The following are some random thoughts on the Democratic National Convention.

A ROLLING STONE LOSES SOME GLOSS

You don’t always get what you want!

~Mick Jagger

If, as I have on occasion, hate it when I am right, today I find myself loving it when I’m wrong.  There was no Beyonce or Taylor Swift last night.  Because they were not needed.  There were enough “rock stars” to fill the arena.  Comma-la’s grand nieces.  The “Exonerated Five.”  The “Liberated Five,”  former Congressman Adam Kinzinger, former Georgia Lt. Governor Geoff Duncan, former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham, former Trump national security official Olivia Troye and Mesa, Arizona mayor John Giles. And headliner Kamala Harris. 

I still think not including Jimmy Carter in the “parade of presidents” was a lost opportunity to remind voters a post-defeat president can accept the voters’ choice and still serve America in any number of ways.

SHORT ONE ABE

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

~President Abraham Lincoln

One would think Honest Abe covered all the bases.  But someone in the right-wing echo chamber proved him wrong.  Please add, “Some people are fools any chance they get.”  In this case, a representative of the media made the following observation as Kamala Harris walked out on the stage to accept her party’s nomination.  “The campaign told women to wear white yet she wore black.”  First of all, these are the same people who thought the world ended when President Obama wore a tan suit.  It did not.

Second, imagine the uproar if she, like Hillary Clinton in 2016, had worn white.  Fox News hosts would  accuse her  of playing identity politics pandering to women.   Or suggest anything but a tailored dark suit is unpresidential.  The Hollywood Reporter  provided the best explanation of her choice of attire, but of course, had to drop the designer’s name, something they never do when covering male politicians. “She bucked the night’s trend by wearing a custom navy power suit and matching silk blouse by French fashion house Chloé, a choice that seemed to say history has been made, now let’s get down to business.”

My only disappointment was that Donald Trump did not post the following on Truth Social.  “I’ve known Ka-MAH-la for a long time, not directly, and she always preferred white.  And then, all of a sudden, she turned navy blue.”

AS THE BRAIN WORM TURNS

No post-convention analysis would be complete without acknowledging Robert F. Kennedy, Jr’s suspending his independent campaign and endorsing Trump.  Some “conservative” media outlets label this a “game changer,” and they may be right.  But not for the reasons they believe. 

There is one undeniable axiom in politics.  When the opposition is trying to define you, do not give them more ammunition.  Ask Mitt Romney who, as the Obama campaign portrayed him as insensitive to working Americans, said, “My job is not to worry about those people (referring to the 47 percent of voters he called ‘the taker class.’)  I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”  Which explains why the Harris campaign should welcome Bobby, Jr. as the perfect surrogate for Trump.

• If you thought Trump and J.D. Vance were weird before, now they have added the guy who dumped a dead bear in Central Park to their ticket.  A trifecta of weird.
• Have you ever noticed Trump is surrounding himself with people who hated him?  His VP choice once called him “America’s Hitler,” and now his latest sidekick once described him as a “sociopath.”
• More evidence that Trump puts himself above country offering RFK, Jr. a job in his administration in hopes of pandering to Kennedy supporters.
• Like Trump, Bobby Jr. is a forum shopper who puts self above country.  Trump was a Democrat until he realized his message of grievance and chaos played better with Republicans.  RFK Jr. has gone from seeking the Democratic nomination to being an independent candidate to asking Harris for a job in return for his endorsement to getting that offer from Trump.
• One more Trump surrogate who has no moral compass.  Kennedy claims to be an environmentalist yet supports the candidate who just promised the oil industry he would take care of them in exchange for a $1 billion donation to his campaign.
• One more Trump surrogate whose family thinks he has betrayed his heritage, unlike Harris and Tim Walz, who feel obligated to honor their own parents.

Thursday night, Adam Kinzinger told DNC convention, “I belong here.”  Likewise, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is right where HE belongs.

MICK JAGGER REDUX

Sometimes, people get what they want and wish they had not.  Such is the case with the Trump and MAGA state legislators pushing for paper ballots.  One result is that the extended time needed to print and distribute paper ballots forced states to wrap up that process earlier than in previous election cycles.  Remember, Democrats had to schedule an on-line roll call to meet Ohio’s ballot requirement.

