| None of those charges are related to what was widely reported that Russia helped Trump win the election. It was also admitted that the entire investigation was inconclusive at best, and the fact remains that it would have been an historic corruption scandal that could have removed Trump from office. They tried extremely hard and the best they could do was find some minor charges on Trump's team. There is a clear double standard, in my opinion. Let's not forget the Steele dossier that as far as I know was full of lies, yet that is not investigated and the media just forgets about it after using it to play dirty politics and smear not just Trump but everyone who is around him or supports him. > Do you disagree that Trump pressured the Georgia elections people to find him votes? On a phone call? Yeah he did, but the context is that Trump thinks there was election fraud, and millions of people also had the same concerns. Even if there was misinformation on all of this, it's still within the realm of possibility that Trump believed it and was delusional about it. Being delusional and aggressive about it is completely different than intentionally stealing an election.
As I mentioned before, this could have been enough for people to move on from Trump, but it seemed as if the government establishment was fully committed to going after Trump for everything and anything and has turned him into a martyr. > Do you disagree that his campaign -- headed by him, reporting to him, with him aware of it -- created fake slates of electors to try to steal electoral college votes? Because that seems pretty obviously to have happened. They were alternate slates, and this has happened before in 1960 (Nixon) and 2020. There is precedent for what Trump was trying to do, and pursuing every legal path aggressively is still completely different than trying to end democracy. In the worst case scenario, it would have been like Bush/Gore in 2020 and he would have served another 4 years. There is no chance at all of becoming dictator or changing the system. The US system with the constitution and division of power cannot be easily subverted! > Do you disagree that Trump knew the January 6th protests would lead to people marching on the Capitol? Do you think it plausible he didn't know and wasn't advised what would happen? He had no business organising that march otherwise -- there was nothing that could happen on January 6th to change the outcome that wasn't against the constitution. It was clearly meant to be a protest to show support and then it devolved into a large riot. Here is what does not make sense: that Trump planned a half-assed insurrection just to have plausible deniability. That does not make sense, either you go in planning a full insurrection with a militia and/or the backing of the military, or you don't. I think Trump is ruthless businessman that often thinks and behaves like a CEO, which is completely different than career politicians. What is really happening is that the system does not want an outsider as a leader, they want another career politician that will be predictable and controllable. I think the biggest difference in perspective here has to do with trust in the existing institutions. People who give Trump the benefit of the doubt are seeing institutions that are corrupt and will do anything to remain in power. I think this a justified perspective given all of the things that the US government has been involved with over the years from unjustified wars, lying to the American people (i.e. Iraq), and surveilling and manipulating American citizens (i.e. NSA). There is overwhelming evidence that we have a corrupt system that is fighting as hard as it can against this one individual that is representing millions of people. What is more unbelievable to me is that Trump somehow convinced millions of people to support completely different issues than what they really care about. Trump is adopting the issues people care about and people are finally feeling that they have some kind of representation, and the system is pushing back as hard as it can. |
Lying to the FBI to impede an investigation is not minor. It's federal time. The investigation faltered partly because of these lies. (This is why Patrick Fitzgerald indicted Scooter Libby)
> Yeah he did, but the context is that Trump thinks there was election fraud, and millions of people also had the same concerns.
No, he doesn't. All the fraud claims were inflated to try to find a way to explain his loss and hold on to power. And if they were not, he said, on that call:'I just want to find 11,780 votes’. Plenty of witnesses.
That is not concern over fraud, it's an attempt to pressure the election officials to change the result by a specific number. There's no honesty or civic function there.
> There is precedent for what Trump was trying to do, and pursuing every legal path aggressively is still completely different than trying to end democracy.
Producing alternate slates of electors is a criminal offence. Which is why they met in secret -- one group, Georgia IIRC, met in a parking garage -- and tried to sneak into the state houses. It's an obvious, anti-democratic, criminal conspiracy. And we will know how it was co-ordinated and linked to Trump because Jenna Ellis has now pleaded guilty to her involvement in attempts to create a false slate in two states -- Georgia and Arizona.
> It was clearly meant to be a protest to show support and then it devolved into a large riot.
No, it wasn't. "Mike Pence didn't have the courage" shows you what it was about. It was an attempt to pressure Pence and the legislature into an illegal action. And everyone knew what would happen. The internet was alive with what was going to happen, days before, and it could have been stopped; stopping it would have been presidential. Because he had lost the election and there was no more measure for which "support" could possibly have a legal outcome that changed it.
> Let's not forget the Steele dossier that as far as I know was full of lies.
So what if it was? And it's not clear it was. It was opposition research. Initially funded by a Republican. But written by an experienced spy who did ordinary human intelligence work and qualified all his claims.
If I were a gambling man I'd bet that it is true in substance.