I agree that the trials should be televised, as I wrote in "The ACLU sides with Trump: The gag order is unconstitutional" (October 26, 2023) and — quoting Trump's lawyers — "The prosecution wishes to continue this travesty in darkness. President Trump calls for sunlight" (November 11, 2023).
Here are the last few sentences of the column:
There is apprehension about what [Trump] might say, and what his supporters might then do if they heed him.... Yet to believe that allowing the country to watch as Trump takes the stand would be more of a threat to the Republic than it would be to his defense is to accept his own myths about himself. The evidence against Trump ought to stand up to scrutiny far better than he will. Everybody should see that. Trump isn’t camera-shy; prosecutors have no reason to be, either.
Now, I know very well which of 2 possible meanings of "ought" Sorkin intended.
I know from the context and I know from the clarity of Sorkin's antagonism toward Trump. "The evidence against Trump ought to stand up to scrutiny far better than he will" must be a statement of prediction: She believes it is likely that the evidence presented against Trump will look much better on camera than whatever Trump does.But there is a second meaning to "ought," and I like it better as argument in favor of having cameras at Trump's trials. Prosecutors are bound by an ethical duty to have sufficient evidence to convict. Their evidence had better be sufficient and capable of meeting the high standard of proof. "The evidence against Trump ought to stand up to scrutiny far better" — it should stand up, it must stand up — because the prosecution has an ethical obligation.
And yes, I did read the OED entry for "ought." The meaning Sorkin uses — "Expressing expectation of an occurrence or belief in its likelihood" — is the most recent definition of "ought," dating back to 1656. The oldest example of the use of "ought" in this manner is: "The Apogæum of the Sunne, or the Aphelium of the Earth ought to be about the 28th degree of Cancer. translation of T. Hobbes, Elements of Philosophy iv. xxvi. 329."ADDED: There's such a thing as jury nullification. If we the People watch the entire trial, we might think, yes, technically, there's a crime here and the evidence supports it, but it's just not right to convict.
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Prosecutors are bound by an ethical duty to have sufficient evidence to convict
The ‘ethical duty’ does not begin with sufficient evidence to convict. Some of the crimes are just plain made up like the violation of oath trial and some trials have an invented standard of guilt, as in the inconsistent with ‘objective valuation’ standard in New York.
When they invent crimes there are no ethics to ‘sufficient evidence’.
Anyone want to predict we’ll get gavel to gavel coverage? I didn’t think so…
The reason that lawyers ought to represent obviously guilty people is that you want convictions to be against the best possible defense, otherwise it's not a conviction.
They participate, in a way, on the prosecution's side by making a convction possible.
I would read it as the 2nd meaning—if the prosecution is to win, the evidence needs to stand up. The first reading—I think it will stand up—seems less natural to me and is an uncharitable reading of Sorkin’s intent. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that it wouldn’t have been the meaning I took from it.
muh democracy! muh norms!!!
Spare us…
The evidence against Trump ought to stand up to scrutiny
Yes it should. But we've seen this playbook before.
The Mueller report was going to be slam dunk evidence against Trump and was secret for far longer than it needed to be. Only released when a new AG was confirmed.
And then we found there was nothing there but innuendo.
This playbook has been attempted at Trump again and again, and it always requires secret communications among DOJ and intelligence officials, and with secret FISA courts with damning leaks only to favorable press.
Then when the facts come out it's not what it seems at all.
Televise it. Trump will be a bigger star than Johnny Depp (another trial that benefited from public evidence rather than newspaper innuendo).
‘The evidence against Trump ought to stand up to scrutiny far better" — it should stand up, it must stand up — because the prosecution has an ethical obligation.’
Should, yes. Must, no.
The evidence likely won’t hold up to public scrutiny. It might win an initial conviction, but otherwise won’t stand up. So the hope is that the can provoke Trump to come across as irrational. The problem for democrats and the sympathetic media is that all their previous claims didn’t stand up to scrutiny. Steele Dossier? Junk based on Russian drunks. Withholding funds from Ukraine? Turns out the investigator looking into Burisma shouldn’t have been fired. Hunter’s laptop? Turns out it is real and very damning of him, Joe, and the establishment that lied about it. Jan 6th? Now we have the video and the narrative is crumbling.
