With the same sick irony that had Trump’s second inauguration fall on Martin Luther King, Jr’s birthday, Easter Sunday, this year, falls on the 136th birthday of one of Trump’s main idols, Mr. Hitler. On a personal note, two years ago today I was wheeled out of the David Koch pavilion of the #1 hospital for orthopedics fourteen years in a row, into the sunshine of a nice spring day, with a brand new titanium and chromium left knee. Presently I am unable to walk around the block with my six year-old neighbor, which I miss. Seeing the world through the eyes of a bright young kid is a wonderful thing, particularly in springtime, as is being able to walk without pain.
But enough with the personal sob stories. Today is the day that the myopic intellectuals and reactionary lawyers employed by far right billionaires submit their arguments to the Leader for why he should impose a version of martial law under the 1807 Insurrection Act so that he can use the military to end these large demonstrations by US citizens increasingly organizing against Project 2025’s determinedly fascist moves. After all, Trumpie has already used emergency war powers to arrest, detain and deport US residents for indefinite stays in a cool 43 year-old dictator’s super-max prison for “terrorists”. What war, you ask? Dubya and Cheney’s “War on Terror” authorized by Congress shortly after 9/11 under the AUMF [1], an authorization that made the illegal invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq perfectly kosher and that never expires, apparently. If the president calls it “terror”, who is Congress to question that?
As soon as he was in the Oval Office Trump issued an executive order calling for a report, within 90 days, from the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Homeland Security Director, assessing the need to invoke the Insurrection Act for the “emergency” at the southern border. Today is day 90 since inauguration day. Pete Hegseth and Kristi Noem will sign whatever report is put in front of them, one of the conditions for their appointment as Trump ass-lickers, the same condition accepted by everyone in MAGA.
Presumably, at some point today, probably this evening when the Leader is done cheating at golf to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, the press will announce what Hegseth, Noem, Mike Flynn, Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon, Samuel Alito, Leonard Leo, Charles Koch et al have decided about the president’s right to invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act. I’m not a betting man, but it’s not hard to guess what this crew of insane, ethically compromised haters will endorse. Particularly now that public opposition to Trump’s purposefully mad leadership is mounting and even reaching some in his own party.
The likeliest outcome, it saddens me to say, is a conspiracy among these lawless maniacs, on the brink of their longtime dream of American fascism, to create a mass death event at some peaceful assembly, call it “terrorism,” blame several marginalized groups for the act they themselves organized and carried out, and bring down the curtain on American democracy once and for all with legally sanctioned state violence. State violence to repress violence they themselves provoke (and often perpetrate as an excuse for martial law) is the go to move of every dictator.
As former civil liberties advocate turned Nazi defender Alan Dershowitz said, defending Trump during his second impeachment for inciting an insurrection, that if the president truly thinks the Jews are using space lasers to unfairly destabilize his absolute rule, he has the right to do whatever he feels is necessary to stop them from using these immensely powerful imaginary weapons in a way that harms the nation. In the words of Nixon, echoed by John Roberts and the Five Moral Dwarves in the unironically captioned Trump v. US, “when the president does it, that means it is not illegal.”
Happy Easter to my Christian friends and may the mercy of the Eternal be upon us all as we wait for the ABC headline.
[1] Wikipedia: The Authorization for Use of Military Force is a joint resolution of the United States Congress which became law on September 18, 2001, authorizing the use of the United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the September 11 attacks. The authorization granted the president the authority to use all “necessary and appropriate force” against those whom he determined “planned, authorized, committed or aided” the September 11 attacks, or who harbored said persons or groups. Wikipedia
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