Trump 2028

[BeBMan]

I'm totally disappointed by the Deep State these days.

Earlier I had the impression that it was some all-powerful/nefarious/shadow/intel/bureaucracy entity that would perma-run vast conspiracies to keep power away from folks like Trump. Y'know THEY!

However right now THEY just seem to be doing nothing

Have THEY been corrupted by the Trump admin? I guess THEY could make up excuses like "Don't worry, we're already plotting against the Donald! You'll here from us soon!"

But I remain sceptic

[Broken_Erika]

I'm totally disappointed by the Deep State these days.

Earlier I had the impression that it was some all-powerful/nefarious/shadow/intel/bureaucracy entity that would perma-run vast conspiracies to keep power away from folks like Trump. Y'know THEY!

However right now THEY just seem to be doing nothing

Have THEY been corrupted by the Trump admin? I guess THEY could make up excuses like "Don't worry, we're already plotting against the Donald! You'll here from us soon!"

But I remain sceptic

Maybe the deep state was inside us all along
unless
The deep state is the friends we made along the way.

[Bereta_Eder]

The deep state is sold to elon musk

it's not what it used to be

[Dauphin]

Not illegality per se but Trump closed his "Trump University" in the face of successful judgements against it in court. Generally, the vast and overwhelming majority of what Trump has done has never had a legal challenge.

Say what now? You can see legal challenge through his life.

For example:

https://clearinghouse.net/doc/83283/

https://www.nytimes.com/1985/03/09/opinion/new-york-doer-and-slumlord-both.html

https://www.sec.gov/enforcement-litigation/administrative-proceedings/34-45287

https://web.archive.org/web/20211224205502/https://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/trump-250g-fine-lobbying-article-1.885295

Trump was never criminally indicted, let alone convicted until 2023. I think it's safe to say that Trump has lived his whole life avoiding conflict with the law rather than just continually overcoming or ignoring it. Since his prosecution in 2023 however I strongly suspect he will show much less interest in avoiding criminal behavior.

If by avoiding conflict you mean paying off. Sure.

https://www.cnn.com/2016/09/07/politics/donald-trump-campaign-donation-fines/index.html

“I give to everybody. When they call, I give. And do you know what? When I need something from them two years later, three years later, I call them, they are there for me,” Trump said at a Republican debate last August hosted by Fox News.

[BeBMan]

Maybe the deep state was inside us all along
unless
The deep state is the friends we made along the way.

The Deep State will return!

[Geronimo]

Say what now? You can see legal challenge through his life.

For example:

https://clearinghouse.net/doc/83283/

https://www.nytimes.com/1985/03/09/opinion/new-york-doer-and-slumlord-both.html

https://www.sec.gov/enforcement-litigation/administrative-proceedings/34-45287

https://web.archive.org/web/20211224205502/https://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/trump-250g-fine-lobbying-article-1.885295

If by avoiding conflict you mean paying off. Sure.

https://www.cnn.com/2016/09/07/politics/donald-trump-campaign-donation-fines/index.html

“I give to everybody. When they call, I give. And do you know what? When I need something from them two years later, three years later, I call them, they are there for me,” Trump said at a Republican debate last August hosted by Fox News.

why do you think paying off politicians was more effective than working with high priced legal counsel to successfully dance along the edge of illegal rather than simply ignoring the law or overcoming it? The number of examples you give, especially absent any convictions, seems perfectly consistent with such a lengthy career with so much activity and high priced legal counsel keeping off of the legal sand bars and rocks. More so than a lucky captain charging his unsinkable titanic into the icebergs.

[Dauphin]

why do you think paying off politicians was more effective than working with high priced legal counsel to successfully dance along the edge of illegal rather than simply ignoring the law or overcoming it? The number of examples you give, especially absent any convictions, seems perfectly consistent with such a lengthy career with so much activity and high priced legal counsel keeping off of the legal sand bars and rocks. More so than a lucky captain charging his unsinkable titanic into the icebergs.

