Another day for justice
Of course, today's news will be dominated by Donald Trump being booked into Fulton County Jail, his mugshot taken, and his real height and weight recorded.
When historians look back upon this period in history—and I am sure that there will be historians, and we will all look back on these times with bewilderment and gratitude that we made it out the other end stronger and better—they will marvel at how a portion of the American electorate was so frightened of the changes occurring in the country that it decided to vote for an uncultured, illiterate, narcissistic, sociopathic carnival barker because they thought he would hurt the people who hurt them.
When an in-group sees its position falter, and the out-groups begin to gain influence, it will act to preserve its privilege. We've seen this throughout human history. Either the in-group prevails by the exercise of coercive violence, or it fails and the out-groups mete upon them what they were wont to mete out in the days of their power.
But it doesn't have to be like that. Non-white Americans being at the table of bounty should not necessitate this reaction. The table is far bigger than white America thinks it is. This is the richest country the world has ever known. And its founding principles are based on equality and liberty.
Liberty doesn't mean what MAGA wants it to mean. Liberty brings with it responsibility. My liberty is contingent on everyone else's. Liberty denied is a scar across the body politic. Liberty is not license to do whatever you want to do. Liberty without a social compact is mere anarchy. What Trump's acolytes, and the modern conservative movement at large, mean by liberty is the freedom to dominate the out-groups, and suppress any protestations against their actions. Again, they want license, not liberty. Liberty, in their mouths, is a meaningless totem, shorn of its essence.
The reason Trump's poll numbers among Republican voters go up the more indictments under which he is buried is because they see his "persecution" as their own. They see someone who thinks and talks like them being held to account by a society they revile. They see their own pathological beliefs being held under the light of consequences and fear those consequences for themselves. Truly, if "they" can get Trump, then "they" can get his followers. And they're right; we need look no further than the thousands who have been sentenced to prison for their actions on January 6th. The foot soldiers were the first to go; now the generals are in the dock, and they see no hope for themselves.
I often say that these people are a dying race, and we should let them die. But their deaths are not of our doing. It is of their own choice and volition. Justice feels like oppression and existential crisis when you can't see beyond your own nose. When the world revolves around you and your own needs, any fetters on that feel like slavery. But the problem for them is that they are a dwindling minority. They haven't enough force to wrest back the country they "lost". And they know this, which feeds their desperation. They turn to auguries and haruspices to hold back the inevitable, but the gods are silent. They are yesterday's people and see no role for themselves in tomorrow.
When Donald Trump's mugshot is blasted across the world, it will be a signal day for American justice and democracy. For the first time in its history, an American prosecutor is treating someone who ascended the height of power as nothing but a common, dirtbag criminal. No special arrangements. Mugshot. Height. Weight. I, for one, will celebrate.
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