TWGB: Corrupted, Absolutely

Asked about Roger Stone, Trump says he has an “absolute right” to tell the Justice Department what to do pic.twitter.com/AZRv9Aff7P

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 11, 2020

In the same statement where Trump claimed an "absolute right" (which, like the "absolute immunity" claimed by his associates and the power like we wouldn't believe conferred upon him by what he believes Article Two of the Constitution grants him, is mostly a bad misunderstanding of law and history) to tell the DOJ what to do, he also suggested that he would like to see the recently-fired Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman see some form of military discipline for the godawful crime of, apparently, snitching. Trump is also wrong in every particular about whether Vindman did the right thing per his chain of command--he apparently feels that, as commander in chief of the military, there is nothing he can do that a person in uniform should question. So it is that he can determine, outside of the code of military justice, that a person who has committed war crimes should be pardoned (of course, pardon power is his by virtue of the Constitution) but a person who lawfully reports a potential problem through his chain of command or responds, again, lawfully, to a congressional subpoena, should be hounded for that act.

That probably could make one think, if one had the mind. But the question of whether Trump has the "absolute right" to tell the DOJ what to do is the meaningful part of his remarks today--as four prosecutors resigned from the prosecution of Trump associate Roger Stone after senior officials at DOJ walked back their sentencing recommendation of nine years as being too harsh. This Tuesday protest is a reminder of the "Saturday night massacre", when, in the course of the Watergate investigation, ethical people resigned rather than commit an act they thought was improper.

The fucking stupid thing about all this is, if the senior folks at DOJ were reducing the sentencing recommendation of Stone because of Trump's whinging about it on Twitter (the only "official" correspondence on that issue we all happen to know of), the whole quandary could have been resolved by the aforementioned "power of the pardon". Like, who cares what Stone's sentence even is if you can just wipe it out, right?

Unless, of course, it would look bad. I guess that could look bad for Trump's re-election, possibly reigniting some belief that there definitely was some consciousness of collusion-like activity via WikiLeaks (a rodent dildo employed jointly by Russia and the Trump campaign in 2016) and the reminder to all that the 2016 Trump campaign in truth had more Russian contacts than a Moscow optician. But couldn't Trump just trust Stone to stick it out until after the election? And like, see to him in November, regardless?

Maybe he thought that would look bad, too, or didn't trust Stone not to give a command vocal performance once in stir, regardless of the relatively minor duration of months. It definitely feels like he went to a bigger to-do over Stone's potential stretch than he ever did over former campaign manager Manafort's (although Manafort is staying shtum). Of course, Trump and Stone seem to have been a little closer than he and Manafort. Also, too, and this is important, Trump has been impeached now, and is losing his fucking mind over it.

So is the cronyism, and the vindictiveness, and the involvement of Trump in things regarding the DOJ that he shouldn't be anything new? Yes and no. I guess it's a matter of degree. Does it mean he did not, as Sens. Alexander and Collins hope, learn his lesson?

Yes, it means he never was being schooled in jack-shit, but for what it's worth, most of the GOP senators earned their obedience school certificates. They can roll over and play dead, now. If that is good enough for them. (It wasn't, obviously, enough for Mitt Romney. Who probably sleeps just fine at night.)

So, how bad does it look? What do I ever say? It looks bad because it is bad! If Trump could have just pardoned Stone, but doesn't because he's feeling like exercising his recently-acquitted swagger, who knows what's next?

You hear me--it better be more investigations and new articles of impeachment. This man is impeached forever because he earned it forever, and every day fosters some new outrage. But maybe the House needs to scrutinize Barr. That's the Roy Cohn Trump didn't think he had in Jeff Sessions. That is the taxpayer-funded mafia fixer for Trump. I think you want to get to the bottom of Trump, that's who you need to immobilize. As he has likely frozen certain actions into Trump that would be most illuminating.