What are we doing?
The January 6th commission is finally releasing its work. They chose to do it during prime time over the course of several days. We seem to be following this pattern day after day, week after week, and year after year. We know exactly what happened. We’ve always known exactly what happened. Hearing it again is both shocking and familiar. Either you will hear it and nod in agreement or you will think it’s fake news. I’m not sure anyone will actually see their opinion change.
This has all been mentioned before, but here we are. So, let’s add up some things and put it all together to see if we can paint a picture. In the entirety of his life, Donald Trump has successfully done only one thing. He’s cultivated an image that he is a successful and a smart businessman. That’s it. If you look at any success he’s had it is all connected to that one thing. The Apprentice, frauds like Trump University, the presidency, all of this can be traced back to that one thing.
The fact that he’s a failed businessman hasn’t really sunk in with the people that support him. So, when you look at his failures as president, they all get laid at someone else’s feet. They are someone else’s fault or they didn’t happen at all. Naturally, it also manages to seep into the natural defense he is able to use when any of these horribly illegal activities get brought back to his door.
All of the fraud over collusion, the attempting strong arming of the Ukrainian president, the attempted overturning of the 2020 election, and the attempting coup on January 6th all didn’t work. They failed spectacularly. Not only did he not meet his objective, but he failed in such spectacular fashion and did such a horrible job covering it up that it all seems so unbelievable.
How does someone so successful fail so miserably? If he really is that smart and that successful then he must not have done it. There really is no other logical explanation. After all, a smart and successful businessman would have clearly succeeded somewhere along the way because he had done so all those times before when he was making billions of dollars.
Except, that was all a fraud. Any success he may have had he stumbled into. Trump Steaks? Trump Vodka? Trump Airlines? These were all spectacular failures. Not only did those businesses fail, but they failed in spectacular fashion. The reality of Trump is as a failed businessman. It is the reality of a blowhard that really is empty when you get past the bravado.
The reality is that when you attempt to collude with the enemy, attempt to overthrow the government, attempt to circumvent our laws to get dirt on an opponent, attempt to strongarm someone into committing election fraud you have broken the law. The attempt is still breaking the law. The fact that all of these were unsuccessful doesn’t matter.
The defense that a brilliant and successful businessman wouldn’t fail so spectacularly is the fraud. Strip everything down and Trump is the guy that holds up the bank without a mask, a bag with a hole in the bottom, and a carrot in his pocket in place of the gun. It’s stupid to the point of being comical. It’s still a crime. It’s haphazard, laughable, and pathetic, but it’s still a crime. Yet, if the commission’s obvious breakdown of these events don’t lead to arrests and convictions then it will be just another episode of the Keystone Cops. Those that know he’s an idiot will know he’s guilty. Those that think he’s brilliant won’t. Those are the facts of the case and they are undisputed.
How far do you think he would have gotten without the knowledge that papa would bail him out more than once for about 1/2 bil? The average peasant not so much.
1He is in debt not only to his evil papa but all the repubs starting with goldwater and the dixiecrats building upon white power racist narcism.
trump may be in the throes of death by a 1000 paper cuts to be left twisting in the wind. I personally do not hate nor wish him dead as that would make me no better than him. That I’m not overly fond of him is true. I will oppose him and his sycophants legally and morally.
I remember Moe from the Simpson’s telling Lisa he was a “general well wisher in that he didn’t wish anyone any specific harm.” That probably represents my feelings towards Trump. I don’t wish him dead. However, if it were to happen I wouldn’t shed any tears and would be happy about it generally.
The sad thing is that I’m guessing if you reach down deep into his inner circle’s soul (mainly his family) you’d find nothing there for him. There’s no real love there. They wouldn’t miss him. They’d be happy to claim their inheritance, but I suspect most of them know they’d also be saddled with all the crap that comes with it. So, it becomes a race to see how much you can bank before he finally croaks. The idea of such an existence is simply sad to think about.
2It’s difficult to find just a list of the tRump business failures, but the list below covers a lot of ‘former and cancelled’ endeavors by the tRump Organization.
Quite a pile of financial bullshit. That there are suckers willing to invest money in Kamerade Donnei’s scams has always amazed me, and we all know that he rarely if ever fronts any of his own money for these cons.
A bit jumbled from the c&p, but I separated the known ‘failure’ items for a little clarity.
The “Former ventures” long list are the known dead failures; most of the other stuff is probably propped up by mostly bullshit, so ymmv, buyers beware .
Others have lost billions of dollars investing in these swindles, so there are lots of fools around to keep the good ol’ ‘world’s biggest bullshitter and conman’ going indefinitely.
[from Wikipedia, the page’s bottom index :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_career_of_Donald_Trump ]:
The Trump Organization
Donald Trump Jr. Eric Trump Allen Weisselberg Legal affairs of Donald Trump
List of things named after Donald Trump
NYC properties
Trump TowerThe Trump Building (40 Wall Street)Trump Parc and Trump Parc EastTrump Park AvenueTrump World Tower
Hotels and resorts
Trump International Hotel and Tower Chicago Las VegasNew York City
Mar-a-Lago
Golf courses
U.S.
