Lock Him Up !

I primarily just use FB for people I know personally.

I don’t think it’s necessary for people to be on social media and I’ve been curtailing my own social media usage but it’s about not engaging in general. Whether it’s through debating others or being actively involved in things like campaigns. In fact the latter is probably more valuable.

 

Why respond to that guy? He doesn’t know what “affordable” means. He can’t even pay $46 in gambling debts.

 

the Dersh opines

Trump’s trial should be televised

https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/4047995-trumps-trial-should-be-televised/

 

Hey now. It isn't 46 bucks. He will tell you with Bidenflation it is more like 53.

 

Welcome to the party. This was apparent for years and slap you in the face obvious for about 4, but it's never too late to snap to reality. I know you are specifically talking about weaponizing the DOJ, but your statement relates to many other lies the GOP tells it's base. I'm not sure how this brought you to the correct conclusion, but an actual physical assault on the institutions of democracy did not. Never the less I appreciate the realization that the lies are effecting our democracy.

 

Germans aren’t great at identifying propaganda.

 

...in the interests of fair and balanced discussion...

Steve Schmidt reacts to the grotesque coverage of Donald Trump's arraignment

 

That Time Donald Trump Promised "Food for Everyone" at Versailles
Laine Doss June 14, 2023 5:23PM

https://www.miaminewtimes.com/resta...nt-in-miami-after-federal-indictment-17198756

Donald Trump was in Miami yesterday to plead not guilty to 37 counts in a felony case that alleges he illegally hoarded classified documents from his time in the White House.

The former president was fingerprinted and arraigned at the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. U.S. Courthouse in downtown Miami. And, no matter what side of the political fence you stand on, it's a fact that after a hard day in court, you need a little break.

Trump opted to decompress with a trip to Versailles in Little Havana. The iconic restaurant has long been a pit stop for politicians seeking to curry favor with Miami's Cuban voters.

Donald Trump was in Miami yesterday to plead not guilty to 37 counts in a felony case that alleges he illegally hoarded classified documents from his time in the White House.

The former president was fingerprinted and arraigned at the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. U.S. Courthouse in downtown Miami. And, no matter what side of the political fence you stand on, it's a fact that after a hard day in court, you need a little break.

Trump opted to decompress with a trip to Versailles in Little Havana. The iconic restaurant has long been a pit stop for politicians seeking to curry favor with Miami's Cuban voters.
Trump and his entourage arrived at Versailles shortly after leaving the courthouse and made straight for the bakery.

The local press was on hand to capture footage of the large crowd milling outside to greet their man. Inside the bakery, Trump supporters fawned over their man, regaling the soon-to-turn-77-year-old with a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday" a day early and holding a group prayer. Former MMA fighter Jorge Masvidal, sporting a University of Miami ball cap, hailed Trump as "everybody's favorite president of all time" after embracing the former leader of the free world.

A glad-handing Trump was heard to declare, "Food for everyone!"

So, New Times wondered, did Trump — who famously fancies his chicken from KFC and his steaks well-done and slathered with ketchup but isn't exactly known for picking up the check — treat his fan club to a spread of croquetas, pastelitos, and cubanos chased with cafecitos?

It turns out no one got anything. Not even a cafecito to-go.

A knowledgeable source assures New Times that Donald Trump's stop at Versailles totaled about ten minutes, leaving no time for anyone to eat anything, much less place an order.

Of course, with a long campaign ahead of him — possibly punctuated with additional South Florida court appearances — Trump will have plenty of opportunities to make good on Tuesday's promise.​

 

And if he had done that he would not be in the pickle he is today. His narcissistic personality would not allow him to do it, instead he listened to some guy who was wrong about the law and what would happen..............yep, he just hires the best of the best

 

While criminally foolish, imagine the political benefits if he somehow prevails. He probably thought prosecutors would be too chickenshit to charge him and probably still thinks he can bully and connive his way out of these charges. If he succeeds, his impunity will be fairly well established.

 

I beg to differ somewhat. His impunity in the political sphere is already well-established. The outcome of this legal criminal case might change that to some extent, but not significantly.

