Donald Trump and maga Republicans ignore lewd behaviors obvious in Trump's overt public comments and 34 felony convictions

Republican right wing MAGA cannot shrug off JeffreyEpstein ties along with Donald Trump’s lewd conduct❗ 

Echo opinion letter published in Pioneer news in Big Rapids, Michigan.

MAGA cult Republicans act like little children putting their fingers in their ears and shouting “la la la”, when they refuse to take into account exactly who and what Trump represented himself to be in the Access Hollywood tape.  (Trump: "You know I'm automatically attracted...I just start kissing them. It's like a magnet. Just kiss. I don't even wait. And when you're a star they let you do it. You can do anything." Bush: "Whatever you want." Trump: "Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.")

Or the lewd confessions he made on the Howard Stern radio show about visiting the dressing rooms of unclad young girls to check them out. Or the numerous photos and videos we’ve seen featuring Trump and his “bestie” Epstein, the two lecherously surveying and assessing the fleshy landscape before them.

Not forgetting, of course, the testimonies given by numerous courageous women citing unwanted sexual advances made by Trump. Sadly, all of the testimonies have been vigorously dismissed and denounced by "Make America Great Again" (MAGA) and, noticeably, by prominent members of the hypicritical Religious Right.

Yes, those same guardians of morality who cite Biblical injunctions of Christ-like values from one side of their mouth while pledging fawning obeisance to Trump’s glory out the other. I wonder now that some red states have mandated placement of the Ten Commandments in classrooms whether teacher lesson plans are being prepared to compare and contrast Trump’s actual behavior to the morality those Commandments command.

(MAGA Republicans must own edited copies of a fake Trump Bible...they completely overlook, ignore and refuse to accept the truth about Donald Trump's lewd behaviors and his obvious friendship with child sex trafficker Jjeffrey Epstein.)

At its core, MAGA ideology is simply amoral when it comes to their fearless leader. So own it❗ Why not make depravity the law – or rather the un-law of the land? MAGA conceded the moral high ground long ago, Donald Trump’s first term.

Two maxims come to my mind in relation to Donald Trump and convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and his evil accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell: “You are judged by the company you keep” and “lie down with dogs, wake up with fleas.”

Stop making such a fuss about demanding transparency about Jeffrey Epstein, MAGAdom. You’ve got what you want. Consequences follow victories such as you’ve achieved (albeit wrongmindedly). 

Let’s see just how far you’re willing to slide when your wives, sisters, and yes, young daughters find they’re at the mercy of Trump (and Epstein) wannabees gratifying themselves at your relatives’ expense. 

From Richard Cochran in Big Rapids, Michigan

Trump #theformerguy is parroting subversive Nazi communications techniques

Echo opinion letter published in Big Rapids News in Michigan: Reading the Trump indictment

So, yet another indictment against #theformerguy aka "the former president" is now issued. (Maine Writer- I've seriously lost count❗)

Unsurprisingly, the response from the tRump campaign claims: “The lawlessness of these persecutions about Trump and his supporters are reminiscent of Nazi Germany in the 1930s, the former Soviet Union, and other authoritarian, dictatorial regimes.”

In his very brief remarks following the release of the indictment, Special Counsel Jack Smith strongly urged the American public to read the indictment for themselves and I have followed his advice. Despite the pushback from the former president and his allies that this indictment abridges the provisions of the First Amendment, at the very outset the indictment (paragraph 3) concedes Trump had “a right to speak publicly about the election, and even to claim, falsely, that there had been outcome-determinative fraud during the election and that he had won.” Contested “free speech” is not what this indictment is about, instead it’s about illegal actions taken to undermine the foundations of our cherished democratic processes.

But the indictment’s acknowledgement that “falsely claiming” untrue facts falls within the realm of permissible speech (and therefore holds the former president harmless, as a point of law), irked me because doesn’t Exodus 20:16 exhort the Faithful: “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor?” But then, this indictment is headed for trial in an American court of law, not accountability to Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates.

In the late 90’s Stephen Carter published “Civility” a book sensibly grounded in day-to-day situations in which citizens of a polarized society find themselves. Discussing tolerance he pointedly notes: “Civility does not require a suspension of moral judgment and must not make us reluctant to impose moral judgments on each other.” And he adds, “A society that refuses to speak the language of morality is more fearful than free.”

The Toronto Star systematically gathered, researched and published untrue and misleading statements uttered by the former president during his term of office. One can still view them online under the banner “The first 5,276 false things Donald Trump said as U.S. president.” It is a matter of fact that for millions of Americans who supported him then and for the millions who support him now, the president’s untrue statements, repeated over and over again despite evidence to the contrary, engendered no moral outrage, even by so-called Evangelicals.

But since the former president has raised the specter of Nazi Germany of the ‘30s, I pulled William Shirer’s classic “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” off my bookshelf. 

Speaking to the astoundingly successful uses to which radio and motion pictures were put by Joseph Goebbels and his Ministry of Propaganda, Shire admitted: “I myself was to experience how easily one is taken in by a lying and censored press and radio in a totalitarian state. Though I…had daily access to foreign newspapers…and listened regularly to the BBC and other foreign broadcasts…a steady diet over the years of falsifications and distortions made a certain impression on one’s mind and often misled it… Often in a German home or office or sometimes in a casual conversation…I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious that they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard on the radio or read in the newspapers. Sometimes, one was tempted to say as much, but on such occasions one was met with such a stare of incredulity, such a shock of silence, as if one had blasphemed the Almighty, that one realized how useless it was even to try to make contact with a mind which had become warped and for whom the facts of life had become what Hitler and Goebbels, with their cynical disregard for truth, said they were.”

The former president will have his day(s) in court, but regardless of the verdict(s) his fate may still be decided at the ballot box.

Richard M. Cochran in Big Rapids, Michigan