All lawfare isn’t created equal
Commenter “Variant” writes, on the Bolton raid thread:
Trump is simply trying to settle petty personal grudges via Lawfare and we’re trying to justify it because it was done to him.
I prefer intellectual consistency on the right. I realize Trump isn’t conservative or consistent, but doesn’t mean we have to applaud this.
Regarding the second sentence of that comment, I suppose it depends what you mean by “conservative.” If “conservative” means playing it safe and being predictable, Trump certainly isn’t that. If it means being patriotic, being Jacksonian in foreign policy, wanting to shrink the cost of the federal government, being tough on crime, and advocating traditional definitions of man and woman, he’s quite conservative. But I doubt most people agree on the definition.
He’s strangely consistent as well, although unpredictable in his approaches. He’s very quirky and often insulting. But if you look at interviews with Trump on politics, starting when he was a fairly young man during the 1980s, his actual positions are – for the most part – remarkably consistent (see this).
But I’m especially interested in that first sentence of the comment, because it’s the sort of thing a great many people are saying – most are anti-Trumpers but not all of them. It rests, I believe, on the definition of “Lawfare” and whether it might sometimes be appropriate, and if so when.
Lawfare is defined here in this manner: “the use of legal action to cause problems for an opponent.” But if that’s lawfare, and one is against it in all circumstances, then there wouldn’t be consequences for political figures breaking the law unless the lawbreakers’ supporters would be the ones to bring charges. And although such things are not beyond the realm of possibility, they’re not at all common and not to be expected of politicians. The reality is that perps in one’s own political party who haven’t turned against the people in power in that party are very rarely going to face any consequences at the hands of that party, and therefore it’s usually up to the opposition to press charges when they are in power, even if the offenses are fairly egregious.
There need to be consequences for lawbreaking by politicians and in particular for serious lawbreaking by politicians. But at what point has the lawbreaking crossed the line at which it needs to be prosecuted? How serious does it have to be? And even when the legal charges against various politicians are the same, the particular fact situation in each case can make the seriousness of the offense very different.
For example, let’s think about classified material. Has a statute been violated merely by taking it and storing it? What level of classification is involved? Is the person authorized to take it and to even declassify it? Does it matter if the person shows it to another person, and to whom? And what about leaking it to the press? These questions differentiate the Trump classified material case from the Biden classified material case from the Hillary Clinton classified material case from the Bolton classified material case, and the details of the answers are highly important in deciding whether bringing charges would be justified and whether bringing charges might even be necessary in order to establish that there are consequences for lawless behavior.
The classified material case was the only one of the legal cases brought against Trump that wasn’t based on an absurdly novel and twisted interpretation of the law. Those other cases were what one might call pure lawfare undertaken for revenge and in order to prevent Trump from being elected. Those cases ended up backfiring, of course, but that was never a foregone conclusion and the people who brought them certainly believed there was a good chance the cases (or at least one of them) would either bankrupt Trump, and/or keep him from a second term, and/or even send him to prison.
As for the investigation of Bolton in a case involving classified material, we simply don’t know enough yet to decide how valid the investigation might be and whether any charges will come of it. But the allegations against Bolton being discussed are that “he sent ‘highly sensitive’ classified documents to his family from a private email server while working in the White House.” That seems potentially serious, if true. Sending them to family? From a private email server? If laws protecting classified documents are to have any meaning whatsoever, it seems as though behavior like that would need to have negative consequences.
It remains to be seen whether there are any legs to the allegations, and whether Bolton will be charged with anything.
Lawfare aside, your assessment of Trump’s conservativeness is spot on. Lord knows I have my issues with him, but I’ve never doubted for a minute that he deeply loves this country, warts and all. That goes a long way with conservatives.
Neo: What I usually end up doing is writing about what most interests me, …
Thank you very much for that. Because if it interests you, I should be aware of it, at the very least.
“Variant’s” first clause, “Trump is simply trying to settle petty personal grudges via Lawfare,” tells me that “Variant” is a troll.
While I like a good ” cop show” , it always bothers me when I see the show’s characters doing all kinds of illegal things with classified materials. The NCIS show is really bad in this regard. They have briefings with classified material in the same room where guest are allowed to enter – and it has clear glass windows to the outside world, etc.
Well they say the room is scif convertable of course often many persons are not cleared now there is an argument whether some information should be classified but thats for a different day
Of course in england they have the official secrets act which determines what information can be published
Aughta sit this one out devlin
https://x.com/julie_kelly2/status/1959970032915447810
He picked up every scrap of innuendo from mueller and ran with it
Trump is playing by the schoolyard rules of politics and life, which include unpleasant but necessary tasks like clearing your opponents out of the bureaucratic sinecures and settling scores.
Part of the MAGA agenda is to make clear to the perpetual revolving-door political class that the rules have changed.
I have little patience for people who think they can remove the Left from power while wearing white gloves and eating cucumber sandwiches.
