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Trial by Popularity Contest [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-01-05
Last Friday, Justice Juan Merchan set the sentencing hearing for Donald Trump in his Manhattan fraud trial for this Friday 10 January 2025, but indicated he won’t give the defendant prison time. He plans an unconditional discharge, which would close the case without assigning any penalty.
This doesn’t serve the interests of justice. What would serve the interests of justice is a stiff prison term, as I’ve discussed here in my series, Prison. Donald Trump is a hardened, violent criminal who shows no sense of remorse. He has yet to acknowledge his guilt. His prison sentence should be commensurate with any other criminal with the same behavior.
However, Merchan’s apparent take on this is in line with the rest of the court system, which has declined to pursue justice for the American people. The courts have made it known that they think the American people should decide whether to hold criminals to account at the ballot box.
This is trial by popularity contest.
Yes, This Is a Dictatorship
By their thinking, if you are popular enough, the courts are supposed to forgive you any crimes you might commit. We now have the rule of law bent to appease the powerful. This is the point at which we step over into a dictatorship. In a dictatorship, the dictator can use the force of government without constraint by the legal system or the backing of the legislature. Once this case is finalized, we can officially consider the U.S. a dictatorship.
It’s unlikely any elected Democratic officeholders will protest. I have seen no indication that Democrats in Congress even plan to protest the Electoral College vote. In theory, they could do that, as I outlined in my posting, January 6th, 2025. But it looks like Oscar Mayer has better weenies than this bunch.
All the obstacles are cleared for Donald Trump to assume the trappings of President on January 20th. That won’t make him President. Unless Congress actually votes, by two-thirds in each house, to give him back his eligibility, he can’t legally be President.
At that point we can’t call him “President”. The country will be officially president-less. I plan to title him “Criminal”: Criminal Trump.
The United States has always been a legal fiction. It looked real only because of our consensus as a people to recognize it as a reality. But with the passing of law, it is no longer a legal fiction. It’s just a fiction.
We might be able to pull these chestnuts out of the fire, but at this point it will take a lot of work. Earlier, I wrote about Timothy Snyder’s suggestion Democrats form a government in opposition. (See Timothy Snyder and Shadow Government.)
Ultimately, I think the party needs to designate official spokespeople for each major area of government. And in the poll I took, the most important of those areas is the area of law represented by the Attorney General.
My recommendation is that the DNC designate people to speak on behalf of the party about law. Since the most damaging thing hitting us right now is the failure of the legal system to rein in dictatorship, this is a critical area.
Officially Speaking on the Law
There are at least two people I think would be good representatives of the party on restoring the legal system: Adam Schiff and Jamie Raskin.
Adam Schiff is currently Senator from California. He graduated from Stanford University and Harvard Law School, and he was an assistant United States attorney. Sen. Schiff supports freedom of the press. He was a lead impeachment manager in the first Donald Trump impeachment (January 2020). He was also a member of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol.
Jamie Raskin is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, serving Maryland’s 8th district. He has a J.D. degree magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He describes his position as not being in the political center, but in the “moral center”. He objected to the certification of the 2016 presidential election over Donald Trump’s close ties to Russia. Like Schiff, he was a member of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol.
Both Sen. Schiff and Rep. Raskin are well-versed in the criminality of the coming administration. And once Donald Trump leaves office, there’s a very strong chance a Democratic administration will follow, with the possibility of cleaning up all the corruption. It would be good to have laid the groundwork for that by establishing the principles and the facts needed to conduct proper investigation and pursue legal recourse.
Are their others who should be on our short list for certification? Who else would be a good spokesperson for the rule of law?
Criminal Trump Belongs in Prison
As for the soon-convict, we should remember why he should be in prison.
Public information provides adequate predicate for his investigation and trial. His trials were not politically motivated. They were fact- and law-motivated.
It was totally fair to try him in Manhattan. The claim he wouldn’t get a fair trial there is based on the assumption that the jurors in New York would be like the people making the claim: devoid of duty and honor, willing to swear one thing and then do the other.
He is not a first-time offender. There were three, separate instances of courts finding he’d defrauded people before the Manhattan trial.
He’s not a “non-violent” offender. His public statements motivate people to commit violence on his behalf. And he is part of a criminal organization, the Republican Party.
Based on his situation, he deserves prison time, as I pointed out in Factors in Donald Trump’s Sentencing.
Donald Trump was the leader in this conspiracy.
This crime took place over time. It wasn’t just a spur-of-the-moment indiscretion.
There was a breach of trust.
He’s never accepted responsibility or shown remorse.
This was a serious crime for which Michael Cohen got a three-year prison sentence.
It’s also clear that a fine would not be a deterrent. He was not deterred from slandering E. Jean Carroll by a $5 million penalty, and only when she got an award over $83 million did he shut his trap, even moderately. A fine for his Manhattan guilt would not reach even $5 million, so no amount of money the judge could order would make any difference. He needs to go to prison. That’s the only deterrent that would work with him.
So, I think The Judgement on Donald Trump has to be prison.
An appropriate range is two to four years. He deserves at least one year of prison just for falsifying documents. But this was part of a scheme to defraud the public. I think he deserves at least a second year just for that. Since sentencing guidelines in New York appear to require a range of years, I suggest that the proper sentence is 2-4 years in prison.
Why?
He’s a hardened criminal.
These crimes are part of a life-long pattern of fraud.
He is completely impervious to correction.
A monetary sentence is completely inadequate.
Given that we know Criminal Trump is set to be sworn in to an office of trust by the federal government, the only question about this is when. Perhaps he could get a suspended sentence, so that he would be on parole unless he committed another crime. But I can’t see the New York authorities showing up at the White House to take him into custody. So, perhaps he could be sentenced to do his time after his time (in the White House).
But really, what we see here isn’t anywhere close to that. You can compare what the authorities do with him with what’s outlined here. That’s the gap between reality and justice.
We have our work cut out for us. We need to focus on winning the next elections, as I said in 2028.
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