P.M. Carpenter

The real reason Alvin Bragg is delaying Trump's indictment

Is District Attorney Bragg having second thoughts?

I'm beginning to wonder if Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is having second thoughts about asking the grand jury for an indictment of Donald Trump.

To reach the felony level he must unfold in a court of law — assuming a federal judge even allows this particular prosecution — the wholly untested theory of a campaign finance violation. That Trump phonied up hush-money payments to his attorney Michael Cohen is not in question. It's right there, in his books. But that was a mere misdemeanor.

Lots — lots — of legal analysts have since questioned the felony charge aspect of the case, which gets into the realm of federal, not municipal or state, law. That might be worrying D.A. Bragg to no end. And a misdemeanor charge isn't worth the prosecutorial effort.

After all the rumors of a grand jury indictment this week, we're seeing postponements instead. And that seems ... odd. The grand jury is meeting again today, but about matters unrelated to Trump's crimes. 

I'd rather see Trump indicted and probably more easily convicted on the Justice Department's multifaceted and far more serious federal charges than see Trump indicted on hush-money payments — only to then see a judge throw the case out of court, or witness his acquittal because of a shaky legal theory.

But, Bragg may not be worried at all. And the delays in what seemed like an imminent indictment may merely be customary legal plodding.  

"So much for Ron and anti-vax," says Donald

Liz Harrington is a prominent MAGA crackpot — she is Trump's spokeswoman — and Yoshi is a nearly anonymous MAGA crackpot. But they both make clear how the MAGA monarch is going to go after Ron DeSantis on dreaded covid vaccinations.

“This is a Classic. So much for Ron and anti-vax. Besides, he got the vaccine and booster, just doesn’t talk about it. He also closed up Florida, and its beaches.” - President Donald J. Trump https://t.co/YHZ5isi9lL

— Liz Harrington (@realLizUSA) March 23, 2023

Harrington's retweeted post is Trump's reply to DeSantis having told Piers Morgan in a recent interview that his "approach to covid was different [from Trump's]. I would have fired somebody like Fauci." Never mind that DeSantis would have had no such presidential authority, as The NY Times had to point out.

(Would it be too much to ask that for once, just for a change, from George W to Donald to DeSantis, that the GOP have presidential candidates who know what in hell they're talking about?)

Late last year, Trump learned from one crowd's boos at his mention of having heroically gotten a covid booster shot that this is a topic he'd best leave off in the future. Better to let them drop like fumigated fruit flies than promote public health.

But he's still stuck — as he used to tell it — with also having heroically, single-handedly formulated the covid vaccine. So what to do? Thanks to a nobody MAGAite, he stumbled on the above, really juicy DeSantis clip. And so up on social media it went.

Get used to it, Ron. Cheap shots are Donald's specialty. Before long he'll have you apologizing for having saved thousands of Floridians' lives, before, that is, you started killing them.   

Republicans "across the spectrum," on the primaries: "Trump wins"

Tina Nguyen, writing for Puck (solidly paywalled), on Trump's nine, 10, or perhaps limitless lives:

"Last August, as F.B.I. agents hauled boxes of classified documents out of Mar-a-Lago, I surveyed a few Republican and MAGA operatives about how this latest legal woe might impact Donald Trump’s political
future. For a brief moment, the former president’s opponents entertained the notion that surely this would be the scandal that broke his hold over the Republican Party. Wasn’t Trump actively endangering national security by leaving sensitive nuclear secrets in his desk? 

"But Trump’s allies were almost giddy about the optics, correctly recognizing the F.B.I. raid as an opportunity to galvanize the base, raise more money, and temporarily paralyze the 2024 field. 'Nobody is worried,' one G.O.P. insider told me at the time, relaying the sentiment around Mar-a-Lago. And worry they did not."

