The downward spiral
Now that Donald Trump’s indictment, arrest, and arraignment have played out in his DOJ classified documents scandal, we’re in a stretch where no actual news is happening. That notion feels counterintuitive of course. You’d think even more would be happening now. But the criminal court system doesn’t work that way.
We’re entering a more clinical, procedural stage now, where it’s mostly about both sides making predictable pretrial filings that don’t mean much. Of course the media can’t admit that nothing is happening in this case right now, because you’ll change the channel and go watch sports until the trial begins. So the media is busy pretending that the low level judge in the case has some magic wand that’ll allow her to just let Trump off the hook at some point of her choosing. Those narratives are 100% fictional, as the 11th Circuit would immediately intervene (and take the case away from her) if this judge tries to make even one foul move. But the media’s scary ghost stories are good for entertaining the panic addicts who want to be fed scary ghost stories.
In the meantime, something is happening with regard to this case: Donald Trump is spiraling downward. You might not spot it right away, because his social media posts were over the top bonkers to begin with, but he’s been ratcheting up the frantically erratic lunacy of his posts over the past couple days.
Trump’s social media posts are meant to put on a brave face, but are instead stupidly wiping out any narrow reasonable doubt arguments that he might want to make at trial. It’s difficult to be certain if Trump is screwing up his trial prospects because he’s too far gone to understand what he’s doing, or if Trump has decided there’s no further harm in behaving however he wants because he knows he’s a lock for prison anyway.
But either way, Donald Trump is in a downward spiral. Getting indicted, arrested, and arraigned is usually the part where arrogant career criminals come back down to earth and realize they’d better take this seriously if they want anything resembling a future. Trump is doing the precise opposite, and is merely heaping dirt on his own lack of a future. In that sense, the real story here may be that Trump is (wittingly or unwittingly) trying to find a way to lose this trial before it’s even begun.
