President Trump- The Implications

[heironymouspasparagus]

Former President Donald Trump is lashing out over "fake news" reports of under-attended rallies, while claiming that his political events "never have empty seats."

Trump, the leading Republican candidate in the 2024 presidential election, has repeatedly boasted about his support and the size of his crowds since launching his political career. While his events are often filled with dedicated supporters, photos and video of some rallies have suggested that they are not always at capacity.

The former president blasted the media for publishing photos of empty seats, insisting that "thousands of people get sent away" from every Trump rally in a Truth Social post on Wednesday.
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-rages-over-rally-crowd-size-reports-we-never-have-empty-seats-1846182


They sure do:




It boggles the mind to see how far the city will go to keep from admitting this was a huge mistake.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/crime-courts/city-seeks-pause-in-civil-rights-lawsuit-filed-by-woman-arrested-outside-2020-trump-rally/article_7332e262-8568-11ee-b195-33d236b7cf3e.html

She is probably lucky they didn't just shoot her...

[patric]

She is probably lucky they didn't just shoot her...

Buck, who had a ticket to the rally inside the BOK Center, arrived wearing a T-shirt that read "I Can't Breathe," a reference to some of the final words of George Floyd, who was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis a few weeks earlier.
Tulsa police officers arrested Buck inside a secure area outside the BOK Center after a Trump campaign official asked them to remove her. The request came after a private security company worker "uninvited" her to the event.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/crime-courts/judge-grants-pause-in-civil-rights-lawsuit-filed-by-woman-arrested-outside-2020-trump-rally/article_d4c7365a-8e18-11ee-b9de-d3eac2f2089a.html



"But, at this point, there is a bigger question: Why is the District Attorney expending this level of time and resources on a simple nonviolent misdemeanor?" Smolen asked. "It is unprecedented, in my experience, for the State to pursue a minor charge so aggressively, especially against a peaceful schoolteacher with no criminal record."

Dan Smolen, Buck's attorney, faulted the order, saying in a written statement that he believed it conflicted with earlier orders.
"For the District Attorney, this appears to be a political game," Smolen said. "For my client, it is much more than that."

This was the second time Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler's office had gone to the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals to challenge dismissal of the case.

Buck has a civil rights lawsuit still pending against the city of Tulsa in federal court over her arrest. A deal to settle the lawsuit fell apart in June after the City Council voted 6-3 to reject a settlement that would have paid her an unknown amount in excess of $1 million.

A second federal lawsuit filed by Buck is on hold until the criminal cases are resolved.
The second case alleges that a city of Tulsa attorney involved in the settlement negotiations torpedoed the agreement by urging councilors to reject the measure.

https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/crime-courts/state-appellate-court-overturns-dismissal-of-charge-against-tulsan-arrested-at-2020-trump-rally/article_d1484238-b61f-11ee-a9bb-832cbd0409d8.html

[patric]

Freudian slip:  https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1731063712637727061

[heironymouspasparagus]

Freudian slip:  https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1731063712637727061

Just accidentally let the truth out for once in his life.

[patric]

If it wasn't for the head of his murdered father's body, a video posted on YouTube by Justin Mohn Tuesday night would be indistinguishable from much of what passes for "content" in the world of far-right social media. In the video titled "Call to Arms for American Patriots," the 33-year-old resident of suburban Pennsylvania raved about "the traitorous Biden regime" and claimed a "fifth column army of illegal immigrants infiltrates our border" and that "far left, woke mobs rampage our once prosperous cities." He repeatedly called on viewers to attack federal employees and accused his deceased father, whose head he put on display, of being a "traitor" for working for the federal government. The only thing missing from the rant was accusations that the NFL was fixing the Super Bowl for Taylor Swift and President Joe Biden, but likely only because Mohn's alleged crime was committed before that conspiracy theory had fully flowered online.

