The Wisdom and No Wit of Merrick Garland

America's political future in the hands of man who doesn't do/know politics....

Aug 10, 2022

The obvious lede:

This little guy is dominating life right now at the LA Dodgers vs #mntwins game, love it 😂

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Despite sensible bipartisan and journalistic calls, neither the Justice Department nor Team Trump has released the documents in their possession or offered a full explanation that would illuminate why the FBI took the extraordinary step of searching the private home of a former president (and likely future presidential candidate).

Nothing I have seen or heard suggests that that status quo will change, at least not today. In other words, it doesn’t look like we will have this cleared up anytime soon.

The irony is this: At a moment of extreme partisan polarization around Monday’s action, there is pretty strong consensus around three points:

1. If DOJ/FBI authorized this step simply over a dispute about the location (or even, maybe, destruction) of government records, it was a bad legal idea and a political blunder.

2. Since even the DOJ/FBI could not be so politically tone deaf as to have acted over such a dispute, there may well be something else going on here.

3. We need unusual transparency, even in the face of a criminal probe, right this minute.

America’s two-best sourced news organizations when it comes to the DOJ and FBI tell similar essential reading narratives today, both of which, unfortunately, blow all three of those points of consensus right out of the water.

The Washington Post and New York Times have myriad and overlapping details that boil down to this: Team Trump was in long-running negotiations with the Biden administration about whether it had more documents to turn back to the Archive; in the process of those negotiations, government officials came to believe that members of Team Trump (maybe?) lied about what was still at Mar-a-Lago; then, instead of continuing the negotiations or issuing a subpoena, the FBI went in without warning; this whole thing is, in fact, simply about government documents (with some combination of highly classified and maybe destroyed materials).

So, basically, the two best-reported stories on “what happened?” run right smack into what everyone says can’t possibly be the case: that, even assuming the worst-case of Donald Trump’s behavior, this whole thing is a big political mistake for sure, and probably a legal one as well.

Defenders of the integrity and judgment of the DOJ/FBI simply cannot believe that that is the case, as embodied by this quote in Politico from David Laufman, the past head of the Justice Department’s counterintelligence section:

“For the department to pursue a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago tells me that the quantum and quality of the evidence they were reciting — in a search warrant and affidavit that an FBI agent swore to — was likely so pulverizing in its force as to eviscerate any notion that the search warrant and this investigation is politically motivated,” he said.

Mr. Laufman might be right regarding his first point (although we don’t know that yet), but he is wrong about what Red America will continue to think about the motives here. There are of equities for the AGOTUS to consider, and what citizens think about his department has to be (should be…) one of them.

Here are two Wide World of News readers’ reaction to Tuesday’s edition and world events:

Reader #1:

Mark, that was some BS the FBI and Justice Department did [Monday].
Before President Trump became president, I didn't do much in politics except vote conservative when the time came.
President Trump excited me to learn government and the players.
I am surprised that the Republican party hasn't handed out player cards to identify who's who to boost involvement. That would be nice.
Last night I donated $500 to Trump that's almost half of what I make a week, but now the fight is out of hand and to be conservative today requires sacrifice, the left has ignited [that] in me now.
That raid reminded me how much I love President Trump. Save America Make America Great Again.

#2:

Catherine Crier (a lawyer!) wrote a book almost two decades ago making the case against lawyers and quoted De Tocqueville who predicted that Americans will eventually lose their liberty to lawyers.
We’re seeing that play out in real-time. If it wasn’t Trump, someone else would’ve come along. (Note that Trump’s "lies and denigrations of institutions" came only after the FBI started their 2015 hit job on him.)
You could say that Trump sped up the process by not only exposing the rotting justice system but by encouraging it — like how someone shows off a whiskey bottle to a drunk and encourages vice in the drunk.
But the drunk IS the story, not the taunter, right? In the end, this seems about the destruction of the rule of law and politicization of judiciary and not Trump.
I prefer DeSantis but it appears the regime has just forced us to pick Trump. The principle at stake is whether the FBI/DOJ have veto power over the democratic election of a president. Some things are worth fighting for and this sure looks/smells like one to me.

It is still far, far too early to figure out where this is headed, including the implications for the 2022 and 2024 elections.