Nguyen's point is that Team Trump's insouciance was seemingly justified. Next came Republicans' disastrous midterms, for which the Orange Blight was almost single-handedly responsible. Then came Gov. Ron DeSantis's huge splash as a morbid, populist favorite of anti-wokeness. And yet eight months after the F.B.I. raid and nearly five months subsequent to Trump's carpet-bombing of congressional Republicans, he "has only gained strength in G.O.P. polls," writes Nguyen.

She continues:

"I asked a number of Republicans close to the top candidates to predict how an indictment would affect Trump’s campaign, and whether it would boost his standing in the GOP presidential primary. The overwhelming consensus was succinctly captured by Alex Bruesewitz, CEO of the MAGA-focused consulting firm X Strategies: 'Trump wins.'

"This assessment doesn’t come only from MAGA-blinded Trump allies, either: Republicans across the spectrum, from DeSantis fans to Never Trumpers, echoed Bruesewitz’s conclusion." 

I remain unconvinced. No political commentator worth his or her cyberspace ever goes without saying, in such a situation, that a day in politics can be an eternity. What, then, is almost a year until the primaries?

DeSantis has just barely stepped onto the national stage, and he's still an undeclared candidate. Big GOP money has expressed a preference for him, and he's undergoing austere tutorials in the polishing of his retail skills.

There is a long, long way to go until primary days. And on every one of them, Trump's felonious behavior, criminal indictments and fatuous legal wranglings will hog the headlines. His base may indeed be initially enthralled by his "persecution" and thus more motivated to back him.

But all the above-the-fold poundings will take their toll, I should think. The novelty of supporting a neon-blinking criminal for the presidency — in terms of electability — could soon have thumbs egressing from the base's ass.    

I hope not. I hope they double down in their primary support of Trump. For I also hope that the Orange Blight is the 2024 face of the Republican Party.

Trump is a joke, but DeSantis scares me.   

In Ukraine, FOR Ukraine, the West has 'the slows' - as the new Triple Axis bears down

"If weapons aren’t delivered fast enough, it makes it extremely difficult for Ukraine to push back against Russian gains," says Rachel Rizzo of the Atlantic Council, who adds that it's "clear" that "time is on Russia’s side." It has what Ukraine lacks: the manpower and war matériel to "grind out a long war along a massive front." Estonian diplomat Kaimo Kuusk says the West should have provided more munitions "[the] day before yesterday."

Those are but two assessments offered to The Washington Post, which tersely recaps the dread: "There are palpable concerns that the West dithered too long." In response to "alarm over recent incremental Russian advances" — plus Moscow's increased military aid from Iran and fresh financing from China — the United States and its European allies are working to elevate their support for Kyiv.  

But Ukrainian officials and Western analysts are saying "the help is simply taking too long." The aid should have arrived "yesterday," since Ukraine's counteroffensive begins tomorrow. Separately, in the east, Russian forces have ramped up their human-wave attacks on the city of Avdiivka, which the Ukrainians say is becoming another Bakhmut. In both the counteroffensive and the Donbas, this war hangs in the balance.

Meanwhile, the West's promised military assistance is dragging. America's Abrams tanks will arrive sometime in the fall, months after Ukraine's spring offensive. Germany's shipment of perhaps 70 Leopard tanks is being delayed by checkups and repairs, since these particular tanks are decades old. Poland and Slovakia will provide Soviet-made fighter jets — says a European diplomat: This proves that such planes are "not a taboo, and will not lead to a World War III" — hoping that other nations would join them, but none so far. 

And so Ukraine is still fighting with what the Post calls a "hodgepodge" of Soviet-era munitions, most of them captured from Russian forces. And stunningly, some analysts in the West are still defending its slow, piecemeal provisionings. It's true, they concede, that as a result Ukraine has taken a nearly unbearable beating in casualties and structural damage. But hey, they "did as much as [they] could while successfully avoiding direct conflict with Russia." 

