Part of the trouble with the human brain is that we tend to make emotional decisions and then use our rational side to justify our position. This means that Trump supporters can scream: “Lock her up!” about Hillary Clinton before she’s been charged with a crime but turn around and complain that the case against Trump is some sort of political witch-hunt, while failing to see the contradiction. And, even if it were pointed out to them, they’d be able to mount a case to explain that there was a real difference. Hillary, for example, was involved in Pizzagate, while Trump has is the second son of Mary…
So I’d like to put Donald to one side for a moment… Actually, I’d like to put him to one side permanently, but that’s my emotional side coming out and the points I want to make have nothing to do with whether he’s actually committed any of the hundreds of crimes he’s been charged with, or whether it really is a giant conspiracy. The basic point is that what some people are saying makes no sense if you take away the emotion of the moment.
Except that it does show something about certain politicians’ value systems but I’ll get to that later.
Let’s consider a totally fictional example:
After years of investigation, the FBI have gathered enough evidence to charge Tiny Supremo# with racketeering, extortion, murder, drug importation and an overdue library book. They are interviewing him but his lawyer interrupts and tells them: “You can’t charge my client!”
“Why not?” they ask.
“My client has just announced his candidacy for President, and it’s a well established principle that we don’t jail our political opponents in this country.”
“Democrat or Republican?”
“Neither. He’ll be standing as an independent candidate, but the protection remains…”
“Damn. You’ve got us. Ok, well, you’re free to go, but don’t think you’ve got my vote.”
#(I was going to call him Tony Soprano but I was worried that I’d be sued for defamation. Yes, I know that he’s fictional but so is Donald Trump and I have to watch what I say about him…)
Yes, that sounds far-fetched and ridiculous, but isn’t that exactly what the people who suggest that prosecuting one’s political opponents would turn the USA into one of those banana republic countries which use the courts against their opposition? Aren’t they saying that your rival should be free to do what he or she likes and under no circumstances should the justice system be involved…
At this point I think that it might be helpful to consider that little thing which we call the separation of powers. In simple terms, the people making the laws aren’t responsible for enforcing the laws, so if the Whitehouse was involved in the prosecution of Trump, we’d have a breakdown of that concept and there would be a real problem. However, at no has there been a link shown between the people who have decided to charge Trump and the Biden administration. Such a link is just asserted, assumed or hinted at. In reality, if there were such a link, there would be a significant breakdown in the way justice is meant to work.
But let’s come back to what I said about what politicians value. A number of Coalition MPs and ex-MPs have said that it’s a bad idea to charge Trump with anything because that resembles some of those countries where they organise coups and then jail the opposition… Ok, they may have missed the whole attempted coup on January 6th which sort of negates their case that it’s the ones who opposed that and argued that we should accept the results of the election who are doing the wrong thing.
When I suggest that their values need examining, I’m talking more about the inferences I can draw from what they’re saying.
First, when they suggest that Trump shouldn’t be prosecuted they’re suggesting that there is no separation of power and that when they are in government, they are quite happy to decide who gets prosecuted and who doesn’t.
Second, when they say that political opponents shouldn’t be prosecuted what they’re saying is that political opponents are really people like us and that people like us shouldn’t be charged with criminal offences because rules are for other people.
Third, they seem to have forgotten the Royal Commissions that Abbott called in order to find some criminal misconduct in the Labor Party.
Perhaps one could draw a further inference that it’s only one side of politics that shouldn’t be held to account. Certainly that seems to be the view of the Murdoch Merde.
Yes, all political parties have their faults and they all should be held to account for their actions. However, there doesn’t seem to be enough balance in the media with how this works. For example, there was the recent moaning about the millions spent on jets to ferry around Federal ministers, but when it was pointed out that it was the Liberals who’d ordered them, the story sort of died.
According to some sections of the media, when Labor are in power they are responsible for every bad thing that happens. But, of course, there is a consistency because when the Coalition is returned to power, Labor are still responsible for every bad thing that happens!
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