Quote (Goomshill @ Aug 9 2023 09:19pm)
Trump was indicted in New York for paying hush money to Stormy Daniels out of his own personal funds. New York's election laws are the most openly corrupt in the country, allowing politicians to get away with plundering their campaign coffers because the board of elections has defined the code to say that 'anything related to an election' can be paid using campaign funds, even in the most tenuous links, with examples like a politician taking a single drive to a campaign stop with a vehicle he buys with campaign funds and keeping it. At the federal level, campaign finance is defined by the 'irrespective test' of the FEC, which says spending must be personal if it could exist irrespective of an election- the classical example being a politician getting an expensive haircut to look good on TV, is still a personal expense because he'd get a haircut anyway. The New York prosecution hinges on inverting the overly permissive state level interpretation with the novel legal theory that they can prosecute anyone who spends personal funds on anything that could influence an election- instead of permitting corrupt politicians to get away with obvious bribery, they'd say that an honest politician complying with the federal law would be committing a state crime. Under the federal definition, 'a wealthy businessman paying hush money to a mistress to preserve his reputation' is something that could happen irrespective of a campaign, which we know for a fact because Donald Trump has already done it before being a politician. Under the reinterpretation used by the DA, anything that could influence the results of an election must be paid with campaign funds. Which means if it was paid with campaign funds, its a federal crime, and if its paid with personal funds, its a state crime, a catch 22 that criminalizes lawful conduct either way. And what's more, if applied evenly, it means every politician in new york state would be guilty of a crime because you'd be able to dig up any contrived connection to a campaign. If Chuck Schumer spends $12 to buy a lox bagel at a kosher deli, he's building rapport with the jewish bloc, gotta throw him in the slammer
The rest of the cases just follow that kind of template. When a crime doesn't exist, you can twist the law to invent a new one, even if it would criminalize everyone else's conduct- you simply don't charge them. So what if Joe Biden had classified documents stored next to his corvette, the same corvette that Hunter Biden used while taking selfies with prostitutes, while taking $20 million+ in bribes with half held for 'the big guy'. So what if half the democrats in congress participated in inciting riots in the summer of 2020 while Donald Trump told people to peacefully go home and respect law enforcement?
We got hard evidence today that the Biden administration coerced the Pakistani government and military with threats to force them to removed Imran Khan from office, bring him up on phony charges and throw him in prison and bar him from running for office (the murder attempt was a freebie). After all, leaving the fate of Pakistani democracy in the hands of the people would be far too great a risk.
You spend most of your post focusing on the weakest indictment against Trump.
In the classified documents case, Trump is charged with
withholding classified documents, and obstruction. So the example of Joe Biden having documents in an unsecure place is not at all equivalent to what Trump was charged with.
Trump, in the coup attempt case, has not been charged with inciting a riot. He was charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights. The indictment lays out some of the damning facts on those counts.
I think your flaccid response reveals how there's not much of a defense for what Trump has done. The whataboutism doesn't even make sense.