Los Angeles, CA”Doral” Miami, FLWashington, D.C.Bedminster, NJFerry Point, NYPine Hill, NJWestchester, NYJupiter, FLWest Palm Beach, FL
UK and Ireland
Balmedie, Scotland (Wind farm dispute) Doonbeg, Ireland Turnberry, Scotland
Other current ventures
Trump Winery Trump Media & Technology Group Truth Social
Name licensing
Riverside South / Trump PlaceTrump Bay StreetTrump Palace CondominiumsTrump Parc StamfordJW Marriott Panama (formerly Trump International Hotel & Tower Panama)Trump Plaza Jersey City, NJNew Rochelle, NYNew York City, NYTrump Tower Sunny Isles Beach, FLWhite Plains, NYIstanbul, TurkeyManila, PhilippinesPune, IndiaPunta del Este, UruguayHonoluluTrump Ocean Resort Baja Mexico
Former properties
GM BuildingGrand Hyatt New YorkOld Post Office (Washington, D.C.)Paradox Hotel VancouverPlaza HotelThe St. Regis TorontoLSH Hotel (Brazil)The Dominick (Trump SoHo)The Plaza (West Palm Beach, FL)
Cancelled real
estate projects
Trump International Hotel and Tower Baku, Azerbaijan Dubai, UAE Fort Lauderdale, FL New Orleans, LA Phoenix, AZ Trump Tower Tampa, FL Brazil Germany Israel Twin Towers 2
Russian projects Trump Tower Moscow
Former ventures
3Central Park Carousel
Donald Trump dolls
Donald J. Trump Foundation
GoTrump.com
Lasker Rink
Miss Universe
Miss USA
Miss Teen USA
New Jersey Generals
Paris Is Out!
Tour de Trump
Trump Home
Trump Entertainment Resorts
Trump’s Castle / Trump Marina
Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino
Trump Taj Mahal
Trump World’s Fair
Trump Casino Indiana
Trump magazines
Trump Model Management
Trump Mortgage
Trump Network
Trump Oil Corporation
Trump Productions
Trump Shuttle
Trump Steaks
Trump University
Trump Vodka
Trump Ice
Trump Village
Miscellaneous Wollman Rink
van heldorf & Nick, I’ll have to disagree with your thinking on tRump’s fate.
4Given that DJT, his handlers and minions, are an extreme threat to our nation and the world, far beyond any other in history, his rapid removal by any and all means possible is imperative.
Sandridge, I share your feelings regarding trump. My sentiment is also the same for the stalins, maos, hitlers, xi’s, etc. But what if I had the opportunity to take these people out once it became clear to me that they are really dangerous people? I don’t know what I’d do. I would like to think that if I were to do it, it would be without a consuming hate destroying me. Then again, maybe it takes a consuming hate to even take out these types of bad people.
5Lesson: a huge portion of the American electorate are pathetic judges of character, and a considerable part of those don’t care about character at all.
6Sandridge @ 3,
Yep, THG was a pathetic failure and grifter as a business man. As Mark Twain said, “I’d read his obituary with great pleasure”.
He was also an unethical and negligent leader who was responsible for 100,000 Covid deaths by his inaction while in office. That’s a category in its own right.
7I don’t care if he drops dead but I’d really rather see him criminally charged and convicted for the conspiracy to overturn a fair and legal election and attempted coup/treason. But here’s where I think we are. We have a scared shitless DOJ and AG. We have a repugnantican party where truth has no place and they seek power at all costs. Trumpf should have been impeached twice and at minimum removed from office via the 25th amendment, yet here we are again. Further, the poison trumpf fed the repugnantican party has led to many other politicians with the same vision as TFFG and lust for power. At least in the days of Richard Nixon, the majority of Republicans in Congress and in the DOJ did respect the truth and wanted to protect our democracy. That no longer exists, therefore, I have zero confidence those that were part of the conspiracy, including the head of the snake, will ever face the consequences. I expect trumpf to announce soon that he’s running again which will further paralyze the DOJ.
8Trump couldn’t have done the Apprentice without NBC, their scripting and coaching. He couldn’t have become President without the GOP leaders, GOP members who walk in lockstep on every issue and general nut jobs. I’m ready to not only never hear his name again, but I want to know who helped him, and asked for a pardon for their Constitutional seppuku.
9Steve from Beaverton @ 8,
I, too, am not confident that DOJ and AG have the chutzpah to do anything. Nothing will stop TFG from running, except perhaps him being handcuffed and frog marched to jail. His nut-job minions and the GOP will still slavishly worship him as their true Jim Jones. As a voter, I expect that my individual vote will count for nothing, and only electoral votes manipulated by the GOP will.
