Ever since the first arrests and charges following last week’s insurrection, a topic that immediately started flying around in the media, as well as in many peoples minds was Trump wouldn’t actually try to pardon these schmucks, would he?!?
Well, it looks like we might be about to find out. Within the last 48 hours, the attorney for one of the domestic terrorists publicly appealed to Trump to pardon his client. This wasn’t particularly brilliant, considering the notoriety of his client, and the blowback that would immediately ensue. Better to quietly back channel the request.
But it got even worse in the way that he conveyed his message. He actually told the media something akin to, He needs to pardon my client. My client was there at the direct request of the President of the United States. President Trump needs to stand up and own these people, they were only following his instructions.
Oh, sweet Jesus. If this guy has a client in court for sentencing, does he stand up and tell the judge, My client had better get straight probation your honor, because he knows where you live. Right now, Trump is quietly trying to do everything in his power to distance his words from their ultimate effect last Wednesday. The last thing he needs is some smartass mouthpiece tying his words to the terrorists actions with barbed wire. That’s no way to get a favor.
It was also a dumbass thing to say for another reason. Anybody who watches Trump knows that you don’t order Trump to do anything. You don’t even tell Trump to do anything. You beg Trump to do something,Trump likes it when you beg. besides, Trump has never owned anything but a building in his life, especially if it failed. Ordering Trump to own these miscreants makes the lawyer sound like an ex wife demanding more child support.
But here’s the real reason that this public pronouncement was so brain dead. These domestic terrorists may consider themselves patriotic freedom fighters, but everybody else considers them seditious traitors. And the public political fallout is scorching the GOP like a blown steam, boiler. Even collaborators like Cruz, Hawley, McCarthy and Blackburn are trying to bury any connection to the events.
But most importantly, this gives Mitch McConnell a cudgel to whack Trump over the head with. Trump really hated being impeached the first time, and doesn’t look the second time any more. But at least Trump was able to console himself with the fact that there were two previous losers that got impeached before him. But no US President has ever been convicted in a Senate trial, and Trump is loathe to claim that honor.
McConnell can go to Trump, either publicly or privately, and tell him that s things stand, his acquittal in the Senate is nothing more than a literal toss up. But he can damn well guarantee Trump that if he moves to pardon so much as one domestic terrorist, the vote to convict will be overwhelming. That should do the trick.
To say that the insurrectionists were misguided is the understatement of the year. But they were also delusional. They went into this trusting two basic principles. The first was the old riot credo, safety in numbers. Get in, do your damage, and get out, hide the forest in the trees. But that doesn’t work so well when the target is blanketed with security cameras, and rioters are live streaming the carnage. And as facial recognition programs start spitting out matches, and people start dropping dimes to the FBI identifying people from images, these people figure to be seriously bummed for years to come.
The second reason is that, like so many blind fools before them, they trusted Donald Trump. Trump is still the President, and it’s still his DOJ. History showed them that if people got caught doing his bidding, he takes care of them. And that’s true, as long as no shit blows back on him. And right now, they are in a world of shit, and I don’t see Trump getting his shoes dirty.
If you enjoyed this article, you might also like to check out President Evil, and the sequel, President Evil II, A Clodwork Orange . They comprise a pretty much daily report from the front of the 2016 GOP primaries, as well as the general election
Follow me on Twitter at @RealMurfster35
You know what freaked me out: there was talk of Trump doing a mass pardon, like Jimmy Carter did with the draft dodgers. I don’t know if that’s going to happen now. I think Trump would do best by himself if he just STFU and left quietly. It’s not in his nature, I know.
But what is in it for HIM, other than greatly increasing the likelihood of his conviction and making are businesses run as fas as they can from hi & leaving him to twist I the wind, exposed and penniless? Generally, he’s pardoned people because they helped him or because they make him look big and tough and mean. This would destroy him, and the seditionists have nothing to offer him.
Yeah, Trump is really really stupid – I’d put his IQ somewhere in the low to mid 90s. So I could see him doing a mass pardon for the rioters, right up to and including the killing the policeman. He has been doing the usual “it was a perfect speech” nonsense for sure but he just doesn’t have the mental ability to see that a mass pardon would invalidate his own defense.
But you’re right that he’ll hate being told. He has no regard for the schmucks who did his bidding, especially since their “operation” failed. (I mean they’d rehearsed it and everything. Putin must have been looking on in dismay at the amateurish mess Trump’s troops made of the whole seditious overthrow thing.) Trump doesn’t like insurgents who fail. So unless they’re needed to carry out the next overthrow attempt, apparently planned for a Sunday start, they ain’t gittin’ no pardon.
Pedo? Seriously? Friend try some self awareness. I would rather be a boy named sue. U bots need some work.
lol when I read that name? I said something a bit worse! You have more class than I do so I will let yours stand!
Must be a Qanon type. They have an unseemly focus on pedophilia.
Im trying to see what’s in it for HIM, other than greatly increasing the likelihood of his conviction and making are businesses run as fas as they can from hi & leaving him to twist I the wind, exposed and penniless. Generally, he’s pardoned people because they helped him or because they make him look big and tough and mean. This would destroy him, and the seditionists have nothing to offer him.
He thinks he’s in a sh*tstorm now, go ahead & pardon the aholes. The hail will go from golf ball size to basketball size in a heartbeat.
That lawyer is indeed as stupid as Trump. If not even more idiotic.
How did the whole “we were just following orders” thing work out for the Nazis? Did anyone earn an “oh well then ok”?
And you would expect what from a fiddy cent court appointed lawyer?
When I heard about Jacob Chansley (aka the Qanon Shaman) asking for a pardon from tRump BECAUSEZ “tRump told him to do it,” I also thought how stupid can these people be? Even tRump should be able to figure out (maybe?) that agreeing that he ordered the rioters to breach the Capitol doesn’t put him in the best position in his own trial coming up in the Senate! Murph, you are right: these yayhoos are “pretty poor protoplasm” and it takes several of them to compile even one sensible, coherent, short thought. ???
How stupid? They are as dense as an iron anvil. Frump & his followers are a match made in Hell. What the devil has joined together, let them be together in eternity.