According to Newsweek,  RFK Jr.’s name may still be on ballots in 23 states where he qualified as an independent candidate.  One of those states is Michigan.  ABC News reports, “A spokesperson for Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said that Kennedy’s name would remain on the state’s ballots in November due to his status as a ‘minor party’ candidate.”  Do not forget, when her name appeared on primary ballots even after she  suspended her campaign, 15-20 percent of Republicans still voted for Nikki Haley.  Do not be surprised if something similar happens among Kennedy supporters.

Scottish-born Craig Ferguson, a naturalized U.S. citizen, would open every episode of his late night talk show with, “It’s a great day for America.”  Friday was one more.  But remember, the one that matters most is November 5th.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

I continue to be surprised how many people who have read my book In the National Interest ask me, “Do you believe it was possible that Kennedy ordered his own assassination?”  I even had one reader ask me, “How did you, of all people, get possession of that journal?”  On Facebook and Reddit sites dedicated to the assassination, I constantly have to remind commenters who want to poke holes in the narrative that it is a work of fiction, not intended to solve the crime of the 20th century.

This morning, based on efforts by the MAGAverse to put the brakes on Kamala Harris’ game-changing entry into the 2024 presidential sweepstakes, I wondered if there was room for one more work of conspiratorial fiction.  Was this mastermind Joe Biden’s last act, eclipsing his rigging the outcome of Super Bowl LVIII?  Another saga in which the mystery is not “who dunnit” but “how dunnit?”

I, therefore, offer for your imagination In the National Interest Redux by Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr.  President Biden has only forwarded the preface to me, but promises to send the complete story to be offered as a serial.

PREFACE
Wednesday, November 6, 2024

Dare I say, “Mission Accomplished!”  On January 20, 2025, Kamala Harris will take the oath as 47th president of the United States.  The first woman and second person of color to occupy the Oval Office.  No surprise, Donald Trump has yet to concede even though the final vote tally represents a larger Democratic margin of victory than 2020.  And the MAGA conspiracy machine is in fifth gear.  Of course, their malarky theories cover all the usual bases.  Corrupted voting machines.  Fake Harris and destroyed Trump ballots.  Foreign interference.

If only they knew the truth.  They are half right.  There was a conspiracy, a grand one in fact.  It was launched years before the election and had nothing to do with when and how people voted.  That is the beauty of a truly great conspiracy.  Get the victim to focus on the wrong things, especially when he fancies himself as a master of misdirection.  I laughed when Trump, immediately following my announcement that I would withdraw from the race, threatened to sue the DNC.  He claimed his campaign had wasted millions of dollars running against me when I had always planned to step aside.  A classic case of the fraud calling the bluffer black.  Donald, you’re getting warmer than you imagine.

Let me take you back to the beginning, January 20, 2021.  When Donald and Melania Trump never invited Jill and me to the White House and said he would not attend the inauguration, I knew he would not ride off into the sunset.  If you are someone who picked up this book, you already know that is who he is.  Therefore, 2020 was not a one-off.  We would have to defeat him again, and this time, he would up his game of fear, lies and misinformation.  He would have four years to build a case against me and my record, regardless of our success or failure.  We, too, needed a four-year strategy.

Now, you may find this hard to believe, but back in 2020, at age 77, I knew I was old.  And I knew if I wanted to run again in 2024 at 81, I would be even older.  That is why I suggested on several occasions, one term was enough to do the things I hoped to do.  Save the country from a second Trump term.  Bring us back from the pandemic.  Restore the United States’ reputation as leader of the free world.  And lay the foundation for the next generation of American leaders, hopefully Democratic ones.

I also knew, to defeat Trump again, we needed to rely on the same coalition of minority voters, progressives and educated suburban voters to counter any increase in my predecessor’s recruitment of cult followers and believers who wished for a return to their delusional memories of a “simpler time.”

