WHAT HAS PUTIN GOT ON TRUMP? NOTHING SAYS BARR

This week all hell broke loose with the revelations of influential high profile insiders Bob Woodward, Michael Cohen and Peter Strzok all of whom provided credible detailed damning evidence of Trump’s commitment to Putin and Russia, (and of course a lot else including his callous incompetence relating to the pandemic). Trump’s former Head of National Intelligence Dan Coates had summed it all up, in the Woodward tome, “What has Putin Got on Him?”. While Trump spluttered on incoherently about his soulless management of the pandemic, regaling the world in his own words courtesy of Woodward’s tapes, a WhistleBlower filed a complaint that he had been instructed to withhold the intelligence that the Russians were once again intervening in the 2020 Presidential election because it made the POTUS “look bad”. 

None of this fuzzed Trump’s latest Consiglieri, the Attorney General of the United States William Barr who in the style of the infamous Roy Cohn doubled down and accused the accusers with the full power of the Justice Department behind him. He is Trump’s last hope to persuade the electorate that Russia was a “hoax” much like the coronavirus is now.

 BARR TRIES TO CREATE A COUNTER NARRATIVE THAT THE BAD GUYS WERE THE ONES THAT INVESTIGATED NOT THOSE THAT THEY INVESTIGATED

Ironically these devastating revelations in the three best selling books emerged at the same time Barr was working full time to negate the fact that Russia intervened in the 2016 election. Barr had instituted an investigation into the Russian investigation to back up Trump’s assertion that it was all a “hoax”. To this end he had already intervened in criminal cases where members of Trump’s campaign had been found guilty arising out of their complicity with America’s totalitarian adversary. Barr needed some proof, before November the third, that the "Deep State" was out to get the POTUS. Trump was relying on it.   

WHAT HAS PUTIN GOT ON TRUMP? NOTHING SAYS BARR.

If Barr’s agenda to exonerate criminals wasn’t outrageous enough, the lead attorney, Nora Dannehy, in the Attorney General attempt to rewrite history on the investigations into the Russian interference in 2016, resigned. Apparently she was under political pressure from Barr to deliver the goods to do the impossible, produce indictments to exonerate Trump, in time of the election.

Barr’s intervention in the case of Roger Stone, Trump’s long time alter ego, caused three prosecutors to resign and the incident is now being investigated by the Inspector General of the Justice Department. Trump’s response to this type of potentially damaging enquiry is to fire the Inspector General which he has done a number of occasions before. 

Also the full bench of the DA Federal Appeals Court ruled by eleven votes to two that Barr had no right to withdraw the criminal case against Flynn, Trump’s former Chief National Advisor after he had pled guilty before two separate judges. The amicus Counsel, in Flynn’s case argued that Judge Sullivan should proceed to sentence Flynn regardless of Barr’s actions, He maintained inter alia, in his detailed thirty page brief: 

 

“Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn’s lies to the FBI are so clear. and their effect on the FBI’s Russia probe so obvious that the Justice Department’s  decision to drop the case can only be a pretext to help an ally - President Trump. There is clear evidence that this motion reflects a corrupt and politically motivated favor unworthy of our justice system…”

Yet another attempt to intervene in favor of Trump’s interests by the Justice Department was pummeled by the courts when Barr attempted to return Michael Cohen to prison because he refused to agree not to publish or discuss his tell all book on Trump. Justice Hellerstein in a scathing ruling against Barr’s Justice Department stated:

“….I find ….the purpose retaliatory. Retaliatory because of his desire to exercise his First Amendment Rights to publish a book….. In twenty one years of being a judge and sentencing people and looking at the terms and conditions of supervised release I have never seen such a clause……”. 

 Barr and his other enablers have prevented the production of Trump’s financial documents prior to the November elections. The financial history it is believed will answer in detail the question, “What has Putin got on him?”.

But Barr has even recently argued to the courts that a case involving an accusation of rape against the POTUS should be against the state and not Trump.

 

The need for Trump to win in 2020 becomes a matter of life or death to him as he could not survive as a private citizen and no one knows it better than Barr. 

One wonders what Trump has on Barr for him to behave in this fashion. 

THE REVELATIONS FOCUSSING ATTENTION ON TRUMP THE SECURITY RISK

In Bob Woodward’s blockbuster, Rage, the former highly respected Republican Head of National Intelligence Dan Coates, is quoted as saying that Vladimir Putin “had something” on Donald Trump. As far as Coates was concerned there could be “no other explanation” for the President’s behavior. Incidentally Coates, sounding like Randy Rainbow,  mused that, “He can’t tell a truth from a lie”. The highly regarded Indianian former Senator served as the National Security Advisor for two and a half years and was Trump’s choice to replace Obama’s retiring James Clapper.

 What will turn out to be the definitive explanation of Trump’s threat to national security is  Peter Strzok’s, “Compromised: Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump”. On the “Daily Beast” podcast, “The New Abnormal” with former Republican strategist Rick Wilson, Strzok even entertained the possibility that Trump had a Russian handler.

 Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer detailed Trump’s involvement in negotiations with Russia to build the Moscow Trump Tower in his book “Disloyal”, at a time when Trump was denying again and again any business relationship with Russia. 

THE LOVE BETWEEN TRUMP AND PUTIN JUST GREW AND GREW BUT NO INVESTIGATION INTO THAT RELATIONSHIP HAS SURFACED. 

Matters have gotten far worse since Coates resigned with Trump failing to challenge the Russian oligarch for placing a bounty on American troops, which he has reportedly paid to Taliban mercenaries, refusing to condemn the attempted murder of the former KGB operative’s leader of opposition and the confrontation by Putin’s armed forces on American personnel and operations in the Middle East to quote just a few of the very latest mystifying behaviors of the POTUS. In contrast he has been no help to America’s traditional allies NATO while allowing Russia to annex Crimea without as much as sending a few more troops to Europe. Rather he is withdrawing them. 

 Strzok maintained that there was no Intelligence investigation into the relationship between Trump and Putin. It was initially believed that this would be probed but he explained that “Mueller, on the instructions of Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein, referred that component to the FBI and no one knows to this date where that investigation is at now. Woodward in "Rage" makes it quite clear that Rosenstein was a Trump supporter and he had total control of the Mueller probe. In fact Woodward calls it the Rosenstein Investigation. So much for the investigation of Trump's personal relationship with Putin.

 Strzok was fired for alleged bias, which had been reflected in his e mails in his preference for Clinton as President in 2016 so his involvement in the Russia investigation ended very early on. The termination was reviewed by the Inspector General of the Justice Department who exonerated the former Chief of the Counterespionage Department and found that there was no basis to the claim that bias interfered with Strzok’s professionalism and work. 

Now Strzok is the real deal and his twenty two year work on busting Russia’s spies is legend. In his book he lays down the sophisticated and comprehensive infrastructure he presented to Mueller as to how to probe the connections between Trump and Russia. But more about him and his book later.

PERSONAL ATTORNEY COHEN DETAILS TRUMP’S RUSSIAN FINANCIAL PURSUITS

Then there is Michael Cohen, Trump’s former consiglieri and personal attorney who went to jail according to the prosecutors for following Trump’s instructions to pay off Stormy Daniels to shut up about their affair. In his expose - the third in one week - “Disloyal”, Cohen spills the beans about Trump’s campaign lies that he had no financial dealings with Russia. At the time Cohen was negotiating what would have been Trump’s biggest deal of his life - the Moscow Trump Tower. The disgraced attorney had a theory about the vast sums of moneys and profits that Trump made from selling properties to Russians - particularly the fifty million dollars he pocketed for a turnkey deal in Florida. He postulated that the money was Putin’s and Trump was in effect laundering it for him. 

TRUMP AND ENABLERS DEFY THE CONSTITUTION AS PRESSURE GROWS FOR FINANCIAL RECORDS THAT WOULD SHOW “WHAT PUTIN HAS GOT ON HIM”

Now Trump has refused to cooperate with Congress to provide his financial records and taxes which he has promised to produce about as often he has reassured his cult that Mexico would pay for the wall he still hasn’t built. The Supreme Court failed to intervene telling the two branches of Government to sort it out. Trump is almost at the end of his rope as it gets closer and closer to the New York State Attorney laying his hands on his financial records which even the Supreme Court agreed that they were entitled to have. However they allowed Trump to go back to the courts again to argue his case. At stake are eight years of records that have been subpoenaed from Trump’s accountants. What is not at stake is the fact that the records will not be in the NY State Attorney’s hands before November the third the date of the elections.

So the situation now is much where it was when Christopher Steele produced his dossier nearly five years ago. Trump and his campaign willingly welcomed, called for and cooperated with the Russians in their effort to support him and to vilify Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. This finding was corroborated by the Mueller report, (four hundred pages) and a bipartisan Senate Intelligence investigation, (a thousand pages). The Senate report suggested that Barr’s Justice Department investigate Trump son Don Jnr. and son in law Jared Kushner for perjury -  Don’t hold your breath!.

The body politic is none the wiser as to what Putin has on Trump because he has defied the Constitution, with his enablers help, to allow for the investigation into his malfeasance. However, Peter Strzok, the master Russian Counter Intelligence agent, in his epistle “Compromised”, outlined in detail the investigation he presented to Mueller to ascertain how to find out.  Rosenstein apparently was not interested. Supposedly the FBI were given the mandate to follow Strzok’s guidelines but nobody has a heard a word. 

STRZOK’S BOOK “COMPROMISED - COUNTER INTELLIGENCE AND THE THREAT OF DONALD J. TRYMP

In a compelling narrative Strzok’s best selling book lays out the case for Trump being at best “A useful idiot” and at worst cooperating directly with the Russians. He outlined the way the Russians conduct their counter intelligence operations. His book is a must read for anyone remotely interested in the future of America. Bear in mind that Donald Trump has had “business relations” with Russia since the 1980’s. In 2013 Trump held his international pageant in Moscow where he allegedly mooted his Moscow Trump Towers project. Putin was offered the penthouse as a gift according to Cohen. 