That argument bears little scrutiny. Take, for instance, the protracted, tortured debate over whether the U.S. should supply F-16 fighters. Ukraine has said it needs them for long-range strikes on Russian ammunition depots and logistics posts. Because in response to the U.S.'s long-range HIMARS — the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System — the Russians have simply moved their depots and bases beyond the system's 50-mile range.

F-16 fighter jets would mean an "increase in range," which would "automatically move the front line, and the enemy’s capabilities will radically diminish," says Ukraine's ground forces commander. As we know, the U.S. has refused the jets because, see above: "avoiding direct conflict with Russia." But U.S. HIMARS increased Ukraine's long-range strike capabilities and therefore posed direct conflict with the Russians. Which, of course, didn't happen, because the Russian dictator is not that crazy. So, except in effective range, what's the difference between F-16s and HIMARS?

Against that argument, the Pentagon adds another. Its policy chief says, in the Post's words, that the "manufacture and delivery of new planes would take many years and even shipment of existing aircraft would take at least 18 months, as would training of Ukrainian personnel." All along, this has been the Johnny-come-lately argument. It ignores that had the West, alternatively, been Johnny-on-the-spot months ago, when Kyiv began asking, Ukraine would now just about be ready to take possession, fully trained.  

Ukrainian authorities, the Post article, this post and David Ignatius's recent column have for months been asking the question: Are Ukraine's sovereignty, freedom and democracy of true, unequaled importance to the West? As they should be? My answer, yesterday, was that "We have pretty much nickeled-and-dimed Ukraine, with a little here and then a little more there. Every progression made in the firepower we've offered has been agonizingly ponderous." 

The justifying reason has been that old, familiar, and biggest of bugbears: Vladimir Putin might get mad. And Vlad has nukes. His use of them we cannot risk, even though there is no risk that he'd use them. Hence ours is a strange, convoluted, rather circular self-justification for limited intervention in Ukraine, which in the world of realpolitik, means the West's intervention in saving itself against the now-united, authoritarian powers of Russia and China — and Iran, which makes it a triple axis.     

Ring any bells? It will if you're up on your 20th-century history of Germany, Italy and Japan's authoritarianism, the original, fascistic Triple Axis. Neither were they content with the world order and Western civilization's freedom and democracy. They aggressed against all three, and Russia's fascism has merely picked up where they left off.       

I'll ask the inflation/employmemt question once again

They went and did it. Jerome Powell went and did it. He raised the Fed's rate again. 

The Times: "Federal Reserve officials raised interest rates by a quarter-point on Wednesday as officials tried to balance two conflicting problems: the risk that inflation could remain rapid, and the threat that higher borrowing costs could fuel turmoil in the banking system.

"The Fed's release, which pushed interest rates to a range of 4.75 percent to 5 percent" - with another increase on its way  -  "was one of the most closely watched in years as conflicting forces left investors and economists guessing at what central bankers would do."

Who was guessing? Powell seems to believe his sole responsibility as Fed chair is wrestling inflation to a floor of 2%, never mind his complementary responsibility of full employment. As Sen. Elizabeth Warren has noted, Powell expects to throw two million Americans out of work so as to hit his inflation target.

I have asked this before. I think it's a fair question. Would you prefer to face 5.4% inflation with a job, or 2-3% inflation without a job? I know which I'd choose.

Xi and Putin's "darker world." Is the West seeing it?

From The Washington Post's David Ignatius: 

Pentagon strategists have always divided the world into East and West, with U.S. regional forces under European Command or Indo-Pacific Command. But looking at the embrace of Presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin this week, you wonder whether we may need a single "Eurasian Command" to handle an integrated threat....

If you were looking for another reason why it’s important that Ukraine succeeds against Russia, consider the photos from Moscow. "The President of Eurasia" — I fear that’s the invisible caption of the pictures of Xi that we’re seeing amid the Kremlin’s golden doors and red carpets. The idea that a vast swath of the world is dominated by a China that stands so resolutely against freedom and democracy is chilling. If this alliance succeeds, we will live in a darker world....

