The “Crazy” Kraken Conspirator
Sidney Powell is undoubtedly co-conspirator 3 in Trump’s January 6 indictment.
Co-Conspirator 3, an attorney whose unfounded claims of election fraud the Defendant privately acknowledged to others sounded “crazy.” Nonetheless, the Defendant embraced and publicly amplified Co-Conspirator 3’s disinformation.
But her role — as described — is actually very limited. Just one paragraph describes her actions:
20. On November 16, 2020, on the Defendant’s behalf, his executive assistant sent Co-Conspirator 3 and others a document containing bullet points critical of a certain voting machine company, writing, “See attached – Please include as is, or almost as is, in lawsuit.” Co-Conspirator 3 responded nine minutes later, writing, “IT MUST GO IN ALL SUITS IN GA AND PA IMMEDIATELY WITH A FRAUD CLAIM THAT REQUIRES THE ENTIRE ELECTION TO BE SET ASIDE in those states and machines impounded for non-partisan professional inspection.” On November 25, Co-Conspirator 3 filed a lawsuit against the Governor of Georgia falsely alleging “massive election fraud” accomplished through the voting machine company’s election software and hardware. Before the lawsuit was even filed, the Defendant retweeted a post promoting it. The Defendant did this despite the fact that when he had discussed Co-Conspirator 3’s far-fetched public claims regarding the voting machine company in private with advisors, the Defendant had conceded that they were unsupported and that Co-Conspirator 3 sounded “crazy.” Co-Conspirator 3’s Georgia lawsuit was dismissed on December 7.
Go back and look! Her most famous role — when she got cleared into the White House and told Trump he should make her Special Counsel and seize the voting machines — doesn’t appear at all. Indeed, my greatest disappointment with the indictment is that it doesn’t explain one of the enduring mysteries of January 6: what led Trump to adopt January 6 as his plan shortly after that meeting.
It describes Trump’s December 19 tweet — the tweet that triggered thousands of MAGAts to start planning a trip to DC — but not what led up to it.
Curse you, Jack Smith!!!
What a remarkable structure, then, for including Sidney Powell in this indictment.
From the description of Powell at the beginning, it makes it sound like she is in there as proof that Trump knew his claims were false: In November, he declared her crazy. But he nevertheless kept magnifying her craziness.
That would almost help prove that Trump knew she was a liar when he used her propaganda.
But paragraph 20 says something different: It says that on November 16, on a date she was still ostensibly on Rudy’s team, Trump fed her the Dominion voting machine false claims and told her — Trump told Powell, not vice versa — to include the Dominion claims.
The false claims about Dominion, according to this, came from Trump.
And then, after Rudy and Jenna Ellis publicly separated themselves from her, Powell submitted the first of a number of lawsuits that would rely on the Dominion claim.
And when called on her crazy, Sidney Powell claimed that, “no reasonable person would conclude that [her] statements were truly statements of fact.”
It’s not just Trump who thinks she’s crazy, she thinks she’s crazy.
But once she filed that lawsuit, on November 25, Trump boosted it.
That’s all pretty interesting timing given something else that was occurring at the very same time. At a time when they were both together in South Carolina plotting how to steal the election for Trump, Trump pardoned Mike Flynn.
The same crazy that went into Sidney Powell’s election disinformation went into her claims about Flynn. If Trump thought she was crazy, he should never have pardoned Flynn.
It gets still more interesting from there — including to where Powell funded at least some of the Oath Keepers’ defense — including, possibly, Kelly Meggs’ attorney, Stan Woodward.
You get the idea.
Even without her plan to seize the voting machines on December 18, even without Flynn’s call for martial law in the days leading up to it, the timeline laid out in the indictment — where Trump gave Powell the Dominion claims, then decided she was crazy, then pardoned her client based off her crazy claims — sure piles up some interesting implications in what are just two paragraphs of a 130-paragraph indictment.