One more thing you might find hard to believe.  I did not pick Kamala Harris to be my running mate.  Donald Trump did, unwittingly of course, but that’s a given.  Although she did not win the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton had been right about what a Trump administration would mean.  Especially, appointments to the Supreme Court and the danger to women’s rights, years before the Dobbs decision.  By putting Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Coney Barrett on the Court, it was Trump who created the backlash that assured time had come for a female chief executive.

Then I had to do my part.  Which is why, on August 11, 2020, I announced the Biden/Harris ticket.  Thus began the journey which brought us to this moment.  However, before I share the details, I need to correct something I wrote previously.  This may have been a grand scheme, but it was no conspiracy.  A conspiracy requires the collaboration of two or more people.  Prior to this account, no one, not family, close advisors or even Kamala, knew this was the plan from day one.  I may be old,  but I can still protect a secret, classified or not.

TO BE CONTINUED
Dr. ESP

Based on the success of my first novel In the National  Interest, I wondered if there was room for a new fictional genre, implausible conspiracy theories in which the motive and participants were unimaginable.  However, as with my account of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, making the implausible possible depended on the use of the public record to back up the story.  In the National Interest, the counter-intuitive narrative that Kennedy’s death was engineered, not by enemies, but a close advisor at the request of the president himself.  The details are laid out in a contemporaneous journal maintained by one of the individuals tasked with planning and carrying out the events in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

Following last Thursday conviction of Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business documents to coverup a sexual encounter with an adult film actress right before the 2016 presidential election, I wondered if this format that worked once, might work again.  The premise was simple.  Was there something not quite kosher about the relative ease with which the jury so quickly came to a unanimous verdict on all counts?  If so, had someone who put a thumb on the scale kept a journal of the process he or she used?  And who might that be, especially if it was someone least expected to want to see the ex-president go down?

NOTE:  The following is an abridged version of a fictional account of the behind the scenes conspiracy to ensure Donald Trump would be convicted using the public record including transcripts of the trial.

My first clue something was afoot came when, the evening after Donald Trump’s conviction, CNN anchor Kaitlin Collins asked lead defense attorney Todd Blanche whether he or his client was responsible for the defense strategy.  In response Blanche told Collins he and Trump made decisions as a team, adding the following justification which was contrary to everything I had ever heard about the attorney/client relationship in a criminal trial.

It was both of us.  If there’s a lawyer that comes in and says that they’re in charge of their defense strategy, they’re not doing a service to their client.

Todd Blanche is no Rudy Giuliani or Jenna Ellis, both of whom have lost their licenses to practice law for malpractice in the service of Trump.  He had experience as a prosecutor and was well thought of in New York legal circles.  Moreover, he had resigned as a partner in one of Wall Street’s most prestigious firms, moved to Florida, bought a home near Mar-a-Lago and started his own firm where Donald Trump would become his primary client.  According to the New York Times, Blanche’s former colleagues during his tenure as prosecutor in the U.S. attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York are baffled by “a striking career move–forfeiting a lucrative law firm partnership to represent a man notorious for cycling through lawyers and ignoring their bills.”

The New York trial is only one of three in which Blanche Law (his new firm) is representing Trump including the Mar-a-Lago documents and the federal January 6 cases.  In these cases, Blanche and his team have focused on ensuring neither goes to trial before the November 5, 2024 election.  One can only imagine why a lawyer who had to deal with Trump’s in-court and out-of-court behavior in a case he had the best chance of winning would want to risk becoming known as a three time loser if the Supreme Court and Aileen Cannon ever let the either two go to trial.  UNLESS, having played in Trump’s legal sandbox for years before the current spate of indictments–he also represented Paul Manafort–he decides, in the national interest, maybe I should help take down this narcissistic psychopath.

If so, he then had to ask, how could I do this?  To see the answer, all you have to do follow the New York falsified business records trial.  Consider the following lists of behaviors and arguments which certainly contributed the jury’s guilty verdict.

