(Because of holiday plans, this week and next week I will post on Thursday instead of Saturday.) About the title: During Trump’s first impeachment, I was offering summaries and commentaries of the legal documents. I asked my readers what I should call them. My favorite suggestion was “Over the Cliff Notes.” On Monday, the House Select […]
Over the Cliff Notes: Criminal Referrals for Trump and Others Read More »
Last week Trump expressed solidarity with the insurrectionists and had dinner with two fans of Adolph Hitler. On Sunday, December 4, he announced that the constitution should be “terminated” so that he can be reinstated as president. On Tuesday, the Trump Organization was convicted on all counts of tax fraud. The Republican leadership remained largely silent. One
Disillusioned With Democracy Read More »
This was a good week for the Department of Justice. It was a bad week for Trump and the seditionists. 1. Trump’s Special Master Lawsuit Bites the Dust First, a procedural overview: August 8: The FBI, pursuant to a search warrant, searched Mar-a-Lago and seized boxes of government documents including documents marked classified. August 22:
A Bad Week for Seditionists Read More »
Spoiler: Maybe Musk did us a favor by disrupting Twitter and forcing us to consider better social media alternatives. Warning: This may get gossipy with some of my personal social media anecdotes. I: Social Media Encourages Demagoguery Democracy Needs a Functioning Public Sphere Definition: The public sphere is composed of voluntary associations that promote social cohesion
Curing the Ills of Social Media Read More »
The big news this week was that Merrick Garland appointed veteran prosecutor Jack Smith as Special Prosecutor overseeing the January 6 probe and the investigation into the Mar-a-Lago documents. Garland skeptics celebrated because they understood this was a clear sign that this investigation is leading toward major indictments. If you’ve been reading this blog, you’ve
The Georgia Criminal Case against Trump and his Pals Read More »
I. Reflections on the 2022 Midterms Before the election, we were hit with a barrage of warnings that we were in for a red wave. This was from 538: In fact, as of this writing, the Democrats: Are holding the Senate and may pick up an extra Senate seat, As of tonight, it looks like
Reflections on the Midterms, Arrogant and Entitled White MAGA Men, and more Read More »
This page has been updated, and all the material moved to a new page here.
Mastodon v. Post v. Twitter v. Everything Else Read More »
In 2016 I signed up as volunteer lawyer to go to Nevada to monitor polling places during early voting and the general election. My job was to watch what was happening and report anything irregular to the lawyers who sat in what’s known as a “boiler room.” The boiler room lawyers solved whatever problems they
Adventures of a Voter Protection Lawyer Read More »
Politico reported that when Trump announced a rally in Florida with Rubio — but not DeSantis— the “apparent snub” angered some people within DeSantis’ orbit, who complained that it mean fewer people would pay attention to DeSantis. This tells us that even with everything we know about Trump’s lawbreaking and attempted coup, he is still
The Person Putting forward Simplifications Has an Advantage Read More »
When Trump is gone—and one day he will be—another would-be Trump will arise to take his place. We will have a DeSantis or Hawley or Stefanik. If a major political party and half of the American voters want leaders who will defy the laws, you can’t solve the problem by putting all of their leaders
The criminal justice system cannot solve a political problem Read More »
On Wednesday, I appeared on the Lincoln Project show We’re Speaking. Shortly after the interview, I thought of ways I could have given much crisper answers, which annoys me to no end. Anyway, most of the answers I gave came from recent blog posts and my FAQ page, with one exception: The first question Lisa and Maya asked
Trump v. The United States Read More »
Contents Part I: The Republican Travelogue to Hell Part II: Trump’s Special Master Lawsuit Backfires Part I: The Republican Travelogue to Hell Tim Miller’s Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell opens with a splash. America never would have gotten into this mess if it weren’t for me and my friends.
The Republican Travelogue to Hell (and Trump’s Special Master lawsuit update) Read More »
I. The Lawsuit (This section was written Saturday, September 17. For the stuff that happened since yesterday, skip to Section II: The Backfire) To recap, two weeks after the FBI executed a search on Mar-a-Lago, Trump filed a lawsuit demanding a special master to review the seized documents. He put forward the outlandish claim that
Trump’s Special Master Lawsuit and the Accomplanying Social Media Doom Read More »
Last week I wrote about Trump’s lawsuit requesting a special master to screen the Mar-a-Lago documents. To recap, his lawsuit was based on the outlandish claim that he had the right to possess the documents, a mindboggling claim given that most of the documents seized by the FBI were government documents, which, by law, must
The Special Master Saga Continues Read More »
TV and Internet lawyers often qualify the word “consequences” with words like “actual” or “real” or “meaningful,” like this: “Trump has never suffered any actual consequences” or the common corollary, “Trump keeps breaking laws because the legal system is corrupt or failing” are what I call a “rage-inducing simplification.” Rage-inducing simplifications take a complex situation