One of the first things I looked for in the indictment was the mention of the Dec 18 meeting. I was surprised to see nothing. But do you think it was excluded because it’s just too crazy & would be a distraction for the jury? The facts, as laid out, are clear & damning and hopefully simple enough for a speedy conviction.
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The CrackHen.
“Krazy” Kraken Konspirator, more likely.
You’ve got a point. It’s an awfully clannish group. But Imma stick with her smokin the rock and Klucking at the moon. ;-))
Would it be crazy to assume that Smith (we miss him in the Netherlands) is counting on Trump to throw the unindicted co-conspirators under the bus like they’ve never been thrown under the bus before?
Sing it, Patsy:
Ok, that is one of the best.
I copied your Patsy Cline google link without the tracking info:
https://www.google.com/search?q=crazy+patsy+cline+lyrics
ah, thanks. I should know how not to do that (tracking)..
You are such a patsy Punaise.
I ain’t gonna take the fall, no way!
I am in-Cline-d to agree.
{Sound of palm slap on forehead, a long, lowing moan].
See? This is why I love you all . . .
lean into it
What’s yer angle?
Hey, I resemble that remark!
TC (Cline!) in NC
Oh punaise, you do yourself proud !!
You inspired me to do a little research on YouTube. Here be a Kraken sea shanty:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP_MRpHA9Ew
Good find. They’d be right at home at this Sea Shanty Festival in Brittany (the place goes nuts for several days, we got out just in time)
Thought of you Sunday, went to Fournée Bakery to get a duck fat fougasse.
Oh nice – Fournée is the best. LOL, we may have crossed paths there without knowing it. Big fan of their croissants (regular and their ham/egg invention) . Walking distance for us… The fougasse is not for the faint of heart, dripping as it is with the good stuff.
Forget not the pain au chocolat.
So do you think she might have been futilely angling for Melinia’s spot? That would explain her preternaturally baleful demeanor.
Nicely done, whatever your beliefs are.~
Oh heck, I don’t know. That’s just the song that first came to mind – and it’s a classic!
I suppose I could have gone with Queen’s “Crazy Little Thing Called Insurrection”
Very nice! Maybe I should take another “krack “ at this:
Were I to pick one girl to ride in a car, O
It’s clear that my gears would engage for sweet Charo.
I’d park her in seat of Corinthian leather
And drive thru the street in both foul and fair weather
And marvel in rapture as, gossip-purveyor,
Her tales did capture the Hollywood Squares,
And tell her sincere that no chica Espana
Was ever her peer at the plucked Malagueña.
Doubt not I’d be wired on ginkgo biloba
To bank the raw fire of Chrysler Cordoba
But our travels proceed without care and sans souci
‘Cause our mileage at speed’s about ten to the “Coochi”
(Cute huh? I got some others but they’re in bad taste mostly. Oh well…)
And…that was good taste?
“It wasn’t a glove…”
Cut back on the shrooms, maybe?
emmm, OK? Not sure I get the connection, but .. fun with words.
Can’t spell “non sequiter” without “neurons quit”…
ALWAYS watch out for student drivers.
Taken in the spirit of Simon & Garfunkel’s Baby Driver, I guess:
Have you seen the movie “Baby Driver” yet? It is REALLY good.
noted, thx!
It’s really good.
If somebody’s PAC was going to pay $108k to get my hair done, I’d angle for Melania’s spot too.
“The PAC also paid over $108,000 for “strategy consulting” to Hervé Pierre Braillard for the first six months of 2023. … and has also been Melania Trump’s stylist for years,”
And I would also take the $155,000 for “event planning and consulting” or maybe it’s for a “speaking engagement.”
Roll out those glazy, hazy,
crazy days of summer,
Those days of FPOTUS,
abettors, careers,
Roll out those glazy, hazy,
crazy days of summer,
You’ll wish that summer
could always be here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDE5eu1SOWE
“1928 Themola London Pianola – Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days Of Summer”
It lines up with Byrne’s claim that she left the meeting with the understanding she was Special Counsel with a report due by New Year’s Day and that Rudy talked Dump out of it after she left the WH (knowing she wouldn’t be able to find anything) and into the J6 plan instead.
