'I Think We're Alone Now'

Time can be a healer or a hindrance.

In the case of Donald J. Trump vs. the D.O.J. it seems to be benefiting the former and frustrating the latter.

‘Time is NOT on our side’ I would shout into my car rants, of which I did many on this subject early into AG Merrick Garland’s tenure.

I am admittedly no legal expert but most assuredly I am an informal one on Donald Trump - and that is the last guy you want to let run out the clock.

Trump has spent his lifetime using the courts as a weapon - on both sides of lawsuits.

The fact that he had been involved in over 4,000 suits BEFORE he became POTUS was to me one of the most serious indictments of the man’s character - and it seemingly went unremarked upon in mainstream media.

Now here we are with a good chance he may be able to stall several of his cases until after the election.

With help from a Supreme Court that he stacked with Federalist Society stooges and charlatans, and a District Judge that appears to be the judicial equivalent of a dirty bomb.

Aileen Cannon will blow up the government’s chances of prosecuting Trump on the stolen documents case before the American people head to the polls in perhaps the most consequential election of our lifetime.

That’s not justice anyway you spin it but the hampering and corruption of justice - and that’s how Trump has always been taught to play it.

From his days with Roy Cohn and the sleazy tricks Trump picked up from him - through the latest round of grifters and strip mall legal eagles that appear as if Trump found them in a ‘hot lawyer’ google search - the former president has all too often gotten away with making the courts proceed on his timeline.

In essence, he has found his ‘battle rhythm’ while the D.O.J. has not; Jack Smith though seems like a man who has moved with alacrity and has wasted no time, my only wish is that he had been appointed earlier so there would be much more of it.

The thing you need to understand most about Donald Trump is there is probably nothing more enticing to him at this moment than the idea of being called and becoming a ‘Strongman’.

It distills his political ambitions into a succinct and stupefyingly simple ideology: that of the corrupt bully with an almost paranoiac sense of insecurity roiling just below his paper-thin skin.

In Trump it scratches an itch that runs much deeper than even his greed, lust for power and considerable criminal and financial exposure demand.

It goes much deeper - and aims at a core defect of perhaps the most twisted man to ever occupy the American cultural and political stage.

That is the desire to lash out, seek retribution and punish those he feels have slighted him.

Slights could be something as simple as reflecting back to Trump his own insecurities and shortcomings.

The former reality TV star doesn’t like anyone around him to get more attention that he does, it is a direct threat in his warped mind.

Guys like Mitt Romney, better looking, with real hair and real money, never stood a chance working alongside of him in Washington - and it is why Trump chased anyone who wasn’t a complete toadstool out of the Republican Party.

He will do the same to the United States as a whole if he is ever returned to power.

Any group Trump views as undesirable will come under attack by his increasingly intolerant and well-armed base of absolute morons.

And while they are indeed morons, they’re a new breed of wretched and hyper-connected morons being exposed to a level of brainwashing that frankly we have not seen the likes of before.

The salute to the ‘January 6th hostages’ - while music played in the background and Trump stood saluting as the recited in ‘Pledge of Allegiance’ - in a video that Donald himself produced - was downright chilling once you got past the clownish absurdity of it all.

The former president went on, of course, to call migrants ‘not people’ and promised ‘a bloodbath for this country’ if he was not re-elected.

An attempt to walk back the violent rhetoric by claiming it was meant to discuss only the ‘automobile industry’ is a classic Trump tactic; subterfuge that his supporters can use in the conservative ecosphere to push back in the larger media climate.

While the message still resonates and reaches its intended audience.

Much like his “Stand back and stand by” directive to the Proud Boys during a presidential debate in 2020.

Or his words on the morning of January 6th - when he knew the clock was ticking on voter certification and he was jumping out of his saggy orange skin to get in front of an armed MAGA crowd and fire up their march to the US Capitol - but Secret Service magnetometers were slowing entry to the Ellipse.

“I don’t f*king care that they have weapons. They’re not here to hurt me. Take the f*cking mags away” Trump said that morning, as related in Congressional testimony by Cassidy Hutchinson.

In my opinion he should have been arrested shortly after uttering those words - as it fully showed his intent and his lack of interest in the rule of law - not to mention his goal of overturning and election and staying in power.

Its almost an affront to the senses that we are once again faced with such a villain leading a political party.

A gutless, hollowed-out party made up of midway freaks and grifters that are only here to scam and self-enrich - and appear to be multiplying as the avenues to share information on progressive candidates and actual fact-based news reporting is shrinking.

Most especially in the markets that the GOP and the dark money behind conservative politics has been mining.

This could pose very real strategic advantages for conservatives should they seek a repeat of Trump’s post-2020 election strategy which was an attempted heist of democracy itself.

Has MSNBC gamed-out a potential ‘long game’ play where Ronna McDaniel is on air this coming election night when Trump inevitably starts claiming the election was stolen and urges MAGA to take action on his behalf?

If she were to even give slight deference to such incendiary statements on NBC News in a high-stakes moment like election night it could be very dangerous.

There is nothing in Ronna McDaniel’s past behavior that says she would not do that since she was all too happy to push fraudulent elector schemes on behalf of her old boss in 2020.

The fact that she is being rewarded with a 300K on-air contributor contract by NBC News just weeks after the monster she helped protect for many years pushed her out at the RNC (and replaced her with Lara Trump), a move itself that was reported on as signs of obvious corruption at MSNBC, shows how much money has replaced morality in much of our media landscape.

In the end it will come down to us a people showing up and voting.

Our greatest resource as a nation is our ability to mobilize and work together for the greater good.

Our finest moments have always sprung from a similar stream.

The cool waters of consciousness and empathy will serve us better than the bubbling cauldron of hate and the headwaters of bile being served up by men who claim to build but can only destroy.

For they lack both vision and skill and make up for it with bluster and sleight of oh-so-tiny hand.

There is a clear path ahead and while it may not be easy, it will represent progress and a further push forward towards equality for all, and economic justice and empathy in our politics and policy.

That path is clear.

Vote Blue.