All Rise

The trial of Donald Trump is a tawdry spectacle replete with tales of duplicity and sleaze.

168 is a newsletter emailed on an unscheduled basis in which I share my thoughts on various topics for discussion. Please add your comments by clicking on the REPLY button at the end of this piece. To view archived newsletters, please visit www.1hundredsixty8.substack.com.

“Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”- Attorney Joseph Welch to Sen. Joseph McCarthy, (Army-McCarthy hearing, June 9, 1954)

An Indecent Man Faces Justice

After a life of escaping accountability for his egregious behavior, Donald Trump is now a criminal defendant for the first time, no longer in control of his destiny. It is clear he is feeling the pressure- it manifests itself in the statements he makes to the press and in his daily flurry of social media posts. For those of us who have been following the trial, the ex-reality TV star’s whining about the “conflicted judge” and his claims that the charges are “a hoax” are the sounds of desperation… as are his lapses into incoherence: During one post-session statement to a gaggle of reporters outside the courtroom, for example, Trump replied to a question of whether he would testify in his defense by saying he “would like to but the judge’s gag order prevented it”. This was nonsense, of course, as the judge reminded him the next day.

It is not shocking, however, that Trump spews such inanities: After all, this was the President who stared at an eclipse and who told the public that perhaps injecting bleach into our bodies would kill the COVID-19 virus. And months ago, in another instance of Trumpian illogic, during the defamation suit against him by the writer E.Jean Carroll, he claimed he hadn’t raped her because “she was not his type”. Was he saying he would have assaulted her if she were “his type”? Is there a word that describes such a bizarre implication? Covfefe, perhaps?

The problem isn’t only that Trump makes these statements but that a sizeable segment of our fellow Americans accept them without question. They cheered at his rally in Wildwood, NJ last weekend when Trump riffed about the “late, great Hannibal Lecter” as if the fictional character were a real person. One has to wonder, “How does that work exactly?”¹

So as the prosecution’s case winds down- former Trump lawyer/fixer Michael Cohen is the state’s final witness- we're left with the sense we’ve been subjected to a sordid narrative of the inept machinations of wannabe mobsters. Some in the media like to compare the Trump family business to an organized crime family but it lacks both the sophistication and the penchant for violence of groups such as the Mafia or Mexican drug cartels. Despite the tough talk, Trump and his cronies are less thugs than grifters. A more apt comparison would be that the Trump Organization more closely resembles a band of larcenous gypsies.

Cohen, who has already served a prison sentence for related federal crimes including the campaign finance violations at issue in the current case, seems to be widely disliked by most of the other prosecution witnesses. He was described as surly and thuggish. David Pecker, the first witness to testify, was CEO of American Media, the parent company of The National Enquirer (the tabloid specializing in trashy gossip) matter-of-factly described the plan he hatched with Trump to suppress bad stories about him (“catch-and-kill”) while running negative stories about opposing candidates. Stormy Daniels, the adult film actor who was the recipient of the payoffs at the heart of the case, acquitted herself well on the stand. Still the seaminess of her description of a brief sexual encounter with Trump, who was married at the time, obviously angered him.

And that brings us to the fact that this case is about Trump the sociopathic narcissist, a thin-skinned man with little self-control. As attorney and writer George Conway (ex-husband of Trump campaign strategist Kellyanne Conway) wrote this week in The Atlantic:

…[W]hat the case is really about is Trump’s modus operandi—lying. He’s a matryoshka doll of mendacity. He lies, usually lies some more, and then often lies about the lies he’s previously told. .. He lies almost whenever he opens his mouth, even when truth would better serve him… [T]he alleged lies in People v. Trump strike at the core of his moral putrescence—and Trump knows it. They are lies allegedly meant to cover up a tawdry man’s tawdry behavior. The case truly embodies Donald Trump.

What is left now is for the defense to make its case. There has been speculation from the onset about whether or not Trump would testify in his defense. It is his right, of course, but his attorneys will certainly make an effort to dissuade him from doing so. It is also certain that the prosecutors will jump at the chance to question him under oath. What remains to be seen is if Trump’s ego, his belief that he can talk his way out of any situation, will prevent him from making a rational choice.

As for the rest of us, for those who feel that the Trump era has been a blight on the body politic, seeing him exposed in open court would be a righteous outcome. For his ardent supporters, it may be the event that finally allows at least some of them to see him for the weak, indecent, and little man he is.

If you would like to support my efforts here, consider becoming a paying subscriber for $5.00 per month.

If you don’t wish to become a regular subscriber, consider contributing occasionally by leaving a tip. Click below:

If you would like to submit a piece for 168, please email me at nicrosato2@gmail.com.

And please remember to click the Like button.

1. A good starting point for a discussion of mass movements is Eric Hoffer’s The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (Harper & Brothers, 1951)