“If Trump thought she was crazy, he should never have pardoned Flynn.”
You are assuming Trump thinks crazy is a bad thing. If he is sowing chaos, doesn’t it follow that crazy is preferable to not-crazy? It even follows that Powell herself might think “crazy” is just what the doctor ordered. “Releases the Kraken”, she says? What the hell does that even mean? It’s a lame line from a lame, yet entertaining, movie, and that’s all these schmoes are about: entertainment. “IT’S GOING TO BE WILD!!!!!!!”
I’m no lawyer so I can only watch and learn.
The whole game of pressuring the already indicted but not yet named is fascinating.
So many “cards” were shown in the indictment.
Sm nay remain to be revealed.
The only person who has been indicted on these charges (so far) is Trump.
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To ease your mind, Marcy: If they had included her as a source of the BLCT (big lie conspiracy theory) they would have had Sydney Kraken Powell in the courtroom (either as a hostile PW or a compliant DW) which automatically conjurs parody. That can’t happen with this particular case.
It has to be cleanly about Trump. Powell didn’t cause trump to do what he did; he was scouring the vacuous MAGA landscape for a reason to fuck me and 85 million voters over and she was standing nearby making an utter, archetypical fool of herself.
Besides, I prefer that she’s prosecuted only after she’s bled dry by the defamation suits she’s facing. Maybe she can represent herself! After Trump is out of the picture and she is standing in the dock somewhere, wearing second-hand leopard-print jump suits, I could actually let myself laugh at that!
I’m thinking that Powell, Bannon, both Millers, Flynn, and the remaining cast of characters will all have their very own indictments coming soon. I can’t believe that the Aug. 1 indictment, with the included co-conspirators ends Jack Smith’s pursuit of the January 6 conspiracy. I would even dare to hope that there’s some way to ensnare and charge Marge Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, Scott Perry, Ron Johnson, Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, Josh Harley, and the rest of the Congressional insurrectionists. A gal can dream…..
“I would even dare to hope that there’s some way to ensnare and charge Marge Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, Scott Perry, Ron Johnson, Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, Josh Harley, and the rest of the Congressional insurrectionists.” Well if the law doesn’t get them history certainly will and if historians fail, there’s the Hieronymus Bosch destination.
https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2018/CKS/2018_CKS_15496_0001_000(follower_of_hieronymus_bosch_the_harrowing_of_hell).jpg
Just Google “Hieronymus Bosch Hell”…you’ll get the idea.
LOL. At the time, I took that as tacit admission she knew she was telling some real whoppers. As in, really really big’uns. The poor girl, it seems, lacked the wisdom of context: eg. if a lie passes muster on Fox, being emboldened to repeat it in court is not wise.
I wonder if Smith will spotlight the over-the-top lieing amongst all these people (eg. Defendent 1 and the other 6) common to all these people. At this point it is a distinguishing MAGA characteristic. A pack of rabid liars.
Which makes me think, as I have for some time now, Trump isn’t the ultimate target of the J6 probe.
Flynn, Bannon, Stone, maybe Alex Jones are.
And I wonder if Meggs was the conduit to the Oath Keepers, not Rhodes.
Remember that Meggs was the conduit to Stone, and also to Jeremy Liggett, who had ties to the bus tour.
And Meggs is the one OK repped by Stan Woodward whose most important job seems to be to enforce the omerta… interesting.
Barely OT – this oughta fire up the rubes:(TPM)
This is very much an exaggeration, as I do not see a leftward leaning jurist ever imposing the death penalty here (nor any DC jury going along with it), but it does bring into play exactly what I cited above, “any number of years or for life.”
