34 felonies, and you know damned well that if Donald Trump serves any time at all–which isn’t gonna happen for reasons, all of which stink on ice–it’s going to be in one of those tennis-lessons prisons where they put all the rich, soft, white guys. He’d live in a comfy room like in a college dorm and eat good, real food, and work on his golf swing. If he was even locked up at all. Maybe he’ll get confined to his own luxury home with an ankle beeper with all his utilities and comfort tended to. Or maybe he’ll be fined for his pocket money. There will be no actual punishment, though, because he’s a wealthy ex-president, andthe rich and the politicians look out for and shelter each other.
Yet people on here and elsewhere are jubilant. Like the bad guy really got brought to real justice. Fuck that; if I or any of my friends or kinfolks got convicted of 34 felonies–or 20, or even 5–they’d be stuck in real prison and probably never get out. And nobody on the SDMB would even know it, or care if they did.
Whoop it up you lot, and pretend like something real happened and positive changes will come of it. But all this excitement over the farce of a trial of a former POTUSA being found guilty of something (and its inevitable aftermath, where the rich white dude goes free to do his thing some more) really goes to show is that a certain class of American can get by with anything.
I’ve got two cousins in prison for similar felonies who are serving longer sentences than Trump will have from this case. However those differences are because of legal technicalities like having two previous strikes each, different demographic characteristics, and also being sentenced in different states than NY. It’s of course mostly the first two differences.
It might just be my reading of the tea leaves, but to my thunking the upside/excitement is about crimping the chances of the reelect.
From this non-merkin perspective, he can cruise the world unimpeded for the rest of his ill-gotten days on a gold-plated yacht so long as he doesn’t get the keys to the White House washroom again.
There won’t be consequences, not meaningful ones. He might be fined–and won’t miss the money, he’s got a whole lot more–or grounded at home (meaning, in one of his mansions, where he’ll be esconced in the manner to which he is accustomed) for a year or so, that’s it. He won’t even see the inside of rich bitch tennis prison. Because The Powers That Fucking Be have decided that some people don’t get punished for what they do.
And? He’s not gonna do any time; you won’t get to see your villain punished like in the movies. If the felonies he got convicted of actually netted him some penitentiary time, that would be consequences. And that ain’t gonna happen–he won’t even go to rich bitch tennis prison, which is in itself a lot better deal than any of the convicted felons I know ever got.
First-time white collar crime convictions depending on the nature of the offense(s) often don’t result in significant prison time; offenders can wind up sentenced to home detention or serve time on weekends.
Regardless of what sentence Trump is given, he’s still a convicted felon.
I would not confer magical powers on Donald Trump that he clearly does not have. Republicans are shouting that this is all rigged and the OP is suggesting the same except that it is rigged in the other direction. Nothing makes Donald Trump special enough to have an automatic exit from accountability here. As of the verdict, even if he dies he’s still guilty. And the rich bitch tennis prison is still a prison. Even the nice prisons are only nice in the abstract.
But supposing he does become POTUS again and manages to unmake history. So what? He will just be swapping his old problems for entirely new ones. All while getting older, more demented (as in dementia demented) and with the people who are supposed to be on his side stabbing him in the back because it amuses them to do so.
He has a choice. He can go to jail or he can continue living in Hell. Whatever he does, he is not going to enjoy whatever is left of his life.
I know where a prison farm is. Right here in Arkansas. (Cummings at Grady, Ark. South of Pine Bluff)
I’m sure SHS would crap her panties to have him here.
I wonder if he likes bologna, everyday? And working in the pea patch?
No tennis courts. No private cells. If you’re lucky enough to get a bed. Most are on pallets on the floor.
We’re talking about a man who flies home after every single rally because he can’t stand sleeping in a place he doesn’t own. Even the softest minimum-security prison Scandinavia has to offer would absolutely wreck his psyche. Within ten minutes he’d be pulling his hair out and scratching himself raw as he flips over the furniture looking for the Diet Coke button.
Any of the minimum security federal joints where they send the rich and politically involved. They’re a lot more like college campuses than real prisons like most people who run afoul of the law get sent to. Do you really think that assholes like Bernie Madof and HR Haldeman deserve to be treated better than regular ordinary inmates? If anything, the crimes they do have a lot more negative effect on a lot more people than drug deals and bank robberies, but since they have money and political pull, they skate. Because of class bias that sees the elite as less guilty than poor people, and deserving of better things just because they are who they are.
I did Air Force basic training about 40 years ago, and I have spent time at a USAF base that co-hosted a white collar federal prison.
From my perspective the two did not differ much.
If Trump spends 8 weeks in that prison, I will consider us square on this charge.
But as I recall, he has 3 more pending
I watched that trial nearly everyday. (CNNs coverage)
It was not a farce.
The only thing stupid was Donnie boys ignorance making that idiotic statement after the days proceedings.
And maybe the defences disorganized closing arguments.
Trump will turn on his counsel. Wait and see.