The poetry of history...
It's poetic that Trump's first indictment will focus on the tawdry, not the profound.
Donald Trump doesn’t deserve for his first indictment to be big. He doesn’t deserve for this fresh humiliation as a twice-impeached, one-term president who launched an insurrection after losing re-election, to be about big things. That is because Donald Trump is not a momentous figure in American history. He is a debased one, and America was debased by having him as president, even for four years. And so his fall should rightly be about something that seems, to the untrained eye, to be small.
It is the pure poetry of karma and history that Trump’s first indictment — which could be his only one or one of several to come, some of which could touch on big things like classified document theft, obstruction of justice, obstruction of congress, and yes, insurrection — is about his clumsy attempts to cover up a tawdry sexual affair. Also poetic: that Trump’s minion party is forced to deploy it’s most venomous defenses of their cult leader, not to argue against the notion of insurrection or about whether a president can possess classified documents after he leaves office, but rather about whether it should be legal for a presidential candidate to pay off a porn star to keep her quiet before the election, then write the checks to reimburse his lawyer for making the payments, while standing in the Oval Office, and lie about the payments in his business records. Well done, Donald.
Related reading:
Charlie Sykes: Trump Indicted for Tawdry Little Escapades
Michelle Goldberg explains why this indictment matters
Michael Harriot has some advice for the newly minted criminal justice reform advocates in MAGA-land
Watch: Trump is finally going to pay for the Access Hollywood tape
New York City and the Exonerated Five get the karmic justice they deserve
Rev. Al Sharpton explains why Trump’s indictment in Manhattan is especially humiliating for him, and why five New York men in particular, who Trump wanted killed when they were falsely accused of rape as teenagers, are finally watching karma kick in for their tormentor.
Watch: Exonerated 5 member Salaam transforms Trump’s ad calling for his death into his first campaign ad
And another thing…
Ja’Han Jones for The ReidOut Blog hails the return of the rule of law in Trump’s indictment
Who won the week?
Last week, the Mouse bit back, as the Disney board in Orlando took the mickey out of Ron DeSantis. Florida’s Viktor Orban really thought he had something when he seized control of the “happiest place on earth” to punish The Walt Disney Company for daring to speak up against his “Don’t Say Gay” law. Welp … looks like the outgoing Disney board got the last laugh… NPR explains:
The newly appointed board was sitting for its second official meeting on Wednesday when it announced it had made a discovery: It might not be able to carry out the agenda it planned.
Nineteen days before DeSantis signed the final bill, the former board had signed agreements with Disney essentially stripping the board of power and handing that power back to Disney.
Called a Declaration of Restrictive Covenants, the measure allows Disney to have the final say on any alterations to the property and requires the board to inform Disney of plans for such alterations without conditions or delays.
Basically, the board loses "the majority of its ability to do anything beyond maintain the roads and maintain basic infrastructure," as board member Ron Peri put it, according to local news outlet Click Orlando.
And, in an extra detail that the internet is devouring, the term of the agreement was set using the "Rule Against Perpetuities" — which states that a policy will continue until after a certain person dies.
In this case, the declaration will continue "until twenty one (21) years after the death of the last survivor of the descendants of King Charles III." DeSantis, after all, frequently refers to Walt Disney World as a "corporate kingdom."
And guess who Charles’ youngest descendant is, folks? A certain bi-racial toddler named Princess Lilibet; daughter of Prince Harry and Dutchess of Sussex Meghan Markle — a fact that adds the literal cherry atop this lovely karmic Sunday, served extra cold to America’s most ostentatiously bigoted governor (who’s probably out there somewhere angrily scooping chocolate pudding with his fingers… eww…)
About this newsletter
Welcome to And Another Thing! Hope you’ll subscribe and stick around for info on upcoming guests on my MSNBC show, The Reidout, details on upcoming episodes of the Reid This, Reid That and What To Reid podcasts, book release and book signing info, and general thoughts about things.
If you’ve quit the blue bird, you can find me in these other spots:
And @joyannreid on Mastodon, too
Stay sporty, shorties!