I do believe Jack Smith specifically chose the civil rights statutes to be able to bypass statutory maximums, especially for younger co-conspirators who might otherwise be willing to cooperate. (cough cough Co-conspirator 6)
Oh, and I forgot about the 56 year old Co-conspirator 4! Who used to lead the Civil rights division, and now is charged with a civil rights violation…. what an ironic plot twist.
Personally, don’t want Trump to be given the death penalty. For the porcelain figure he is, many, many years in prison is way better than the death penalty.
Best case scenario, Biden wins, Trump will be in prison for about 4 years more or less until the next election plants a republican in the white house and Trump gets pardoned, which is still justice.
Even if the gets death penalty (which is not likely given the other comments), takes about 10 years to appeal it, so in 10 years a republican will probably get in the WH anyway.
But will see how the system holds.
Um, there are NO “death penalty” factors in this. Let’s please not go there.
Exactly. It’s a patently ludicrous bad faith proposition.
Exactly. Fire up the rubes: “If they can threaten and do this to lil’ ol’ me, imagine what they will do to you! Send me your rolls of nickels and quarters, and I will defend you to your last dime!”
IMHO Special Counsel Smith is not finished with the Co-Con 6, nor with some others. There will be additional indictments, but including all those people in this one makes the package much more messy and difficult to pursue expeditiously.
Question: Can Trump be tried for conspiracy alone, without Smith indicting alleged co-conspirators or forcing their 5th amendment? Not with standing, Trump can always call them as witnesses.
Yes. Happens a lot. And they can be separately charged together or, more likely, with their cells. So for example, Sidney COULD be charged with Byrne and Flynn.
Did my own research and found this article helpful on a “Klein conspiracy” which appears to be the story the DOJ is telling, to enable “prosecutors to develop and present the full panoply of evidence of an intended fraud. In other words, it provides a means for prosecutors to “tell the story” of criminal conduct in such a way that juries can decide the truth of the matter. It seems to also negate the need for direct testimony (or indictment) of co-conspirators.
https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/usao/legacy/2013/06/28/usab6104.pdf (pages 1-10)
OT: I think you (Marcy) may want to look at Riggleman interview on Morning Joe today. Riggleman says: “I have the forensics on the Hunter Biden data.” Forgive me if I am mistaken, but this is the first I’ve heard of that (although speculated something similar seemed possible here a couple weeks ago given he’s been working with Hunter’s team since November).
Riggleman also makes the point that most of the people in Smith’s indictment yesterday were also key players in the Hunter Laptop saga. I appreciate MSM saying this explicitly, long overdue. Also think it likely they (Hunter’s “team”) know well what you illustrated, that Hunter’s Mac had multiple incidents of data manipulation after the Isaac dropoff. Good forensics + knowledge of tampering w/the MacBook likely starts painting a coherent picture.
I can’t get direct link to the video. It’s listed in this morning’s program, labelled with a picture of Riggleman.
I provided a link to the Riggleman video below…
Can we move on now? You’ve published three comments related to that video, only one of which has a link.
TY. He’s working for Hunter’s benefactor, and so should have real forensics. I hope they do try to recreate my work.
“…he fed her the Dominion voting machine false claims and told her — Trump told Powell, not vice versa — to include the Dominion claims.”
IANAL. Any chance Dominion is able to do anything with this? Or is it best to sit back and watch what DOJ does?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbTCWYQRdxo
This is the Riggleman video that jdmckay8 refers to above…
A propos of nothing, does anybody see a resemblance between Jack Smith and oddball Coach Beard of Ted Lasso fame?
Nailed it. Hoping Jack Smith does not develop a case of the yips.
I didn’t come up with it myself, but I think this painting by El Greco fits better both visually and characterologically.
https://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/art-work/the-nobleman-with-his-hand-on-his-chest/9cb73bdf-66e8-4826-a79c-5de2b15a1da6
That works.
I see Hugh Laurie’s character Ryan Clark from Avenue 5.
