The Witness Chronicles, April 28, 2024

A sleepy, sleazy thing

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The Day in Court Strategy is Failing Badly

Everyone got this one wrong

The legal pundits braced for endless appearances on political talk shows. The campaign waited expectantly for a flood of small donor money. And the defense lawyers insisted their bills be paid ahead, just in case.

Today the New Yorker published an observational piece (possible paywall) by Benjamin Wallace-Wells titled A Sleepy, Sleazy Trial. That title pretty much says it all, at least so far. Those legal pundits touted a Trump strategy that called for his MAGA people to rise up in anger at seeing him in court and empty their pockets into Republican coffers.

It’s not happening. In the article referenced above, Wallace-Wells reports the crowd of Trump supporters outside the courthouse as being in the ‘mid-single digits’, i.e. a handful. Inside the courthouse we see a rumpled man who, during the morning photo op, glares at the cameras in defiance.

But by the end of the first few hours he looks like what he is, an old man, not too healthy looking, with a tendency to nod off. The typically defiant glare is gone and instead he has to listen to witnesses, all either self-professed friends or former associates, tell one tawdry detail after another, for hours.

Trials are rarely glamorous or exciting and this so far is neither. But we do have the testimonies of the porn star and the Playboy model ahead, so it could at least get salacious as they detail their involvement with Donald Trump, both while he was married to Melania.

Things are not going to be pretty at home in Mar A Lago. It won’t come out in the trial but apparently some of this stuff took place while his wife was pregnant, a detail that the jurors are not supposed to hear. Right.

Legal experts consider this trial as hardly worth pursuing, questioning whether the felony indictments should actually be misdemeanors punishable by a slap on the wrist, if prosecuted at all. The much more significant trials ahead are the real meat, crimes against the state, the American people, and well-documented with indictments of many Trump co-conspirators.

This trial is chump change, or so the narrative goes. Except it may not be as inconsequential as they say, because it is revealing the man as what he really is, a cheeseball con man who has created a bombastic personality to cover for his scams.

The MAGA folks like the show at his rallies. The incomprehensible gobbledygook, the hands pumping and the weird little dances, the glaring outrage. But they’re not getting it here. He tries with his daily press appearance as he leaves the court, but that is getting tired too. The terrible fake Biden conspiracy, etc.,etc. It’s not news, it's repetition. 

The American people have already tuned out, which is unfortunate because there are enormous stakes here, the literal future of democracy and the rule of law. But it’s boring and he is being revealed as boring, not exactly the strategy going into this thing.

And there will likely be four or more weeks of this. 

This may be the way Trumps checks out, in a dumpy Manhattan courtroom, grumbling, napping, and veering closer and closer to contempt charges and a few days in jail or a fine. Just another small-time crook. Who happens to be an ex-President of the United States of America.

Of course he will walk, convicted or not, and he will continue with his campaign, and the legal bills, already some $75 million will keep piling up, and he will lose, and he will cry fraud, and some of his more violent believers will do bad things, and…it won’t matter this time because we will be ready for it.

But this day in court is not turning him into a hero except to his loyal base, a feared juggernaut that is turning out to be nothing more than a fringe element. The ultra-wealthy who support him will fade away if his election chances fade and their dreams of even more tax cuts and oil drilling fade with him.

Yes, this is a contrary scenario, especially if you are an ardent Fox watcher or a ‘fair and balanced’ New York Times reader, the two ends of the coverage we get. A reminder, there is nothing fair and balanced in comparing Donald Trump and Joe Biden. One is an upstanding man who has devoted his life to the country.

The other is a broken grifter.

And the difference will get more glaringly obvious as this thing continues. If anyone is still paying attention.

~ I write The Grasshopper, a letter for creatives, The Witness Chronicles, a place for my articles on politics and climate, and The Remarkable, a recovery letter, about my addiction and reentry experience. All are weekly and free, however this is how I live and I strongly believe all writers and creatives should get paid, if we provide value. Your upgrade to a paid subscription helps make that happen. 

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