However, there is some sense in the US.

[flatandy]

He certainly seemed guilty as far as I could tell from all the details I saw.

Committed fraud in order to try and change the election, which is what made it a felony offence.

Very unlikely he'll go to prison, I reckon. The only reason he might is all his contempt of court stuff.

[voice]

He's crying now like a dropped baby, 'whaaa, its all rigged, i'm being persecuted, followed by some incoherent rambling about imigrants'

[voice]

even if he's handed a jail term, the appeals will take years and cos of who he is he'll remain free till the end of the process, so will unlikely ever to see the inside of a jail cell, that's the real two tier justice system.

Funny seeing how much he's wailing he was not allowed to defend himself while refusing to testify in his own defence.

[voice]

sentencing in July

[marechal]

Hahaha. Great news, although being a convicted felon is just one more reason for the law-and-order types cultists to love him.

He can still run for president, but he won't even be able to vote for himself now. Again, hahaha. The poor whining, mound of jiggling excrement.

[flatandy]

The whiny pathetic whine when he came out of the court was just astonishingly pathetic and whiny.

[marechal]

A victim mentality, habitual liar, life-long fraud, malpeasant orange a$$hole. What's not to like?

[voice]

pArTy oF lAw aNd oRdEr...

[mids]

Is this what the Americans call a "misdemeanor".

[mids]

I see the BBC has declared a week of celebrations.

[perrykneeham]

Yep. The BBC has gone all pull-out-and-keep commemorative colour supplement over this "historic" event. I'm not sure it's even remarkable: Trump was, and remains, a creepy tosser. The USA is an embarassing shithole. I think we knew all of that already.

[moggyonspeed]

Agree with pretty much all of that.

An interesting take for me is that the US of A clearly thinks that it is OK for a convicted felon to run for POTUS, but it is decidedly NOT OK to run for the office if you were born outside its hallowed shores. It's as if being born in "Foreignland" (which none of us can do anything about) is a greater crime than being a convicted bully, fraudster, liar, sexual predator etc. etc. (which Trump could have chosen, all along, NOT to be).

Strange place.

[mids]

Yeah, that is a bit weird. Although obviously Obama was born in Kenya but we all know that.

[perrykneeham]

Also, while Trump is a world-class cunt with ears, it's not like he's the first PoTUS to have disgraced himself. Of course there was Nixon but, for my money, it was Clinton who really screwed the poochUS.

[Repat Van]

May 31, 2024 9:27:49 GMT moggyonspeed said:

Agree with pretty much all of that.

An interesting take for me is that the US of A clearly thinks that it is OK for a convicted felon to run for POTUS, but it is decidedly NOT OK to run for the office if you were born outside its hallowed shores. It's as if being born in "Foreignland" (which none of us can do anything about) is a greater crime than being a convicted bully, fraudster, liar, sexual predator etc. etc. (which Trump could have chosen, all along, NOT to be).

Strange place.

I think what is also strange (if true) is that a convicted felon can run but not vote for him/self (or others) apparently?

Very odd.

And the point about place of birth has always struck me as odd.

I get they are worried about split localities but somebody born in the USA but lived their entire life overseas is qualified to run for office but not somebody born overseas but who has spent their entire life in the USA.

[flatandy]

May 31, 2024 10:26:25 GMT perrykneeham said:

Also, while Trump is a world-class cunt with ears, it's not like he's the first PoTUS to have disgraced himself. Of course there was Nixon but, for my money, it was Clinton who really screwed the poochUS.

Obviously Nixon committed actual crimes and Clinton behaved in an abusive way. But neither of them was convicted of felonies.

Nixon aligns better with this Trump trial, because both committed their crimes for political gain.

There's an irony that billions are spent on US Presidential campaigns, money is so loose in US politics, but even so Trump managed to f**k up a few hundred thousand in a way that managed to breach campaign finance laws because he was such a penny pinching arse and simultaneously needed to try and silence a woman he shagged. But that it was a really stupid crime to have committed doesn't mean it's not a federal crime, which is why this is a bigger deal than Nixon or Clinton.

Obviously, Trump having previous been found liable for rape in a civil case means that just on the sexual abuse side of things he's a bigger deal than Clinton.

And, of course, there are the other trials which are both much bigger deals still if he's convicted and which - under normal circumstances - would result in long prison sentences. The one in Florida where he hoarded loads of top secret documents in places where all the public had access and where he waved nuclear submarine details around in front of people he was trying to impress is the kind of thing the US normally gets incredibly angry about and where people done for breaching US security protocol get locked up for many years. And the one where he was specifically leaning on people in Georgia to get them to fraudulently declare extra votes is much more direct election fiddling where the cause and effect is not so subtle. And we have recordings and transcripts that show both are true, even if we don't yet know if he will be prosecuted for them.

He is in a different class of crook to previous US Presidents, and we know it. But this is still the first time any President or ex-Prez has been convicted so it's properly notable. If you think how many Nixon movies have been made, you'll know that Nixon's crookery was a massive news deal, so the BBC should have reported that in depth. This is a step beyond.

[flatandy]

By the way, allowing felons to stand for President is weird, but I think you could posasibly justify it.

He probably will be allowed to vote, because the Florida statute can be waived by deSantis. It would have been funny but it seems like it's not a thing. The Florida statute that stops felons from voting is of course itself completely undemocratic.

The born overseas thing is f**k*d up. Although if Britain had it, you wouldn't have had Boris Johnson which might have been helpful.

[perrykneeham]

I still think Clinton's non-crime, and his subsequent excrutiating display of blatantly dishonourable behaviour were, curiously, more corrosive and damaging than either Trump or Nixon.

Clinton broke America, at home and abroad. It's never recovered it's prestige and is regarded with contempt on the international scene. Worse, it's pitied.

[flatandy]

I think the US's sh*t prestige abroad has little to do with Clinton's sex abuse and much more to do with cynical or just bad foreign policy decisions since at least Kennedy.

You might be right that Clinton was more corrosive than Trump because people thought Clinton had mostly been OK and then found out that he'd been abusive. Everyone's always known that Trump's appalling - we know he's committed a bunch of crimes and a whole bunch of other abuses - so there's no revelation about him that could change peoples' perceptions.

It remains true, though, that none of the others ever got convicted of anything. Trump may be less corrosive, but he is orders of magnitude more appalling.

[perrykneeham]

Oddly, Clinton's actions just seem worse because they were something and nothing. It was a wierd, creepy thing that he should have just said he did, or refused to engage with it as a private matter. As it was, he tried to weasel it and it spiralled totally out of control.

The World was watching. I don't think America's prestige was damaged by apparent foreign policy decisions at that point. Yeah, there had been Nam, BoP, etc., but the US was still World's Policeman. I grant you that many poor decisions had been made, but those hadn't really borne bitter fruit until the end of the Clinton era, when the wheels started to come off big style.