Apologies if someone asked this above or in another post’s comments, but what is the likelihood that the disappointment Marcy notes above regarding the enduring mystery about Trump’s adoption of the J6 plan will be resolved in a superseding indictment (with Powell and/or others as (an) added defendant(s))?
Let’s hope not. Strings of rolling indictments is bullshit and not the type of fundamental fairness the law contemplates.
Can you explain what you mean about the rolling indictments being unfair ?
Yes. It is wrong to string out charges the government already knows about for tactical leverage and advantage. If the government has the goods, bring them, don’t string them out serially to screw a defendant. I wrote about this a decade ago. https://www.emptywheel.net/2013/06/21/aaron-swartz-plea-leveraging-the-bordenkircher-problem/
Ok, thanks for the link
Do you think Trump will try to plea out ?
No.
Interesting.
When it comes to the idea of a plea deal I’m seeing a variety of opinions. For example, in a recent interview with Kenneth McCallion, the former Justice Department prosecutor who also worked for the New York State Attorney General’s office as a prosecutor on Trump racketeering cases, he thinks trump will work out a plea that keeps him out of jail.
“Trump will take it down to the wire. Spiro Agnew did the same thing. The prosecutors were ready to start, they were picking a trial date, and then Agnew blinked. So that’ll be the moment when Trump either blinks or does not. I don’t think Trump can withstand a trial. Only when Trump’s first trial is imminent will Trump’s ego permit him to even consider entering a guilty plea in return for no jail time. My guess is that Trump will never be wearing an orange jump suit, to the great disappointment of many of us…. Trump will have to agree not to run for public office. He wouldn’t get jail time. There would be a period of time where Trump would be confined in a gilded cage such as Mar a Lago.”
If he’s right and that is the end result I don’t see the public at large accepting it very well.
I have no idea. But Trump is a different cat than Agnew was. We shall see apparently.
I think it can go either way.
If there is a lawyer left standing next to him on that last day, one that’s telling him not to take a plea, that he can still win, and all he has to do is listen to him while he tells him what he wants to hear, he won’t do it.
I say that based only on his past behavior, record of dodging any real consequences for his actions, and mental issues. If he can he’ll see things as he wants to see them rather than as they actually are.
However, if he should see a way to escape any real consequences while still retaining his followers and grifting machine, he may do it.
I see a lot of people asking if trump would take a plea deal but no one asking if Smith would even offer one. With the mountain of evidence he has would he still entertain that option?
BTW, I hope you are right.
Agnew was a lot smarter than drumpf, and knew he couldn’t win – so he pled out.
Drumpf is living in the bubble that he blew for himself and it’ll take a lot to burst it.
I can hear the rabblerousing now: ’See, that’s what they were after all along, they were afraid of Trump! They weren’t interested in justice or the law, they would do anything to keep Trump out of office!’
Are clauses forbidding individuals from running for public office the norm for people who have been convicted of some form of voter fraud? I don’t know enough about law to phrase this correctly, and hope you understand what I’m trying to say. Trump should be treated like any other person facing similar charges. We cannot twist the law to take care of problems that belong in the political sphere.
If such a provision is normal, then fine. But if it is not, then it’s probably a bad idea.
damn, tough to go back and read that. i knew aaron.
I don’t think they’ll supercede this to add other people. They likely will fill in the network around Trump w/other indictments.
And meanwhile. those very folks will be whining to their colleagues. “What!? I’m important, I’m a Big Deal in Trumpworld, and Smith didn’t see fit to include me alongside CC-1 through CC-6?”
Cue the tiny violins.
Kari Lake must be fuming!
Trump hasn’t named her as his running mate yet, nor has she been indicted.
I mean, how is she going to do any grifting if they don’t get her on TV dammit!
“Curse you, Jack Smith!!!”
