TWGB: Everything Looks Worse in Black and White

 

The image I went with for today's TrumpWorld Grab-Bag is a black and white rendition of the one-fingered salute his faithful crowd gave him his past Saturday as he gave more of his "American carnage" type of doom-saying with the obvious punchline of how only he could fix it. He's been dipping a little deeper into Qanon signifying lately, and I can only surmise it has a lot to do with their being a goddamn cult that worships him, that they will believe anything, and they are primed as hell for violence. If you are a legally-jeopardized twice-impeached one-term wonder with multiple indictments potentially coming your way and a very limited defense, and are also Donald Trump, insurrectionist, sure, what the hell: 

Threaten mass violence in case of indictments. 

But is it fascism? Oh hell. It isn't history repeating, but it's been rhyming for a while now, ok? If you are looking for exact parallels, hey, maybe that isn't the metric we want to be looking at. I will say that Qanon is obviously a derivative of Nazi (and earlier) anti-Semitic blood-libel though. And that actual demonization of the other creates a permission slip for doing any amount of horror to one's political enemies. Look at this:

Pastor Mark Burns, at Eric Trump and Michael Flynn’s event in Idaho: “I’m coming here to declare war on every demonic, demon-possessed Democrat that comes from the gates of Hell!” pic.twitter.com/URUcHo11V8

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) September 16, 2022

Trump has been using religion as a way to prove legitimacy and religionists (Christian Nationalists) have been using Trump to try and make their religious POV into law.  There are a number of evangelical "prophets" who insist God told them Trump never lost the 2020 election or is definitely coming into power again.   And you know who would have really hated this kind of thing--our founding fathers. This religious enthusiasm is too much. This dictating from the pulpit. This non-separation of church and state. 

But everyone knows religion is a huge part of a Kulturkampf and state religion is the Weltanshauung enabling cult of personality uprisings like that of Hitler, right?

Uh. Right? 

Well, no, Most Americans don't seem to know any such thing. And when Marjorie Taylor Greene says that criticizing this fealty to the one true leader (as she called him) is anti-Christian, ah well. We are supposed to let the sleeping dogma lie. But I can't. Because Trump is not my religion, and his filthy corrupt seditionist traitorous ass never will be. And while I don't answer to the term "Christian"--I think this is blasphemy to many Christians as well. And if you don't stand up now, then when?

So anyway, back to the TrumpWorld libretto, where Trump's attorneys just met with the Special Master, Judge Raymond Dearie, which they specifically asked for and their favored Florida Judge, Aileen "Loose" Cannon, gave them. But she did them an inconvenient favor, right? She quoted their public-facing lie with the thing they didn't say in court: that all the documents were declassified. 

So of course the first thing Judge Dearie wants to know is--are they and how is he supposed to know that? And the dumb dog ate my homework lawyers have special master-baited this question with the simple-ass answer: "Well, we would show you the work, but we're saving it for if Trump is indicted". 

Why is your best defense in case of indictment not also the best defense against further investigation? Who is this argument for? Because Trump's team are the ones who asked for a special master in the first place. Team Trump is offering up that Jim Trusty has a TS clearance.  They are seriously hedging this one, no? And it's Trump's lawyers that look unprepared, probably because their client, the same guy who told his lawyers back in June, YEP TOTALLY HANDED OVER ALL THE DOCS! and they signed their names to it and became witnesses to his state of mind with re: obstruction, still haven't been told by Trump, the supposedly faithful custodian of these haphazardly gathered and boxed documents, what they hell he had or why. 

It's like DOJ and Trump alike have a "need to know" problem regarding what these things are even about. 

Team Trump were sort of hoping we were at Nurenberg levels of corruption in the judiciary, and no, not yet. Odd claims like Trump having "scribble-dibs" on documents because his Sharpie scrawls personalized them don't actually survive the problem of what the fuck is that even? 

But let's get on back to what he had and why--because that, and not whether the court is treating him with the due deference of a...well, disgruntled former employee of the US government who is prone to conspiracy theories and threats of violence, seems to be missing. 

I'm still not able to get to a place where he had any good reason to have them. And the bad reasons that present themselves are so grave I do not trust people who are able to give him a broad defense without further investigation. Those who do are some unimaginative and gullible marks. Because shit gets classified for a reason. Lives can be at stake.  And not respecting that in deference to this angry ex-POTUS, this twice-impeached one-term wonder, is beyond reason. 

So, if you are someone who wants to take the word of Kash Patel that the docs were declassified, ok fine.  But keep in mind he also wrote this full-body cringe bullshit and wants to peddle it to kids. Like, indoctrinating kids about the Russia investigation, which was a totally fair counter-intelligence op, which is not, I repeat not, probably an argument to have in front of the children. Why is this a thing? They don't know what any of this shit means.  (Do Trump or Patel? But I digress.)  (But no, obviously if Putin backed Trump and he did, it wasn't because he loves us and wanted us to have the bestest president ever--WTF?) 

Anyway, in black and white, Trump looks bad because the facts are bad. Regardless of who he demonizes on his way down.