The Legal Wall has replaced the Blue Wall, which replaced the Maginot Line.
Transparency will force the prosecutors and a few judges to abide by judicial norms in these cases. They’ve already failed in that respect, so it will be fascinating to watch them squirm as they consider the publicized damage to their reputations, potentially including disbarment.
I've understood 'ought' to be an old past tense of 'owe' and its multivaried meanings.
"I would read it as the 2nd meaning..."
If that's what she meant, I think the editor would have noticed the ambiguity and reworded it.
If the Trump trial isn’t televised gavel-to-gavel and Trump is convicted then about half the country will conclude he was railroaded by a DC jury.
I want to see what happens when a mob of thousands surround the DC courthouse during the trial. It was allowed during the Chauvin trial in Mpls.
Ann Althouse said...If that's what she meant, I think the editor would have noticed the ambiguity and reworded it.
That objection works both ways--the editor should have reworded no matter which meaning applies. But editorial staffs aren't what they used to be.
The circus is in town.
Should op-eds under an individual’s name have editors?
I’m certain propaganda does…
The media is so corrupt. So invested in the Democrat Part agenda, that the reporting is just nothing but lies.
Nichole Wallace on msnbc spends 1:45 of 2:00 hours pimping the lies about Trump. NEVER touching on the defense of the charges used in the courtroom. Why? Because the narrative cannot survive even a cursory peek of the law in question.
The media outlets want the trial televised. Are they so brainwashed they believe their own stories, their own scripted fiction?
Its looking more and more like these trials will not make it to the courtroom before the Election. We all know these charges are nothing but election interference. Their usefulness is rapidly evaporating as Trump continues to solidify his position on the Republican Ticket.
"Should yes, must no."
Basically, the imperative here is to convict Trump and imprison him, if possible. Guilt of an actual, letter of the law crime? Well, that would be nice, but hardly necessary.
to believe that allowing the country to watch as Trump takes the stand would be more of a threat to the Republic than it would be to his defense is to accept his own myths about himself
Likewise, to believe that allowing the country to select (or not select) Trump as its President in a free and fair election would be more of a threat to the Republic than denying the country that choice is to accept extremely dangerous myths about the divine rights of elites.
Of course one of the primary purposes of this campaign is to throttle Trump's ability to leverage negative coverage into free political advertising. I read it that somebody with their finger on the pulse has concluded that the list of laboratory-grown indictments has become embarrassingly long and absurdly devoid of credible content.
They've hung their prospects on Bad Science, then. Like 'Beyond Meat' products, in spite of the deluge of marketing hype, it is without gustatory appeal or nutritional value, and therefore, does not arouse interest in the public arena.
So, maybe the stain of these persecutions is becoming a liability, an insupportable weight. The polls are swinging in a dangerous arc. It would seem that Trump is more savvy about what the public is eager for.
"The Way Things Ought to Be"
- Rush Limbaugh
There's such a thing as jury nullification. If we the People watch the entire trial, we might think, yes, technically, there's a crime here and the evidence supports it, but it's just not right to convict.
And if the actual jury (not just "we the people") finds that it is right to convict, what then? And I guarantee you that the "we the people" jury will be far from unanimous in their verdict.
Prosecutors are bound by an ethical duty .. convict
after all, when a prosecutor runs on the statement, that she WILL convict Trump.. No matter what;
She had Better follow through on her witch hunt
in Other ethical trial news..
https://www.frontpagemag.com/derek-chauvins-ongoing-nightmare-epitomizes-the-decline-of-america/
Equal justice under the law has given way to mob rule and Leftist virtue-signaling.
Despite his criminal record and lack of accomplishment in life, George Floyd has become a hero and a secular saint, a symbol of the injustice against which all decent people must struggle. Scholarships are now offered in his name at North Central University, Alabama State, Oakwood University, Missouri State University, Southeast Missouri State, Ohio University, Buffalo State College, Copper Mountain College, and other allegedly academic institutions. Murals honor Floyd in Minneapolis, Houston, Naples, Belfast, Manchester,England, Dallas, Miami, Idlib, Los Angeles, Nairobi, Oakland,Berlin, and Pensacola.