I think this is being said in a lot of places, Marcy, though for very different reasons. CC-1 through CC-6 are probably wondering when their indictments will drop, and — more distressing — what they will look like. Given how focused and direct this indictment is, imagining how Smith will structure these later indictments will induce nightmares for all these folks.
And then there are the other co-conspirators, whom Smith deemed not important enough to include here among the Big Six. Are they in the clear, or are they so apparently insignificant that they are beneath mention here? If the latter is true, how much whining and stamping their feet will that induce, and what will their indictments look like?
Lots of cursing Jack Smith to go around.
LOL
Let them stew.
One of the things about the rhythm and flow of this indictment is how it feels something like a symphonic overture. Take section 10(b):
“The Defendant and co-conspirators organized fraudulent slates of electors in seven targeted states … attempting to mimic the procedures that the legitimate electors were supposed to follow under the Constitution and other federal and state laws.”
We know that the parties that engaged in the violation of these “other federal and state laws” include some of the Co-Conspirators identified in this document as well as other individuals not specified. At some point later in the “symphony” we might expect another indictment charging the relevant Co-Conspirators as well as other undefined parties, and directed towards those specific federal laws being alluded to in this passage.
I have a feeling that many more will get their day in court – might be state court, though.
I’m surprised that Lin Wood missed the cut. Maybe Fani will correct that. Most of Wood’s greatest hits were in Georgia.
Possibly a very dumb question – Could evidence from indirectly related civil lawsuits (like Dominion’s) be used in this criminal trial, and could that possibly be one reason why Sydney is an unnamed co-conspirator?
Sure, if the foundation can be laid.
Rudy’s recant of his Georgia lies?
We shall see.
There’s this thing called, “admission against interest” …
It also can work in the other direction. Dominion et al. can use evidence that comes forward in this case to bolster their own civil actions, assuming they can make the requisite connections.
Exploring the facts, the applicable law and possible defenses is important.
But sometimes I get the feeling that the NYTimes and Washington Post spend a lot of time handwringing over possible defenses and not enough time thinking about the non-legal implications, which might be more significant. For example, what does it say about Trump’s mental and emotional competence that he believed he had won despite all of the evidence to the contrary?
Any “belief” would have its sole foundation in willful ignorance, given how many senior officials, whose jobs it was to know such things, told Trump his various beliefs about voter fraud were not only false, but off-the-wall.
As you say, the NYT and WaPo don’t seem to spend much time in print parsing through the alleged crimes, which they must have done to come up with so many purported defenses. But those all come from the perspective of Trump’s defenders, because they ignore obvious points. Trump’s beliefs are irrelevant, for example, whether or not rational, if he committed crimes to pursue them. The crimes are what he’s been indicted for, not his purported beliefs.
I think about this often as well.
More specifically for example, give Trump his “defense” that he really believes the election was stolen. Given so many big problems in the world to deal with, how the f**k can any sane person think this guy can lead a nation well when he can’t get he lost the election 2+ years ago!!! AFAIC, it is literally insane. And its also our reality.
As someone who IRL is involved with religion, that word ‘belief’ is a tripwire. It appears to my eyes that Smith is trying to avoid the issue of what Trump ‘believed’, to render it immaterial. This, by the way, is John Calvin’s take on belief – it is irrelevant what you believe, God is judge.
The Jan. 6 mob showed up with heads stuffed with belief, their hearts empty of faith – faith in their government, the majority of their neighbors, and their God. The 14th C author of The Cloud of Unknowing thought belief to be the opposite of faith.
Addendum: when I served on a couple juries, the interrogation, it seemed to me, was to try to determine the armor-plated beliefs – prejudice – of each prospective juror’s about the defendant or the case, i.e., whether they had any, or whether they had superseding faith in the courts, the law, or themselves to handle the attendant ambiguity and rationally consider the facts as presented.
“This, by the way, is John Calvin’s take on belief – it is irrelevant what you believe, God is judge.”
