Let's not forget Lady Justice holds the scales in one hand and a sharp sword in the other

 

By Hal Brown

Former Rep. David Jolly (R-FL) said "Lady Justice is showing us she has an understanding of karma and a sense of humor" (Reference) but she's never shown as smiling. She does hold a sworn and at times she can be seen as a purveyor of karma.

As shown in my illustration above, Trump has two overlapping mouths. This represents the conundrum of trying to understand Trump. He says things that are demonstrable lies, but we never know whether he believes what he says.

Here's what I think David Jolly is describing in interview with Nicole Wallace dwhen he said the following from the article in Raw Story.

"You could not write the projection that Donald Trump was engaged in, then Secretary Clinton, to now be facing his own loss of liberty about what exactly he accused her of. I think Donald Trump knows that and understands that. I think Donald Trump knows that his wisest strategy is not to win this case in the southern district of Florida but to win the presidency. And that is why you're seeing this two-tiered strategy. Attorneys are left with a client who continues to lie to himself and misrepresent. But it's a political strategy that he sees as working."

There are contradictions here. 

Psychological projection is an unconscious process. While Trump is accusing Hillary Clinton of doing what he did (and of course he's comparing an arsonist to an overripe apple considering that what Hillary did with the email server is nothing like what he did). This is projection in the colloquial sense, i.e. to accuse someone of doing something wrong to deflect from the fact you did something wrong, often worse, that what they did.

We just don't know what Trump believes. 

Therefore, when Jolly goes on saying that Trump knows that his wisest strategy is not to win the Florida case but to win the presidency again, it is just speculation to say what he knows. From what I hear Trump saying about the documents case it seems that he very much cares about winning that case.

I don't see the two tiered strategy Jolly describes.

Then Jolly goes on to say that Trump continues to lie to himself, which of course entails misrepresentation. But if this is due to his lying to himself, then it isn't deliberate misrepresentation even though it is a misrepresentation of the truth.

Finally, how can all that we observe coming from Trump be a political strategy that he sees as working if he is lying to himself? If he is lying to himself to this degree then he is delusional. If he is delusional he is not mentally capable of devising a rational strategy.

If there is such a thing as karma it works in mysterious and erratic way. If Lady Justice is about to wield the sword of karma and strike Trump down, or  to put it another way, give him his just deserts, I don't think she'll be chuckling to herself finding it the least but amusing. 

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My other blogs today:

HUFFPOST title editorializes in title, but gets it wrong, The Rolling Stones got it right.

Sorry, Jennifer Rubin, Bill Barr can't play a vital role in helping Republicans accept that Trump is unfit for office

HUFFPOST title editorializes in title, but gets it wrong, The Rolling Stones got it right.

 

There's no mention of Trumpworld playing with fire per se in the article which it titled: 

Trump, Allies Escalate Attacks On Criminal Case.

I think the appropriate saying is more like playing with matches, especially around a spilled can of gasoline. Of course children do play with fire whether they use matches or lighters and as such they are playing with fire. 

This being pointed out, I might suggest that this Rolling Stones song could apply to Donald Trump thinking he can play his games with Jack Smith.

For that matter, this Talking Heads classic also applies to Trump:

 

Just saying....

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This is the second blog for the day. The first one is here.

Sorry, Jennifer Rubin, Bill Barr can't play a vital role in helping Republicans accept that Trump is unfit for office

 

The words in Jennifer Rubin's opinion piece in The Washington Post (here, subscription) which I've highlighted below are why I say that Bill Barr can't play a vital role in helping Republicans accept that Trump is unfit for office:

 As Trump’s former attorney general, Barr’s willingness to speak out tells Republicans still capable of reason that the case is real, it’s serious, it cannot be brushed off and that the Justice Department didn’t engage in misconduct. Barr could break through the right-wing media bubble that shelters millions of Republicans from reality. They have convinced themselves that Trump is innocent and/or that this will all go away. Even after word of the indictment spread, Republican politicians continued to attack the Justice Department as if it, not Trump, were on trial. Barr is there to shake them by the lapels, effectively telling them, “No, he’s in big trouble because he did something very, very wrong.”

To be capable of reason one has to be willing to engage in critical thinking. People who aren't seriously mentally impaired are capable of reason, of rational thought, but before they exercise these "brain muscles" they have to be willing to accept they may have to alter beliefs they have not only held before, but shared with others, sometimes in very public ways.

Barr has said that if even half of what Trump has been accused of can be proved in court, he's toast.

You can listen to Barr here:

Consider that following these remarks by Barr, Trump called him  a "disgruntled former employee' & lazy Attorney General who was weak & totally ineffective" and wrote on Truth Social:

"He doesn't mean what he's saying, it's just MISINFORMATION.Barr's doing it because he hates 'TRUMP' for firing him. He was deathly afraid of the Radical Left when they said they would Impeach him. He knows the Indictment is Bull.... Turn off FoxNews when that 'Gutless Pig' is on!"

Jennifer Rubin wrote that "Trump’s former counsel Ty Cobb told CNN, 'I think Trump is in an enormous amount of trouble. This indictment is about as carefully structured and evidentially supported as any indictment in history.' Law professor Jonathan Turley, who frequently defended Trump’s behavior during his impeachments, wrote, 'For two years, I have said that the Mar-a-Lago charges — particularly obstruction — represent the greatest threat to Donald Trump. It remains baffling why Trump forced this issue over these documents rather than just give them all back.'" Nobody who isn't a political junkie really knows who they are (although they might recognize Cobb with his mustache and flowing locks). 

Consider that Daddy Trump even turned on his most favorite progeny, Ivanka after she supported Bill Barr:

Posting to Truth Social -- the social media network Trump launched after being kicked off Twitter -- Trump continued to repeat false claims about the 2020 election as he mocked the committee's work and lashed out at comments Ivanka Trump and former Attorney General Bill Barr made in videotaped depositions.

"Ivanka Trump was not involved in looking at, or studying, Election results," Trump wrote after she said she agreed with Barr's assessment that there was no amount of fraud sufficient enough to overturn his loss.

"It affected my perspective," Ivanka Trump told the committee about Barr's assessment. "I respect Attorney General Barr, so I accepted what he was saying."

Trump fired back Friday that Ivanka "had long since checked out, and was, in my opinion, only trying to be respectful to Bill Barr and his position as Attorney General (he sucked!)."  Reference

Even if there was a cat in the presumably petless Mar-a-Lago who had hidden away Melania's tongue and it was returned to her along with all the copies of the couple's prenuptial agreement, and she decided she could reign as a queen in the Manhattan social scene as a redeemed heroine, none of the dyed in the wool Trump supports would blink when Trump disavowed her. 

Trump after all could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and they'd shrug it off, and he could call his dear Melania any horrific name in his book of insults and they'd figure she deserved it for her disloyalty. Remember Megyn Kelly?

There's a Trumptown cult and it's members would drink his Kool-Aide if he told them to.

So, so sorry Jennifer Rubin, even Bill Barr won't be able to get enough  members of Trump's cult to think rationally. 

Update:

Trump continued by calling Barr "weak" and taking a shot at his weight.

"And now he goes and he sits down — if they can find a chair for him, because it's not that easy — and he sits down and he just bloviates and it's disgraceful," Trump said. "It's actually unpatriotic. It's so bad for our country, just so bad. But, you know, he's got a lot of hatred." From:

Trump rages at Bill Barr on Truth Social for admitting Mar-a-Lago indictment is "very, very damning"

Real mature, Donald...

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