Today in New York and Florida

 “Show me the man, I’ll find you the crime”

Statement widely attributed to Lavrenti Beria, head of Stalin’s  secret police (NKVD)

What a sad day this is for our country. Incredulously, I watched today’s events in New York, where for the first time in our history, a former president is charged with a crime though I cannot figure out what crime has been committed. 

Here we have a DA (Alvin Bragg) who campaigned on a promise to prosecute President Trump. That in itself is highly unprofessional and unethical. And now, based on the testimony of Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels, Trump now stands charged of 34 felonies. That is all surrounding his alleged payment of $130,000 to Daniels. Trump supposedly made 34 false business records, which constituted, if true, misdemeanors for which the state of limitations has long passed. To get around that, Bragg has tied these counts to “other crimes”. In other words, Trump’s 34 misdemeanors were committed in furtherance of some other crime-which the indictment didn’t even specify, and which Bragg refused to identify in his subsequent press conference. It does appear that the “other crime” was connected to the 2016 presidential campaign. The question begs: What gives Bragg as a local DA the right to prosecute what would be violations of federal election laws-allegations that the federal government investigated and declined to prosecute? It has also been argued that if the money paid to Daniels was Trump’s own money-as opposed to campaign funds-there is no reporting requirement under federal campaign laws. (I should add here that I am not a lawyer, but the argument is being made.)

This is a case that screams for a dismissal. The defense is preparing a host of motions, all of which have merit. They want to get a change of venue from Manhattan, where it is doubtful Trump can get a fair trial. They will unquestionably ask for a dismissal based on the law, selective prosecution, statute of limitations, and the obvious overreach of this DA. 

Trump’s speech from Mar A Lago was vintage Trump, and he didn’t hold back. He attacked Bragg. He attacked the judge (and apparently his wife), and he attacked New York State AG Leticia James, who also campaigned in a pledge to prosecute Trump. He attacked Jack Smith, the Merrick Garland-appointed independent counsel investigating the Mar A Lago classified document investigation and the January 6 events, calling him a lunatic. Trump threw down the gauntlet in defiance of the New York judge’s warning to him to watch his rhetoric.

After Trump’s speech, the networks reacted predictably. Fox News continues to be in Trump’s corner, and they dissected the legal problems surrounding Bragg’s case. CNN followed up with host Jake Tapper convening a panel that included CNN’s “legal expert”, the disgraced former FBI agent, Andrew McCabe, with his holier-than-Thou remarks condemning Trump. It was McCabe, who as an FBI executive, tried to submarine Trump during the 2016 campaign with the Russian dossier hoax. Yet, CNN fails to see the irony. Then they brought on none other than Michael Cohen himself for an interview. It was surreal.

NBC’s Los Angeles affiliate followed up with host Colleen Williams interviewing another one of those famous University of California Irvine law professors, Michel Goodwin. She proceeded to discuss how strange it was that Melania Trump was not at her husband’s side today, as if that had any legal relevance. She then proceeded to legitimize the prosecution and stated that a dismissal of charges was “unlikely”.

This is the UC Irvine Law School, the former workplace of Congresswoman Katie Porter (D-CA), and the creation of Erwin Chemerinsky, a lefty ideologue who now runs the UC Berkeley Law School. Both law schools are little more than a training ground for future left-wing activist lawyers. But I digress.

Whether you like Trump or hate him, and even if you want to argue that no man is above the law (I agree), you have to be troubled by this particular case and all the history that goes into it. Our political system, particularly the Democrats, has weaponized our law enforcement to try and bring down the opposition. Is this our democracy? Do we still have a democracy? I have serious doubts. This is a political prosecution, and if it succeeds, we are nothing more than a banana republic.

I have little doubt that this will be followed by indictments in Fulton County, Georgia and Washington DC by Democrat-led prosecutors who are trying to affect the outcome of the 2024 election. Think of it: Just as in 2016 and 2020, the 2024 election will play out under the cloud of threats of indictments (with at least one actual indictment), the participation of law enforcement, prosecutors, and grand juries.

This is not how a democracy is supposed to work. This is not how our system of justice is supposed to work. You add this to what is going on with Russia and China, our border, a senile president, as well as a host of other problems, and our country is in serious trouble. Serious trouble. Think about how suddenly the Soviet Union collapsed. It can happen to us.