Interesting point. I’ve noticed this term “sincerely held belief” popping up over and over again in court cases, and that has always struck me as peculiar. As if they are some kind of totem words like “in God we trust” was intended, to serve in fending off those godless heathen communist hordes.
Heh, “sincerely held” does not mean it is legitimate or sane. Not magic words.
Agreed. So why does it keep showing up in SCOTUS cases?
Because that is the SCOTUS we have, somewhat negligently, collected up over the years. It is disturbing, and they will be there a very long time.
Ah. So you believe (in a “sincerely held” manner) that it’s an intentional ploy by the petitioners?
Thanks for the response.
Faith is a kind of belief. Arguably, the opposite of faith is knowledge. Knowledge is defined in philosophy as justified true belief, whereas faith is firm belief that something is true in the absence of a valid justification for the belief (often because evidence is incomplete, sometimes because the belief is actually false). I think the J6 mob had hearts full of faith in Trump, a misplaced faith.
Thank you @wasD4v1d. I did not know that quote of Calvin. Beautiful line: heads stuffed with belief, hearts empty of faith.
You took this somewhere I was definitely not intending. Maybe if we diligently get into it and stick with it, we can figure it all out in a century or two. Seems to me this stuff tends to always go full circle, and end up about where it started with nothing that really matters, changing.
You bring up IMO really interesting and important “points”, well worth discussing. But this probably isn’t the right place.
I’ll just comment on what you called “tripwire”. As Marcy has pointed out several times, under the law Trump’s belief the election was stolen is irrelevant. What is relevant (at least in Lambert’s court): whether a defendant broke the law. Makes sense to me.
So the “frothy right” media working overtime getting the “belief” belief into their minion’s heads, which the courts say does not matter. Almost like the bad guys win by launching/fueling a national conversation about beliefs: its just a lazy way to avoid scrutiny of the facts (what Trump did).
Also seems to me, in a more just system, “beliefs” are what Trump should get to examine in himself inside a prison cell to hopefully find where the hell he took a hard right turn to the dark side and never came back.
We’ve badly bastardized our language, and its a problem. In your to comments you use the word “faith”. Taken out of context, it has become another word for “belief(s)”. We have the Catholic, Presbyterian, Jewist and (……) faiths. Pence wears his “faith” on his lapel.
A etymology workup on the word, however, points to something else not connected to “belief” at all: faith comes from an entirely different domain, and when articulated outside of religious terms is something most relatively honest people will agree is something virtuous. But within religious contexts, almost always flips back into: belief(s). Like a tripwire as you said.
Ahhh, Marcy deals with this exact same stuff today.
It is the same with the documents case. The handwringing over whether Trump believed he had a right to those documents misses the point, both legally and politically. He kept sensitive national defense information in the bathroom, on a ballroom stage, and in a storage room by the pool with a flimsy lock. And when cautioned to install a better lock, his property manager installs the lock and then loses track of the key!
The indictment spends some time on Co-Conspirator 4. It’s interesting in itself wrt the story the indictment lays out. But not unnoticed with respect to the story is the irony of Republicans claiming the DOJ has been weaponized by Biden. Hmm, what were the Defendant and Co-Conspirator 4 attempting to do?
What Kraken’s curse/mythological punishment/faerie’s spell/answered prayer is poor Daniel Dale living under? Who or what can free him?
Daniel Dale doesn’t give a rat’s arse, he’s Canadian. :-)
Hm ok well, maybe some kind of ancestral karma then…
(My bad, see above. I was texting while texting)
It seems obvious now that Ms. Powell has a tenuous grip on reality but I question how criminally culpable she should be for the events of January 6th. If an executive makes decisions based on the ravings of a lunatic, who should be responsible for the chaos that results? Is it the executive’s fault or the crazy person’s fault? I don’t see a direct line of causation between Powell’s ideas or statements and any crimes that were committed on 1/6/21, but I am not an attorney. I guess I see where she would be considered part of a conspiracy, but was she really helpful in the execution of that conspiracy?
