Jeez, first day back from vacation and I get pulled over by the pedantry police! 
I don’t recall making that assumption, but if I did, I take it back. Your Al Franken example is on target.
I was trying to stay close to the topic of how Trump’s indictment will matter.
It seems like you view American politics as something other than an all-out political knife-fight. But that’s what it is today. If we’re going down the drain to corruption, it’s already too late – the options at present are to effectively surrender to Republican corruption (both moral and legal) or to fight as hard as we can.
Or just merely hold people accountable without fear.
Violating the law and committing a felony are two completely separate beasts, and conflating the two doesn’t help the case you’re making. Underage drinking, smoking weed when/where it is illegal, and speeding are very different things than committing a felony. Like, for example, the things TFG has been indicted for.
Quoting Beria in an attempt to prop up an argument pretty much disqualifies anything else someone says from serious consideration. The law under Beria didn’t matter, if he deemed you a criminal you were. That is the point of his words, not that there were too many laws in the Soviet Union. Millions of people were murdered, imprisoned, or sent to die in gulags under Beria’s watch. Whether they had actually committed the crime they were charged with was entirely irrelevant, which is the point of the quote attributed to have allegedly been said by Beria.
My mistake. You wrote “punishing Trump for major lawbreaking will facilitate sending Democrats to prison for minor lawbreaking;” I misinterpreted what degree of severity you meant by “minor.”
I may have been conditioned by having just spent time learning about the (Democratic appointee) Sandy Berger case. If the current Trump episode “facilitates” cases like that leading to prison time, I think that’s a good thing.
If it facilitates cases like Hillary’s emails leading to prison time, then I agree with you — it’s a bad thing.
(To any typical Republican voter reading this post: this isn’t because I “like” Hillary and “dislike” Berger — it’s because of the facts of each case, as I have learned from impartial sources.)
IF she was convicted of committing a crime. Jesus, can we take this leniency toward criminal actions and apply it to everyone, or is it just for politicians?
I hold there’s no reason for concern about Republicans going after Democrats – if they’re actually guilty of criminal behavior, then good riddance; if not, then they won’t turn up anything (like with Hillary, the ongoing Jim Jordan nonsense hearings, and a million other examples of right-wing fakery). And further (and perhaps most importantly), Republicans are already trying to do this. I don’t believe that any Republicans in power out there are “holding back” out of some sense of civic duty. They’re corrupt and acting corruptly, but because there’s nothing there, they’re not accomplishing anything other than smoke and mirrors.
You have great faith in our justice system. I agree with you overall, but there are concerning cracks here and there, particularly (perhaps) at the highest levels, i.e. the Supreme Court — though even they (meaning, enough of their conservative majority) have made a few reassuringly just decisions recently. So, overall I share your faith (including in the impartiality of most jurors, when push comes to shove.)
Even if I’m wrong, the answer is not appeasement - that won’t get us anywhere. The only answer is to fight and hold wrongdoers accountable. That’s always the only answer.