Xi is [Putin's] only powerful friend. Dealing with them separately is bad enough. If they truly become partners in Eurasia, sharing dominion under a Chinese banner, that would be worse.

I've not too much to add, since the essence of what Ignatius writes I have also observed in numerous posts; thoughts on a "darker world," whether one characterizes the mushrooming conflict as one of East vs. West or the U.S. confronting a double-barreled, Orwell-like "Eurasia."

I will however add to Ignatius's remark, "why it’s important that Ukraine succeeds against Russia." Is the West acting as though it's truly important? Eminently important? 

We have pretty much nickeled-and-dimed Ukraine, with a little here and then a little more there. Every progression made in the firepower we've offered has been agonizingly ponderous. By now, in a just world, Ukraine would be weighted down by Western tanks, perfectly domed by Western antiballistic missiles, its skies full of Western fighter jets.

And yet ...

Furthermore, the West should signal to Putin that Ukraine will not fail in its upcoming counteroffensives, whatever it takes. Period. Let Vladimir fret and stew as to what that means. NATO flights? U.S. and allied ground troops?

Make Putin sweat out the possibilities of his escalated war for a change, rather than the West always trying to second-guess what he's thinking. 

While we're at it, we would also make President Xi realize just how far the West is genuinely willing to go in defense of freedom and democracy. Are we, in fact, willing to go all the way? To do whatever it takes to defend Ukraine? To ensure its unmitigated victory?

Because that is where the borders of our "darker world" begin. And it's there they should end — indeed, must end; not in Taiwan and the Baltics. 

Here we go: A Trump defender describes a straightforward arrest as a "Third World-country tactic"

Now here's an item that probably did not require reporting:

"According to a Trumpworld operative and a source close to Trump, the former president definitely doesn’t want to be placed in handcuffs. 'Being in handcuffs isn’t something Trump would want to do,' the Trump operative said," reports the Daily Beast. 

Perhaps someday we'll also read this edifying report: "Being raped in prison isn't something Trump would want to happen."

***

Jackson Lahmeyer, of "Pastors for Trump," is nevertheless rooting for the former president's nastiest possible arrest, and at Mar-a-Lago — where the FBI would have to go to get him — rather than Trump surrendering himself in New York; for that would "help from a political standpoint, absolutely," he tells the Beast.  

But Lahmeyer has a rather peculiar way of looking at what for anyone else in the United States would be standard operating procedure. "If they come and they do basic Third World-country tactics, if they do that—and that video footage becomes something that circulates—it totally backfires."

By "Third World-country tactics," Laymeyer essentially means a simple arrest. What pious Trumper thumpers and the entire right-wing noise machine are literally praying for is nothing more than an everyday pinch, preferably at Mar-a-Lago, which they can cynically distort into a tactic of Bidenesque despotism and the Justice Department's "weaponization."

According to the Times, both Trump and law enforcement intend to disappoint "Pastor" Lahmeyer. The scofflaw is likely to surrender himself in New York, and:

"There is no indication, even if Mr. Trump is charged, that the authorities would have him take part in that storied New York City law-enforcement tradition known by detectives and crime reporters alike — walking the newly arrested past a cluster of journalists. If Mr. Trump is indicted and surrenders voluntarily, arrangements are likely to be made between the Secret Service and law enforcement to avoid a media circus."

No sensational video, no Third World arrest, not even an entrance through the courthouse's front door. As Trump suffers in silence, the Trumpers will be emotionally crushed.  

DeSantis's "explosive interview" with Piers Morgan

I confess. This post's title is clickbait.

But I plead for mercy before the court of public probity. The title is merely, ironically phrased after the fashion of Piers Morgan's New York Post column, titillatingly titled "Ron DeSantis rips Trump's character, chaotic leadership style."

Morgan goes on to write that in an "explosive interview," the governor "take[s] the gloves off" in a "blistering attack" on Trump. 

