Adolphe Yvon, Caesar Crossing the Rubicon, 1875.

John Lucas:

As the world now knows, former President Trump was convicted today of 34 criminal charges. It was a shameless political verdict shaped by an unscrupulous prosecutor, aided by a corrupt and incompetent judge, and rendered by a jury that supposedly considered six weeks of testimony and 55 pages of complex jury instructions, and then deliberated for one day.

These are small minds, who do not give a flying fig leaf for the good of the Country. They and those gleefully cheering the result do not care about the damage that they have done to the nation. Some, although not all, doubtlessly lack both the intellect and a knowledge of history and human nature to recognize the fuse they have lit. And the fact that some are well known public figures does not mean that the foregoing does not apply to them. It applies to government officials of every stripe – congressional representatives, attorneys general and prosecutors, lying CIA and FBI grandees, and to the platoon of pygmies in that New York courtroom.

I weep for my Country. Not because one man was convicted, but because this New York judge, jury and prosecutors have flung this Country into a downward spiral from which we may never recover. I hope that I am wrong, but I fear that I am not.

One of my former law partners, a world class trial lawyer, when faced with an adversary who wanted to engage in unprofessional “hardball” litigation tactics would say, “I can play the game; just tell me the rules.” The Democrats have made the rules, and their opponents will have little choice but to play the game.

This is not a game that can or will be played by one side only. The rules are now set. When Republicans have the chance, they will play the game. Many, perhaps most, will think that a response is mandatory and that “taking the high road” is no longer an option. Instead, it would be regarded by the “progressive” left — that is to say those now in charge of the Democratic party — as weakness if they roll over and fail to respond. This is an existential threat to the stability of our political system and nation. That risk makes this the most dangerous day in the history of the Country, at least in our lifetimes.

Henceforth, weaponization of the justice system against a political opponent will be the norm. Political grudges will be resolved by political opponents in cherry-picked courtrooms where conviction is most likely. All this confirms that when controlled by scoundrels, our judicial system is becoming more like what we expect in places like China, Cuba or Venezuela, where political opponents are routinely imprisoned or worse.

RTWT