All this and much more has happened despite the readily demonstrabled fact that Chauvin is not guilty. Chauvin is supposed to have murdered Floyd by holding his neck on Floyd’s neck despite the victim’s cries that he could not breathe. The autopsy report, however, showed “no life-threatening injuries” and no “blunt force injuries” to the neck; thus if Chauvin had murdered Floyd, he did it with extreme subtlety.
But the outcome of that trial was a foregone conclusion. Chauvin was white, Floyd was black. Chauvin was a police officer, and Floyd was a serial criminal.
Amy sorkin is always clueless when shes not evil
Watching two hours or two minutes of Nicole Wallace is an act of self-hate.
I don’t think jury nullification works outside of the courtroom, though.
What good would it do for We the People to think there’s no “there” there while a biased jury convicts someone anyway?
Normally I appreciate your careful parsing of words and inspection of their intended meaning, but in this case it seems irrelevant. Barn door wide open. Horse long gone.
The yearslong series of contrived prosecutions in multiple venues and wide array of charges have obviated any question of fairness or prosecutorial ethics. Everybody knows it's a sham. Those who hate Trump know it and love that it's happening. Those who love Trump know it and hate that it's happening. And everybody else just knows it and are incredulous that it just keeps going. Talk about embodying the phrase, "trumped up".
And the shameless prosecutors definitely know it because the only places where they are conducting the persecutions (sic) are so heavily partisan that the chances for jury nullification are about the same as a snowball's chance in hell.
Either way, "evidence" made public can benefit the side offering the evidence.
"If the glove does not fit, you must acquit."
Wait! That guy got off! Not really. By the time that trial went to jury, the defendant wasn't O.J., it was "Whitey" and all that represents.
It would be useful to know the demographic details (not identities) of the jury. In DC and similar jurisdictions, it doesn't seem likely that that all defendants are accorded a jury of their peers.
Early in Stalin's regime, two men were arrested and convicted for conspiring to blow up a bridge. The interesting part of the case was that the bridge did not exist. They were sent to prison for plotting to blow up a bridge that the state was thinking of constructing......We've topped Stalin's prosecutors. There is, I think, reasonable doubt in the case of Chauvin. The knee he used to restrain Floyd was an authorized technique. The officers were convicted of not intervening to stop Chauvin from using this technique.. They were, in effect, sent to prison for not intervening to stop a crime that was not being committed.....The New Yorker elaborated on many of the charges in the Steele dossier. Their profile on Steele himself was uncritical and admiring. They've gone far down the rabbit hole, but they're not Alice. They're the Red Queen.
The prosecution IS camera shy because they know the charges are full of shit. Their biggest fear is airing Trump's defense for all the world to see. Everyone will also be able to see the bias of the bought and paid for judges. Our "justice" system no longer serves "justice".
It also becomes MORE obvious every day that the 2020 election was fraudulent. HUGE rulings in GA, AZ and other fraudulent purple states. Media covers it up and just repeats "Trump is worse that Hitler" and "Musk is an anti-Semite".
Comment above regarding Chauvin and George Floyd. Floyd died of a Fentanyl overdose. Chauvin didn't kill him. But Chauvin got knifed in prison this past weekend and almost died.
Democrats are fine with all of this. American's have their heads so far up their asses, or just struggling to buy groceries and pay rent...they don't have the time or the energy to pay attention or absorb the walls crumbling down around them.
These lawfare fake trials of Trump are an attempt to rig the 2024 election. The general charge against Trump is that he correctly claimed that the 2020 election was sabotaged and rigged.
So, what are you doing here, prof? These are not legitimate legal proceedings. The conspirators in the DNC who phonied up these trials must be charged and prosecuted, and the attorneys who brought these fake charges must be disbarred and prosecuted.
The cruel neutrality stuff is BS in this case. There’s nothing here to debate.