That's all very nice, and it would all be very true, too, if the interview had indeed been "explosive," had DeSantis "taken the gloves off," had he "ripped" Trump, and had he "launched a blistering attack."

But between temporal reality and Morgan's sensationalism there sits a bottomless chasm wider than the Pacific Ocean. And so the interview will not, in fact, "ignite a firestorm in the Republican Party."   

Nevertheless, Morgan soldiers on, predicting that "Trump’s mood is likely to deteriorate further when he hears what DeSantis now says about him." Alas, DeSantis "has had enough of Trump’s constant baiting," insists Piers. The Donald, though, is more likely to laugh while asking, "Is that all ya got?"  

For Gov. DeSantis was as gentle as a sick kitten.

About his manner of "leadership," he said "I get personnel in the government who have the agenda of the people and share our agenda. You bring your own agenda in you’re gone. We’re just not gonna have that. So, the way we run the government I think is no daily drama, focus on the big picture and put points on the board and I think that’s something that’s very important."

This, Morgan describes as DeSantis having "slammed Trump."  

Asked for examples of "specific differences between him and Trump," the governor said "I think there’s a few things. The approach to COVID was different. I would have fired somebody like Fauci. I think he got way too big for his britches, and I think he did a lot of damage."

There we have an implicit criticism of Trump. But a "blistering attack"? Even Trump wouldn't defend the good doctor these days, and of course the entire, crackpotted party agrees that Fauci is Satan himself. (Note: "In reality," Trump had no "direct control" over Fauci. [NYT].) 

The point being, that was as close to an actual, by-name criticism of Trump as DeSantis came. Not that Morgan failed in trying to rile him.

What, for instance, about that "rude nickname" — Sanctimonious — he asked. The governor said I kinda like it, adding that "we’ll go with that, that’s fine. I mean you can call me whatever you want, just as long as you also call me a winner because that’s what we’ve been able to do in Florida." 

DeSantis then repeated his stump banality: "It’s not important for me to be fighting with people on social media. It’s not accomplishing anything for the people I represent. So, we really just focus on knocking out victories, day after day, and if I got involved in all the under tow I would not be able to be an effective Governor. So, I don’t think it’s something that makes sense for me." 

In other words, DeSantis just told Morgan precisely the opposite of everything Morgan just described, from a "ripping" headline to a party "firestorm" to an attack on Trump's "sleazy behavior."

At least for now, the Florida governor is choosing to leave the drama to Donald — but neither is that the style of the NY Post or Piers Morgan. 

The larger point, or rather question, revolves around the duration of DeSantis's tame approach. That will most likely be determined not by the governor per se, but by polling. If his numbers are looking bad as he nears the Iowa and New Hampshire contests, well, so much for gentility — and Piers Morgan will finally get the interview he just described.

China moves closer to Russia - and its support of Putin's war

The Wall Street Journal reports on the disquieting, and tightening, kinship between the two authoritarian powers:

"China and Russia are expected Tuesday to sign a joint declaration on economic cooperation worth tens of billions of dollars, deepening trade in energy, agriculture and other fields. Trade between the two countries rose to $189 billion last year. Mr. Putin said before the visit he believes it will exceed $200 billion as early as this year....

"Putin will host a state dinner for Mr. Xi in the evening. The heads of the largest Russian companies have been invited to attend the dinner."

Attending a recently indicted war criminal's state dinner and signing a pact of greater economic "cooperation" with a militaristic aggressor are the acts of a national leader as roguishly outside the global circles of civilized behavior as Vladimir Putin himself.

Xi already has propped up Russia's mass-murdering war machine in Ukraine by buying its oil and natural gas, which has lightened the otherwise ruinously oppressive weight of Western sanctions. It appears such purchases will only increase in quantity, and thus further underwrite Putin's lethal designs.