Grandma Ada @ 9,
Here AZ, we are seeing his ugly face and voice every hour in campaign ads. He’s like a virus you can’t get rid of. I don’t think I’ve seen a complete list of names of those who asked for pre-emptive pardons. The next hearing should be pretty revealing about Meadows.
10I don’t wish him dead, necessarily. I’d prefer to see him living the rest of his miserable life under a highway overpass holding a sign saying “Any little bit helps. God bless.” I’d settle for seeing him in a prison jump suit for the rest of his miserable life.
11“or you will think it’s fake news. I’m not sure anyone will actually see their opinion change.”
Yep. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can fool all of the Republicans all of the time.
And in the case of the 2016 election Trump didn’t even have to fool most of the people. The Electoral College took care of that, where I still imagine a group gathering to vote, wearing grey sweatshirts like John Belushi in Animal House simply printed “College.”
12Rick, you are correct. In our system of electing a president, the amount of dirt between voters is more important than the actual number of votes cast. That’s the electoral college reality.
13Two thoughts on Repubs: First, they have one issue that they do not deviate from, and that is the Dems must go down. Issues, polls, logic do not enter into their approach. If the Dems are for it they are against it.
Second, a quote from John Kenneth Galbraith: “The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy: this the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness”
14Essentially, basically it comes down to the fact that “what should happen” went out the window a long time ago. I would a slight majority of the country agreed his ass and everyone else’s ass should have been in jail before a single hearing was held. We know what happened. We saw it. We knew what he was doing because he wasn’t trying to hide it. So, essentially any hearing would only be beneficial as it simply discovered how many participated and what their participation was. Again, they aren’t there to convince me.
The only question I would ask about a prime time airing is who exactly they want to convince. Is it Merrick Garland? I don’t think it needs to be public to do that. I don’t know how much he will ever move on Trump and his immediate family. I get it in part I find the general idea of criminalizing politics to be distasteful in general, but enough is enough.
So, if they aren’t convincing us and they aren’t convincing the justice department then who exactly are they convincing? That’s the question that needs to be answered. Who do you want to see this? Who will be swayed by this? I honestly don’t know the answers to those questions.
15If there are no consequences it sends a message that this behavior will be tolerated. Next time will be worse.
16Our electoral system must have safeguards to prevent anyone with a history of fraud and, or sedition, no experience in civil service, and credible charges of sexual abuse from running for any office whatsoever.
17Trump should never have been allowed to run for the highest
office in our government.
On Merrick Garland. As far as I know, he plays his cards closely.
18It would seem to me that were he to disclose all now that the crucial voting public that might switch against trump would be distracted by several repub things before Nov and his findings likely would lose perhaps a critical degree of umph. Timing might be everything or damn near.
The fact that the DOJ has not moved against the instigator of the conspiracy (we all know who that is) and his coconspirators, but only on his puppets (and the proud boys and the like should be prosecuted and some were coconspirators) doesn’t change that the house had no choice but to investigate and report. Not doing so would only enable future insurrections. There were 20 million viewing but many more read the highlights (lowlights) such as me. With the upcoming 6 more prime time reports, I think the best we can hope for is they will move voters to go to the poles in great numbers and vote against candidates that would continue the fraud. I hope van heldorf is right and Garland is holding his cards close to the vest in order actually prosecute TFFG and his coconspirators. We can only hope.
19I get the whole “We’re not gonna become them” argument.
20But so do they.
They’re counting on it.
Trump will claim that everything he did was legit “otherwise the very fine, highly qualified people the American people paid for as my staff would have stopped me.” Yep — he’ll lay the blame on all the staff.
With respect to the hearings, I believe it was very powerful to see the film of the insurrection with TFG’s real-time comments overlayed onto them. The testimony of the guy who did the documentary where he testified this was no ad hoc event but a well planned, military-style event was also good. I think for many the testimony of the officers was also very important as they talked of hand-to-hand *combat* for hours and wondering why nobody was sending help despite repeated calls.
I particularly like the idea of showing the riot with real-time inserts of events happening elsewhere and hop the committee will continue that method of presenting information. Show the insurrection while telling what was going on in WH and inside the Senate, the phone calls being desperately made for help, etc. Follow that up with a printed timeline showing riot picture on the left, a timeline on the center, and what was happening elsewhere on the right. Yes, it’ll go for pages – maybe hundreds and hundreds – but the clear presentation of what happened is critical.
21One of many details I learned from hearing #1 was Trump’s
22statement that Mike Pence deserved to be hung and Trump
refused to send help to prevent it.
Is it too much of a stretch to accuse him of conspiracy to commit murder in addition to all his other crimes?
Where’s Jack McCoy when you need him!
I’d be perfectly happy to see him dead.
23Jus’say’n’
oh yeah, maryelle…
24Jack’s been in San Diego for the last 6 or 7 years. I saw a few weeks ago that he’s coming out of retirement for a while.
Hey, who took my clever posts?
25