I made no claim on effectiveness of his approach.

You claimed 'the vast and overwhelming majority of what Trump has done has never had a legal challenge'. I am pointing out that it has not gone unchallenged, and he had to back down again and again. And it normally involved a payoff, fine or calling in a favour after the conduct had occurred and the conflict had arisen. He didn't avoid conflict, he factored it in as a price of doing business.

[Dauphin]

Given his current position, he probably thinks that cost no longer applies.

[Geronimo]

Given his current position, he probably thinks that cost no longer applies.

on that we agree. I do think that if the primary mechanism for avoiding convictions was Trumps political connections, then I would have anticipated that post presidential Trump would be more legally bulletproof than ever rather than facing a string of his first indictments and convictions in the years following his first term as President.

You've established that when Trump faced indictment in the past, he resorted to calling in favors and to various settlements to dodge it. That strategy sees more likely for someone as a backup than as a primary means of avoiding indictment even if only for cost effectiveness. I simply suggest that Trump probably has usually taken pains to get what he wants the legal way in most cases. Don't you agree that after so many decades we should have seen more indictments if total disregard for legal constraints and boundaries was his standard modus operandi?

[Dauphin]

Don't you agree that after so many decades we should have seen more indictments if total disregard for legal constraints and boundaries was his standard modus operandi?

I do not. Justice is not blind. Not all people get equal attention, treatment or consequences. Equal crimes are not treated equally. To believe otherwise is naive (not saying you are). Ergo, a long history of indictable actions or lack thereof is not evidence one way or another for a man in Trump's position (who could get away with shooting a person on Fifth Avenue).

My view is that the reason Trump only recently got a conviction was because he became a prize. Not that he wasn't guilty before. If there was a desire to take him down earlier, I'm pretty sure they could have - in the past they were more content to disrupt and deter because his crimes were non-violent, not targeted at vulnerable people and complicated crimes are hard to prove especially when the kingpin works through others for plausible deniability.

Stormy Daniels-esque debacles would have gone nowhere if he was running for mayor of New York, and not President.

[Dauphin]

To re-iterate the point - see how many Trump associates got indicted, convicted and jail time. Go further back and they were his companies, not his henchmen that took the hits.

For example

https://www.fincen.gov/news/news-releases/fincen-fines-trump-taj-mahal-casino-resort-10-million-significant-and-long

Trump Taj Mahal, a casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, admitted to several willful BSA violations, including violations of AML program requirements, reporting obligations, and recordkeeping requirements. Trump Taj Mahal has a long history of prior, repeated BSA violations cited by examiners dating back to 2003. Additionally, in 1998, FinCEN assessed a $477,700 civil money penalty against Trump Taj Mahal for currency transaction reporting violations.

[Aeson]

We don't generally send rich people to jail. They get a slap on the wrist fine. There were 0 people sent to jail for the 2008 housing market fiasco, one of the largest frauds in human history. Our response was to bail most of the fraudsters out.

[Geronimo]

We don't generally send rich people to jail. They get a slap on the wrist fine. There were 0 people sent to jail for the 2008 housing market fiasco, one of the largest frauds in human history. Our response was to bail most of the fraudsters out.

This is something that desperately needs to be fixed. Failing to do so is not only immoral but has repeatedly led to societal revolution and breakdown several times throughout history.

[N35t0r]

This is something that desperately needs to be fixed. Failing to do so is not only immoral but has repeatedly led to societal revolution and breakdown several times throughout history.

Just don't start with trump, because then it's political.

[Geronimo]

Just don't start with trump, because then it's political.

Agreed. I suspect Trump is president in no small part owing to the martyrdom veneer that persecution with "lawfare" gave him and his campaign.

Instead, it would be best to start with a large bolus of apolitical and politically mixed batch of wealthy elites possibly including Trump so long as he is joined by enough sufficiently high profile opposing politicians to deflect accusations that the process is just politics by other means rather than justice.