In addition, reports the Journal, an aide to the Russian dictator said "discussions between Messrs. Putin and Xi will focus on ... military-technical cooperation." And so Western intelligence must now focus with even more intensity on the exact meaning of that cooperation. Much-needed artillery shells?

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said this about the Chinese leader's visit to Moscow: "That President Xi is traveling to Russia days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for President Putin suggests that China feels no responsibility to hold the Kremlin accountable for the atrocities committed in Ukraine.... It would rather provide diplomatic cover for Russia to continue to commit those very crimes."

Note that Blinken confined his remark to China's diplomacy; no further word — not yet, anyway — about military assistance from Beijing to Moscow to the immediate ground zeroes of Kherson and Kharkiv. No civilized leader would indulge Putin along those lines. But then again, no civilized leader would dine with the bloody tyrant and buy his goddamn oil.  

Trump's call to protest, Marxists everywhere, and other right-wing weirdness

The key to populist RepublicanSpeak these days is to utter, in rapid succession, "radical leftist," or "socialist," or "Marxist." Or, if you're feeling really feisty, to throw them all together: So-and-so is a radical leftist socialist Marxist.

Never mind that the terminology is immeasurably tautological. The point is to hypnotically bamboozle the rabble and transform their eyes into dazzled pinwheels. Repeat ... after ... me: "All our opponents are radical leftist socialist Marxists." Then repeat again. And again.

It's an all-purpose mantra for any occasion. For instance, soon after dialing into an online prayer coven staged by "Pastors for Trump" yesterday, the supplicant's call was interrupted by some sort of technical malfunction. But not according to the Donald. Once reconnected, he (according to Insider) seriously ventured: "I think what happened was that the radical left was working on the phone. There is no question about it." 

Most commonly these days the term, in part or in whole, is used by Republican hacks in targeting the "federal weaponization" of American justice against Trump. If the target happens to lie outside the federal arena, no problem. Just throw him into it, as Rep. Elise Stefanik did yesterday when she complained on Fox News that "radical leftist socialist" Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is a member of the anti-Trump, federal conspiracy. That Bragg is a city prosecutor was, to Stefanik, immaterial.    

This week, the cardinal bugaboo among Republicans and Trumpers is, as you know, Trump's pending indictment by said district attorney. Secondary to the legal question is whether all good Trumpeteers should unite and descend with malice aforethought on the Marxist D.A.'s office building. Opinions vary.

Some, such as the president of the New York Young Republican Club, are saying that declining to "protest" — as Trump has euphemized his incitement to riot — is "a strange, cowardly and impotent position to take." It's also (in case you missed his point) "ridiculous and pathetic and nihilistic," said the club's prez, who was speaking about "peacefully protest[ing]" — which would gravely disappoint Trump.

Others, such as insurrectionist Jeffrey Clark, whom Trump almost appointed acting attorney general in the final epoch of the Dark Ages, are saying "Better to stay home." Conspiratorially minded till the last cur dies, Clark's monitory theory is that radical leftist socialists could infiltrate the virtuous Trump mob, or, as Clark put it, "rootless Antifa agitators [might] advance their Marxist agenda with violence and intimidation." 

There was, however, at least one rather charming reaction to the clamorous tumult of a Trump indictment, and it came, of all people, from Gov. Ron DeSantis. "I don’t know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair," he said to reported "chuckles" from a crowd at a Panama City, Fla. event. "I can’t speak to that" — which of course he just did, while holding a bloody knife.  

Naturally, irresistible to Trump was the unwise course of reacting to DeSantis's reaction. In a Truth Social post, he hinted at the governor's, shall we say, "alternative" sexuality: "Ron DeSanctimonious will probably find out about FALSE ACCUSATIONS & FAKE STORIES sometime in the future, as he gets older, wiser, and better known, when he’s unfairly and illegally attacked by a woman, even classmates that are 'underage' (or possibly a man!)."

But that, by comparison, is somewhat weak tea in the besmirching lexicon of RepublicanSpeak. We'll know that Trump is really on the warpath when he starts calling DeSantis a radical leftist socialist Marxist. 

