It’s also the bullshit “I’m innocent, I was framed” that many mobsters use as they are taken away.
He’s going full Jesus mode now.
I AM NOW GOING TO WASHINGTON, D.C., TO BE ARRESTED FOR HAVING CHALLENGED A CORRUPT, RIGGED, & STOLEN ELECTION. IT IS A GREAT HONOR, BECAUSE I AM BEING ARRESTED FOR YOU. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!
From Truth Social.
We wish.
(Not you, @aurora_maire!)
“Truth” link not required.
Sorry if I contributed to the confusion. I swear I read the annotated indictment, but I am very much not a lawyer and get sidetracked by the claims by trump defenders that he was just protecting his rights to challenge the election results and he can say whatever he wants, yada yada.
Historians say that Jesus Christ was a person of color, but I’m fairly certain that color was not orange.
He’s landing in Newark now. Wonder if he will have more remarks at the bottom of the stairs?
Took it off and just referenced it.
Interesting exchanges, his attorney states, president trump is present, the judge says, good afternoon, mr trump. He is asked to state his name and age he says, Donald j trump, John., seven seven, seventy seven.
Seven seven? Does anyone give their age like that?
I’m sure he was not happy with how things went in court. He no doubt had a bunch of things to say about the judge.
Looking forward to the 28th.
Here’s some interesting analysis on the co-conspirators and Trump’s chances of a successful defense (spoiler: it’s none) by Robert Katzberg, a former federal prosecutor and high-profile white-collar defense attorney.
He takes exception to some media analyses that suggest that by not indicting the co-conspirators, Smith intends to put them on notice that they should consider cooperating. Katzberg argues that the time for that is long past. Time is the enemy of someone considering flipping, because every day provides the opportunity for someone else to step forward, and for your potential deal to get worse. Pence and Meadows apparently already took the government up on the offer, so while it might be a bonus if another flipped, it isn’t the reason they weren’t indicted.
Instead, in addition to simplifying and speeding up the trial, the biggest reason to not include them was to avoid having them testify at the trial.
Jack Smith’s choice not to charge the six was made so that they will not be defending themselves at the Trump trial, and thus will not provide a jury with some sort of rational explanation for certain of the events at issue. If Trump were to call them at his trial now, each, as an unindicted co-conspirator, would be mad not to invoke his or her Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.
As for Trump’s possible defense, the “free speech” defense is for media consumption, it won’t see the light of day in the courtroom. Trump’s only real defense is that he was acting on the advice of experts, namely the co-conspirators. According to Katzberg, this has two problems:
First, except for cases involving a trial defendant’s confession, the evidence establishing Donald Trump’s criminal intent is as overwhelming as I have seen in my 40-plus years in the courtroom. Second, as pointed out before, none of the six “experts” he allegedly relied upon are likely to be available to so testify. Thus, the only way the former president can rebut the mountain of evidence establishing he knew he lost the election and that his attempts to overturn the result were illegal is to testify in his own defense and somehow convince a jury it was all an innocent mistake.
Even if the case against him were less overwhelming, as I have argued previously, Donald Trump is incapable of successfully testifying on his own behalf. He possesses no real and exculpatory facts to present to a jury and lacks the emotional and intellectual self-control to get through a direct examination, let alone a hostile cross-examination loaded with the legal equivalent of nuclear weapons.
I wanna see! Danged work.
I wonder how they determine the exact right number of vehicles for his convoy. Watching it, it’s fun to imagine it’s his funeral cortage.
Geez Louise, anybody who has watched one single episode of Law & Order (or any other cop show) knows that one!
…
[golf clap]
Giving him the benefit of the doubt (for maybe the only time ever), maybe he had cotton mouth and “seventy” came out as “seven.”
Plus, DOJ can always charge and try them after Trump is convicted, right?
Thanks, btw, for sharing that excellent analysis.
More accurately, it’s the principle of effective lying that he once taught Stephanie Grisham when she was his press secretary – the important thing is to keep repeating the same thing over and over, and if you do that, it doesn’t really matter what you say.
For someone being so honored, he sure spent a lot of time looking super pissed off!
Kinda like at the first arraignment, when he told the media afterwards that all the law enforcement types apologized to him with tears in their eyes that they were being forced to put him through this, but what we actually saw was one of them letting the door slam in his face on the way to the courtroom. But perhaps this particular officer couldn’t see very well, because of the tears in his eyes.
It bears a bit of amplification:
The fundamental principle of all propaganda was the repetition of effective arguments; but those arguments must not be too refined – there was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the stronger, and this will always be the man in the street. Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not to the intellect. Truth was unimportant, and entirely subordinate to the tactics and psychology, but convenient lies (“poetic truth”, as he once called them) must always be made credible.
[and]
If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.
–WWII Germany Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels –
questionable attribution
British historian Richard J. Evans told Reuters via email that indeed the words in the claim are not directly from Goebbels, adding the quote is “a précis of what Goebbels wrote, so not the exact words, though doubtless Trevor Roper accurately summed up what Goebbels wrote.”
DOJ/Smith can indict them whenever he chooses, even simultaneous to the Trump case. I’m interested to see the timing of it.
I’ve waited for this day for so long, when Trump was finally under the control of the D.C. District Court. The best part of today’s proceedings for me was learning how Trump was admonished to not tamper with witnesses or jurors, or he could “be held” pending adjudication of the case. I do hope he understands what this means.
Sounds too like this court means to move things along. I don’t see any way Trump is going to be able to delay to anywhere near the election. I expect a trial date will be set in March or April at the latest.