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Jailing a manifestly corrupt president is a helluva challenge, but sometimes it just has to be done [1]
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Date: 2023-01-16
Left-right: Donald Trump, Nicolas Sarkozy, Pedro Castillo (Credit: Independent Australia, Screenshots via YouTube)
It has been a bad week for several national leaders who now appear more likely than ever to serve prison time for criminal activity while in office. It has also been tough for some of the countries they served. But not all. Some nations are passing the tests presented by criminal leaders better than others.
In France, Nicolas Sarkozy, who was Président from 2007 to 2012, has been found guilty of corruption after offering a magistrate a prestigious placement in exchange for information about a criminal investigation into Sarkozy’s finances. He was originally sentenced to three years jail with two suspended. This week, all appeals were exhausted. The guilty verdict stands and Sarkozy will be incarcerated.
There has been some incrédulité in France that Sarkozy will in fact be subject to the law like everyone else. But this is generally seen as désirable, even on Sarkozy’s centre right side of politics. There is no serious clameur against the judgment.
This contrasts dramatically with Peru where more than 48 people have died in protests following President Pedro Castillo’s jailing last month. Castillo tried to dissolve the parliament and rule autocratically, but was immediately impeached by congress members – 101 votes to six – and replaced by his vice-president, Dina Boluarte.
The ex-president of Brazil, Peru’s South American neighbour, is also likely to be prosecuted for refusing to hand over government after last October’s bitterly-fought national election. Far right leader Jair Bolsonaro falsely claimed the election was rigged, boycotted the inauguration of incoming reformist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and has only reluctantly called his supporters to end their violence. He is currently staying in Florida, USA.
Presidential criminality in the USA
Events in the United States over the last week make it almost certain former President Donald Trump will face criminal charges. The atmosphere there is far closer to the volatility of Latin America than the Gallic calm of France.
The first development was in Georgia last Monday where a special grand jury completed its report into unlawful interference by Trump and his allies in the 2020 presidential election count. This follows the infamous January 2021 phone call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and others, in which Trump said:
“There’s no way I lost Georgia. There’s no way. We won by hundreds of thousands of votes ... So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break ... All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state.”
Specific charges arising from the Georgia report are still pending.
The second development was the release of first-hand evidence from pro-Trump Republican Party chairwoman Ronna McDaniel that Trump asked her personally to engage in fraudulent interference in the 2020 election count.
The significance of McDaniel’s testimony is that this is direct evidence, not merely hearsay, as was much of the damning testimony presented to the Select Committee which investigated the 6 January 2021 insurrection.
Role of the mendacious media
News Corp’s Fox News has led the disinformation campaign which has spread the manifest lies that the 2020 election was stolen, that Trump is the duly-elected president, that the Biden family is corrupt and that violence is necessary to reclaim the country.
News Corporation has run “news” items in Britain, the USA and globally supporting the anti-democratic protests in Brazil by furthering far right conspiracy theories.
Fox News regular guest and Trump associate Steve Bannon has played a highly visible role in the USA and Brazil by repeating the blatant lies that both elections were stolen and urging physical mayhem.
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This is an abbreviated version of an article published today in Independent Australia. The original article is available here in full for free:
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/gaoling-a-president-is-a-helluva-challenge-but-sometimes-it-has-to-be-done,17141
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Read about Alan Austin's current defamation situation HERE and help out by contributing to the crowd-funding campaign HERE.
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