Marjorie Taylor Greene and Kevin McCarthy - a kind of reverse, #MeToo power relationship

Yesterday I noted that cerebrum horribilis Marjorie Taylor Greene is "quoted by the national press as much as the Speaker of the House; this is the depth to which the Republican Party has sunk." Indeed, she may get quoted even more often than Kevin McCarthy — not that that, in itself, would be a comparative loss to political rhetoric. But that such a wackadoodle harpy could now be the voice and literal face in what only a generation ago was still the Party of Lincoln, T.R. and Eisenhower is simply, breathtakingly, grotesquely astounding. Kevin the Speaker is but the lapdog of Marge the Bitch. And so Mr. Borowitz's satiric humor, once again, is frightfully close to reality. 

Two dictators meet, united against Western civilization - and against civilized behavior

China's dictatorial "President" Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow today to meet with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, the 40th meeting since Xi became China's leader 11 years ago and the first meeting since Putin invaded Ukraine last year. "I am very glad at the invitation of President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin," — an indicted war criminal — said Xi, according to Russia’s Tass news agency.

Putin wrote a typically long-winded, buddy article for China's People's Daily — like Russia's Tass, a state-run news outlet — which begins, or rather should have begun, "I am glad to seize this opportunity to address the friendly Chinese people in one of the largest and most authoritative authoritarian world media." Continued Vlad: "We welcome China’s readiness to make a meaningful contribution to the settlement of the [Ukraine] crisis," which China could do only by ceasing its Russian oil purchses, which are filling Vlad's warchest.   

Xi reciprocated by publishing a similarly schmoozy article in a Russian newspaper, saying China is seeking "to promote reconciliation" and "play a constructive role in promoting talks" between the vicious aggressor and its innocent neighbor. Observes The NY Times:

But American and European officials are watching for something else altogether — whether Mr. Xi will add fuel to the full-scale war....

U.S. officials say China is still considering giving weapons — mainly artillery shells — to Russia for use in Ukraine. And even a call by Mr. Xi for a cease-fire would amount to an effort to strengthen Mr. Putin’s battlefield position, they say, by leaving Russia in control of more territory than when the invasion began.

A cease-fire now would be "effectively the ratification of Russian conquest," John Kirby, a White House spokesman, said on Friday. "It would in effect recognize Russia’s gains and its attempt to conquer its neighbor’s territory by force, allowing Russian troops to continue to occupy sovereign Ukrainian territory."

"It would be a classic part of the China playbook," he added, for Chinese officials to come out of the meeting claiming "we’re the ones calling for an end to the fighting and nobody else is."

The West is right to be extraordinarily wary. China has so far played nothing but a destructive role with respect to what Putin calls the "crisis." (Like one of Trump's, it's of his own making.) Echoing Moscow, Beijing has repeatedly denounced NATO, but not once Putin's blatantly illegal invasion of Ukraine. China also blathered in a 12-point "peace plan" about all nations needing to "respect the sovereignty" of others, and yet it has helped to block more than one international statement condeming Russia's warring disrepect of sovereignty.

Because of its refusal to join civilized nations in denouncing Russia's actions, NATO's Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg summarized the situation quite plainly: "China doesn’t have much credibility." 

And it will have even less — as in, none — should it begin shipping artillery shells and God knws what else to Russia, assisting Putin in his manic obsession with murdering unoffending Ukrainians.

This is more than a war to conquer a neighbor. It's a long-term, East-West conflict in which civilized nations will struggle to survive against united, authoritarian brutality. 

Is the hush-money case a political "gift" to Trump?

Meijer is a former U.S. representative from Michigan — former, because he voted to impeach Trump in the second go-around, a Republican crime far worse than foreign extortion or sedition. And he could be right. 

This indictment is a billion dollar gift-in-kind from Democrats to Trump’s ‘24 campaign.

