You can’t do that. You can’t go after people [weaponize the Justice department] … You don’t go after them so you can win an election.
Donald Trump, Univision interview, Nov 9. 2033
The Democrat News-media Colluders (hereafter the DNC) have managed to misrepresent a new Trump remark in order to smear him (and to distract from their own malfeasance). As they see it, in an interview with Univision, Trump stated that if he is re-elected, he is going to institute a new era of authoritarianism and weaponize the Justice system against his political enemies, and, of course, bring an end to our democracy itself.
Trump did no such thing. In the past I have argued that one only needs to be able to read at the 7th grade level to demolish some of the DNC’s silly misrepresentations of Trump’s words, but, admittedly, in the present case one might need a high school level of comprehension to do so.
The offending Trump statement was produced when a Univision anchor remarked that Trump has claimed that the Democrats have “weaponized the Justice Department [and] FBI [against him]” and asked “Would you do the same if you’re re-elected?” Trump replied,
Well, he’s (Biden) … released the genie out of the box, … They have done something that allows the next party — I mean, if somebody — if I happen to be president, and I see somebody who’s … beating me very badly, I say, ‘Go down and indict them,’ mostly that would be, you know, … They’d be out of the election.
Both the New York Times and The Washington Post referenced this remark to rehearse their standard tiresome “Democracy is at stake!” narratives. NYT’s Jamelle Bouie said that “Trump plans to turn the Department of Justice against his political opponents, prosecuting his critics and rivals.” WaPo’s Catherine Rampell stated that it was “horrifying” that Trump threatens to use presidential power “against political rivals in retaliation for their alleged persecution of him.” Vanity Fair and many others “liberal” sites chimed in.
However, Trump did not state that he “plans” to “turn” the DOJ “against his political opponents”. Trump merely pointed-out that the DNC has set a precedent by using lawfare against him that can be used by future administrations against their political enemies. He is describing what setting this precedent “allows [Trump’s word]” future administrations to do. That is a logical point! Thus, when Trump sketches a hypothetical scenario in which someone is beating him very badly, and states that “I say, ‘Go down and indict them,” he is merely stating the “logical consequence” of the DNC’s foolish precedent, not saying what he actually “plans” to do it. For some mysterious reason all these “liberal” DNC propagandists neglected to mention that immediately after making those remarks Trump said: “You can’t do that. You can’t go after people [with the Justice Department] … so you can win an election”.
For the same reason, Trump is not in that statement making any “threats” of “retaliation”. Trump is engaged in a “meta-level” discussion of the logic of precedents, something that is, apparently beyond the comprehension of these “journalists”.
What is literally comical about the DNC’s accusations is that what they accuse Trump of threatening to do against his political opponents they are already actually doing to Trump already as they excitedly gush how they are going to jail him or bar him from running in certain states. Tulsi Gabbard, former Democrat star and presidential candidate puts it thus,
This is another example of their hypocrisy. In one breath they talk about defending democracy and Jen Psaki on MSNBC says if you elect Trump you are going to undermine the rule of law and throw his political opponents in jail. Look at what they are doing right now and you see that on the smirk on [New York AG] Letitia James face. They know exactly what they are doing, undermining the rule of law so that voters don’t have the opportunity to decide who they want to vote for.
Tulsi also explains why the DNC has to unfairly cripple Trump in these ways,
[The DNC] think … they can get away with this. But the American people [see] exactly what they are doing: the Democrat establishment is going after Trump because they are afraid of him. They cannot challenge him on substance whether it’s the economy, securing the border, or foreign policy and the issues of peace and war.
Since clearly Trump governed so much better than Biden, the DNC cannot meet him with honest arguments but must accuse him of seeking revenge on his political opponents in order to distract from the fact that they are currently seeking revenge on him. When one is guilty of some sin one accuses one’s political opponents precisely what one is doing in order to distract from one’s own guilt.
Similar points could be made about the DNC’s claim, by Jake Tapper and Abby Phillip and Anderson Cooper and MSNBC and USA Today and NPR and Vox and Robert Reich and many more that Trump called his political opponents “vermin”. Trump did not do that. One must go slow here as if talking to children. When Trump says he is going to root the “vermin” out of the government he is not saying that all his political opponents are vermin. If one says one is going to get the spiders, the mice and the flies out of the garage one is not saying that everything in the garage is a spider. Trump merely said that he has political opponents in the government, some of which are vermin, that need to be rooted out.
In an earlier speech he clarified that in his second term he would direct the DOJ to investigate “every Marxist prosecutor in America.” Trump is not saying he will go after everybody, just Marxist prosecutors. Joe Manchin need not worry. Is investigating Marxist prosecutors no longer allowed in the USA? Apparently, the Marxists in government think so.
The same point can be made about for DNC’s false claim that Trump’s use of the word “vermin” is Hitlerian language. When Hitler used the word “vermin” he was characterizing an “inferior race”, e.g., the Jews. Trump is merely using the word to characterize destructive individuals, e.g., Marxist prosecutors who may belong to any race or religious creed. Unfortunately, the standard DNC practice is to find a word, e.g., “vermin,” in Trump’s remarks and then, like children, talk themselves into a state of frothing hysteria.
One cannot accuse these professional DNC propagandists of lying. Most of them do not have the conceptual tools to understand what they are doing. Many of them cannot even read. It would take a Ludwig Wittgenstein or a J.L. Austin working round the clock to get them even to begin to appreciate the intricacies of linguistic usage.
It would be good for the country if what remains of our “journalistic” profession were not so downright eager to distort the English language, selectively, to smear their political opponents. The DNC smear merchants are the real authoritarian threat to our democracy using the legal system to seek revenge on their political enemies, ergo, the attacks on Trump.
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