Besides all the gory details Strzok puts it very simply as to what would made a counter intelligence agent freeze with fright when he makes the following observation of a Presidential candidate:

“The moment Trump said publicly, “I have no business dealings with Russia”, he knew he was lying. Putin knew he was lying and the FBI had reason to believe he was lying but Americans citizens didn’t know that…..(it) signaled to Putin that Trump was more interested in maintaining his personal interests than telling the truth to America and that he needed Putin’s complicity to maintain the lie…. in this moment Trump became compromised”

Then with regard to the Trump campaign involvement in the Russian campaign Strzok notes…. 

“For starters, we knew that one of Trump’s foreign policy advisors, Papadopoulus, had boasted about his knowledge that Russia had information damaging to Hillary Clinton and Moscow had offered to assist the Trump campaign by releasing the material…. Papadopoulos lied to us… he, (subsequently), deactivated a Facebook account that he had used to communicate directly with the Russians”

Should there be any doubt as to the Trump/Putin axis what followed should obliterate any uncertainty. Trump’s campaign managers, deputy campaign manager, foreign policy advisor, lawyer, national security advisor, life long advisor, (Roger Stone), were all indicted for their involvement in the Russian efforts to elect Trump. In addition his incoming Attorney General had to recuse himself from the Mueller investigation because he had lied about his contacts with the Russians. Finally, the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report on the campaign the body recommended prosecutions for perjury of Trump’s son Donald Junior and his son in law Jared Kushner.

WHERE WE ARE NOW - OVER TO BARR

The Trump administration aided and abetted by Barr in the teeth of a Whistleblower complaint are attempting to deny Russia’s involvement in 2020. Barr in fact hopes to provide Trump with “proof” prior to the election that the Mueller investigation and presumably the Senate report are “hoaxes”. Barr is not investigating Jared and Don Jnr in spite of being presented with a water tight case of perjury against them. Nor is he investigating the new Postmaster General for 2016 campaign fraud. He is undeterred that his chief investigator of the investigators has resigned because of political pressure he has placed on her to produce the goods for Trump.

Barr when asked how he believed history will judge him responded history is written by the winners. He should read the history written by the “loser” German historians on the collusion of the Judiciary and the Justice Department in the Third Reich to realize that history, “is what it is”. He might also take note of the fact that John Mitchell, Nixon’s Attorney General went to jail.

Perhaps Barr is also compromised by the Russians.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

No - one is taking too much notice of this major scandal because Trump’s behavior has been normalized. In addition they are focussed on his climate denial on both sides of the continent, his science denial of the pandemic coupled with his heartless disregard for human life illustrated by his restarting of his Nuremberg style rallies. In fairness to him his historic peace deal in the Middle East between Israel and two of the Sunni Gulf States is garnering some deserved attention.

Disgust never ends and the nearly forgotten plight of the separation, in some cases forever, of parents and children at the border has been revived by a WhistleBlower complaint that women were having their uteruses removed without their permission! 

If the Pennsylvania Town Hall was a dress rehearsal for the debates in two weeks then Trump needs to stop prepping with Fox.  

In spite of all of this Trump is in there with a chance and has signaled he ain’t going to give in without a fight literally and figuratively .  

With Barr's belief that lockdowns for the virus are akin to slavery the

time for him take medical leave is now.

TRUMP 2020: CAN THE 1787 CONSTITUTION PREVENT A COUP D’ETAT?

As the 2020 election approaches there is a fear that Donald Trump will carry through with his threat not to recognize the “rigged” election results. The question is will the intent of the Founders of the American Constitution which envisaged a smooth transition of power be realized. Having created a Constitution which sought to avoid a Donald Trump, then how to contain and eliminate one if somehow a Donald Trump was elected, the Founders’ efforts have thus far been thwarted. It remains to be seen whether those interpreting the document will carry though on its imperative that America’s President should not become an absolute monarch.

IN THE BEGINNING

America was founded on aspirational hope as articulated in the Declaration of Independence, (July 4, 1776), which was written and signed during the American Revolutionary decade’s long war. The Founders had a number of assumptions which they hammered into the Constitution, signed into Law on September 17, 1787.  The latter was formulated with the Declaration of Independence as their guide. Jefferson’s defiant document had announced to the world that, “All men were created equal” and that would be the basis of the new democratic Republic. 

However central to the creation of the American Federation was the fear that had been the central cause of the War of Independence. The latter had been fought against the absolute power of the British Monarch to tax without representation and his failure to allow the citizens of the colonies any say in government. The objective was thus to create a government “representative” and accountable to its citizenry. Central to the endless deliberations was who should be the President and how could it be ensured that the country’s leader would not be in the mould of King George III.