— Peter Meijer (@RepMeijer) March 18, 2023

Note, however, that "this indictment" is a minor one compared to three others — one state, two federal. By itself, a hush-money trial is unlikely to stir much anti-Trump passion. If it incenses and motivates anyone, it's more likely to do so among the Trumpers. About that, Meijer is probably correct.  

But then consider the cumulative effect on the electoral mind of up to three more, and separate, indictments.

One: Trump is looking at a Georgia state trial for having criminally interfered with a presidential election — which he did on tape. It's nearly impossible to conceive how any jury would acquit in such a flagrant offense.

Two: Trump is looking at a federal trial involving a conspicuous cluster of criminal activity, from the mishandling and destroying of classified documents to obstructing justice to violating the Espionage Act.   

Three: Trump is looking at a federal trial of his heavily witnessed, 2020 and 2021 insurrectionist crimes, from "aiding and comforting" a violent mob at the Capitol Building to obstructing a congressional proceeding to conspiring to make false statements to a government agency to conspiring to defraud the United States.

The whole, here, being greater than the sum of its parts. And that, in the electoral mind, would likely weaken what I assume is Meijer's more general point. The ludicrous, Trump-peddled fabrication that four criminal indictments, from state to federal, were all "politically motivated" by radical Marxist prosecutors would have even Steve Bannon rolling his eyes.   

"It's my party and I'll riot if I want to"

You can hear the unease with Trump from Orlando, where House Republicans are on a glitzy "retreat" from the exhausting labors of ... whatever it is they do when in Washington.     

The ink on the former president and future felon's incitement-to-riot posts had not yet dried when Kevin McCarthy stood athwart impending history, yelling Stop. "I don’t think people should protest this stuff," burbled the slithery Speaker at a press conference. But who can blame him? When the criminal defendant is your guy, "this stuff" is much more preferable to "this indictment."     

McCarthy went on to put words in Trump's big mouth. What the insufferable scofflaw had actually posted was a call for crackpots and conspiracy theorists to "educate people about what’s going on," clarified the Speaker. Trump was not "talking in a harmful way." No no no. "Nobody should harm one another," continued McCarthy in characteristically writhing syntax. "If was this [sic] to happen. we want calmness out there." If what was to happen? Anyway, please, no "violence or harm," he urged. Credit due.  

I'm rather skeptical, however, that Trump was tossing credit slips McCarthy's way. Nor could he have been pleased with Reps. Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene, who both dismissed the Trumpian need for violence and harm. "I don’t need to protest," said the cerebral cipher from Georgia (who now gets quoted by the national press as much as the Speaker of the House; this is the depth to which the Republican Party has sunk). Marge instead intends, through the vote, to "end this extreme corruption in America." (The Hill) 

But no other absurdity could top McCarthy's notation that Jim Jordan, the always levelheaded chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, is expected to investigate any federal funding of Trump's "politically motivated prosecutions," because, said Kevin, "the last thing we want to have is somebody putting their thumb on the scale simply because they don’t agree with somebody else’s political view."

Meanwhile, Trump's Saturday screeds about a Tuesday arrest are, of course, unraveling. In a slight indictment delay, the Manhattan grand jury may hear today from a former lawyer of Michael Cohen, the prosecution's chief witness in the Donald's seemy hush-money scheme, which acted as an illegal, 2016 campaign contribution. The lawyer, at Camp Trump's request, means to discredit Cohen's testimony and character. At any rate, as The NY Times reports, "a Tuesday surrender was unlikely, given the need to arrange timing, travel and other logistics."

Incidentally, the location of Trump's next bund rally carries as much villainous meaning as Ronald Reagan's 1980 "states'-rights" speech in Philadelphia, Mississippi, where three civil-rights workers were murdered in 1964. Thirty years ago, almost to the day, four federal agents and six gun-loving extremists died in Waco, Texas — where Trump, it just so happens, will soon be speaking.