A Very Innocent Man (No Longer)

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I was in a local park yesterday practicing my pickleball serve when a guy on the adjacent basketball court looked at me and said, “Have you heard? The verdict is in.” It was kind of out of the blue, this statement made by one total stranger to another, but he must have been so excited to tell someone that he took a chance that my reaction, excitement and anticipation, would be the same as his.

“Wow!” I said, “Did they finally get the bastard?”

“All I know is that it’s in, but that they haven’t announced it yet. Here’s hoping for the best,” he replied, with the unspoken assumption that “the best” meant the same to him as it did to me.

So I rushed back home to see if “the best” had actually happened—the best involving the words “34 counts” and “guilty” being spoken in close proximity to one another.

So yes, it finally happened. After years and years of shady dealings, civil suits, illegal and immoral behavior, typically followed by out of court settlements, transfers of cash, and promises of silence, the Trumpster finally became an official felon. Finally unable to outrun the law, he got nailed in a criminal court.

I caught the news on TV in time to see the once-but-never-again king leave the courtroom and repeat over and over his claims of witch hunts and a Biden-inspired legal system out to get him.

And you have to love the man’s butchering of all the rules of the English language. It wasn’t enough to state that he was railroaded, but Mr. Trump told the audience that he was not only innocent, but “very innocent.” If I’m correct, one can be very stupid, one can be very dishonest, both of which he is, but I don’t think that technically there can be degrees of innocence. (Although if there were, my guess is that he’d be very, very, very innocent.)

Beyond the joy of finding that his legal team hadn’t succeeded in stashing a Trump-o-phile among the twelve to hang the jury, and that the verdict was quick and decisive (none of this guilty on this, but not guilty on that), does it all amount to little more than a hill of beans?

Will Judge Merchan, whom he has constantly maligned, finally release some of his own anger and put Trump behind bars in an orange jumpsuit? As much as I salivate at the thought, I do not think that we will see this 77 year old, first time offender, white collar criminal in jail. A pity, but it’s not going to happen–as the result of this conviction at least. Probation? That’s probably what he’ll get, though so much less than what he deserves.

Ah yes, a third option is community service. Perhaps the Grand Poobah can help out at a local abortion clinic. Or better yet, send him down to the border. Maybe he can assist some poor fellow to cross the Rio, that is, as long as he can determine that the would-be immigrant, like millions of his brethren, hadn’t just escaped from an insane asylum.