Mohn has been arrested and charged with murdering his father and abusing the corpse. Police say he killed his father and decapitated him with a machete, putting the head in a cooking pot to show on camera. It appeared Mohn was reading from a script as he encouraged violence against government officials, police added. YouTube removed his 14-minute-long video, but not before it was viewed 5,000 times.

It's easy to recite the typical deflections from right-wing media and influencers in the wake of yet another far-right crime: They're not to blame. This is about mental health. And look over here while we spread even more conspiracy theories calling the killer a psyop and a deep state plant.

No doubt Mohn is a deeply disturbed person, as evidenced by his repeated attempts to sue the federal government, claiming he cannot get a job due to discrimination against "an overeducated white man." (Mohn has a bachelor's degree in agribusiness management from Penn State University.) But it's missing the point, albeit deliberately so, to say that mental health factors mean the political motivations behind violence don't matter. On the contrary, our nation's mental health crisis is one reason that the relentless drumbeat of right-wing conspiracy theories and insinuations of violence are so dangerous. The people who spread hateful and violent rhetoric, starting with Donald Trump, know full well that unstable people are listening and will take this rhetoric as an excuse to act. In many cases, the loudmouths are counting on it.

After all, that's exactly what Trump and his lackeys did on January 6. Many, if not most, of the people who showed up that day had some kind of personal or mental health problems. Trump knows full well that a lot of his biggest fans are unwell or in crisis, which makes them vulnerable to conspiracy theories and false promises that MAGA (or QAnon) will give them community and purpose. That's also likely why Trump saw the Capitol rioters as especially disposable, as well.

On Monday, the FBI released a report showing reported hate crimes in schools nearly doubled between 2018 and 2022, likely propelled by groups like Moms for Liberty making public schools the battlegrounds for right-wing lies about race, gender, and sexual identity. There hasn't been a rigorous study yet, but it's also clear that schools have seen a dramatic increase in threats, as well, often having to evacuate after bomb threats. In Oklahoma, Republicans signaled approval for school violence by hiring Chaya Raichik as a board member to the state's library council. Raichik is behind the infamous "Libs of TikTok" account that offers up a steady feed of photos and names of ordinary people, often educators. The result is invariably that those people and their employers get targeted with violent threats.

Often these stories only get reported on locally, which obscures the extent of the problem in the national press. Mohn's alleged crime is grisly enough to be getting national attention, but that also means it will likely be treated as an oddity, instead of what it is: part of a larger pattern of growing right-wing violence. It's just violence that has become disorganized and diffuse, unlike a targeted (if still chaotic) strike like the Capitol insurrection. That doesn't make it less dangerous, however. It's often way more deadly, as the people acting out are close to home and have more resources — and weapons — at their disposal. We saw this in the 2022 mass shootings inspired by MAGA rhetoric at a Buffalo supermarket and a Colorado gay club. And we see it again, as a man allegedly acted out his anti-government fervor in the most intimate way possible, on a family member while shielded by the walls of their home.

https://www.salon.com/2024/02/01/right-wing-violence-hasnt-disappeared-its-just-gone-local/

[heironymouspasparagus]

Standard MAGA-t garbage.

[patric]

"This case has garnered so much media attention and the politicians are using it as part of their reelection"
https://www.nydailynews.com/2024/02/09/body-cam-video-appears-to-contradict-nypd-version-of-what-led-to-migrants-beating-cops-in-times-square/

New footage of a confrontation last month between New York Police Department officers and a group of migrants in Times Square appears to contradict the story that law enforcement and conservative news outlets have been hammering for days.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSQRenKUwjY

Outlets like the New York Post and Fox News have reported that several men — "asylum-seeking thugs" and "punks," in New York Post parlance — picked a fight with a pair of NYPD officers in midtown Manhattan, sharing video stills as apparent proof.

The officers had been telling the migrants to move along because they were blocking the sidewalk for pedestrians.
Footage released after a press conference Thursday, however, shows that the sidewalk was not blocked and pedestrians were able to walk by.

