Philip Rosmarin

 

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

Where I practice law, until 2012 it was a felony to commit the kind of libel Donald Trump committed when he falsely accused Barack Obama of wiretapping the billionaire liar.

The idea that the former President would even want to do such a thing to the now current-President kind of tickles the silly-meter.

How, for starters, could anyone begin to evaluate the credibility of the “intelligence” gleaned there, if that’s using the right word for anything that goes on in Trump Tower.

What Trump says under the influence of Kentucky Fried Chicken is about as valuable as what most people might say under the influence of torture — though I may have just recollected the same thing twice.

The New York Times put a meter on the man last September and found he lied on average about thirty-one times a week. And that’s just the whoppers he told in public.

Every President has lied. I don’t believe that story about the cherry tree for one damn second. But this is the first President who is supporting a whole cottage industry of people gamely trying to keep up with the count of the lies he tells. And, like the man himself would say of the New York Times, failing.

 

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

President Donald Trump has every Constitutional right to nominate whomever he likes to the Supreme Court. So did President Barack Obama.

In both instances, the Senate of the United States had every Constitutional obligation to advise and consent to or veto those nominations.

The Senate unconstitutionally refused to do its duty in the case of Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland. The executive branch of our government — perhaps from hubris, or a failure of imagination to see that, disgusted with politics, the American people would take short-sighted revenge and elevate a television buffoon to the Presidency — declined to sue the legislative branch for that dereliction.

Now the high court chickens come home to roost in yet another revolting display of the bipartisan hypocrisy we’re wholly accustomed to see ooze all over these D.C. barbecues.

Neil Gorsuch is eminently qualified to be a Supreme Court Justice of the United States.

He’s just not the Justice to replace Antonin Scalia that, had the Senate any actual respect for the Constitution, the American people deserved. Maybe next time, but not this time.

 

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

Near as I can tell, these are the key things to know about the new Republican President’s members of the Cabinet (with thanks to NBC News):

Vice President Mike Pence

• Master of the steely-eyed gaze, though CNN and other top fake news outlets report it’s probably the result of a medical condition.

• Persuaded Syrian refugees they’d like Illinois much better than Indiana.

• Treats gays no better and no worse than any other lesbian, bi, or transgender pervert.

• Converted to Republican Party after listening to Ronald Reagan, though because he was only a teenager when he heard Reagan say, “By golly, I’m the richest man in six counties,” he might not have understood Bedtime for Bonzo was only a movie.

• Never did become a billionaire anyway.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson

• Personal friend of President Putin, so knows his way around presidents.

• No government or public service experience, so he knows his way around our President.

• Only half a billionaire (though who knows how much he’s got in Russia).

Secretary of Defense James Mattis

• Marine general, but retired, so isn’t sure it’s “Oorah!” or “Rahoo!”

• Wishes President Trump would call him “Mad Dog” maybe only every other time.

• Agrees with Congress that civilian control of military just a silly old cornerstone of American democracy.

• Disagrees with President and Tillerson that Russia isn’t really a threat but more of a business opportunity.

• The “Warrior Monk” is a mere millionaire.

Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin

• Knows almost as much about going bankrupt as his new boss.

• Said he would make sure any issues about the President’s foreign debts would go away as soon as possible.

• Gained a lot of good experience by foreclosing on loads of active-duty military families.

• Hopes that will make up for otherwise no government experience.

• Barely worth three hundred million dollars.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions

• Can’t understand those Democrats who think he won’t defend minority groups just because he never has before.

• Thinks LGBTQ folk already have way too many protections and letters.

• All those racist comments he made when running for judge were just because he didn’t really want the job.

• Another near pauper with six million bucks to spend.

CIA Director Mike Pompeo

• Not really in favor of waterboarding, though might bring it back for old times’ sake, but would like to hear more about those “other torture things” the President mentioned.

• Agrees Russians interfered with U.S. election, but how else you gonna explain what happened?

• Support for mass surveillance of everyday Americans made him the perfect candidate for top spy.

• Keeping his net worth a secret, just to prove he can keep a secret.

Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross

• When asked about his public service, asked, “What’s public service?”

• Never met a subprime mortgage he didn’t like.

• Perfect for overseeing bankruptcies.

• Billionaire, natch.

Secretary of Health & Human Services Tom Price

• Would implement Republicans’ Obamacare replacement plan, if only they had one.

• Says the health care industry legislation he sponsored or co-sponsored during alleged insider trading deals were just forty-four lucky coincidences.

• Promises to give everyone access to health care, even if they can’t actually get any.

• Two-figure multimillionaire.

Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao

• Already been in Labor, time to get moving.

• Is there no one who doesn’t like this person?

• Oh, wait…she’s married to Mitch McConnell.

• This person is a saint.

• She’s got twenty-four million dollars, but it’s not her fault: her dad was a shipping magnate — another reason she’s perfect for Transportation.

Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos

• Already agreed to do the job before learning it had something to do with public education.

• Felt better when realized she’d be able to get the public to pay for private schools.

• Felt even better when somebody suggested she might even de-fund public schools altogether.

• Came perilously close to a principled stand the other day.

• Yup, billionaire.

Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly

• Retired Marine four-star general.

• Goes where no military man has gone before.

• Must keep straight face while implementing the President’s immigration proposals.

• Don’t tell Trump, but thinks the idea of walling off Mexico hilarious.

• Millionaire.

Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin

• Promoted from Undersecretary of Veterans Affairs.

• First Trump guy unanimously approved.

• Actually a real doctor, if not a real veteran.

• A millionaire, but only just.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley

• Pledged to speak up when she disagrees with President Trump, but then heard he’s going around firing people who disagree with him.

• Relieved to learn the President doesn’t really talk much with his Cabinet anyway.

• Would have warned him about that two-state Israel/Palestine thing if Trump really did talk much with his Cabinet.

• Doesn’t support a Muslim registry, but may have thought they were talking about a wedding registry.

• Not even two million dollars.

Administrator of the EPA Scott Pruitt

• Sued the EPA more times than Elizabeth Taylor sued for divorce.

• Promises to reconsider his crusade to destroy the EPA.

• Believes the climate changes, but people can’t do anything about it.

• Loves oil.

• Really, really loves oil.

• Five million dollars at best.

Budget Director Mick Mulvaney

• Tea Party guy, welcome to the T Party.

• Would rather shut down the government than increase the budget, and brother, shutting down the government sounds good to me lately.

• Forgot to budget pesky payroll taxes for the nanny, but promises to do better with the national purse.

• Three million Washingtons.

Administrator of the Small Business Administration Linda McMahon

• Literally the only appointment the President has wrestled over.

• Been trying to get to Washington for years, but failed in two Senatorial bids.

• Donated five million dollars to the Donald J. Trump Foundation, millions more to Republican candidates.

• Co-founder of World Wrestling Entertainment — fake sport.

• Ten years ago, her husband, Vince, “wrestled” Donald Trump, using seconds, the winner of the match to shave the loser’s head. Because it was a fake sport, Donald won.

• They called it the Battle of the Billionaires.

• They’re all still billionaires. There are more to come.

If only Vince had won, and shaved Donald’s stupid orange hair, who knows?

 

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

The Amnesty International Annual Report on human rights followed hard on the heels of the similar work by Human Rights Watch I wrote about last month.

“2016,” says Amnesty International, “saw the idea of human dignity and equality, the very notion of a human family, coming under vigorous and relentless assault from powerful narratives of blame, fear and scapegoating, propagated by those who sought to take or cling on to power at almost any cost.”

In case you spent all of 2016 prepping your appearance on “Dancing with the Stars,” as Hillary Clinton apparently did, they’re talking about places like Aleppo, “pounded to dust by air strikes and street battles;” Yemen; Myanmar; mass murder in South Sudan; Turkey; Bahrain — and the rise of hate speech in the United States, contributing to a world that in 2016 “became a darker and more unstable place.”

It takes Amnesty International’s four-hundred-nine-page report all of three paragraphs to get to the foremost cheerleader of vile vocalization.

It marks the election of Donald Trump following a campaign of frequent deeply divisive misogynistic and xenophobic statements, of promises to roll back established civil liberties and introduce policies “profoundly inimical to human rights.”

In other words, Amnesty International won’t be invited to any White House press briefings anytime soon.

 

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

I recently heard the new Republican President describe himself, with the degree of humility to which he if not the nation has grown accustomed, as the most Presidential of heads of state in history, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln.

And so it was heartening to read these words of Lincoln, possibly even more Presidential than his party successor, urging the electorate to give him four more years in the midst of civil war:

While the people retain their virtue, and vigilance, no administration, by any extreme of wickedness or folly, can very seriously injure the government, in the short space of four years.

So how bad can it be when the leader of the Free World labels the media — specifically the New York Times, NBC News, ABC, CBS, and CNN (isolating those fakes from their more distinguished brethren Breitbart News and Alex Jones) — the enemy of the American people.

You know what we do with the enemies of the American people.

Maybe one, or two, reporters will be assassinated as a direct result of criminal incitement to violence by the President of the United States. Half a dozen, tops.