I believe that Dominion has filed a defamation suit against her.
She played a major role in amplifying the “election is rigged” theme by filing lawsuits.
PS An executive who makes decisions based on the ravings of a lunatic might just be a lunatic as well.
I’d just happened upon this bit in a 23-NOV-2020 WaPo piece by Aaron Blake a few minutes before I read your comment:
Communists. Sure, right. LOL
Lol is right. It is not just Trump, how these other ancillary players proceed will be pretty amusing.
Powell must be a lifetime member of the John Birch Society.
Marcy links to a Georgia press release from the Secretary of State’s office, re: “no reasonable person would have taken the statements as true.” But that is in the context of claims made by Dominion that Powell’s claims were crazy. So her response to that was, if I’m crazy like you say, why would any reasonable person believe me? Essentially, she’s just trying to undermine Dominion’s claims, that is, if they are right (she’s nuts), then they have no basis to claim she did anything wrong in making the claims, i.e., Dominion should have known better than to believe them. So she is absolutely not backing away from any of the claims she made. The implication is that she still believes them.
Ms. Powell may have been noted as crazy in the indictment but crazy could also describe Giuliani and Eastman with relation to the Fake Elector scheme. They went from a normal trajectory of filing lawsuits to free fall when they came up with the idea of using Fake Electors as pretext to throw a monkey wrench into normal certification process. And Jeffrey B. Clark had to be crazy to think his schemes would work.
I share the curiosity about Smith’s interpretation of the December 18, 2020, meeting in the WH where Powell (and who else?) were sneaked in. I’m still more curious about the connection between Navarro’s report that is praised by Trump before he calls for the “wild protest” in DC on January 6, 2021, in the very same tweet, in the early hours of December 19, 2020, as some sort of conclusion of the Dec. 18 meeting.
Will it be saved for one of the upcoming (or additional?) Navarro trials? Or is there no connection?
I would like to think that Special Counsel Smith has amassed a lot of evidence and has planned how to use it to best advantage.
Navarro’s crazy comments on Ari Melber’s show may be used against him. On the other hand, maybe Byrne, Lindell, and Navarro are so bizarre that Smith will just think of them as the crazy uncles at Thanksgiving.
Nobody’s examined the “release the Kraken” statement.
Did Sidney Powell fall asleep and miss the end of the movie? If I understand the story, the Kraken was defeated. So, is that a great rallying cry?
This also begs the question of who Sidney Powell was rooting for. Didn’t the Bad Guy release the Kraken to fight the Hero?
Does Sidney Powell not understand the basic Good Guy-Bad Guy narrative device of American film?
The concept of a genuinely held belief comes up in a variety on contexts. To get a conviction of certain crimes, prosecutors must prove that the defendant knew what the law was and intentionally chose to violate the law. This is the general rule for tax crimes.
Thus for example, if a defendant is charged with tax evasion based on a failure to report $1 million of income, the defendant can avoid being convicted if the jury determines that the defendant had a genuine but erroneous belief that he or she was not required to report the the $1 million of income. It is difficult (probably impossible) to get a jury to make that determination unless the defendant takes the stand.
Not all criminal statutes require proof the the defendant knew what the law was and intentionally chose to violate the law to get a conviction. There is a Supreme Court case called Ratzlaf where the court reversed a conviction based on the failure of the prosecutor to prove that the defendant knew that they were violating the law. Later, Congress changed the law to eliminate that requirement.
Thanks for all the great back-and-forth on this thread, everyone! I still think there are some important uncharged crimes related to J6 lurking out there. The most compelling are unraveling the goings-on at the Willard Hotel in DC on the dates, January 4th-6th, 2021! Steve Bannon and Roger Stone were at this planning nerve center for multiple days in advance and on the day of the attacks and are uncharged in Trump’s indictment as co-conspirators. I hope we learn more about their roles in this insurrection and they are appropriately punished!