Law enforcement said that a man in a yellow jacket became verbally aggressive and did not comply with the officers' request, and the fight devolved from there.

But the footage appears to show the men following orders until one of the officers yanks a member of the group away.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/new-footage-contradicts-nypd-story-on-clash-between-migrants-and-officers_n_65c65924e4b093b2e78384ff

The NYPD lieutenant who tried to arrest a migrant in Times Square, prompting a nationally publicized sidewalk scrum, was once found liable in a police brutality case that cost New York City taxpayers $5 million in legal payouts.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/cop-in-times-square-melee-once-found-liable-in-5m-police-brutality-case/5122545/

[patric]

The Supreme Court has ordered the most important of former President Donald Trump's four criminal trials to be put on hold indefinitely.
The ostensible reason why the Court ordered Trump's trial paused is so the justices could spend the next few months considering Trump's argument that he is immune from prosecution for any "official acts" he engaged in while he was still president.

This is an exceptionally weak legal argument, with monstrous implications. Trump's lawyers told one of the judges who ruled against this immunity claim that a former president could not be prosecuted, even if he ordered "SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival," unless the president was first successfully impeached and convicted (by lawmakers that, under Trump's argument, the president could order killed if they attempted to impeach him).
https://www.vox.com/scotus/24086594/donald-trump-supreme-court-trial-immunity-never-going-to-save-us

[Red Arrow]

This is an exceptionally weak legal argument, with monstrous implications. Trump's lawyers told one of the judges who ruled against this immunity claim that a former president could not be prosecuted, even if he ordered "SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival," unless the president was first successfully impeached and convicted (by lawmakers that, under Trump's argument, the president could order killed if they attempted to impeach him).

Steven Colbert, in his monologue, said Trump's lawyers need to be careful about what they say.  Joe Biden is presently in charge of SEAL Team 6.

[heironymouspasparagus]

The Supreme Court has ordered the most important of former President Donald Trump's four criminal trials to be put on hold indefinitely.
The ostensible reason why the Court ordered Trump's trial paused is so the justices could spend the next few months considering Trump's argument that he is immune from prosecution for any "official acts" he engaged in while he was still president.

This is an exceptionally weak legal argument, with monstrous implications. Trump's lawyers told one of the judges who ruled against this immunity claim that a former president could not be prosecuted, even if he ordered "SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival," unless the president was first successfully impeached and convicted (by lawmakers that, under Trump's argument, the president could order killed if they attempted to impeach him).
https://www.vox.com/scotus/24086594/donald-trump-supreme-court-trial-immunity-never-going-to-save-us

And what???   Could you possibly have been under the delusion that you live in a Constitutional Republic...

How could you have gotten to your age maintaining that illusion?

[patric]

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Jared Kushner, Donald Trump's former White House adviser and his son-in-law, praised the "very valuable" potential of Gaza's "waterfront property," suggesting that Israel should remove civilians while it "cleans up" the area.

"It's a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but I think from Israel's perspective, I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up," Kushner added.
https://apnews.com/article/jared-kushner-trump-israel-waterfront-property-901895eeafee867e69d0c4582a4deb47

[Red Arrow]

Official acts vs. non-official acts.  Trump better tread carefully, Biden is still President.

[patric]

Official acts vs. non-official acts.  Trump better tread carefully, Biden is still President.

The irony would be Trump later going after the Supremes to cement his authority.

https://www.justsecurity.org/92714/american-autocracy-threat-tracker/

[heironymouspasparagus]

Official acts vs. non-official acts.  Trump better tread carefully, Biden is still President.

The lack of supreme court told Biden he can do what he wants.   Just appoint Kamala, and go enjoy retirement.  There is nothing legal anyone could do about it.

[Red Arrow]

The lack of supreme court told Biden he can do what he wants.   Just appoint Kamala, and go enjoy retirement.  There is nothing legal anyone could do about it.

I think that would have worked better if he waited until after he won and was sworn into a second term.