The Federalist papers written by Founders James Madison, James Hamilton and John Jay were produced mainly for the purpose of gaining overall support for the new Constitution. However they provided much insight as to the thinking of the Founding Fathers. The ultimate product the American Constitution, with the obsessive separation of powers with checks and balances gave little doubt as to the overall intent of the Founding Fathers. Besides being an instrument of “We the People” they desired a leader of the highest integrity. Ultimately the Constitution was designed in an attempt to ensure that “ambition” could be kept in check by another’s “ambition” and that unscrupulous individuals would not be able to subvert the intent of the American democracy. To this end there would be three co equal branches of government  the bicameral Legislature, the Presidency and the Judiciary

 In their deliberations Jay H. Ell had to believe that in going to the lengths they did that had to have had in their minds the arrival of Donald J. Trump who believes that the Constitution is the legal document that enshrines his unchecked power. It remains to be seen whether or not that the Constitution ultimately achieves its objective, namely to prevent a monarchy from being installed.

One of the Federalist papers is currently being misinterpreted to support Trump’s arguments that,“He alone can fix it” and that he is entitled to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue New York. However the end product, the Constitution makes it quite clear that the President cannot have absolute power and hence the concept of impeachment was introduced. In addition the whole system of checks and balances with three co equal branches of Government with the President answerable to the Legislative branch is clear evidence that he is not above the law. 

FEDERALIST PAPER  70 USED TO SUPPORT TRUMP’S CLAIM TO ABSOLUTE POWER

The nearly ninety Federalist papers contain the central arguments for creating a representative and accountable democracy. However to support different political and constitutional positions one or other paper is alluded to as if it rather than the ultimate Constitutional product represents the consensus of the Convention. Of late the main focus of attention is on the power that the President should have. It is Federalist Paper 70, authored by Hamilton, that those who believe the President’s power is absolute rely on. Trump if he had heard of the Federalist Papers, let alone Alexander Hamilton, let alone Paper 70  would have maintained as some have, that, that is the basis of his unfettered right to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue New York. While Hamilton is misinterpreted as being supportive of this position, he wished like Plato one assumes, to be able to appoint an incorruptible philosopher king. His fear was that if the incumbent was chosen from the body politic a riff raff like Trump could be elected President. He believed that such an outcome would be a disaster. Hamilton even looked to existing nobility - someone who had an inherent sense of values.

FEDERALIST PAPER 51 MORE REFLECTIVE OF THE INTENT OF THE CONSTITUTION.

Federalist Paper 51 provides a key explanation around the concept of checks and balances in limiting the President’s power and was authored by future President James Madison. Here the famous term “Ambition must be made to counteract Ambition” is found. It is also in this explanatory document that Madison outlines the rationale for the elaborate convoluted set up of checks and balances that wouldn’t be necessary “If men were angels”. Madison argued that the biggest burden to the country would be if one branch grew too powerful. However there had to be some branches more important than others. There he designated the Legislative branch which was directly answerable to the people besides having the power to remove a President from office.  

INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION AND EXPLANATORY FEDERALIST PAPERS RE TRUMP

The fact, that in this day and age there are constitutionalists including Attorney General Barr, of course the President who is a "very stable genius", and even a few Judges of the Supreme Court that believe that Article 11 of the Constitution which broadly lays down the job definition of the President, gives him unfettered license to do as he wishes, is incomprehensible. Barr has taken this lunacy one step further arguing that litigation involving an alleged rape by Trump should be against the State and not Trump personally. As mind-blowing is the fact that the Republican National Committee are supporters as well. This year’s Republican Convention Platform Policy document laid down no policies other than to support President Trump. Hail to the King!

While there were differing models on how to reach the goal of what type of character the President should be, the overwhelming consensus was that the President be a man of integrity and character as was George Washington. Needless to say the Hamiltonian method of selection was not adopted although what was ultimately decided upon had his motivation in mind. A mechanism was created whereby if somehow or another a Trump slipped through the cracks he could be contained and even removed as the power of impeachment allows. An elaborate system of checks and balances were put in place so as not to allow the Executive President Absolute Power by the creation of three co - equal braces of Government. The Executive Head which would be elected by the States, (now directly by the voters in the States), a Legislature which would have two chambers so as to afford some veto power for the smaller states and the Judiciary who would interpret the Constitution and the Amendments.

The fact that the President constitutionally needs to report to the Legislature and that he could be impeached by that body contradicts the argument that his power is absolute. The most amazing sadness of the whole attempt at a coup d’etat is that those empowered constitutionally and morally to put a halt on the pretender Trump, have shirked their duty

As history has shown you cannot create a Constitution to prevent the behavior of the “bad angels”. So if the President commits High Crimes and Misdemeanors and is supported and not impeached by the body appointed to maintain the Executive’s integrity, then there is nothing even Hamilton could have done to prevent it. If the checks and balance institutions collude with the Executive Head, who for example backs a foreign adversary against his own institutions, what further could the Founding Fathers have done? Presumably they relied on the Judiciary.