1. Involve Trump in decisions related to his defense knowing he will “direct” you to focus on messaging rather than the evidence and the law.
2. Let Trump think that Juror #2’s presence on the panel, because he included Truth Social as one of his news sources, made a hung jury a slam dunk.  On that assumption, Trump was convinced he could now use the trial for political messaging without fear of a conviction.
3. Unleash Trump to attack the judge, judge’s staff, witnesses and jury knowing it would result in a gag order his client would violate, irritating the judge.  All the while, standing stoically beside him to cover his complicity in Trump’s self-destructive behavior.
4. In your opening statement, tell the jury Trump did not have sex with Stormy Daniels.  The jury would know it was a lie, and therefore could not trust anything else Blanche said.
5. When Trump, for some reason, does not demand that his defense team challenge the accounts offered by David Pecker and Hope Hicks, let him have his way.  Was Trump afraid they, especially Pecker, had even more dirt on him?
6. Obviously, vendetta-seeking Trump wanted to use the trial to destroy Stormy Daniels?  Instead, Blanche and his co-counsel Susan Necheles decided to slut-shame her, making her more of a sympathetic witness than she deserved to be.
7. Trump’s motive for dealing with Michael Cohen was the same.  How could Blanche make this backfire?  First, bore the jury to sleep with hours of cross-examination that achieved nothing except to have Cohen simply confirm everything he had admitted during direct questioning.  Second, set up a “gotcha” moment which, maybe just maybe, Blanche suspected the prosecution could undercut with a time-synced video of Trump and his “bag man” Keith Shiller.
8. Trump tells the defense team they have to call Robert Costello to bury Cohen, based on Costello fiery testimony before House Republicans accusing the Biden Administration (without evidence) of weaponizing the Department of Justice.  Blanche knows it will be a disaster based on the emails and text messages provided by the DA’s office during discovery.  But he gives Trump his wish anyway.
9. In his final summation, Blanche continues to tell the jury the payments are for legitimate legal services, something he knows is not true and nobody on the jury will believe.
10. Still unsure if he has convinced the jurors that Trump should be found guilty, Blanche hammers the final nail into his client’s coffin.  In his closing he says, “You cannot send someone to prison, you cannot convict somebody based upon the words of Michael Cohen.”  Blanche knew this inappropriate behavior, referencing sentencing when the juror has no role in that process, would infuriate Judge Merchan.  And Merchan would give the jury curative instructions which would telegraph his displeasure.

One or two unintentional mistakes by a legal team are understandable during a seven week trial.  But ten suggests a strategy.  And there are only two explanations.  Knowing they could not win on the evidence, Blanche risked his reputation so Trump’s appeal lawyers could point to these “errors” and suggest Blanche and his team were guilty of malpractice.  Or, having become frustrated with Trump’s trying to play lawyer, Blanche decided, “I’ll show this know-it-all SOB just how stupid he is.  And I dare him to accuse us of misrepresenting him.”

Where is Occam and his razor when we really need them.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

Happy April 15, a day most salaried workers in America believe should be recognized as April Fools Day when they compare their effective tax rate to those of real estate developers, day traders and hedge fund managers whose net worth dwarfs their own.  But that’s not what I came here to talk about.  Over the past 48 hours Americans have been subjected to a flood of “malarky” that has taxed the human brain beyond any sense of credulity. 

New Hampshire Governor Chris SuNoNo

During Sunday’s edition of ABC’s “This Week,” anchor George Stephanopoulos asked the New Hampshire governor about his support of Donald Trump in spite of his previous statements affirming Donald Trump’s role in the failed January 6, 2000 coup d’état. “You believe that a president who contributed to an insurrection should be president again?”  In a response that could only be imagined as a future teaching moment in Tying Oneself into a Pretzel 101 at the University of New Hampshire, Sununu explained:

His actions absolutely contributed to that. There’s no question about that. I hate the election denialism of 2020. Nobody wants to be talking about that in 2024. I think all of that was absolutely terrible. The reason I am supporting not just the president, but a Republican administration.

To be clear, an elected official, upon taking office as governor of the Granite State, must affirm, “I, NAME, do solemnly swear, that I will bear faith and true allegiance to the United States of America and the state of New Hampshire, and will support the constitution thereof. So help me God. (exact working and emphasis contained in Article 84. Oath of Civil Officers in the NH Constitution),”   Despite taking that oath, John Sununu admitted he will take the Constitution for granted (or is that “for granite” in native New Hampshirese), putting it before party, in return for lower taxes and less regulation.

