When a judge won't stick to the rules that were highly publicized and which actually had Donald Trump scrambling, probably for the first time in his whole, corrupt life, ever, it's a clear indication that justice will never be served in the United States. Is that too cynical? Sorry. It's the way I see things right now.
People like Trump always get advantages, always beat the rules, always. It's a fixed system. I call it two Americas. There's ordinary America, the one in which we live, the majority of the population that works for a living, doesn't have the luxury of living without being in debt, and either follows the rule of law, or faces the consequences immediately. We have no influence, no power to direct actions on our own behalf, and suffer the consequences if we step out of line. Our possessions are repossessed when we don't pay our bills, if the bank raises interest rates on our loans, we pay, and a whopping percentage of Americans suffer having their credit rating under the control of an unknown, faceless entity which exercises full control over their financial life. We are powerless to change it, even if a mistake is made. Too bad.
Ironically, most Trump supporters live in ordinary America, which is one of the reasons why they have idolized Trump, turning him into a character that doesn't exist, and don't seem to mind when he gets away with breaking the law and cheating the rules. They only wish they could do the same, and since he does, and gets away with it, they live vicariously through him. Hillary Clinton referred to most of them as "deplorables," and many of them really do fit that description. After watching them spew their blithering ignorance of politics, the world, history and just about everything else in interviews on social media, prior to entering one of his rallies, or voting for him in a primary or general election, I prefer the term "pathetic."
A lot of us also fall in the same category, however, because we demonstrate implicit trust in a system over which we have almost no control, but which we keep insisting we can change. We find political candidates who tell us they'll make a difference, We watch, in frustration, and get angry with our fellow ordinary Americans who have given up, and who are difficult, if not impossible, to convince that they need to do what we do, register, and go vote, because they have done it, and they have seen nothing change.
I must admit, after seeing the disastrous, anti-patriotic, anti-democratic, anti-American attack on the Capitol, after four years of what was the worst Presidency in American history, provable by more than just the opinions of the eighty million Americans who voted the idiot out of office, I thought that justice would prevail, protect us from the imminent danger of an overthrow, and restore what has been undermined and destroyed since Rush Limbaugh started encouraging his audience to destroy America and make it over in his fascist dreams.
What was I thinking?
The ordinary Americans who participated in that insurrection and rebellion against American values and democratic government are, indeed, paying for their crimes. At least, some of them are. The system is not large enough to catch, and prosecute, them all. So much for the rule of law. But the fact of the matter is that there were perpetrators who were caught, including those who were in on the planning and conducting of the insurrection. Most of them are ordinary Americans, so they have been through a trial, sentenced and are now in prison. But the man who incited them, who sent the emails inviting them to Washington, who encouraged, supported and helped plan the whole thing, and then sent them marching down to the Capitol, he lives in the other America, and even though it has been more than three years, he has barely been indicted, and is using his influence to delay his trial, while running for President again, for the purpose of using those powers to get himself off for the crimes he committed.
By now, if America worked the same for everybody, Trump, the organizer and traitorous perpetrator of the insurrection, should also be in prison, permanently disqualified from ever running for public office, stripped of all of his wealth necessary to pay for the damage he caused, and preparing to transition from prison into hell, where he belongs. But unfortunately, many of those who I believed shared the same vision and trust in America that they had, have been his benefactors, backing away from any meaningful application of the rule of law in his case, granting the delays, obfuscating, dawdling, and doing everything they can to make sure the system doesn't bring justice.
Something is wrong when we are able to know everything there is to know about the complete and utter bribery of one of our Supreme Court justices, and the reaction is simply some tongue-clicking, head shaking and doing absolutely zero about it. The justice system faced by the wealthy and powerful in this country is in a different America than the one the rest of us must face. We can talk about the values of our nation, written in the Declaration of Independence and subsequently into the Constitution by our founding fathers, but the only value in America, for those who have plenty of it, is money. On that side of this national divide, power is purchased and justice can be bought. There are no democratic values, and there is no democracy. Everyone who has it is equal, and the rest of us don't matter.
We've been ideologically and politically hijacked. The fact that a criminal can go without consequences, and can, in fact, be considered the presumptive nominee of one of our major political parties is a sign of just how hijacked America actually is, and it's because money is the currency that determines the values of the nation. In the places where political power exists, it runs things. It has created two Americas, and what happened in that New York courtroom today is an egregious example of exactly what the other America looks like.
Now we're left with the increasingly more difficult task of convincing ourselves that when we go cast our ballots in November, it will make a difference. Between now and then, will we see more egregious examples of a justice system that is powerless in the face of wealth and power, as we watch court cases against Trump fall by the wayside, or get delayed into the next century as those behind the scenes move heaven and earth to stop justice from happening to him or will someone, somewhere, actually have the courage and fortitude, and the love and respect for this country, its values and we, its people, to stand up, do the right thing, and send this antichrist fascist to prison where he belongs?
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