THE JUDICIARY

There was one further brake to authoritarianism - the Judiciary, ultimately the Supreme Court which was given the authority to adjudicate every dispute or transgression that might arise in the Republic.  One might have thought the third branch of Government, the Judiciary, when asked to adjudicate when the Executive Branch had refused point blank to cooperate with the Legislative Branch would have acted decisively. In falling to do so it has allowed four years to pass without the Legislature being able to investigate what motives, financial or otherwise, the Executive head may have had in cooperating with a foreign adversarial power. Further the Legislature were unable to get to the bottom as to why he allowed the foreign power to place a bounty on this country’s militia. To add to the gravitas of the Supreme Court's failure is that it has emboldened the Executive Head who according to a WhistleBlower account is that he has instructed Intelligence not to provide reports on Russian interference in the 2020 election and on the white supremacists groups that support him. This state of affairs was bad enough for the former Head of Intelligence Dan Coates to comment, "....that Putin had to have had something on Trump".

While the Judiciary have agreed that the Constitution did not allow the President to be above the Law they have acted so sluggishly that again the legal institutions investigating him will be unable to do so before the 2020 election. This could have the practical effect of the President never being subject to the law of the land. 

In short the Founders, who had fought a war for almost a decade to create the Constitution that claimed that “All men were created equal”, then deliberated for eons to formulate a government which was answerable to “We the People”, could not have envisioned that if their worst fear materialized - an Executive head turning out to be a mendacious self serving traitorous narcissist, that he would be allowed to continue unchecked. How shocked they would have been to see that those who were in charge of  their elaborate checks and balances, who swore the same oath to uphold the selfsame Constitution, would not halt the Executive Head’s unconstitutional actions. The Judiciary in the form of the Supreme Court have more than their share of the blame.

THE PRESIDENT HIS ENABLERS AND THE 2020 ELECTION.

The last line of defense in this sorry mess is the electorate. The good news is that the Executive Head is consistently behind in the polls. The bad news is that the Executive Head has made it quite clear that he is going to “win” one way or another. 

The Party that the President is a member of has long recognized that the demographics of the population would ensure that their nominee would not be elected in the third millennium unless they were more inclusive of all America’s demographics. The answer has been to suppress the vote of those who would vote against them. There had been limits placed on that behavior but the current Supreme Court neutered them by three bizarre interpretations of the Constitution. In one instance they removed the protections that were put in place to prevent the blatant voter suppression tactics of certain states;  in another they ruled that corporations could spend as much money as they liked in elections - the rationale being was that money was akin to free speech and corporations were people; and more recently they maintained that there were no limits to the gerrymandering a State Government could resort to to distort  electoral constituencies to favor their Party. 

The reports are that once again the Executive Head is being assisted by a foreign adversarial government in his campaign. This after it has been conclusively accepted that he participated and welcomed that country’s efforts in getting him elected in 2016. 

The Executive Head rales against the States’ efforts to ensure fair voting in the 2020 election. He has weakened the postal process whereby this could be effected. He has gone to the extent of appointing a donor as head of the Post Office who is crippling its capacity to handle the massive amount of voting that will take place by mail this election. The President states that the election will be “rigged”. He exhorts voters to break the law setting up a scenario that election results could be challenged. He warns that there is going to be monitoring to avoid the non existent problem of electoral fraud in the hope to diminish the turnout of the voters that would vote against him. He claims that the result may not be known for weeks or months…

THE LAST CHANCE TO PREVENT AN UNDEMOCRATIC RESULT IN 2020

It seems apparent that one way or another that President Trump will not step down politely if beaten in the November Presidential elections. He will challenge, smear and claim that the election was rigged. He could even appeal to his “second amendment people” to support him. The belief is that he could create such a stalemate that would allow him to declare an Emergency and remain the de facto President. This not so unimaginable scenario is bolstered by the fact that much of the voting will be post and that the outcome may be delayed. Trump will challenge every turn of events. 

However does the Constitution and the Law allow this to go on forever? It doesn’t. Federal Statute says a halt must be called to all these disputes and bickering by December 8. This was the reason that the Supreme Court called a halt, even before that date, in Bush v Gore. In so doing they over rode the authority of the Florida Supreme Court to hold a recount when Bush had ostensibly won the State by five hundred and nine votes and indications were that the Gore would triumph on a recount. That decision gave Bush the Presidency.

If the Supreme Court won’t decide this issue by December 8 and leaves it to the politicians then the chaos which the Rehnquist Court claimed they were preventing will ensue. There are an elaborate set of procedures and votes that will be taken by Congress to decide who will be President. However there could be fights as to who the electors are and so forth and so on. Ultimately the House is supposed to elect the President and the Senate the Vice President. As the newly elected legislators decide this should ensure Biden the Presidency and Harris the Vice Presidency. But the problem is that even though the House has an overwhelming Democratic majority each State has one vote and even in the biggest landslide ever the Republicans they will be in the majority as in many rural states there are only a few House Members.

Now if Jay H. Ell knows all this so does Chief Justice Roberts. He also has to be aware that as matters stand at the moment Trump will lose the popular vote by at least eight to ten million votes and the legislative Republicans re electing him under these circumstances would destabilize the country. The Bush vote was five to four and that is what the vote is going to be in the Biden vote. Roberts who has shown he is an adherent to precedent will follow the Rehnquist 2000 decision. Whoever is ahead before December 8 he will use his casting vote to declare the winner. He might reflect at the time of his and his Court's role in allowing America to get to this disastrous state of affairs, in the first place. 