The only debate I can think of that matters now is: Should citizens take up arms and rebel against a CCP installed president? The reason the Dems are so worried about “insurrection” is that they know they rigged the 2020 election. Trump won in a landslide.
"The Way Things Ought to Be"
- Cyrus, The One and Only
Can you dig it?
Anyone ever see a copy of "Sham Trials for Dummies?
The location of the trials was chosen for juries that will convict, no matter the evidence. Franz Kafka would understand.
Shouting Thomas said...Trump won in a landslide.
More than likely, he did win in a landslide. He was up 700k votes when they stopped counting in corrupt Philly, and then slow rolled the absentee fraud. Biden's "81 Million Absentee COVID Votes" was WAY over the top. You have to be a moron to believe the got that.
The 2020 election fraud is the crux of all matters. It is scary to challenge it head on as we now see the US Gov't is will to hold J6 political prisoners. Even those who claim "cruel neutrality" have to be scared to call it out. In 2020 even The Supreme Court was scared turning a blind eye to Texas vs PA. Probably one of the biggest cowardly mistakes they ever made.
"Floyd died of a Fentanyl overdose. Chauvin didn't kill him."
Chauvin is innocent. Criminally negligent "Open Borders" Biden is not.
what was the crime again?
The trials ought to be televised, but won't be. The Democrats cannot allow Trump's defense to be seen by the public and spread on social media. Additionally, in order to control and stymie that defense, the judges and prosecutors need to be out of the camera's eye when they do so.
As for what Sorkin meant- Althouse is completely correct- Sorkin believes deeply that the evidence justfies a conviction- just read everything else she has written about these matters if you don't believe me. She really does believe it is a slam dunk case.
I definitely understood "ought" to be used in the second sense when I first read the post. I may have been influenced by my first quick scan of the post title, with the word "ought" in quotes. It put the idea of the "is" "ought" distinction in my mind. And the "ought" in that distinction is the ought of the second sense.
If we're going to be a Bannana Republic where Joe Biden gets to put his poliitcal opponent in jail, we should at least get a televised Trial. Even Joe Stalin made his show trials public.
And maybe if the Trial is televised, we can actually understand what so-called crime Trump committed. Because as "I Stand" says, I still don't know what Trump did that so criminal. Somehow it was so criminal he didn't get impeached, but so bad he needs to be put in Jail.
Okey-dokey.
Frankly the silence surrounding this scam from legal minds who write is abhorrent. You Fuckers…
I think the editor would have noticed the ambiguity and reworded it.
I think a good editor would have cut the snark about standing scrutiny better than Trump. I realize it is an opinion piece, so why not a snark opinion of Trump, except it detracts from the validity of the argument, and provides the confusion on what the author is actually trying to say. Alas, I’m cynical enough to believe the whole article was commissioned to drop Trump’s name for clicks, and nothing in it is sincere.
Focusing on the "ought" misses the basis of her argument which is that the trials should be televised not because this will give the public faith in the outcome but because putting Trump on camera will be detrimental to Trump because he's Trump and all right-thinking people detest him and their numbers will grow the more the public sees of him.
It's a typical opinion from inside her bubble. I tend to disagree.
As an example of that bubble and referencing your later post on searching her magazine, Vanity Fair, for "Racial justice" you'll find this gem if you put it inside quotes:
"Report: Trump Wants to Bring Back Hangings and Firing Squads in His Second Term, Is Thinking About Guillotines Too"
Lead sentence:
"Donald Trump is a disturbed individual with a strong penchant for violence."
Do they actually believe these things? Increasingly, yes they do.
Perhaps this trial in January should be on TV too:
Judge Sets Trial Challenging Georgia Voting Machines
And in the Georgia voting case - which I think will be televised - it could get very interesting if the defense were to put Garland Favorito, of the Georgia voting integrity organization VoterGA, onto the witness stand. His organization has documented numerous issues with the 2020 Georgia election. He testified in the John Eastman dis-barment trial but the judge disallowed most of his testimony since, it seems, none of it fit the narrative. That trial was about as ridiculous as the NY "fraud" trial.
VoterGA.org 2020 Election Report
When is the transcript of the trial available? Is it released daily?
