TRUMP’S NEW LAWSUITS AREN’T BULLSHIT

Actually, on a factual, legal basis, Trump’s latest lawsuits, defending his “freedom of speech,” are indeed bullshit. He can sue Facebook, Google and Twitter all he wants about them denying him his First Amendment rights, and even one of the “judges” he appointed would throw the case out as meritless. That’s because the First Amendment applies only to the actions of governmental bodies. I can deny your First Amendment rights to free speech here at this blog by putting you on block and there’s not a damn thing you or anyone else can do about it besides scream and yell and jump up and down. That’s because TCinLA isn’t a state organization. That he got six lawyers to sign these suits (only one of whom can actually practice in Florida, where he filed it) merely shows that ambulance chasers will chase ambulances if they get paid to do so. So, yeah, legally, they’re total bullshit.

The legal merit or lack thereof, however, has nothing whatsoever to do with why he filed the suits and what his goal is in so doing.

This is all about politics, as all his sixty other lawsuits that got laughed out of court in the wake of his loss of the election, were.

All now 63 lawsuits are designed to accomplish one thing: allow Trump to maintain his political control and dominance of the Republican Party. That they get thrown out of court doesn’t matter. What matters is that they keep the base riled up and involved. If you have any doubt of this, take note of the fact that at the same time he was holding his faux “presidential rose garden” press conference yesterday, pretending to be what he no longer is, every sucker on his sucker list, er, I mean his e-mail lists, received a plea for donations “to help me fight this case” in their in-box.

Once Trump knew the jig was up on November 4 - and he did, regardless of what he said in public - he had to find a way to stay relevant to those who voted for him because “he’s fighting for me.” So he performatively kept up the fight. Constant complaints about having the election stolen, constant complaints that the system is rigged against conservatives.

The people who responded to him since 2015 have done so because they are constantly fed a diet of fear, that they are being replaced, that they have no future. This is how authoritarians get activated politically, and Republicans have been doing it consciously ever since one of Ronald Reagan’s campaign consultants stumbled on a poll in 1980 that showed a significant number of people with authoritarian responses were coming over to support that campaign. In the 40 years since, the authoritarians that previously existed in both parties have sorted themselves into the GOP. They now control it by sheer numbers.

Whether Trump actually believes his own bullshit (there’s a strong argument that he does, if you look over the past 50 years he’s been on the scene one way or another) or not, the people who work for him know that keeping the rubes riled is the ticket for his continued ability to keep control of the party.

Traditionally, a failed candidate retires from the scene after conceding, and his supporters spend some time mourning the loss, then the next set of ambitious wannnabees become active as they sort out who will be the replacement as the leader of the opposition. Trump, knowing like all criminals just what danger he was now in now that he didn’t have the protection of being in the White House, realized that the only thing he could call on for a defense was to keep those 70 million who voted for him supporting him. Legal jeopardy gets played out in the public arena.

When someone tells you that all is going to be OK, because the lawsuit can’t go anywhere, just remind yourself this is someone who doesn’t understand the situation. The lawsuit doesn’t have to go anywhere. Just sitting there, for as long as it does until it is pushed aside, keeps Trump in the driver’s seat in the Republican Party. It keeps the grift going with money coming in - as the old saying goes, “A fool and his money are soon parted.” That’s what Trump’s known from the very first minute he stepped onto the public stage. Whether it’s selling the “Trump” brand on buildings, or Trump University, or the Trump Foundation, or the Trump Party, it’s all about keeping the rubes sending their cash.

Never ever judge anything Trump does by the rules of whatever it is he appears to be doing. Always look at it to see where the only thing that matters to him - “what’s in it for me?” - is working. His businesses may have failed, his presidency may have failed; control of the Trump Party is all he has left, and everything he does is to maintain that control.

Follow. The. Money. With Trump, it works every time.