AT THE END OF THE DAY

Whichever way this is looked at it is going to be ugly.

Jay H. Ell could be totally wrong and Biden’s victory so apparent that even Fox News will call the result for him on the morning of November 4.

Who says Capitalism doesn’t work? The Trump campaign is running out of money.

If the Michael Cohen book shattered the rafters stick around for Bob Woodward’s next week. 

Peter Stzrok's book Compromised makes a water tight case that Trump is a risk to National Security making the enablers of King Donald I even more culpable.

WOODWARD'S BOOK RAGE WILL ENRAGE AS IT OUTLINES TRUMP'S PERFIDY IN THE COVID CRISIS WHERE NEARLY 200,000 AMERICANS ARE ALREADY DEAD. 

AFTER KENOSHA: TRUMP’S VIGILANTE USA v BIDEN’S RETURN TO ITS SOUL

Every parameter points to a Trump defeat in 2020. However there is a persistent belief (and fear in opposition quarters) that the mendacious Trump is invincible. Incidentally this assessment is not shared by him as evidenced by countless “anonymous” inside reports, the fact that he is doing everything he can to suppress the vote including crippling the Post Office and declaring that he will not necessarily accept the election results. 

What justifies the free flowing anxiety is that Trump knows no boundaries and is so desperate that he will, as he has always done, go for broke ignoring the country’s health, racial and economic crises. The rubric under which he will defy all norms and even his illegality is Law and Order. As the election approaches the race tightens exacerbating the fears of his re election. The opposition cannot rid themselves of the irrational delusion that Trump walks on water. Trump who knows the polling numbers are barely budging will throw caution to the winds and will risk bloodshed by exhorting the vigilantes to support him. Up till now Biden has concentrated his message to returning life to normality and reinstating America's soul..

While every fact shows that the threat to Law and Order is predominately from the right wing militia type vigilante movements, a conclusion reached by the Security and Intelligence communities, Trump and Fox News distort reality and claim it is the Democratic inspired Black Lives Matter protestors and the left wing Antifa that are at fault. Add the latter distortion to his  message that his was the greatest response to the pandemic the world has ever seen, that the economy has once again reached the highest heights, that only he can stop the violence and suburbia being overrun by blacks that is Trump’s election manifesto. 

With his election platform set he proceeded, with William Barr his Attorney general in tow to Kenosha to restore Law and Order.

VOTING HAS NO NUANCES

 Voting is a binary choice - you vote for one person or the other. Large sections of the population are one issue voters. On key factors such as the economy, management of the current health care crisis, direction that the country is going, job performance and character. Trump is way behind Biden. In the national polls Trump is over eight points behind. That disparity is even more than the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans in 2018 when the Democrats trounced Trump’s GOP. The number of swing states have doubled as evidenced not only by the polls but by the fact that vulnerable Republican Senators weren’t on the speaking list at Trump’s love fest. Trump, Fox, the FaceBook  trolls and the GOP have selected to make violence and support of vigilantes, “Make America Safe Again”, the binary issue that voters must decide the election. That issue is fraught with risk to his chances but more importantly could be read as an invitation to mayhem by the right wing militia that support him. An outcome the he believes will support his narrative, 

With his message finalized and in spite of being asked not to go to Wisconsin as he would just add fuel to the fire Trump crashed the party in Kenosha

IT IS THE VIOLENCE - STUPID

 So why on earth is everyone so convinced and/or terrified that Trump has four more years? There are those that argue the polls aren’t reflective, look what happened last time? But for the most part they believe that  the independents and suburbanites will ultimately buy into the fear that Trump’s America is about to burst into flames and the that he is the best guy to put out them out. The rationale is as follows :He is the Law and Order President. Biden is responsible for the violence in Trump’s Presidency. So don’t vote for “Sleepy Joe” as he will carry on making America unsafe. 

The Trump strategy is to divert the country’s woes in favor of the illusion that America is burning, mainly in Democratic cities perpetrated by the Democratic Party backed Black Lives Matter. As proof just focus on his response to the protests and violence that has followed police shootings most recently in Kenosha. He is taking a big chance in the belief that the overwhelming support for The Black Lives Matter campaign following the spate of police shootings is waning. The movement is being supported by corporations, sports teams and the citizenry. There is an empathy for the situation and the repetition of these killings is reinforcing the perception that the protestors are right. The highly respected Doc Rivers’ sobbed on TV blurting,“How dare the GOP talk about fear when we are the ones getting killed”.

 But Trump has really nothing else he can run on. The virus deaths will soon be over two hundred thousand. The evictions and the food lines are growing while unemployment is over ten percent and as his advisors must be telling him - those in power get the lion share of blame. He is aiming to link Biden to the violence, urban terror and the prospects of blacks overrunning the suburbs. Trump’s whole history is littered with this tactic. His insistence on inviting the McCloskey vigilantes as key speakers to his convention bears witness to his decision is go full tilt in this direction. The Kenosha uprising during the convention jamboree was a blessing to his narrative. 

