The blockheaded know not what ambush awaits when they get what they wish for
As self-appointed peer of the realm, the ever-scheming Trump deserves a jury of his peers to handle his spate of upcoming trials. Whether there’s another, let alone a dozen Trump knockoffs – that problem I leave to jury selectors. But consider this curious insistence to answer chronic Trump whining. Let’s give the intrepid goon what he demands to expose what it means to have a jury of like-minded, egotistical criminal peers.
With infinite machinations, Trump’s non-stop complaint/delay machine pommels the low-class (read: non-MAGA, darker-skinned) urban jury pool as deficient jurors. Right, so only small-town, white, older MAGA screamers need apply? Equally bizarre is DeSantis’ showboating that locals must give way to nationalized jury selection because disrupted victims can’t possibly judge criminal liability in their backyards. So much for centuries of precedents, struck down by what amounts to “jury gerrymandering.” Plus, what divinity decides who and where to move trials and find prospects? How about the moon? Why not let defendants pick their judge, too, not just the court? That stops the wheel of justice.
But what if we take the idea of peer jurors literally? Beyond scary, what if 12 Donald Trump drones could be corralled in one jury box? Since “carnage” culture produces diverse, unpredictable juries, no wonder this shameless racist, now understandably aggrieved crime boss is perturbed. Perhaps ex-bank robbers should judge indicted thieves? All guilty defendants dream of picking judges – especially when “biased,” “crazed” and “politicized” DAs persecute the best, guiltless person in the world, scapegoated with 70 indictments.
We’re talking Donald Innocent Trump. Trump as permanent “good person” is both self-evident and self-confirmed, verified by MAGA enablers who shout the truth because Trump says so, a circular fantasy trip. What better explains MAGA than the alternative reality wherein countless enemies are solely consumed with making this mastermind’s life hell? To doubt, let alone indict the cult leader proves your own guilt (forget trials), joining the nefarious world obsessed with abusing this sacrificial lamb.
Why, fumes the prince of prejudice, scorning all dutiful, elected black female prosecutors (proof positive of white victimhood), should moral, illiterate inferiors decide his moral destiny? So not only is Trump innocent as a new-born lamb (baa, baa), he’s now the most injured, perjured white guy since the Europe-bound tribe left Africa (though few ultra MAGA lackey accept this folly any more than they do evolution, safe vaccines or climate threats?). Everyone important knows white produced black, not the other way around.
What’s the payoff?
So, what would a peerless Trump peer jury, thus negating the whining, look like? First, make jurors definitively white, richer than most, self-entitled, and aggrieved so they sympathize with a populist, scapegoat plagued by reverse racism. Grievance with an edge. Being masters of lying, hustling, and willful ignorance raise their chances, for no juror otherwise appreciates Trump’s role, race and narcissism.
Above all, jurors must be eternally transactional. When asked about biases, they will insist on knowing upfront “what’s in it for them” to perform on cue. Bereft of moral or principled guidance, what other motivation decides anyone’s final votes? Really, only losers embrace the playing field of life (and ability to tilt the game) without guarantees about the risks and rewards for performance delivered.
So, while finding Trump’s jury of parallels is a stretch – billionaires don’t grow on trees – prospects should not hide regressive views (invoking bleach whatever the problem), nor white preferences (with genealogical proof of being a “real American,” per Palin). Moreover, simpatico jurors talk up paranoia, sharing inane conspiracies, say, that white supremacists face structural racism. Finally, there’s religion, messy since Trump wouldn’t know a spiritual gene unless it stole his bank balance. However, despite Trump’s allergy to Jesus’ gospel, evangelical fundamentalists who share his black and white reductionism qualify as fit jurors.
Especially welcome are Christian nationalist true believers, terrified that absent Biblical commandments America’s well on the road to perdition, if not rightwing-induced civil war. Without steadfast, fundamentalist values – on race, guns, militarism, abortion, capital punishment, church-going, education, reading, gerrymandering, political propaganda and ferociously smiting your every enemy, America disintegrates, with backwater world status for sure. The ideal peer Trump juror would repeat, “Carnage is carnage, redeemed as was southern racism by MAGA today, MAGA tomorrow and MAGA forever.”
Does “anything goes” go anywhere but bad?
Of course, however Trump tries to offset, intimidate or pay for his obvious lawbreaking, even Trump-like hustlers may be forced by overwhelming stacks of evidence to put his criminal ass in detention. In the transactional world Trumpers endorse, where selfishness is all, it’s not impossible for Donald’s enemies to corrupt the jury, like they’ve corrupted so much else. Even a lawless control freak may have over-reached. That’s the problem with a true Trump jury of his peers – if they’re just as greedy, nasty, and selfish, they may reverse expectations and stumble over truth. What, trials and life are crap shoots, not rigged games run by the owners?
In any case, even a true drone Trump jury would broadcast the very mindset that drives the Criminal-in-chief to recklessly, unintelligently keep breaking the law. Enlightenment can ooze out of the weirdest corners. We’d at least certify that it’s backward not to try criminals where crimes take place, answering to territorial human nature. I mean, real estate is real, even for real estate crooks. My modest optimism (if not alleged defense of the status quo, per deranged trolls) projects that, whatever the jury, even the testimony, just having endlessly humiliating trials cannot but interfere with the criminal’s re-election fantasies. Trials never help, even with acquittals.
On the other hand, years of appeals will complicate the finale, we should all live so long. What the Trumpist Turmoil Terror teaches is that, while the con artistry never changes, whatever deal went down yesterday or today can be wiped out by tomorrow. A transactional world is not only amoral, but keeps blasting out opportunities. The only current solution to Trumpism is perpetual court battles so that unprincipled, unmoored logic (like literal peer or nationalized juries) is bad for our health, the nation and the universe. Eventually, functional, institutional patterns endorsed over time must be acknowledged for Trump’s anything goes immorality assures democratic perdition. President Biden’s even more fortunate than the supposedly lucky Donald.
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