Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy

| 6:00 pm EDT August 3, 2023
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I found an apropos Trump meme that I posted to my Facebook wall. It shows a cartoon Trump lamenting, “This is the worst day of my life.” In the next panel a waggish Homer Simpson corrects him: “The worst day of your life so far.”

To my mind that summarises what being Donald Trump must be like these days. A living hell with a bigger, more horrific hell on its way tomorrow. Every now and again, when I am outraged anew at the horrors of death and divisiveness Donald Trump visited on the land of my birth in his four nefarious years as “president,” when I think of how close he came to destroying forever my country’s ideals and still could, I imagine what he’s going through right now — and I smile.

That, brothers and sisters, is what justice looks like. The years when Trump and his evil claque of idolaters smugly pushed our faces into his triumph, tormented us with visions of an endless succession of Trump dynasties stretching off into the future, insouciantly ignored our needs and loudly advocated for the incarceration of our political heroes, are over.

We are having the last laugh. Never have the mighty fallen so far and so fast. It really is looking like Donald Trump is going to go to prison. It’s so perfect a vengeance I can scarcely bring myself to believe it.

But it wouldn’t be perfect were it not for the latest indictment, the four counts of the 75 thus far that count the most. Count 1: Conspiracy to defraud the United States. Count 2: Conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. Count 3: Obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding. Count 4: Conspiracy against rights.

These are the charges that pertain to Trump’s attempt to defraud the American people out of an election and despoil the sacred peaceful transition of power enshrined in the Constitution of the United States. It is the last of these charges, “Conspiracy against rights,” an enigma of brevity, that best tells the story.

What is Conspiracy against rights? It is a crime where two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten or intimidate any person in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him or her by the Constitution or laws of the United States. Trump and his cronies attempted to injure, oppress, threaten and intimidate us out of our vote. He tried to steal the election with lies and nefarious acts, lies that he knew to be untrue, acts that he knew to be unlawful. And he was caught and he was duly charged. And for doing that to us he is probably going to go to prison, effectively for the rest of his life. That, my friends, is justice.

It is significant that six other unnamed people are mentioned as his unindicted (so far) co-conspirators. We don’t know for sure who they are but we have a pretty good idea. They are probably, numbers one to six respectively: Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Sidney Powell, Jeffrey Clark, Kenneth Cheesebor and Peter Navarro.

Numbers one and three are, for me, the most satisfying. The days of having to endure “America’s mayor” Rudy Giuliani shouting his litany of lies and defamations on television are over. And the hideous fool Sidney Powell now gets to learn the true consequences of the hate she maliciously and viciously spread. Time to “release the kraken,” Sidney?

Their day of shame and blame will come. Meanwhile this is all about Trump. Justice for Trump first. He, and he alone, is the First Cause of the insurrection. Remove any of the others and you would still have had the January 6 insurrection. Remove Trump and it would have been just another day.

That, I believe, is why Jack Smith, in his wisdom, left the names of the others out of this indictment. He wants Trump to bear the full weight and consequences of his crime all by himself. And he wants Trump’s trial to proceed unencumbered by distractions concerning his criminal co-conspirators.

No discussion of the latest Trump indictment would be complete without a word about the judge assigned to the case. Tanya S. Chutkan, presiding judge, is known to be smart, honest, honourable and ethical. What is more, what is most delicious of all, is that she is a Jamaica-born woman of colour. Donald Trump, who has spent his life showing his contempt for immigrants, women and people of colour, will now have his fate presided over by someone who is all three. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.