If so, someone could hire a dozen or so actors, a courtroomy looking studio and just re-enact the trial then publish on Rumble or X.
Like they did the OJ Civil trial. Only now you don't need a network to do it.
John Henry
"because the prosecution has an ethical obligation."
Bless you! Have you taken a look at these "prosecutors"? If they have ever heard the word "ethical", they likely thought it had something to do with those dresses grandmother used to wear in the Old Country.
Democrats are worried about more trials that will boomerang and impeach their credibility further. Sorkin is worried that Republicans will follow the progress and precedents set by SS BLM, Antifa, Occupy, etc.
Too many televised trails appear to include the Judge acting like he's a contestant on the Gong Show.
(See OJ trial and the DJT valuation case.)
"Why Trump’s Trials Should Be on TV."
Will his subsequent execution also be televised?
The trial of Charlie Manson survived President Nixon declaring Charlie's guilt mid-trial, and Charlie was convicted despite the best efforts of the Family to use the newspaper headlines to cause a mistrial. Using that trial's decorum level as the historical baseline for my understanding of how the Trump trials will proceed, I say let the former president say whatever he wants. It won't matter.
Comparisons to the OJ trial and quotes from "Inherit the Wind" are also yet to appear. Salem witch trials don't count. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition, after all.
Additionally, in order to control and stymie that defense, the judges and prosecutors need to be out of the camera's eye when they do so.
Agreed they won't want it televised (Juror safety will be the watchword). But I expect the defense will have their talking points out daily. Hence the gag order battles.
I'm not so sure we get a trial before summer, and possibly nearer the election. There are lots of discovery issues in all the trials. It is ripe for delay, emergency appeals, etc. The longer it goes, the more it looks like just politics and the more it helps Trump in the election.
Trump won't give up though. He'll run from jail if he has to. I know the RNC thinks they can keep him from getting the nomination if he becomes a convicted felon, but I think they underestimate the base.
Brian at 5:48 a.m.
The Mueller report was going to be slam dunk evidence against Trump .... there was nothing there but innuendo .... it always requires secret communications among DOJ and intelligence officials ....
Keep in mind that Mueller found publicly that Trump and all his associates had nothing to do with the hacking and leaking of the Democratic National Committee's computer files. This was a public finding that upset the Trump-haters.
In recent months, I have changed my opinion about the Mueller Report -- because I have re-read it recently. Now I think that Mueller -- although not his entire staff -- was quite correct.
In particular, I have come to recognize that Mueller apparently did find that a group inside Vladimir Putin's Presidential Administration indeed did hack and leak the DNC files. The major motive was to cause trouble cause trouble for Hillary Clinton in her race against Bernie Sanders in the Democrats' primary election race in 2016. That was the motive stated in the Mueller Report.
Re-reading the Mueller Report now (the passages that are not blacked out), I recognize that Mueller indeed did obtain inside information about the hacking and leaking from Russians who were personally involved.
When the Mueller Report was published (with many blacked-out passages), Mueller was well informed about the hacking and leaking. That is why Mueller publicly exonerated Trump and all his associates from the hacking and leaking.
In the meantime, Mueller's gang of Trump-haters indeed did cause much trouble -- abusively and unfairly -- for Trump and his associates, all of whom were innocent of the hacking and leaking. In the end, though, Mueller refused to go along with that mistreatment and refused to pursue the Trump-hating gang's last resort to pursue an obstruction-of-justice persecution of Trump and his associates. On the contrary, Mueller's exonerated of Trump and of all his associates of the hacking and leaking accusations was clear and public.
Some of Trump's supporters did remain convicted of various process and taxation violation. Those persecution should be criticized as abusive, but they were extraneous. Overall, Mueller was correct.
"Will his subsequent execution also be televised?"
That part will be shown, as a warning to the rest of us.
"There's such a thing as jury nullification. If we the People watch the entire trial, we might think, yes, technically, there's a crime here and the evidence supports it, but it's just not right to convict."
The other side of nullification is that we will convict the people we are told to whether guilty or not. Like almost all cases in the privileged DC Federal courts.
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