The first day of the shebeen’s dance with the 'rona certainly got off to a flying start. The FBI calls the Secret Service and says, 'Hey, dudes, we showed what we know to a judge and he said we could come to Mar-a-Lago and look for evidence of criming, so would you guys leave the door unlocked, OK?' And the Secret Service says, 'Sure, drop on by and stay as long as you like. We’ll leave some bottled water in the fridge.' And so the FBI came to Mar-a-Lago.
And I, in my isolation, learned about it from…THE DESK OF THE 45TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES at 6:52 p.m.
These are dark times for our Nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents. Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before. After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate. It is prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024, especially based on recent polls, and who will likewise do anything to stop Republicans and Conservatives in the upcoming Midterm Elections. Such an assault could only take place in broken, Third-World Countries. Sadly, America has now become one of those Countries, corrupt at a level not seen before. They even broke into my safe!
The exclamation point makes it art.
From there, I had to wait for TV news to catch up, and the first place I went—and this may have been a result of my illness—was to the Fox News Channel, where hysteria reigned. For the first several hours (it being August, when nothing ever happens), we were treated to substitute anchors, young tyros fairly lusting after the main chance. Were I one of the regular anchors, I’d hire food tasters as soon as I get back to the office. These were lean and hungry types, and they eagerly tied into the programmed paranoia with their guests, who were appropriately outraged at the unprecedented events unfolding in Florida. Jonathan Turley continued his descent into the screaming void, where Alan Dershowitz is waiting for him, writing nasty letters of the editors of the Vineyard Gazette.
But the evening in Bedlam was mostly divided between warnings about—or, if you will, threats of—violent reaction and some bravura performances of Bad Analogy Theater. They played all the golden oldies. One of the ambitious young Foxsters referenced how “the Clintons stole $200,000” worth of furniture when they left the White House, a W-era canard that was debunked when the twerp was in diapers. Hunter Biden’s laptop got a serious workout on all sides. Eric Trump mentioned Benghazi, Benghazi!, BENGHAZI!, as well as the old Uranium One business.
Eventually, however, the regulars were back. Hannity comforted Eric, who apparently was the only Trump on duty Monday night. Meanwhile, Laura Ingraham appeared to be on the edge of complete HIGH-sterics, as my mother would have said. Her dudgeon was joined at its lofty height by Mark Levin, and those two voices should never be allowed on TV at the same time. I’m not kidding. Their voices sterilized frogs in Manitoba.
That was it for me, given my weakened condition. But I did come away with a feeling that we’d all be better off if the media stopped hyping the “historic” and “unprecedented” nature of the events. The more these events are spun that way, the more the excitable people get ginned up to feel like prominent actors in a world-historical conflict. The Republican elite is more than willing to encourage them in their delusions of bloody grandeur. From the Washington Post:
“Merrick Garland, Chris Wray, come to the House Judiciary Committee this Friday and answer our questions about this action … which has never happened in American history,” [Rep. Jim] Jordan said on Fox News. “What was on the warrant? What were you really doing? What were you looking for?”
Bunk. This is an investigation into a possible federal crime. No legitimate aura of authority surrounds ex-presidents. The republic can survive the investigation, indictment and even the conviction of a former president, no matter what that old fool Gerry Ford thought back in 1974. But nothing permanent can be done about the reaction until someone or something knocks from a lot of heads the notion that every political defeat is Concord Bridge and that every pronouncement from their favorite TV news star is a message from Thomas Paine from beyond the grave. In 2016 (albeit with some help from abroad), the country elected a grubby little crook riding America’s longest lucky streak to be its president. Now the bill has come due.
This wasn’t a presidency, it was a burglary. And they got caught.
Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976. He lives near Boston and has three children.
