Donald Trump’s perilous dilemma
In a recent interview with MSNBC, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that she thought Donald Trump wasn’t “man enough” to show up and testify before the January 6 Committee. While that term may seem a bit dated I see where she’s going with it. Nancy Pelosi is a master of provocative rhetoric, undiminished by her 80 years, and she is clearly goading Trump where it will get to him the most, under his thin-skinned, hypersensitive ego.
This puts Trump in an awkward place and Pelosi has deftly manoeuvred him there. He’s enough of a three year old that he will be unable to ignore her taunts (“I dares yah, I double dares yah!”) on the one hand, and the deadly serious fact that Donald John Trump cannot open his mouth without telling a lie on the other hand.
While Trump can largely get away with telling lies in public, for now at least, it will be much more perilous in front of the Committee. He will be under oath. There could be life-altering consequences if he lies to the Committee. And he knows it. Or at least his lawyers know it.
If you doubt this, just ask former lawyer and Trump fixer Michael Cohen. He did significant jail time for lying to Congress. Trump’s lawyers know it’s largely up to them to make sure the ex-president threads this very delicate needle. Governing the querulous man-child is not an enviable job. What is that job? Finding a way out of testifying that won’t be worse than testifying.
It is one of numerous dilemmas Trump is under. To testify or not to testify, to surrender documents or not surrender documents, to cut a deal or not to cut a deal. How on earth can one man be in so much trouble in so short a time?
It occurred to me lately that the lion’s share of the trouble Trump is in right now is owed to the last fourteen days of his administration. Had he reacted to the January 6th insurrection pro-actively and not stolen documents, it’s very possible he would be home free just now. To be sure, there are other crimes he committed prior to that time frame, but would they be pursued as vigorously, or at all, had it not been for his actions during and after January 6? Possibly not.
It’s a compelling question. Say what you like about Trump, when it comes to getting into serious trouble, he’s certainly efficient. It only took him 14 days to destroy his own peace and his best chance of staying out of prison. From this time forward Trump will have to endure the slings and arrows of outrageous legal peril. All thanks to those fourteen days. And he has no one to blame but his stupid, greedy self.
To be sure, we are the inheritors of far greater trouble. Trump merely faces life in prison. America faces its untimely destruction in the toxic waste that Trump has left behind. Much is riding on the 2022 election. All because of a little man who isn’t man enough to own his own mistakes. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.