But here is what we do know:

A. This fight energizes, unifies, and galvanizes the right in ways that those with Trump Derangement Syndrome cannot see, and that will almost certainly help Republicans in the midterms.

B. This fight puts Trump front and center in the midterms, which is what the Democrats have long wanted (although whether they still want that – or should – after Joe Biden’s recent run of success are different questions).

C. While Donald Trump was already almost certain to run for another White House term and become the Republican nominee in 2024, this fight makes both things more likely – as it almost certainly does Trump’s chances of winning the general election.

The Dominant Media’s efforts to minimize Trump’s political potency notwithstanding, please nota bene these sign posts from the current news cycle:

1. Although the Washington Post fact checker doesn’t much like the “campaign-style” video Trump released yesterday, it is essential viewing and one of the most important pieces of messaging content Trump has ever released.

Watch it:

Daniel Bostic @debostic

Trump posted this on Truth Social an hour ago. 👀

Note that this isn’t about the 2020 election being stolen, or January 6, or Mike Pence. It is a critique of the Biden record and an elevation of the elements of MAGA themes that play best in the suburbs (as well as rural America). If you think Trump can’t return to the White House on this message, think again.

2. Tuesday’s Republican primary results saw Trump-backed candidates win almost everywhere.

3. This Monmouth poll:

The House January 6th Committee has tried to make the case that former President Donald Trump bears direct responsibility for what happened at the U.S. Capitol last year. The latest Monmouth (“Mon-muth”) University Poll, though, suggests it hasn’t moved the needle with the American public. In general, public opinion stands pretty much the same as it was before recent headline-grabbing testimony of former presidential aides during the last three public hearings. This is true of both Trump’s culpability in the attack on the Capitol and claims of election fraud. In fact, Trump’s favorability rating is nearly identical to where it stood immediately after the 2020 election, and 4 in 10 Americans would lean toward backing a comeback bid in 2024….
Overall, 40% of Americans have a favorable opinion Trump and 50% have an unfavorable opinion. More than 8 in 10 Republicans hold a positive view of Trump, including a majority of 57% who have a very favorable opinion of him. All these numbers are virtually unchanged from November 2020.
Four in ten Americans say they would either definitely (23%) or probably (17%) vote for Trump if he ran again in 2024. At the other end of the spectrum, 48% say they definitely would not vote for Trump and another 8% would probably not support him. Among Republicans, 62% would definitely back Trump and 23% would probably vote for him.

4. This, from Politico, seems at least slightly hyperbolic to me, but directionally it is on point:

If there was ever a lane for a Trump-y — but not Trump — Republican in the 2024 presidential primary, it now appears to be that much narrower.
“Completely handed him a lifeline,” groused one Republican strategist who advises a potential rival to Trump in 2024. “Unbelievable … It put everybody in the wagon for Trump again. It’s just taken the wind out of everybody’s sails.”
For any other Trumpian candidate, the strategist said, “It’s over.”
John Thomas, a Republican political strategist who had been organizing a PAC to support DeSantis in the event he runs in 2024, said on Tuesday, “We can hang it up.”
“It couldn’t be clearer,” he said. “If Trump wants it at this point, I don’t see how it’s not his … It’ll be a coronation at this point, not a primary.”

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Right now, it is more important/interesting to follow what the right is saying about what has happened than the left:

* Hugh Hewitt thinks a search of a former president is ok but he wants everyone to come clean asap.

* The New York Post ed board thinks this:

Unless and until Garland goes for full transparency, telling us all exactly what he’s investigating, we have to fear he’s simply taking a huge roll of the dice — hoping to find a Trump-slaying mother lode of evidence at the great risk of turning the ex-prez into a martyr and the next president.

* Holman Jenkins argues this:

Has the Justice Department learned nothing from 2016, when the FBI’s incompetent and antic meddling likely caused Hillary Clinton’s loss? To let itself be seen trolling siloviki-style once more in our presidential politics, even the most forgiving American is likely no longer to detect a Trump-era aberration but a pattern. Don’t put it past Mr. Garland’s inherited crew of bumblers to end up electing Mr. Trump a second time.