BIDEN AND HARRIS DISTINGUISH BETWEEN PROTEST AND ILLEGALITY

 Biden responded aggressively to the Trump juggernaut - “He is fermenting animosity and cheering on a spasm of violent protests to benefit himself politically”. Kamala Harris his Vice Presidential running mate and a former District Attorney of the largest state in the country saw the danger in the Trump scenario argued that, “We must always defend peaceful protest and peaceful protestors but we should not confuse them with those looting and committing acts of violence. We will not let these vigilantes and extremists derail the path to justice” Biden has been quick to add that Trump is pouring gasoline onto the racial flames but this does not justify the looting, the burning or any of the damage done by the protestors.

Harris and Biden are reassuring the anti Trump coalition, which is growing by the day, with screeds of the Republican establishment signing up. Trump’s line on the major cities wallowing in crime is an old one. The cry that the barbarians were marching into America and the suburbs didn’t work in 2018 - who can forget the caravans bearing down on America.

THE GENESIS OF THE KENOSHA UPRISING AND OUTCOME.

It is salutary to note one crucial fact - that had a white policeman not shot an unarmed black suspect in the back seven times there would have been not have been a Kenosha. What is more the sequence of events is on tape where a white policeman pushes a black man into his car holding the back of his shirt,  then, in front of his three young children pumps seven bullets into his back. After the recent similar incidents it is amazing that this happened but it did. In no time the protestors poured into the streets as the videos of the bystanders went viral. The armed right counter protestors then followed as they have in every other tragedy. Why are they there - not to protest.  However the white vigilantes did not emerge in a vacuum as local news reports and research from the Atlantic Council have shown.

For whatever reason the atmosphere in the City must have been fomenting prior to the incident. (At the risk of being a bore Jay H. Ell will remind the reader that this is happening in Trump’s America not Biden’s). The Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth reported to the local NBC News that vigilantes were patrolling the streets and asked to be deputized. The law officer outright refused. There is an active white right wing group in Kenosha. They had a FaceBook page entitled The Kenosha Guard which FaceBook subsequently took down because it violated its policy against militia organizations and glorified violence.

In addition to the local illegal militia, according to the regional NBC, Ray Roberts a black resident of Kenosha and an army vet, claimed that men from rural areas loaded with guns got into town, “You would see them driving around and no one stopping them”. 

Following the shooting and the response to it the Kenosha Guard’s FaceBook page lit up and at 10.44pm that night  went on a recruitment drive for “… any members that were willing to take up arms and defend the City from the evil thugs. No doubt they are planning on the next part of the City to burn tonight.”. There were similar repeated calls from multiple threads on Facebook and Reddit. These proceeded the murder of two protestors and the wounding of another. The Atlantic Council reported that there were several online discussions exhorting acts of violence while the conspiracy website InfoWars agitated for more of the fellow travelers to proceed to Kenosha, (All of this in Trump’s America).

The background of the  shooter a seventeen year old who lived in the neighboring state of Illinois who attended Trump rallies has been part of the national news but an interview he gave to the local conservative outlet “The Daily Caller” has not. The latter reported that the alleged murderer stated that, “Our job is to protect this business” referring to the boarded up building he was standing in front of. And part of his ]ob is also to help people. If there is somebody hurt I am running into harms way. Thats why I have my rifle - obviously But I also have my med kit”. 

Wisconsin is one of those states that allow open carry of guns. The Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin Mandela Barnes an African American stated that the shootings were not surprising and the white militias have been ignored for far too long. “How many times across the country do you see armed gunmen protesting walking into State Capitola and everyone saying it is ok. People treat it as some kind of normal activity that people are walking around with assault weapons”, he added.

As Trump and Pence repeated Joe Biden will take away your guns.

TRUMP ON VIOLENCE AND VIGILANTES IN KENOSHA - IS HE AN ENABLER?

It is really easy to know what criticism Trump thinks he has to defend himself from. Roy Cohn his original super ego taught him - you respond by turning the charges on them, doubling up. The psychologists call it projection. So it stands to reason that in relation to the Kenosha affair Trump tweeted that Biden was as  “weak as hell and an enabler of anarchists and rioters”. It stands to reason that Trump offered no condemnation, solution or regret about the Jason Blake shooting.  He tweeted that, “I will not stand for looting, arson violence and lawlessness on our streets”,  At a Press Conference he stated “We will put out the fire. We will put out the flame. We will stop the violence very quickly”. In addition he laughed off the National Basketball Association - men and women, the pro tennis tour, Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer’s powerful protests at the police shooting and support of Black Lives Matter. He gave them what he would consider the biggest criticism possible - their ratings were very bad, 

He supported the vigilante seventeen year old who illegally bore weapons of war. In the teeth of contradictory video evidence he stated that the teenager acted in self defense. He argued that the matter is being “investigated” ignoring the reality that the vigilante has been arrested and charged with multiple crimes including two accounts of murder.  Fox News’s Tucker Carlson went one further claiming that the assassin was doing what he had to do because local law officials were useless.

The question thus arises is Trump an enabler of these gun toting anarchists? Nobody in their right mind will allege that Trump is a co conspirator in this tragedy but at the very least one can argue he has done nothing to prevent it. On the contrary he has done everything to foster the illegal gangsterism of vigilantes. 

