Since Terrible Trump corrupts all he touches, no big surprise for decades he’s abused our relatively independent, admirable justice system. “Frivolous” understates what damage a pugnacious billionaire can do. Moneyed, sleazy lawyers like Michael Cohen propel Trumpery to crush vendors, manufacture stunts, intimidate looming threats, and flaunt his insatiable mania for attention.
Fine, I say: let the sovereign people return the favor, especially when otherwise conscious politicians stand mute and dumb. Here’s a doable, if daunting action plan for change. Two, even ten million, can play the lawsuit gambit – even impede a crooked manipulator who scorns the spirit and letter of justice. Fund collective litigation to redeem trust and reality. If Stormy Daniels can succeed, why not outraged progressives?
The best way to defeat a dim, if entrenched bully is punish him with his own medicine – yet here in the service of truth, justice, and the best American way. It’s not like Trump understands law, legal procedure or listens to his lawyers – all the more reason to target this gaping Achilles heel. He who sues indiscriminately could melt down when he confronts truckloads of litigation. Look how often he loses – item Trump University scandal – costing him a cool $25 million. Or media routs by Stormy Daniels’ tactically-brilliant attorney, Michael Avenatti.
Donald sues at the drop of a faux hair follicle, so why not together orchestrate a litany of legal actions, crowd-funded by irate Americans who’ve had more than enough? Imagine an organized ten million as a forcible, political offset against Trump’s chronic lawlessness and Constitutional violations. Okay, establishing legal standing may be an issue, but let’s support and partner with women devastated by Trump, NeverTrump candidates right and left, and legit vendors never paid by the Donald’s sneering contagions.
Think havoc to Trumpworld that 20 million wreck when pooling resources – ideally, producing our lamest, earliest lame duck ever. Think of massive self-empowerment when we go to bat against someone getting away with murder, metaphorically speaking, if not thuggery. Think that Nevada parking lot threat to Stormy Daniels happened without anyone in Trump Tower knowing? Why not try at least to neutralize the tsunami of Trumpery with a slew of judicial moving objects, with the unselfish goal of simply stopping a deviant president in his tracks?
True patriotism today = litigation
And what is the best focus of collective patriotic litigation? So many juicy choices with Trump, who knows where to begin? Crimes against democracy? Crimes that inform dirty tricks? Crimes against open, democratic electioneering? Crimes against skilled, professional Washington officials, if not Trump appointees, maligned when doing the people’s work? Even crimes against all earthlings who aren’t aggrieved, white, male, aging, Tea Party Protestants – or the addled-brained who swallow more Trump phoniness than would choke a million John Kasich Republicans.
The first arena is self-evident: obstructionism in the third degree against truth, reason, and honesty. Conspiracy using a foreign power to corrupt an election campaign (oh, the Democrats beat us to the punch). Theft and profiteering in the nth degree, using the White House to grasp uncountable dollars hand over fist (small hands or not). Of course, even Trump family billions squandered in legal defenses won’t keep the most clueless, arrogant forces (Kushner and Trump, Jr. for two) from indictment – or worse.
Here’s one target that captures Trumpery in a nut-shell: full-fledged Malice Aforethought, oozing with wads of vicious, destructive and sneering nastiness. Global harassment in the nth degree. Egregiously bad taste in everything from junk food to cabinet picks to outlandishly gilding whatever gold lame paint will stick to – obscuring the rot and corruption below.
Doing what we can to make Trump a permanent lame duck feeds his fondest, half-conscious dream: as ghastly, under-informed figurehead who hates working hard, like reading or thinking that goes deeper than gold veneers. Would not limitless litigation make him so mad, let alone keep him dancing fast, he’d turn his life into an extended golf vacation? That result is akin to what impeachment and a Senate trial would do – damp down the mean-spirited public bleats, the protean temper tantrums (changeable like diapers on the newborn), and chaotic ignorance towards an array of foreign allies and policies. Make Trump pay cash for his infamy.
Answer to vexation: The golf course
A ton of humiliating vexation is a strong tactic against a malignant narcissist, pushing escape venues while he thinks he’s still ahead (that is, not in jail or fined a billion dollars, neither beyond the realm of possibility). Litigation would be faster than House impeachment, even were the Dems to takeover, and so much quicker than a Senate trial, the slowest moving object after Yosemite’s Half Dome. Trump leashed to his golf cart would immediately make America greater. Mr. Part-time President would get all the prestige without any of the inevitable pain and immense work he apparently had no clue about. Yes, indeedy, perpetual golfing is better than driving Trump from office, deflecting the agile, slippery, equally menacing Mike Pence.
Anything that impedes Trump from committing more unspeakable, unpardonable disgraces – whether bad tweets, bad decisions, or bad appointments – saves us from Trumpery. If the 60% aghast at this failed hustler can halt a bad presidency from getting worse, if only by distraction and a bundle of legal fees, I say: Why not? If dozens of law suits distract him from making more mayhem with foreign policy or trade, about which (like DACA) he knows nothing, then, gosh, we’ll default to the besieged State Department and professional veterans who know real things. As bad as the worst Washington establishment might be on trade or diplomacy or military affairs, Trump is and will be worse. Got any better ideas to cage the disruption?
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