Headlines we’re sure to see It’s not as if the question of Donald Trump running for president from jail hasn’t been addressed before. It’s just that Trump’s arrest seems more imminent. The chances of Trump actually being held in jail pending trial for any of four separate investigations seems remote. That doesn’t stop the speculation. Newsweek (Wednesday): CNN (Wednesday): Mad Magazine should run a “Headlines We’re Sure To See” bit on Trump’s arrest. We’ve been here before.
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The two-day poll, concluded on Tuesday, found 54% of respondents – including 80% of the former president’s fellow Republicans and 32% of Democrats – said politics was driving the criminal case being weighed by a Manhattan grand jury. Seventy percent of respondents, and half of Republicans, said it was believable that Trump during his 2016 presidential campaign paid the adult film actress Stormy Daniels for her silence about an alleged sexual encounter. Some 62% of respondents, including a third of Republicans, said it was also believable that Trump falsified business records and committed fraud. So a large number of Republicans obviously don’t care that he paid the hush money, and committed fraud. The rest are delusional. No surprise there.
We’ve been here before There are so many lawsuits and criminal investigations involving Donald Trump in the news right now that it’s hard to keep up. The indictment he announced was coming on Tuesday didn’t materialize but by all accounts, it is imminent, possibly even today. If that happens Trump won’t be immediately handcuffed and extradited to New York on Con Air. Prosecutors will arrange for him to appear for an arraignment which, according to the New York Times will disappoint Trump as he is looking forward to the spectacle so that he can “show strength.” I don’t buy that but I can certainly see that he might look forward to bilking his loyal following for another chunk of their social security checks by playing the martyr. Lucky for him, his defenders have circled the wagons and are preparing to fight fire with fire. At the moment they are concentrating their efforts on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
The Bulwark’s JV Last distilled what we all know about the GOP and their voters into a nice concise analysis: Roughly speaking, there are six things an elected Republican could say about an indictment of Donald Trump: 1.Trump’s alleged actions are deeply concerning.2.Let the legal process play out; I have faith in our justice system.3.No comment.4.Yes, Trump’s alleged actions are concerning; but because of various externalities, the wiser course of action would have been to not indict.5.Democrats and this Soros-backed prosecutor are out of control. We will fight this to the bitter end.6.Donald Trump is innocent of all charges; this is a miscarriage of justice. This is not science, but my sense is that the distribution of these positions among elite Republicans will look basically like this:¹ The two unlabeled slivers are “These allegations are troubling” and “wiser not to indict.” I peg them at 1% positions. Maybe I’m off at the margins But this is close enough for the purposes of our discussion. So let’s move on.
It looks like the Manhattan DA prosecutes a lot of people for the crimes Trump is suspected of committing: According to the Times, it’s still a tricky case with the need to attach it to the federal election crime in order to make it a felony, but nobody can say that they don’t ever try people for crimes like this.
Has he met any teenagers? These people are living in a dream world. Do they think that teens and young adults are docile cows they can herd at will? Ridiculous: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ′ administration is moving to forbid classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in all grades, expanding the controversial law critics call “Don’t Say Gay” as the Republican governor continues a focus on cultural issues ahead of his expected presidential run. The proposal, which would not require legislative approval, is scheduled for a vote next month before the state Board of Education and has been put forth by state Education Department, both of which are led by appointees of the governor. The rule change would ban lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity from grades 4 to 12, unless required by existing state standards or as part of reproductive health instruction that students can choose not to take. The initial law that DeSantis championed last spring bans those lessons in kindergarten through the third grade. The change was first reported by the Orlando Sentinel. Hey keep it up guys.
Actually, it’s today’s GOP Not to mention that this longstanding argument has always been ridiculous. They truly believe that if only Hitler hadn’t tightened some gun laws for Jews and “undesirables,” there would have been no holocaust. Really? Jews were less than 1% of the population. And in case they haven’t noticed, Hitler conquered most of Europe. I don’t really think the German Jews could have held him off with some pistols. It’s so ludicrous it makes you want to scream. But the gun nuts have been saying this for years and now the party itself using actual holocaust images to make their sick, absurd point.
Jim Jordan doing his MAGA thing From Pro Publica: House Republicans have sent letters to at least three universities and a think tank requesting a broad range of documents related to what it says are the institutions’ contributions to the Biden administration’s “censorship regime.” The letters are the latest effort by a House subcommittee set up in January to investigate how the federal government, working with social media companies, has allegedly been “weaponized” to silence conservative and right-wing voices. So far, the committee’s investigations have amplified a variety of dubious, outright false and highly misleading Republican grievances with law enforcement, many of them espoused by former President Donald Trump. Committee members have cited supposed abuses that include the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago, its investigations of Jan. 6 rioters and the Biden administration’s purported use of executive powers to shut down conservative viewpoints on social media.
It’s a reflex Running for U.S. Senate is a pricey proposition. Candidates spent on average over $10 million a decade ago and nearly double that by 2016. The Citizens United decision means outside groups now pour in even more than candidates. With Democrats outraising Republicans in the Trump era, the GOP more than ever is looking to oligarchs for candidates who can self-fund (Politico): Both parties have relied on self-funders before. But this approach has taken on increasing importance for Republicans because they failed to counter Democrats’ massive grassroots fundraising in Senate races during the past two cycles. In 2022 alone, Democratic nominees outraised Republicans by $288 million in the six closest Senate races. The strategy is also an acknowledgment that the party’s reliance on super PACs funded by its richest supporters has been insufficient. In the last two elections, Republicans were unsuccessful in stopping Democrats from nabbing a narrow majority in the upper chamber.
“Serious creativity” lacking from the left There isn’t a lot of outside-the-box thinking among Democrats. For all the Left’s attraction to novelty and appreciation for creativity, stepping outside their safe spaces is not something many established Democratic operatives do. They color inside the lines Republicans ignore. Greg Sargent warns that should Donald Trump be indicted by the Manhattan district attorney’s office over his concealing hush-money payments to a porn star, Democrats seem unprepared to meet both the moment and the expected Republican backlash: Democrats will have to marshal some serious creativity in response. The extraordinary move by House Republicans to insert themselves into Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s investigation of Trump provides Democrats with an opening to do just that. This week, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and other top Republicans sent a letter to Bragg demanding documents and testimony related to expectations that Bragg might charge Trump over a hush-money payment to a porn actress in 2016.