WN: I have a close relative who railed against the dishonesty of the Clinton’s, Obama, and in general all the Democrats. Yet, when Trump ascended to the Presidency, suddenly, “dishonest politicians in power” were remarkably no longer a concern. Good thing. Otherwise, the railings would have been of necessity incessant and overwhelming (exponentially more than previously) . . . Indeed: nary a peep from said morally “troubled” relative . . . (Not that I particularly disagreed with him on the nature of politicians in power . . .)
In politics, you can say what you want and if people like it, it works. In a legal realm, it’s different. It’s an arena where there are tangible consequences for missteps, misdeeds, false statements in a way that doesn’t apply in politics.—Chris Edelson
Yet, guaranteed: he’ll claim now with millions of Americans (sadly, almost the entire Republican leadership) that this is all a witch hunt (which “witch hunt” claim number is it now?) against poor, beleaguered, impeccably honest Trump and cohorts/co-conspirators/acolytes. (See, by Zachary Basu, September 21, 2022: New York AG refers Trump family to federal prosecutors and IRS:
Trump has denied wrongdoing in any of the investigations that prosecutors or members of Congress have pursued over the last seven years, using the allegations to whip up his base and cast himself as the victim of a long-running partisan “witch hunt.”)
Said relative indeed is one who seemingly would witness in real time a murder by said “Saint Donald,”1 and say it was either a staged scene by the dastardly Left/Progressives, or fully justified since all the foregoing absolutely deserve it! (Yikes! He includes me in that crowd!)2
Today reports on a recent poll it conducted with Suffolk University: “In a hypothetical 2024 presidential primary in the Sunshine State, [Florida GOP Gov. Ron.] DeSantis leads Trump 48%-40%. That’s a reversal from a poll of Florida in January, when Trump led DeSantis 47%-40%.” That poll was taken between Sept. 15 and 18, just after DeSantis’s appalling ploy to send asylum seekers to Massachusetts. A recent national poll from Politico-Morning Consult also shows Trump leading DeSantis 52 to 19 percent, a 5-point drop for Trump since August.
Trump’s primary endorsees are also crashing — from Mehmet Oz and Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania’s Senate and governor races to Blake Masters in the Arizona Senate race to Tudor Dixon in the Michigan gubernatorial race.
As HuffPost’s S.V. Date notes, “recapturing the House is no longer a certainty, thanks to those weak general election candidates, Trump’s insistence on putting himself in the spotlight, and a fundraising operation that has locked away more than $100 million in small-dollar GOP donations into what is effectively his personal slush fund and will not be used in campaigns this fall.”
There is also this top take-down of T**** by Stephen Colbert:
An appeals court obliterated the former president’s defense in his classified documents case, and even Sean Hannity was confused when T**** rattled off conspiracy theories in an attempt to change the subject. Also, if you’re working from home right now, it’s a good idea to check your house for squirrels. #Colbert#Comedy#Monologue
excerpts:
New York Attorney General Letitia James on Wednesday announced that following a three-year investigation into former President Donald Trump and his real estate empire, the state is filing a civil lawsuit against the ex-president, accusing him and his family members of “staggering” fraud.
James said the probe that culminated in her 220-page legal filing in the New York State Supreme Court showed that Trump systematically overvalued his assets with the help of his children, Donald Jr., Ivanka, and Eric Trump.
“We found that Trump, his family, and the Trump Organization used fraudulent and misleading asset valuations over 200 times in 10 years on his annual financial statements,” the attorney general said on social media. “These statements were then used to obtain hundreds of millions of dollars in loans and insurance coverage.”
In a statement, James called the former president one of “the most egregious examples” of the kind of misconduct seen among “powerful, wealthy people” who operate “as if the rules do not apply to them.”
“With the help of his children and senior executives at the Trump Organization, Donald Trump falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to unjustly enrich himself and cheat the system,” she said. “In fact, the very foundation of his purported net worth is rooted in incredible fraud and illegality. Mr. Trump thought he could get away with the art of the steal, but today, that conduct ends.”
James called on the court to permanently prohibit Trump and his three eldest children from ever serving as officers or directors at any company in New York and from acquiring real estate in the state for five years. The attorney general is also seeking $250 million from the Trumps, saying they wrongfully gained that amount via “persistent fraudulent practices.”
…
“Mr. Trump’s own triplex apartment in Trump Tower was valued as being 30,000 square feet when it was 10,996 square feet,” said James. “As a result, in 2015 the apartment was valued at $327 million in total, or $29,738 per square foot. That price was absurd given the fact that at that point only one apartment in New York City had ever sold for even $100 million.”
Trump’s resort in Florida, Mar-a-Lago, was also valued at $739 million “based on the false premise that it was unrestricted property and could be developed and sold for residential use, even though Mr. Trump himself signed deeds donating his residential development rights, sharply restricting changes to the property,” said the attorney general’s office.
The property should actually have been valued at only about $75 million.
Trump’s overvaluing of his assets violated both state and federal law, James said, noting that the case is being referred to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Wayne Northey was Director of Man-to-Man/Woman-to-Woman – Restorative Christian Ministries (M2/W2) in British Columbia, Canada from 1998 to 2014, when he retired. He has been active in the criminal justice arena and a keen promoter of Restorative Justice since 1974. He has published widely on peacemaking and justice themes. You will find more about that on this website: a work in progress.
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