Donald Trump alluded to the intervention of the “second amendment people” since he ran in 2016 against Hillary Clinton. Believing like everyone else did at the time that he was going to lose, he stated that the election was rigged and the only people who could do anything about it were “the second amendment” people. Trump has made it quite clear that he is not going to risk losing support of the far right whatever their position may be. From the KKK’s David Duke to all the other fellow travelers it has been wink wink nod nod. His backing of right wing fanatics was evident by the statements that among the Neo Nazis in Charlottesville like the QAnon anarchists there were good people. QAnon has been characterized as domestic terrorists by the law agencies.  

THE BINARY DECISION: TRUMP’S VIGILANTE AMERICA v BIDEN’S UNIFIED AMERICA

The Trump mantra Is simple the protestors enabled by Biden are threatening America and reducing it to chaos. This propaganda was repeated again and again at the Trump Convention. (Interestingly the chaos in the streets of Obama's America is what he ran on. He promised he would make America safe. Needless to say by his own admission he has failed!).  Lest there be any doubt as to his preference and objective, his most loyal sidekick Kellyanne Conway bluntly stated that the more chaos and violence the greater Trump rates his chances. As a corollary Biden is attacked as being the leader of a violent revolution with his socialist policies. Rather than investigate the right wing groups that have killed close on a hundred victims, Trump’s fixer, Bill Barr, (the previous one is in jail), will investigate the Black Lives Matter Protest movement.

It is amazing how brazen Trump is making the electoral choice the right of vigilantes to enforce Law and Order. He backed an alleged murderer, seen on video by the world shooting fleeing protestors. This is his America. This is what he is running on. He has ignored the plight of repeated instances of shootings by white police of unarmed black men and has openly supported this type of street action. For the moment he has successfully diverted attention from the country’s woes that he has failed to address.

 

Biden for his part has forcefully replied laying the blame for the parlous state the country is in squarely at Trump’s door. Eloquently he made clear the choice America faced. With his near half century record it is hard to rationally argue that he doesn’t support law and order. Nor can anyone call him a Socialist. However to Trump and his cult it doesn’t matter. The latter still believe that his inauguration was attended by the largest audience in history and that he won the popular vote because three million illegals voted for Hillary. 

Biden must not allow himself to get sucked too far into Trump’s narrative. His mission is to focus on racial equality, return America to economic and health stability and to regain the soul of the nation.

MEANWHILE THE SCANDALS EXPLODE AROUND TRUMP

While everyone is awaiting Barr and Lindsey Graham’s  bombshells against Biden and Hunter not a day passes without another expose of the corrupt Trump Presidency. Trump’s two remaining powerful allies, Fox News and his fixer Attorney General Barr, came under heavy fire in three books that immediately became best sellers. Hoax by Brian Stelter lays bare the inner stories of the incestuous Fox and Trump relationship. One of the more chilling tales Stelter related was when the Attorney General of the United State’s of America, aka Trump’s Fixer, went to Rupert Murdoch to have Judge Napolitano, Fox’s legal analyst, removed from the nework as he had come to the conclusion that Trump had committed impeachable offenses. 

Just a few gems from New York Times’s Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Schmidt’s  spellbinder Donald Trump v The United States of America - here it was learned that Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein stopped Robert Mueller from investigating Donald Trump’s personal ties to Russia. Schmidt detailed how he succeeded in getting the WhiteHouse Counsel Don McGahn to admit that by his behavior he had damaged the Office of the President. Schmidt uncovered Trump’s unexplained trip to the Walter Reed Medical Facility. Trump with his characteristic delusional paranoia responded that he never suffered a series of mini strokes, precipitating debate about his health.

Stephanie Wolkoff’s expose Melania and Me became the number one best seller in the country in one day. An aggrieved Ms Wolkoff outlined that the Trumps including Melania dumped her under the bus laying the blame of the missing fifty million dollars from Trump’s inaugural at her door. In the interim the scandal has been investigated by three entities and another bunch of the Trump and the RNC’s inner circle face corruption charges. This story really has legs as like Mary Trump the authoress has tapes of discussions with Melania.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

The myth that Donald Trump’s supporters are more motivated to vote for him than Biden’s are is not backed by the facts or polls.  Following the Conventions the Biden/Harris ticket roped in a ton more money than did the Trump/Pence duo. The Democrats raised three hundred and sixty - four million dollars in August which is an all time electoral record. 

Biden and Harris need to repeat their counter narrative daily and focus the country on the disaster Trump has created. They have to win the election Trump is not going to lose it. Remember they are running against someone whose supporters still maintain that he  had the largest inauguration audience in history and who persuaded banks to loan him billions even after he had gone bankrupt six times.

When Joe and Jill go to Kenosha will the Kenosha Guard call out its members to assemble with guns to prevent them from looting? They have been given permission by Trump to start shooting when the looting starts.

On September 8, Robert Cohen’s book will hit the shelves.

Would you buy a timeshare from Donald Trump?