But that is just half the story.  Does Sununu really believe a second Trump administration is going to be anything but a RINO (Republican in name only)?  Does he also believe Steve Bannon, Stephen Miller, Jeffrey Clark, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Vivek Ramaswamy will govern according to the traditional Republican values of Ronald Reagan, much less his own father former NH governor John Sununu. Let me paraphrase the late Texas senator Lloyd Bentsen, “During my time at the National Governors Association, I got to work with John Sununu, I knew John Sununu, I respected John Sununu.  Chris Sununu, you’re no John Sununu.”

The Road Very Seldom Taken

A quote often attributed to Oscar Wilde is, “When opportunity knocks, open the door.”  This was never more true than this weekend when Iran and its supported network of terror organizations launched a barrage of drones and missiles at Israel in retaliation for the targeted strike that killed an Iranian general in Damascus.  Fortunately, there was minimal property damage and a single injury (ironically a young Bedouin girl).  This outcome was due in part to support from U.S., British and (yes) Jordanian defense forces, one more sign Sunni Arab nations understand the value of alliances with Israel to deter Iranian aggression.

On Sunday morning, Iran’s mission to the United Nations released a statement declaring the drone and missile attack to be sufficient retaliation.  “The matter can be deemed concluded.”  In a subsequent phone call with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Biden advised the Israeli government to “take the win” and avoid any regrettable action that might increase the potential for a full-scale regional war.  The Israeli war cabinet has suggested otherwise but only time will tell if that is bluster or a promise of an actual military response.

Biden also suggested Israel’s next moves should be strategic rather than tactical.  It does not take a McArthur Genius Award winner to understand the Iranian attack is an opportunity to address multiple Israeli strategic goals. 

• Secure release of all the surviving hostages.
• Reverse widespread condemnation of Israel’s execution of the war by the international community.
• Grow and solidify alliances with its Sunni Arab neighbors.

On today’s edition of “Morning Joe,” Israeli government spokesman Avi Hyman seemed to have opened that door.  First, he reminded viewers that Israel is still David, not Goliath.  In reference to Iran, Hyman said, “This is a large country attacking a small country.  It is funding its proxies in terror since the Islamic revolution, whether it’s Hezbollah, Hamas the Houthis, etc.”  He then thanked the U.S., Britain, and “allies in the region” who helped repel the missile attack.

However, when Politico reporter Jonathan Lamere asked whether Israel would heed Biden’s advice, Hyman replied:

As a sovereign nation we will have to make decisions in the best interest of defending our country.  At the beginning of the war we were told not to rush into Gaza, do not go in hotheaded. And we didn’t.  We waited it out.  We went in cool, calm and collected.

Yes, the ultimate decision how best to defend itself lies with Israelis and their government.  To suggest that the response to the October 7 terrorist attack was “cool, calm and collected” is less than credible in light of airstrikes less than 24 hours after Hamas’ attack and the use of bunker bombs in civilian-populated areas.

Political leaders seldom get a chance for a “redo.”  And on those rare occasions, they seldom learn the lessons of their own mistakes.  Hopefully, this time will be different.

The Latest Moon Shot

In his September 1962 speech at Rice University, President John F. Kennedy said, “We go to the moon, not because it is easy, but because it is hard.”  On Friday, House Speaker Mike Johnson gave Ukraine, Israel and U.S. national security a different kind of moon shot by again complicating the passage of the Senate supplement aid package.  He might as well have explained his actions this way.  “We stall this legislation, not because it is hard, but because MAGA likes to make the easy things hard if not impossible.”

Johnson was not the only MAGite citing the threat to Israel from the largely repelled Iranian drone and missile attack without acknowledging the constant destruction and death in Ukraine resulting from drones and missiles launched from by Putin’s Russia.  Therefore, one must ask, why is it okay for the U.S. to actively participate in the downing of Iranian armaments but the MAGA leadership in the House delays funding for Ukrainians to protect their territory without U.S. military forces involvement?  Could it be the influence of extreme evangelicals on MAGA party policies?  If so, would the situation be reversed if the “rapture” was dependent on every Ukrainian returning to their homeland, instead of Jews returning to Israel?

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP