Lawfare - The Hail Mary of Those in Trouble

[whag]

I don’t understand the right-wing talking point that the legal system has been weaponized against MAGA. Unless someone can make the case there’s disparity between the number of anti-MAGA Dems being charged with crimes compared to MAGA CEO and his associates, I don’t see it. But this would be the arena to prove it.

Crying “lawfare” is the last refuge of the scoundrel (Samuel Johnson said this of “patriotism”) and not exclusive to ideology. Bill and Hillary Clinton, too, said they were especially persecuted by their political opponents. It’s weak.

JimL, HA, and rogue, shant participate in this thread. I don’t have the patience for rogue’s Gish Gallop technique.

[Diogenes]

In regard to the affair with Monica Lewinsky, Bill was persecuted.

[whag]

In regard to the affair with Monica Lewinsky, Bill was persecuted.

I dunno, man. Starr was getting nowhere with Whitewater, was planning to move on to a teaching position, got criticized by GOP for bailing on his investigation, then came Linda Tripp and the perfect opportunity to trap Clinton. I can’t say I’d have passed up that opportunity, but maybe you’re right and it set a bad precedent.

[Mountain Man]

This can be answered with a simple rhetorical question: do you think any of this would be happening if President Trump had quietly gone away after 2020?

[Ronson]

In regard to the affair with Monica Lewinsky, Bill was persecuted.

Agreed. It was a bad precedent.

As we touched on in another thread, Nixon had the Watergate hearings, Reagan had the Iran-Contra hearings, Clinton had the Lewinsky mess, Trump has a million bullets coming at him, and Biden's woes are still in the oven. It's hard to say when the "lawfare" began and how much of it is/was justified. My personal opinion is that Lewinsky and Stormy Daniels were not justified. They were purely politically motivated.

[Juvenal]

Lawfare is an exceptionally high quality blog and podcast, so I'm always happy to see it get some extra publicity, even if it's only inadvertent.

[CivilDiscourse]

I don’t understand the right-wing talking point that the legal system has been weaponized against MAGA. Unless someone can make the case there’s disparity between the number of anti-MAGA Dems being charged with crimes compared to MAGA CEO and his associates, I don’t see it. But this would be the arena to prove it.

Crying “lawfare” is the last refuge of the scoundrel (Samuel Johnson said this of “patriotism”) and not exclusive to ideology. Bill and Hillary Clinton, too, said they were especially persecuted by their political opponents. It’s weak.

JimL, HA, and rogue, shant participate in this thread. I don’t have the patience for rogue’s Gish Gallop technique.

I think it's simplistic to lump "the legal system" as one monolithic block.

I believe that there the NYAG has definitely let political animosity guide their decision making. I liken their case against Trump to that of Al Capone and Tax Evasion. It was done from a politician looking for a crime to charge trump with. Then of course there were the extraordinary remedies sought against the Trump organization in that case. It does not help that Bragg (and his predecessor) made "Holding Trump 'Accountable'" as a key piece of their campaign strategies.

The Doc Case. I think that one is good, its primarily a case of Trump tripping over his own Ego.

Georgia? Call it up in the air. It's being ran by a DA who doesn't have the sense God gave a rock. It's a DA who was forced to recuse herself from a case because she thought it was a good idea to throw a fundraiser for the political opponent of one of the people she was trying to prosecute. You wouldn't have to try very hard to convince me that a woman with that poor of a judgement made political decisions in charging. But It's RICO, so there's always the possibility something can stick.

[Cow Poke]

In regard to the affair with Monica Lewinsky, Bill was persecuted.

And prosecuted, too!

[whag]

Lawfare is an exceptionally high quality blog and podcast, so I'm always happy to see it get some extra publicity, even if it's only inadvertent.

Quality stuff there. Thanks for the link.

[whag]

I think it's simplistic to lump "the legal system" as one monolithic block.

I believe that there the NYAG has definitely let political animosity guide their decision making. I liken their case against Trump to that of Al Capone and Tax Evasion. It was done from a politician looking for a crime to charge trump with. Then of course there were the extraordinary remedies sought against the Trump organization in that case. It does not help that Bragg (and his predecessor) made "Holding Trump 'Accountable'" as a key piece of their campaign strategies.

The Doc Case. I think that one is good, its primarily a case of Trump tripping over his own Ego.

Georgia? Call it up in the air. It's being ran by a DA who doesn't have the sense God gave a rock. It's a DA who was forced to recuse herself from a case because she thought it was a good idea to throw a fundraiser for the political opponent of one of the people she was trying to prosecute. You wouldn't have to try very hard to convince me that a woman with that poor of a judgement made political decisions in charging. But It's RICO, so there's always the possibility something can stick.

With one solid case and a couple politically motivated cases that were still evidentiary watertight and enforceable, lawfare sounds like a HM defense. There are really no other options.

Re: Georgia, what a disappointment. Trump and D’Souza are directly responsible for the harassment of many individuals there. Just for that alone, he should be stripped of any responsibility to lead.

Arguing “politically motivated” these days is laughable since it’s been always existed in the off-season and is ubiquitous in campaigning. We are a weird society for pretending it’s ever been anything but that. There is a scary contingent of silent wild card voters who know that.

[Starlight]

This can be answered with a simple rhetorical question: do you think any of this would be happening if President Trump had quietly gone away after 2020?

I think Trump is very guilty of all the crimes he's charged with...

but...

the elites would have let him get away with it for 2 reasons if he'd just quietly gone away, because (a) they like to let elites get away with things that normal people would go to prison for, and (b) they worry that charging Trump is seen as 'political' and will hurt American unity.

Only once Trump made it clear he wasn't going to just go away, the elites reluctantly let the obvious charges against him go forward. Thus the timing is political in the sense that the obvious charges were being dubiously prevented from occurring by the elites, until Trump made it really clear he was going to run again and the elites felt they couldn't keep protecting him and had to let the charges play out.

As we've seen, with him being found guilty on all charges in the legally weakest of the 4 cases against him, he's clearly very very guilty once the charges are actually allowed to play out in court.

I guess you could call it "reverse lawfare"... the elites were protecting him for things he was obviously guilty of, and now they've abandoned that protection. But due to the innate incompetence of the US elites the timing of it looks terrible, and their plans for first protecting him then abandoning that protection have left the situation in a worse state than if they'd never existed and interfered at all. Typical inverse-meritocracy of the US cocktail drinking elites.

[CivilDiscourse]

With one solid case and a couple politically motivated cases that were still evidentiary watertight and enforceable, lawfare sounds like a HM defense. There are really no other options.

Re: Georgia, what a disappointment. Trump and D’Souza are directly responsible for the harassment of many individuals there. Just for that alone, he should be stripped of any responsibility to lead.

Arguing “politically motivated” these days is laughable since it’s been always existed in the off-season and is ubiquitous in campaigning. We are a weird society for pretending it’s ever been anything but that. There is a scary contingent of silent wild card voters who know that.

I won't go into Fani because there's a bit more murkiness here.

The docs case. Is really odd. Trump was charged with a felony false document charge. While that particular charge being upgraded to a felony, in and of itself is not unusual, it is unusual in the way it was charged against Trump. When that particular crime is used as a felony, it is often an 'ancillary crime', so to speak. You've been caught embezzling money. You are arrested, and charged with felony embezzlement, and because you falsified records while doing so, you are ALSO charged with falsifying records. It is rarely ever charged on it's own. (This, also, is why there's usually not a need to 'specify' the other crime that was committed. Since it's usually already part of the charges).

MM has been in a discussion with Sam about the jury not having to agree on the underlying crime, and those two are talking past each other. Part of that is because Bragg has created a russian nesting doll in order to create the case that he brought. It's created a situation where Sam and MM are kind of both right.

Sam is right. Bragg claimed that the crime Trump tried to cover up was NY "Election through unlawful means". MM is right, because that particular law that Bragg cited, itself requires an underlying crime, and THAT is where the judge said the jurors don't have to agree. That's a very unusual set of circumstances, and it's very likely such a Frankenstein build would have never been built except in the process of trying to find a crime that could be used against Trump.

To me, this is the biggest problem with this case, it's, for lack of a better word, 'Contrived'. It's building a chain of possible crimes in order to say that the crime is a felony. It's alot of effort, and one not likely to have happened elsewhere.

Though, let's be specific. LAWFARE doesn't require the targeted person to be innocent. It's about abusing the legal system to achieve desired outcomes. I think New York has been pretty open about it's desire to do so. Lawfare, in and of itself, is a very dangerous game for the government to be playing with political opponents, even if they are not innocent. You won't see me shedding tears for Trump's ordeals, but at the same time you will see me thinking that those making the decisions are doing so for corrupt reasons.

[Mountain Man]

I think Trump is very guilty of all the crimes he's charged with...

but...

the elites would have let him get away with it for 2 reasons if he'd just quietly gone away, because (a) they like to let elites get away with things that normal people would go to prison for, and (b) they worry that charging Trump is seen as 'political' and will hurt American unity.

Only once Trump made it clear he wasn't going to just go away, the elites reluctantly let the obvious charges against him go forward. Thus the timing is political in the sense that the obvious charges were being dubiously prevented from occurring by the elites, until Trump made it really clear he was going to run again and the elites felt they couldn't keep protecting him and had to let the charges play out.

As we've seen, with him being found guilty on all charges in the legally weakest of the 4 cases against him, he's clearly very very guilty once the charges are actually allowed to play out in court.

I guess you could call it "reverse lawfare"... the elites were protecting him for things he was obviously guilty of, and now they've abandoned that protection. But due to the innate incompetence of the US elites the timing of it looks terrible, and their plans for first protecting him then abandoning that protection have left the situation in a worse state than if they'd never existed and interfered at all. Typical inverse-meritocracy of the US cocktail drinking elites.

Please, there never was any no reluctance. You even had prosecutors running on the promise that they would get President Trump any way they could. And when you look at the cases that have been brought against him, charges for things others have done without consequence (known as selective prosecution), or cases based on novel legal theories, it becomes obvious that this isn't about holding a man accountable for actual crimes but about using the courts to punish a political rival. In the end, they don't actually care if any of the convictions stick (the recent case in New York was so sloppy and had so many unforced errors committed by the judge that it is all but guaranteed to get overturned on appeal), or if they even go the distance (Judge Cannon in Florida forcing the prosecution to support every aspect of its case every step of the way is giving jack Smith some sleepless nights) because, in the end, the process is the punishment.