Patriot or Victim?

"Illegal leaks from a corrupt & highly political Manhattan district attorney's office ... indicate that, with no crime being able to be proven ... the far & away leading Republican candidate & former president of the United States of America, will be arrested on Tuesday [3/21] of next week… Protest, take our nation back!" 

Donald Trump, March 17th.

“Here we go again — an outrageous abuse of power by a radical DA who lets violent criminals walk as he pursues political vengeance against President Trump.” 

Speaker Kevin McCarthy tweet, March 18th.

“No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.” 

 US Constitution, Article II, Section 1, Clause 5

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.” 

US Constitution, 14th Amendment, Section 3.

Gravitating from one who placed the blame for the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol on Donald Trump, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, joined a majority of Republicans in Congress, has reversed the clearest and massive video evidence of an armed invasion, to relabel that event as “legitimate political discourse” that was overwhelmingly peaceful. That many of those self-same GOP rewriters of history came within a hair’s breadth of physical assault as they dived under desks or were whisked away down controlled passages to safety, seems to have passed into an altered narrative.

McCarthy’s giving Fox “News” Tucker Carlson exclusive access to 41 thousand hours of January 6th government footage controlled by the Speaker (who controls the Capitol Police directly) produced a severe edit. The only footage Carlson chose to show to the public were those moments and areas where a few peaceful protesters were shown. Just what McCarthy wanted. Except most of the United States had already seen the violence.

Watching radical GOP extremists from Congress visiting convicted criminals – some by pleading guilty, other by jury verdict – who engaged in violent acts, was sickening. The mantra that Republicans support the police is a myth that must die forever. Tough on crime? Clearly not these members of Congress. The reality is that well-armed extremists, even trained militia, are inexorably linked to the fully MAGA-dominated Republican Party. The fundamentalist base that the GOP believes they must have to win primaries and general elections. If we have elections.

Donald Trump is a master of turning his most vulnerable and negative qualities into strengths, at least to the base. That these proceedings are nothing more than a deep state conspiracy of left-wing radicals, a proverbial “witch hunt” to defeat the “twice legitimately elected” President of the United States, Donald John Trump, is the victim card Trump has used repeatedly to bolster his support from so many GOP voters. Us vs them. Conspiracy theories as facts. There has never been any serious evidence of voter fraud or a stolen election, and indictments and disbarments from those who posted knowing falsehoods to this effect are accelerating.

Indeed, an arrest and prosecution of Trump under New York law in connection with purported election irregularities involving payoffs to silence alleged sexual partner, Stormy Daniels, is a strange place to start. But even rising probable Georgia indictment, involving a concerted effort by Trump himself to pressure Georgia officials to “find” votes and reverse that state’s presidential tally, and the possible federal case for mishandling classified documents, are not sufficient to stop Trump from running in 2024. He wears those threats like badges of honor.

Insurrection is the key. Running on a clear platform of self-declared “retribution,” the only area where Trump could indeed be stopped, even he is actually incarcerated for other crimes, is Section 3 of the 14th amendment, which does not require “conviction,” only that a candidate have “engaged” in the proscribed activities noted in the provision noted above. And if those protests get out of hand as expected, there will be blood. Trump obviously does not care.

Trump and political violence seem to be welded together. Looking at the testimony of the convicted insurrectionists, the statements from rightwing militia leaders and politicians in deep red districts, even the position of the NRA that guns are necessary to overthrow an unpopular government, it is hardly ambiguous that Trump is, once again, stirring the violence pot. He knows exactly what his call to “protest” means… a form a blackmail against prosecutors drilling down on Trump’s rather blatant criminal activity. The very notion that no one is above the law is at stake.

I’m Peter Dekom, and as I watch rising younger voters so disenchanted over our political system that they are beginning to feel voting is worthless, we just may lose their entire voting confidence in the entire system if Trump’s accountability is not pressed to the fullest.