, it felt like all the previous trauma and divisions of his eight-year journey into the nation\u2019s psyche were just the start.<\/span><\/p>\n

America now faces the prospect of an ex-president repeatedly going on trial in an election year in which he\u2019s the Republican front-runner and is promising a new White House term of retribution. He is responding with the same kind of extreme rhetoric that injected fury into his political base and erupted into violence after the last election. Ominous and tense days may be ahead.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump spent the afternoon at a federal courthouse within sight of the US Capitol that was ransacked by his supporters on January 6, 2021. He pleaded not guilty in the gravest of the three cases in which he has so far been indicted \u2013 on four charges arising from an alleged attempt to halt the \u201ccollecting, counting and certifying\u201d of votes after the 2020 election.<\/span>
\nLive video of Trump motorcading to an airport and sweeping into yet another city for yet another indictment on his branded jetliner has become part of a sudden new normal. But if the arraignment of a former president seems routine, it\u2019s a measure of\u00a0the historic chaos Trump has wrought<\/strong>\u00a0since he bulldozed into politics in 2015.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wearing his classic dark suit and long red tie, Trump on Thursday rose to his full height in court and slowly and clearly elucidated the words \u201cnot guilty\u201d in a hearing in which his fall from president to defendant was underscored when he had to wait silently for the judge to arrive. He was irked, sources familiar with his mindset told CNN\u2019s Kaitlan Collins, that the judge referred to him simply as \u201cMr. Trump,\u201d rather than with the presidential title he still used at his clubs.<\/span><\/p>\n

The 45th president and special counsel Jack Smith \u2013 who has also indicted him for the alleged mishandling of classified documents \u2013 shared several glances, before a proceeding that, unlike when he was president, means Trump\u2019s fate is now out of his control.<\/span>
\nThe entire day was surreal, but given its historic implications \u2013 after Trump became the first ex-president formally charged in relation to alleged crimes committed in office \u2013 also sad.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thursday was a day when the country crossed a point of no return. For the first time, the United States formally charged one of its past leaders with trying to subvert its core political system and values.<\/span><\/p>\n

It was Trump who forced the country over this dangerous threshold<\/strong>. A man whose life\u2019s creed is to never be seen as a loser refused to accept defeat in a democratic election in 2020, then set off on a disastrous course because, as Smith\u2019s indictment put it, \u201che was determined to stay in power.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump is steering a stormy course to an unknown destination. If he wins back the White House, the already twice-impeached new president could trigger a new constitutional crisis by sweeping away the federal cases against him or even by pardoning himself. Any alternative Republican president could find themselves besieged by demands from Trump supporters for a pardon that, if granted, could overshadow their entire presidency. And if Trump is convicted, and loses a 2024 general election, he risks a long jail term, which would likely become fuel for him to incite his supporters to fresh protest. . . .<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, enough of that. Notice how Collinson pretends that all of this was Trump\u2019s fault, as if nobody else involved \u2014 Attorney General Merrick Garland or Special Counsel Jack Smith \u2014 had any choice or discretion in the matter. No, they had to indict Trump. Because Trump \u201cforced the country over this dangerous threshold,\u201d which I suppose is pretty much how the Roundheads explained themselves after they beheaded King Charles I: \u201cWe had no choice! He made us do it!\u201d The Roundheads then set up a \u201cRepublic\u201d far more tyrannical than anything Charles ever did, much the same as those later regicides in France imposed a tyranny more brutal and repressive than the monarchy of Louis XVI, and likewise the Bolsheviks were infinitely worse than Czar Nicholas.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One might notice a historical\u00a0pattern<\/em>\u00a0here, and then \u2014 since we\u2019re speaking of ominous auguries \u2014 contemplate America\u2019s future once Our Leaders save us from Trump\u2019s alleged threat to \u201csubvert democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

But these people seem to have no proper sense of history, no more than they have any sense of irony or self-awareness, which explains the latest entry in\u00a0John Hoge\u2019s \u201cI\u2019m Not Making This Up, You Know\u201d files<\/a>:<\/p>\n