Our society is split into political factions so wide and deep they sometimes seem separated by an ideological Grand Canyon. Extremists on both sides describe the other in apocalyptic terms.
In this, one side is right; the other is wrong.
This November, the wrong side will vote for a convicted felon. This adds a new twist to the national conversation that’s never happened before.
Rather than acknowledge his crime, which was a conspiracy to steal the 2016 presidential election, this felon is waging an all-out assault on our entire system of justice, which is one of the cornerstones of the American concept of democracy.
Don’t get me wrong. Our criminal justice system is far from perfect and I‘m well aware of its weaknesses. A good place to start is “Injustice for All” by Annie Struck (1977). But even with its flaws, it is worth defending.
Meanwhile, what exactly is a felon? A person who has been convicted of the most serious kinds of crime., and that would be approximately one in 12 U.S. adults. The four most common categories are drug crimes, violent crimes, theft and sex crimes.
White-collar crimes, which is what the presumptive Republican nominee committed, account for only 3 percent of federal prosecutions. It is estimated that 90 percent of such crimes go unreported.
Much has been made by supporters of our would-be Felon-in-Chief that the prosecutors in New York resorted to a novel legal theory to convict him, but then again, he presented them with a novel set of circumstances:
An ex-President who conspired (successfully) to steal the election in 2016.
When he lost his bid for re-election in 2020, he incited supporters to riot at the Capitol to overthrow the results.
Incredibly, he now is running for a third time, despite multiple trials in multiple venues over his attempts to overthrow the results of the 2016 and 2020 elections.
From the results of the New York trial verdict, it can be reasonably inferred that he would also be convicted in his other three criminal trials — if and when they take place.
In that event, he would be a repeat felon and a serial election-stealer.
The mere presence of this man and his megalomanic desire for power is stretching our criminal justice system to its breaking point. As such, he ought to be known as The Man Who Would Destroy Our Democracy.
And as such, he cannot be said to have committed “victimless” crimes. There are hundreds of millions of victims. They are called Americans.
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