Legally, this is uncharted territory. It will set a precedent, but beyond that, it doesn't have much to do with Trump himself

 

https://thehill.com/opinion/crimina...come-of-putting-a-former-president-in-prison/

Learn from South Korea: Nothing good will come of putting a former president in prison
by Seung-Whan Choi, Opinion Contributor
06/15/23 1:00 PM ET

Former President Donald Trump is in serious legal trouble. He could, in theory, go to prison for many years.

It may be apparent that Trump shook the foundation of American democracy and the rule of law, but throwing him into prison will not ensure justice or fairness.

America’s criminal justice system will likely weaken if Trump is convicted and imprisoned. This will only give some future Democratic or Republican president an excuse to use the Department of Justice to go after his or her political opponents, at the same time exercising the pardon power to set his or her allies free.

Those Americans who want to see Trump serve a prison sentence assert that other democratic countries have convicted their former presidents, citing South Korea specifically. However, these convictions and prosecutions have not served South Korean democracy well. The imprisonment of presidents has only served to create a cycle of recrimination and revenge from both conservative and progressive presidents who have abused loopholes in the legal system.

To prosecute a former president is much easier in South Korea than it is in the U.S. because the incumbent Korean president can control the entire legal process through a group of hand-picked prosecutors.

The Korean president not only appoints all prosecutors, but can also direct each and every investigation and prosecution, since his prosecutors can monopolize both criminal investigations and prosecution. Prosecutors openly work for the president’s interests, so that people view them as the most untrustworthy among government officials, even calling them “the regime’s running dogs.”

As of today, four South Korean presidents have been indicted and convicted. Three out of the four cases are not relevant to the U.S. controversy over Trump -- two military dictators (Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo) found guilty of initiating the 1979 coup d’état, and one civilian president (Park Geun-hye) impeached for corruption. This leaves Lee Myung-bak, the first civilian former Korean president ever imprisoned without being impeached.

To understand the prosecution of Lee Myung-bak, one needs to know what he did during his tenure. The nominee of one of South Korea’s conservative parties, Lee scored a landslide victory in the presidential election in December 2007. However, due to his mishandling of the economy, Lee faced an alarmingly low approval rating, 21 percent, after less than six months of office.

Lee decided to save his presidency by scapegoating his predecessor, Roh Moo-hyun. He appointed a group of ambitious associates from his own college as prosecutors and ordered them to charge Roh and his family for bribery.

When Lee’s chosen prosecutors could not find hard evidence, they fabricated it instead and leaked it to the media to humiliate Roh in the public eye before even bringing him in for interrogation. Lee’s prosecutors eventually summoned Roh, his son, and his wife, alleging that they had taken illegitimate money to pay for their child’s education abroad.

Roh, who always maintained his innocence, committed suicide. Korea Daily, one of the largest conservative newspapers, quoted a friend of the deceased president: “The politically motivated investigations conducted by the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office must have caused the suicidal death of the former president on May 23, 2009.”

Lee’s prosecutors subsequently closed the investigation without any charges against Roh’s family after his death. But Roh appears to have been exonerated in the public eye, according to a 2022 survey. Among all former presidents, Roh is now viewed as the most trustworthy.
​

more

​

 

conclusion

In 2017, Moon Jae-in, representing a progressive party, was elected president. He appointed prosecutors who were loyal to him and directed them to go after Lee. They did so ruthlessly, securing a 17-year sentence and a $10 million fine connected to an older business scandal that had first come up during Lee's 2007 run for president. At that time, Lee had been let off the hook by a group of prosecutors that included Yoon Suk-yeol.

Eleven years later, Yoon would play a major role in securing Lee's conviction. The public came to see him as a symbol of justice and fairness, and in June 2021, he rode a wave of popularity into a presidential campaign.

Seven months after Yoon was elected South Korea's new president in 2022, he pardoned Lee, absolving him of the balance of his prison term and $6 million of his fine. Yoon and Lee are now affiliated with the same conservative party, and many of Lee’s friends have assumed key roles in the Yoon government. Yoon has so far refused to grant clemency to any of his political opponents.

The shoe may soon be on the other foot. Yoon now suffers from the lowest approval rating of any president in Korea's democratic history. He has reacted to this circumstance by selecting a group of prosecutors to go after his predecessor, Moon Jae-in, and his former officials.

The case of South Korea provides useful guidance for Americans about the potential consequences of indicting former presidents. This act, in itself, will make America less democratic, because it only guarantees future political prosecutions under the pretext of justice and fairness. If the experience of South Korea is any indication, then convicting and imprisoning one former president is far less likely to secure justice than it is to trigger a vicious cycle of retribution and revenge.

Trump's opponents may be satisfied in the short run if Trump is sentenced to prison. They will not feel that way when Trump is pardoned by a Republican president, who additionally exacts retribution by sending the hounds after Democrats. And of course, this too will backfire on Republicans when Democrats are back in the driver’s seat and in a position to initiate another political prosecution. And the cycle will go on, and on, and on.

The problem with Trump's prosecution is not that he is innocent, a good president, or a good person. It is that sending Trump to prison risks ruining the long tradition of American democracy that tolerates and respects different opinions and actions of political competitors. In the U.S., at least prior to 2023, it was essentially unheard of for the winner of an election to prosecute the loser. For this reason, the risks of sending Trump to prison are far greater than the potential benefits.

Seung-Whan Choi teaches Korean politics and International Relations at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
​

 

Yup, Trump lost every voter at Versailles because he didn't buy them coffee........ Bruh, not a single person there was looking for free anything... Not a single person there needs a free coffee..... They all still voting Trump...

 

Trump took classified documents and refused to return them. He potentially endangered the security of our nation and that of allies. He may have put American and allied personnel. He may have damaged intelligence gathering capabilities.

Not prosecuting encourages others to do the same or worse because they know there will be no prosecutions.

Furthermore, American people see a huge example of the powerful getting away with crimes which they can't get away with. It also makes our DOJ and legal system seem week and inconsistent. It establishes that some people are indeed above the law.

Those outweigh any other inconveniences of prosecuting a criminal former president.

 

related

Have You Seen This Man? Biden Special Counsel Robert Hur Appears to Have Vanished
https://jonathanturley.org/2023/06/...-counsel-robert-hur-appears-to-have-vanished/

excerpt:

After six months, it may be a tad early to put Robert Hur’s face on milk cartons with a “Have you seen this man…” plea. However, after six months, it would be reassuring to see some proof of life in the investigation of President Biden’s classified documents.
​

more at the link

 

double post

 

I love how the article just causally ignored the the conviction of Park in order to make its point.

Park was found guilty of bribery (businesses bribed her, and she used her influence to support these businesses through government policy), abuse of power (coercing companies into making donations to her foundations and supporting her friend's organization), leaking state secrets (revealing confidential government documents, including classified national security information, to a private citizen), and other charges. Notice those charges. They are almost standard operations in the political environment of the US. The good it has done is that South Korea holds its politicians to a very high standard.

The statement in the article is misleading.

"To prosecute a former president is much easier in South Korea than it is in the U.S. because the incumbent Korean president can control the entire legal process through a group of hand-picked prosecutors."​

Like the US, South Korea has a separation of powers system where the three branches of government—executive, legislative, and judicial—are separate and have their own independent roles and functions. Specifically, the South Korean president does not have direct control over choosing prosecutors, but they do have some indirect influence. They appoint the Minister of Justice, who oversees the prosecution services. The Minister of Justice in South Korea is similar to the US Department of Justice (DoJ).

If the South Korean president were to abuse that power, it would not be so different from what Trump and DeSantis said they will attempt to do through the DOJ. However, even in such cases, the US still mostly maintains an independent judiciary system as a check on an abusive executive.

Beyond South Korea, one can look at France, where former presidents have also been convicted. Strong democracies hold politicians accountable and do not shy away from it

 

Even if he does get past these charges he still has to deal with the Georgia election issues.