* Marc Thiessen:

[A]n agency that has shattered public trust in its fairness and objectivity has decided to conduct the first search in U.S. history of the home of a former U.S. president. If the Justice Department now tries to prosecute Trump for the same crimes for which it declined to prosecute Hillary Clinton, it will cause Republicans to rally around him. And if Democrats think he can’t win back the presidency, they should recall their shock when he won the first time.

* The New York Post has details on the search.

* The Associated Press tees up:

Former President Donald Trump will be questioned under oath Wednesday in the New York attorney general’s long-running civil investigation into his dealings as a real estate mogul, he confirmed in a post on his Truth Social account.
Trump’s testimony comes amid a flurry of legal activity surrounding him, taking place just days after FBI agents searched his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida as part of an unrelated federal probe into whether he took classified records when he left the White House.
The New York civil investigation, led by Attorney General Letitia James, involves allegations that Trump’s company, the Trump Organization, misstated the value of prized assets like golf courses and skyscrapers, misleading lenders and tax authorities.
“In New York City tonight. Seeing racist N.Y.S. Attorney General tomorrow, for a continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in U.S. history!” Trump wrote on Truth Social, invoking his oft-repeated claims about James, who is Black, and the investigation.
“My great company, and myself, are being attacked from all sides,” Trump added. “Banana Republic!”

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Here are some closing thoughts from another WWoN reader, who was at first taken aback by my writing on Tuesday that “we are not headed to civil war, we are in one”:

I'd like to believe there is some % of hyperbole in this sentence. However, I just did a dumb thing by reading some popular tweets from Team Red (borrowing WWOW parlance) regarding the FBI raid and their underlying comments from Team Blue. Then I read some trending Team Blue tweets and their underlying comments from Team Red.
Conclusion: not hyperbolic.
The never ending negative feedback loop of intellectual dishonesty and whataboutism from both sides has all the markings of a dysfunctional relationship beyond repair. I don't know what/if there's an off-ramp to this madness. But things are starting to feel... really... weird...
When FBI agents are raiding Mar-a-Lago, cracking into to safe boxes, things are starting to feel weird.
When Andrew Cuomo is kinda/sorta tweeting in Trump's defense, things are starting to feel pretty weird.
Joe Biden gets weirder every day.
Jan 6th was also very weird. Yesterday and today I've had that same feeling that we're entering unprecedented territory and it really frightens me.

The reaction in the press to the raid on Trump, including from zealots on each end, continues to frame the issues in stultifying normal terms. The “AGOTUS has gone too far” meme is for now a quite rational view, to be expected of the right. But many non-Trumpers, centrists, and lefty Democrats, share this view (assuming there isn’t evidence of documents being used to help a foreign power or for personal enrichment).

These critics of AGOTUS say cleaning up paperwork, a literal read of some press reports as the alleged reason for the FBI action, is far too light a basis to justify starting/furthering a civil war. As starting that war plays into Trump’s hand, Garland is characterized a bumbling fool, bringing on a worst outcome for the stupidest of reasons. These critics are 100% correct... if that is what Garland did.

Again: The act of a legal search of the home of the last POTUS by AGOTUS, no matter its predicate, cannot in any way be separated from declaring civil war on Republicans.

And while it is crystal clear as well, for all of the complaints about Merrick Garland generally, stupidity has not made the top ten, but political judgment has. Is it credible under any scenarios to think Garland would do a search of Trump’s home for other than existential reasons? Sadly, it might be.

Which brings me back to repeating the thesis of Tuesday’s edition:

AGOTUS has vastly overreached to disastrous ends if the purpose of the raid was to clean up some record files for the National Archives, or even to recover some top secret government documents that could have theoretically endangered national security. This sin of grave political malpractice would be clear even to the bright high school senior writing a term paper on the inside game of Willie Brown.

Some said Tuesday’s WWoN was too apocalyptic. When is the tale of the coming apocalypse not felt to be too apocalyptic? Name one apocalypse you signed up for that you thought was reasonably framed.

Humans aren’t comfortable with apocalypses. It somehow seems embarrassing to admit you feel one at hand. It is not a good look. It is not cool.

Too damn bad.

We are in one.

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