Trump蘑菇视频 finger-pointing problem
Hardly anything about Donald Trump surprises me anymore.
Hardly anything.
For his upcoming federal trial, I’m surprised he’ll be tried as an adult.
The one-term, twice impeached, twice arrested, twice-indicted ex-president isn’t taking his lumps like a fully grown man.
Hours after special counsel Jack Smith filed that extensive 49-page federal indictment, Trump showed everybody why he’s become an ex-president, with, possibly, a future criminal record.
“I will appoint a real special “Prosecutor” to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the USA, Joe Biden, the entire Biden Crime Family, & all others involved with the destruction of our elections, borders, & country itself,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social message platform.
He emphasized the latest Republican talking point – the so-called “Biden Crime Family” – to sound the alarm that he’s being railroaded by a notorious crime boss, whom he usually claims is too “sleepy” to mastermind anything having more than a spoonful of complexity.
To Trump and many spineless Republicans, the “Biden Crime Family” is the reason for the former president’s legal problems.
Biden apparently splits his free time between plotting Trump’s demise and nodding off at staff meetings, I suppose.
If you can manage to get a Republican in front of a TV camera, there’s a good chance they’ll accuse the Biden administration of being the essential element of a “crime family” that has “weaponized” the Justice Department to only go after Trump.
It doesn’t matter if they use the word “weaponized,” “weaponizing,” or “weaponization,” as long as the word “weapon” gets spliced onto the beginning of it.
At least they aren’t trying to sandwich the word “woke” into their preplanned half-defenses of Trump.
Using “weaponize” in the service of Trump trumps “woke” nowadays.
Just about every Republican not running for president appears on CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, or Newsmax with a predigested message about the supposed “double standard” of having Trump indicted, while Biden and Hillary Clinton still walk free.
Well, there is no “double standard.”
They’re engaging in the latest Republican ploy – “whataboutism.”
Interviewer: “Well, Mr. Trump has been indicted on 37 felony counts.”
Republican apologist: “Yeah, but Hillary has an outstanding parking ticket. And Biden once punched a guy … on a playground … in third grade!”
Any fair reading of the 49-page indictment should eliminate the desire to engage in such “whataboutism.” But we know most of the Republicans beating their gums in the fronts of news cameras haven’t taken the time to read it.
If they did, they’d understand that when Hillary Clinton was caught in the snares of her own classified documents dilemma, she never tried to obstruct the investigators or conceal the classified documents.
Trump is accused of doing both. Obstruction and concealment are essential elements of the case against him.
Likewise, Joe Biden may have had documents in his possession since he was a U.S. senator. But he never concealed the fact that he had them. So, he never obstructed the efforts of investigators to retrieve them.
This entire episode is classic Trump.
He’s being accused of engaging in a willful act.
So, he accuses as many people as possible of being the real culprits.
But this time, a grand jury, with an assist from a special counsel, laid out a damning 49-page portrait of a man who may have compromised the nation’s well-being, as if it was some kind of game.
That document contains names, dates, times of day, audiotapes, and pictures that tell a story that should make it difficult for his cheerleading sycophants to ignore.
Yet they still do.
They’ll stick with him – no matter what.
Even if, as that indictment spells out, there are critical documents that were under Trump’s control that may have been devastating to the nation’s security interests – they’ll fight his battles with talking points.
On page 31, under item No. 19, there’s one entry marked Secret//Formerly Restricted Data, which it describes as: “Undated document concerning nuclear weaponry of the United States.”
Can you honestly find any evidence of the “Biden Crime Family” in that?
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter, and anchor for Entertainment Tonight, and 50-year TV news and newspaper veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.