Tubby got fingered

Take the W, folks

I hope none of you will mind too much if we change the style of this Fun Friday from the usual esoteric prompts to something a little simpler — like talking about the pleasure to be had from Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts.

I know democracy fans are not supposed to be able to enjoy anything anymore. The good economic numbers and legislative and regulatory achievements of the Biden administration (not to mention Biden’s judicial appointments) are, we are regularly told, meaningless, as the voters allegedly either think we’re in a recession or agree with the driltweet “zero difference between good & bad things” super-geniuses that elections are mostly about vibes and Trump has to win because he is an exception to all natural laws.

Maybe. But it is something to see ordinary citizens serving as jurors examine Tubby’s crimes in an ordinary judicial proceeding and — despite all the Al Capone bullshit by him and his goons — pronounce him guilty 34 times.

Because that whole vibes thing was the only reason this was in doubt. Everyone (myself included!) has been doing the whole “ho ho let’s see him wriggle out of this” joke about his criminal cases, assuming they’d never amount to anything, because —

Wait — why exactly were we doing that? Because when you think about it, while Tubby may be somewhat insulated from consequences, when you look at the record he’s no more insulated than most rich people. That is to say, he gets away with more than you or I would because we’re not nearly as depraved or enabled as he is. But he isn’t invulnerable.

For one thing, he was handed the presidency and he fucked it up. Remember Van Jones burbling “he became President at that moment” because Trump got through his first State of the Union without shitting himself, two months in? That was about the last normal moment of his accursed term. Thereafter it was an endless shitshow of cruelty, stupidity, and mismanagement, and in 2020 the American people resoundingly rejected him.

And then he tried to stage a coup. People still remember and disapprove of that, by the way — in fact, along with abortion, it’s probably Biden’s ace in the hole.

So why do we tend to forget that Tubby is in fact vulnerable? Maybe because of the way he zombified the Republican Party, with even alleged “reasonable” “moderates” like Nikki Haley falling into line. When he summoned Speaker Johnson and all those other clucks to come to New York, don the Trump Costume, and glare into the camera as he yammered, it was disheartening, because while we’ve all seen human beings betray themselves and their humanity, it was rare to see so many allegedly serious people do it for such an obvious piece of shit.

Not to mention the prestige press absolutely giving the S.O.B. every conceivable break, always turning it around to “but Biden is old.” One might get the impression that the world was going mad.

But in New York, where we all first caught the defendant’s act, the D.A.’s office, the judge, and the jurors were not so affected. They just applied the law as if Trump were not Superman but just another guy with lawyers facing charges, given the usual opportunity to deflect them, and failing miserably.

And without all the smoke and mirrors, it turns out, he’s just another crook.

Now, as you have certainly seen, all his rightwing sycophants are crying fix and snarling revenge. They’re puffing themselves up, doing the social media version of the courthouse glare. National Review has reached a new nadir — written by Rich Lowry, author of the magazine’s previous nadir — with an article called “Yes, It Was Rigged” that simply repeats that assertion in a number of ways without attempting to explain what was so rigged about it, because Lowry knows that’s all his followers want or expect, and all he’s prepared to provide.

That they’re still willing to do this despite this massive embarrassment further challenges one’s faith in mankind, and maybe over time this too will get to us and make us feel discouraged again.

But for right now let us, as they say, enjoy the moment. Feel free to tell us in comments what your favorite part of this conviction has been. (For me it’s been this Beanie Baby, but the night is young!)