Paying Attention: Broken News

PREEMPTIVE UPDATE:

To quote the title of one of my favorite Bob Dylan songs: Everything Is Broken, not just the news, though the following BROKEN NEWS bulletin is more broken than usual. In preparing this story for your, let's call it pleasure, we could not have foreseen the fact that professional defendant Donald Trump (aka Josef Stallin') might have to delay his court appearance because, as of this posting, he has not found a lawyer to stand by his side for today's historic arraignment . We at Paying Attention™ are always here to help, and every American citizen, even one who despises everything about this country that is not him, deserves, and the Constitution guarantees, the right to legal representation (until the Extreme Court ends this right, which they are poised to consider). In this vein, we offer the following advice: better call Saul.

Cloudy With A Chance Of Arraign

June 13, 2023

“This indictment was voted on by a grand jury of citizens in the Southern District of Florida, and I invite everyone to read it in full to understand the scope and the gravity of the crimes charged.”*
Special Counsel Jack Smith, June 9, 2023

“We can’t have someone in the Oval Office who doesn’t understand the meaning of the word confidential or classified [that’s two words, numbnuts, but who’s counting – obviously not you].”
Special Asshole Donald Trump, September 6, 2016

“If even half of [what is laid out in the indictment] is true, he’s toast”
Long-time Trump sycophant Bill Barr, June 11, 2023

Jill Wine-Banks, May 20, 2023

Disgraced, twice-impeached, twice-indicted (so far), failed insurrection leader and Fifth-Amendment-dependent ex-one-term-president Donald Toast is scheduled to be arraigned again today in Florida, having been indicted on 37 counts including obstruction of justice and violations of the Espionage Act. Don’t try this at home, even if you live at a garish golf resort with your own name plastered all over it.

Typically, defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty, but Trump has waived that presumption since we have all seen him criming all over the fucking place for the better part of a decade (ignoring in the current context all the known crimes he committed, and was found guilty of, prior to that).

Click image to enlarge

Per the indictment, the charges against Trump carry a maximum of up to 22 years in prison, presumably with time off for good behavior, so probably more like 25-30 years. While this is painfully insufficient for a lifelong criminal, it should protect our country from any more of his malignant malarkey. That is, unless of course, he is elected president in 2024. Unfortunately, the theoretically randomly-assigned judge in this case – Aileen Cannon – was appointed by Trump. Cannon has already been reprimanded and ridiculed for putting her unqualified thumb on the scales of justice in service to Trump (she attempted to derail the entire special counsel investigation), and now holds the fate of our democracy in her injudicious hands.

Besides having his own personal, already-proven-to-be-biased judge overseeing this case, it seems that Trump's primary defense will be, “But Hillary's emails!!!” and Dick Nixon’s ignominious, “If the president does it then it is not illegal.”

Fortunately for Trump, Jack Ruby is no longer with us; Ruby shot Oswald for

assassinating JFK, would he do the same to Trump for assassinating America?

Once again, we will be denied the innocent-until-proven-guilty pleasure of seeing Trump’s mugshot. Apparently, the law does not apply equally to every American. That is why God made Photoshop.