A Liberal Dose
June 6, 2024
“Donald Trump: Now
and Forever a Convicted Felon”
Troy D. Smith
I am temporarily interrupting my attempt to outline the
history of Israel and Palestine, important as I think that is, to address the
historic events of last week.
For the first time in our nation’s history, a former
president of the United States has been convicted of felonies in a court of
law. 34 counts. Simultaneously, for the first time in the history of our
country a convicted felon is the presumptive presidential candidate for one of
the two major political parties. Of course, we’ve had a lot of firsts with this
particular criminal. There’s never been a president who was impeached twice (in
fact, this president has had half of all the impeachments in presidential history).
There’s never been a former president even indicted for crimes. There’s never
been a former president found liable in civil court for fraud and sexual
assault. There’s never been a president who incited, encouraged, and cheered on
a civil insurrection that involved an assault on the Capitol and efforts to
kill his own vice-president.
A lot of people voted for this criminal in 2016 because they
said he didn’t act like a politician, and boy were they right about that. None
of us guessed then just how much worse than a regular politician a carnival
huckster could be.
I know that many people in America are disappointed in this
verdict, and even angry about it. That is understandable; people usually want
their hero to win, and Donald Trump is a hero to a lot of people. Many of those
people are saying the trial was a sham, a rigged process, an effort by
Democrats to take down a challenger to the incumbent from their party. I
understand their feeling that way -but they are wrong. This verdict came from
twelve jurors made up of the defendant’s peers, after hearing all the evidence
and weighing it in their minds -even though some of them lean very
conservative. This is how our system works. This is how our system is SUPPOSED
to work. If his other three trials ever get before a jury, THAT will be
justice, no matter which way that jury decides after presentation of the evidence.
I posit that the injustice in this whole process is not that
the conviction happened in a state that leans much more liberal than many other
states; the federal government and the Democratic Party had nothing to do with
the trial. The injustice is with those other three trials, which have been
delayed and delayed by judges appointed by Trump, in hopes of pushing them past
the election so they won’t affect his chances of winning and so if he does win
he can call them off because he is president. A jury needs to decide those
cases, and the public should have a chance to know what that jury decides
BEFORE any votes are cast.
But we do know what happened in this one. Donald Trump was
convicted on all counts. Now and forever, he is a convicted felon. Not that
long ago, that would have permanently ended a politician’s career… but a lot
has changed since the criminal first rode down that golden escalator to
announce his candidacy. Well, maybe nothing has changed, but a lot more has
become apparent about America and who we are, who we want to be, and who we are
willing to be.
I’ve seen people comparing Trump, yet again, to Jesus
-saying Jesus was also convicted in a sham trial but they still follow him. This
strikes me as blatant idolatry- but not any more than all the other Trump-is-Jesus
memes that floated around before this. It’s worth noting, though, that Jesus
told his followers to lay down their weapons when he was arrested. Trump does
the opposite, and in fact judges, attorneys, reporters, Democratic officials,
and just known liberals have been receiving physical threats from Trump
supporters. I know pearls are being clutched tightly as I say this, amid cries
of “fake news.”
But I believe the felon will lose the upcoming election, and
will not be able to permanently stymie those other, federal, investigations.
The evidence will be presented, and jurors will evaluate it. I believe we will
watch it happen in the next year or two, and the felony convictions will keep
piling up.
None of this will matter to some people. But it will matter
to just enough voters to change their minds on election day. The end is in
sight for Donald Trump.
--Troy D.
Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at
Tennessee Tech and serves on the executive committee of the Tennessee
Democratic Party. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.
Buy the book A Liberal Dose: Communiques from the Holler by Troy D. Smith HERE
You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE
A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE
Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com
The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE
