FORMER FIRST LADY ROSALYNN CARTER PASSES, AT AGE 96

by Vijaya Chandrasoma

Colorado voters failed in their efforts to disqualify former president Donald Trump from the state ballot for the 2024 presidential election. However, District Court Judge Sarah Wallace, in her ruling stated, “To be clear, part of the Court’s decision is its reluctance to embrace an interpretation which would disqualify a presidential candidate without a clear, unmistakable indication….of intent”.

“Trump cultivated a culture that embraced political violence…. He responded to growing threats of violence and intimidation in the lead-up to the certification by amplifying his false claims of election fraud. He convened a large crowd on the date of the certification in Washington DC, focused them on the certification process, told them their country was stolen from them, called for strength and action, and directed them to the Capitol where the certification was about to take place”.

Judge Wallace’s conclusion hinged on one factor, whether Trump was “an officer of the United States as the framers of the 14th Amendment envisioned”. It was deemed that a president of the United States is not an “officer of the United States”, because the 14th Amendment did not contain the word “president”. Trump’s lawyers argued that an earlier draft of the 14th Amendment included the presidency and the vice-presidency in the list of disqualified officers, but the fact that it was later removed was clear evidence that the framers’ intention was that the president and vice-president were not to be included in the list.

A preposterous ruling, as the Amendment includes all those who have sworn allegiance to the Constitution, which is the first action of the new President before he (or hopefully, some day soon, she) formally assumes the presidency. As Trump did in January 2017, after which the Bible on which he had taken the oath was found to have spontaneously burst into flames.

Sadly, in this case, as in others involving Trump and his co-defendants, the judiciary seems to be bending backwards in giving them the benefit of the doubt of every technicality in the book. Law enforcement treats Trump with kid gloves, avoiding the treatment and punishment regularly meted out to criminals arrested on lesser crimes.

The only excuse for such lenient treatment by the government towards these criminals is probably because there has never been a precedent of a twice-impeached former president who has been convicted on sexual assault and fraud, and arrested and on bail on four indictments and 91 felonies.

And I cannot stress with more contemptuous amazement that such a criminal remains the front-runner as the nominee for the 2024 presidency of the Republican Party; and currently favored to regain the highest position of the land, an office he disgraced so comprehensively from 2017 to 2021. A presidential term when the global reputation of the United States plummeted to depths never seen, indeed imagined, in its history.

My use of the word “global” excludes Russia, North Korea, Hungary, Argentina, and other nations with equally corrupt and kleptocratic leaders. And sadly, even some ill-informed third world citizens, even Sri Lankans, who have perhaps become immune to the pestilence of crooked, corrupt elected officials.

The petitioners will appeal Judge Wallace’s ruling to the Colorado Supreme Court by next week. The Court has the discretion to decline hearing the case. However, the majority of the Justices of the Colorado Supreme Court has been appointed by Democratic governors.

Neil Kumar Katyal, former Obama administration Acting Solicitor General, is an acclaimed constitutional lawyer of East Indian origin, who has argued more cases before the US Supreme Court than any other minority lawyer. Katyal has also argued numerous cases before the Colorado Supreme Court. During a recent interview with Jen Psaki, who has served as President Biden’s Press Secretary, Katyal stated that Judge Wallace’s reluctant legal conclusions were constitutionally irrational. When asked if he would argue the case before the Colorado Supreme Court, his unhesitating and enthusiastic response: “Hell, Yeah!”

Judge Wallace’s ruling will provide a road map for voters in other states to petition the disqualification of Trump in their states. Perhaps this was the Judge’s intention in the first place, to incriminate Trump while indicating her impartiality by making an obviously unconstitutional ruling, overtly favoring the criminal.

Unfortunately, whatever the ruling of the Colorado Supreme Court, or that of any other state, these cases are likely to end up in the Supreme Court of the United States, with its bought and paid for 6/3 Republican majority. The highest court in the land, a proven corrupt body more concerned with right-wing ideology rather than constitutional justice.

There is one major advantage in Judge Wallace’s reluctant ruling. Her conclusion that Trump was guilty of inciting a violent insurrection to disrupt the constitutional certification of President-elect Biden’s presidency, can and will be used as evidence in the Washington DC federal case against Trump.

Trump

District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, the presiding judge in the Washington DC case, has imposed gag orders to prevent him from disparaging or threatening her, and special counsel Jack Smith and his family, as he has been doing in the past. The gag order also includes threatening and intimidating other prosecutors and witnesses involved in the case. Trump has already violated this gag order, calling the judge “prejudiced” and Special Counsel Smith “deranged”, his wife and family “Trump Haters”, with no justification whatsoever.

Judge Chutkan is known to be a very fair but disciplined judge, not in the least intimidated by Trump’s vulgar arrogance and his threats, as dangerous as they may be. Trump is about to discover that his threats may not be covered by his First Amendment rights and do not constitute election subversion, as his lawyers contend.

Trump is also about to find out that his pathological narcissism, which has led him to believe that he is above the law, is not without consequences, and may involve fines, sanctions, even the incarceration he so richly deserves.

Such incarceration may be a prelude to the rest of his miserable life after he is convicted of the multiple felonies with which he has been charged. When that happens, the greatest tragedy in his narcissistic mind will be that his so-called “base” will do nothing, as they did nothing when he was arrested on 91 felonies in four jurisdictions. No “death and destruction”, no “blood in the streets”, not even a “civil war”, as he and his enablers predicted would erupt if he was arrested. The lack of even token protests during these arrests may be a portent that many in his “base” now see him for what he really is; what some moderate members of the Republican Party are also finally beginning to acknowledge: that Trump is a dangerously maniacal loser.

The gradual decline in his popularity in the Republican polls, and the rise in that of his Republican rivals, notably Nikki Haley, though slow, is significant. As is the fact that the Republican Party has performed abysmally in every election, local and national, including the recent elections in 37 states, since Trump won the presidency in 2016. Proof that polls do not necessarily translate into votes.

Despite his current, prohibitive lead for the nomination for the Republican candidacy in the 2024 election, it is on the cards that Trump will be prevented, one legal way or another, from being a candidate for the 2024 presidency.

As for his First Amendment defense, Renee Griffin, University of Michigan Law School, writes in her treatise, “Searching for Truth in the First Amendment’s True Threat Doctrine”:

“A threat is a grotesquely powerful weapon. Threats of violence (death threats, or threats that imply bodily harm), even when not carried out, can inflict real damage. But threats are also speech, and free speech is broadly protected by the First Amendment”.

The criminalization of threats is, nonetheless, feasible within the First Amendment. There are Supreme Court precedents denying First Amendment protections to “true threats” which may jeopardize the sanctity of criminal proceedings.

Biden

Trump’s threats have already met this benchmark of “true threats”, as they have resulted, on more than one occasion, in mental distress, even bodily harm to his political opponents and their families.

The attack on former Speaker, Nancy Pelosi’s husband, 82-year-old Paul Pelosi in October 2022 by Trump supporter, David DePape, immediately comes to mind.

DePape broke into the Pelosi residence in San Francisco and brutally attacked Paul Pelosi with a hammer, fracturing his skull, which required extensive surgery. Pelosi was saved from almost certain death when the police arrived in response to a 911 call he had made when he first realized there was an intruder in the house. Speaker Pelosi was in Washington DC at the time of the attack.

At his trial, DePape confessed that the attack was motivated by far-right conspiracy theories, including Trump’s false claims about a “stolen election”. He had planned to hold Nancy Pelosi hostage, having broken her kneecaps so that she would be wheeled into Congress, “as a warning to others”. He also admitted that he had additional targets, naming California Governor, Gavin Newsom, actor Tom Hanks and President Biden’s son, Hunter.

In other news, former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, wife of former President Jimmy Carter passed away peacefully at the age of 96, at their home in Plains, Georgia, on Sunday, November 19.

Jimmy Carter and his wife of 77 years, Rosalynn enjoyed the longest presidential marriage in the history of the nation. They have been personally involved, since 1984, in building and renovating homes with Habitat for Humanity. Rosalynn, one of the nation’s leading mental health advocates for much of her life, was suffering from dementia for months, which probably hastened her death.

Carter, 99 years of age, said, “Rosalynn was my equal partner in everything I have ever accomplished. She gave me wise guidance and encouragement when I needed it. As long as Rosalynn was in the world, I knew someone loved and supported me”. Carter was one of finest, most progressive, yet most underestimated presidents of the United States in the 20th century. He was unquestionably the best ex-president in the nation’s history.

Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002, “for his decades of untiring efforts to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social welfare”.On a happier note, President Biden celebrated his 81st birthday last Monday, November 20.

Predictably, the narcissistic Trump, who is 77-years old, celebrated President Biden’s 81st birthday with an open letter from his physician that “he (Trump) is in excellent physical and mental health and will continue to enjoy a healthy active lifestyle for years to come”. Certainly not a convincing prognosis, considering his obesity, his physical imbalance and the gaffes he makes at campaign rallies. During a recent speech, he said he had defeated Barack Obama at the 2016 election, and greeted the crowds at Sioux Falls, North Dakota, when the campaign was actually being held at Sioux City, Iowa!

On the other hand, Biden marked his 81st birthday with a humorous, tongue-in-cheek Instagram. “Turns out on your 146th birthday, you run out of space for candles!”, holding a cake ablaze with a multitude of candles.Laughing at and jokingly exaggerating one’s age is certainly more empathetic than forcing your physician to describe you as Superman, at an obese 77, on the cusp of moronic dementia.

Our very best wishes to President Biden for many more years of healthy and happy years ahead, at least till 2028. We have every confidence that he will have the maturity and the wisdom to settle the ongoing Israeli Palestine conflict. After all, he is six years older than Israel.