In the wake of 34 guilty verdicts in the Donald Trump hush money case, the party that chanted "lock her up" has suddenly found religion. Conservatives who had no problem with the idea of incarcerating Ms. Clinton out of sheer revenge responded with rage when Trump was found guilty of 34 felonies.
The never ending narrative from Fox and Newsmax has been that Joe Biden is weaponizing the justice department to attack his 2024 presidential opponent. In the process Biden is perceived as single handedly attempting to destroy the democratic process that has reigned supreme in our country for close to 250 years.
On the day that the verdicts were read all of the commentators who live in Trumpworld went ballistic. Fox News' Laura Ingraham had these words to say to her viewers, "This is a disgraceful day for the United States, a day that America may not recover from." Lidia Curanij a Newsmax pundit had an apocalyptic response to the verdicts, "The America we know and love has perished.
President Trump found guilty on all 34 counts which could put him behind bars for the rest of his life, marking the end of what was once the fairest justice system in the world." Fox News' Sean Hannity pontificated in response to the jury verdicts, "Let me bear no doubt here. This is a sad day for our country. It's a sad day for our justice system, the best justice system ever created by man, the foundation of our constitutional republic. It's literally dying before your eyes."
A guy can find less drama at a Bette Davis film festival. These pundits seem to be suffering from collective amnesia. The folks at Fox and Newsmax have conveniently forgotten that when Hillery Clinton ran for president in 2016 she ran through eight Bengazi investigations, and an ongoing email inquiry. A few days before election day in 2016, the email case against Clinton was reopened perhaps having an impact on the final vote count. Common sense dictates that there was absolutely nothing wrong with any of those investigations of Clinton.
The issue here has to do with unhinged hypocrisy on the part of the Republican party. When Hillery Clinton ran for president in 2016, she was faced with multiple legal challenges from the GOP. When Donald Trump has been put on trial for a variety of legitimate reasons. Republicans have accused Joe Biden of election interference.
Conservatives would have us believe that Trumpworld is a place where justice and the rule of law are embraced. The fact is, all of the employees of Fox and Newsmax have willfully chosen to forget that on January 6, 2021, thousands of radical supporters of Donald Trump attacked our nations' Capital building. One hundred and forty law enforcement officers were injured that day, and the mob chanted a terrible mantra: "Hang Mike Pence, hang Mike Pence."
It has long been forgotten that in early 2021, Donald Trump's harshest critics were former "Speaker of the House" Kevin McCarthy and current "Senate Minority Leader" Mitch McConnell. On February 13, 2021, McConnell said these words about the former president, "January 6th was a disgrace. American citizens attacked their own government ... They tried to hunt down the Speaker of the House. They built a gallows and chanted about murdering the Vice President ... There is no question none that President Trump was practically and morally responsible for the events of the day."
In January of 2021, Kevin McCarthy condemned Donald Trump in no uncertain terms, "Last week's violent attack on the Capital was undemocratic unAmerican and criminal. Violence is never a legitimate form of protest. The President bears responsibility for Wednesday's attack on Congress by mob rioters."
In a speech given by Donald Trump on May 11, 2024 at Wildwood New Jersey, the former president provided our nation with a terrible prophecy of what a second Trump term will look like, "2024 is our final battle. With you by my side, we will demolish the deep state. We will expel the war mongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists Marxists and fascists.
We will throw off the sick political class that hates our country and we will rout the fake news media. We will drain the swamp, and we will liberate our country from these tyrants and villains once and for all." With these terrible words, the former president made it abundantly clear that in a second Trump term there will be a scorched earth purge of all of his political enemies.
Say goodbye to the United States of America. Say farewell to our great democracy. It was fun while it lasted.
W. Palmer Riley