We have the same problem here in Israel with Likudniks and religious Zionists (my own tribe!) who still think they must win over the hearts and minds of the Leftist establishment, still think the Left will just hand over the keys without a bitter, dirty fight…. Part of it is cultural: over decades the Left has established itself as the cultural elite, and every college-educated Israeli frames their opinions to satisfy a “cool” Leftist professor/newscaster/actor who lives rent-free in their head…. sound familiar?
Bibi himself made this mistake by not immediately dismissing the generals responsible for the October massacre…. instead he went on about “unity at this difficult time” – which has not stopped the Leftists from divisively trying to pin the blame on him.
Clown show. Little people used to get thoroughly squashed for the tiniest F up regarding classified material.
Selfy:
I can see why you might think that, but “Variant” has posted about ten or so comments here and the rest of them do not indicate that he/she is a troll.
The problem is the swamp is very deep in israel not merely the likes of halavi and many officials in the shinbet but apparent gallant who came from the forces
I’m open minded about the Bolton matter. It seems that his conduct was/may have been particularly egregious. When the first Trump administration sued to prevent publication of his book on account of classified information in the book, the judge declined to prevent publication on 1st Amendment grounds, but noted in the opinion that Bolton may be civilly and criminally liable for the disclosure of classified information. So there may actually be something to this one.
It looks to me as though we had a culture where the “right” people regularly got away with mishandling/disclosing classified information or received a slap on the wrist, while the little people who committed the same crimes went to jail. See Clinton, Petraeus, Biden, Pence on the one hand and Reality Winner and a bunch of other lesser-knowns on the other. You might add Trump to the other hand as well. If Bolton took advantage of this environment to try and push the boundaries even further, then there is a strong argument for his prosecution.
Granted, the optics of Trump prosecuting Bolton are horrible. But it all comes down to Bolton’s behavior. Besides, the new Biden/Trump precedent seems to be that you had better follow the same rules as the little guys while you’re in power or the opposition may come after you later. Is that so bad? This isn’t Mueller-style witch hunting with manufactured process crimes. It might actually be the least bad way out of the where we are now.
Now, I think there may be a better case to accuse the Trump administration of unjustified lawfare over the mortgage fraud prosecutions of Schiff, James, and the Fed governor. I have no problem cracking down on folks who game mortgage applications, but I find it nearly impossible to believe that the only politicians playing it fast and loose with their mortgage papers happen to be Democrats. Even Lois Lerner was smart enough to throw a few token members of her own team on her target list.
BenDavid I tend to agree with you. Trump is one of those rare critters who fights for the love of fighting, the left does not understand this. With one such as he, you have to render him hors de combat. The Left keeps looking for an apology which they’ll never get.
BenDavid I tend to agree with you. Trump is one of those rare critters who fights for the love of fighting, the left does not understand this. With one such as he, you have to render him hors de combat. The Left keeps looking for an apology which they’ll never get.Ever!
We realize after 50 years the left never cared about the rule of law this happens in small ways in hoe blue cities are managed to the proscription attempts they have tried in different ways to opposition staff from watergate to whatever you call the last round of persecutions not only in dc but atlanta and they even tried in michigan and wisconsin (walker was the test case) or a few years before in alaska
Against ted stevens ‘it worked didnt it’ he never got his seat back same for the hunting of tom delay the final result didnt matter (just the immediate one) also conrad black
@Bauxite:I have no problem cracking down on folks who game mortgage applications, but I find it nearly impossible to believe that the only politicians playing it fast and loose with their mortgage papers happen to be Democrats.
There are lots of people who own more than one house, and I don’t know what percentage falsely claim their second home to be their primary residence. Like speeding it’s impossible to crack down on everyone who might be doing it, and the people most concerned ought to be the lenders, of course.
Given that you have to start somewhere, starting with people who made a big deal about other people doing it sounds fine to me. People in positions of high financial trust, like the Fed, are a very good place to start; much like you might have less tolerance for school bus drivers who speed. Republican politicians would be well-advised to clean up their act too if they’ve played fast and loose with “primary residence”. This toothpaste is not going back into the tube.
My only requirement on charges being brought against Dems by this administration is that the charges should be for actual criminal activity for which there is substantial evidence.
If everybody in politics in Washington games the mortgage system by fraud, that’s a serious problem and I agree it’s not only Dems who should be charged. If there’s evidence of this against prominent Rs I imagine it will emerge from leftist investigators.
An investigation, even a raid, is not proof. Nor an accusation. It indicates, or should, a degree of evidence justifying further investigation. It can also be a catastrophe. See Malinowski. With that standard, Bolton got off easy.
@Kate:If everybody in politics in Washington games the mortgage system by fraud, that’s a serious problem and I agree it’s not only Dems who should be charged.
I agree and if there’s been a collective blind eye turned to this among politicians generally it needs to stop. I actually had to pay extra on the mortgage for my first home because it did not count as a primary residence and I wasn’t willing to tell the lies needed to make it count as one. (Not long after, it did become our primary residence and we refinanced on that basis, but that was a cost in time and money we had to incur for not lying to our lender.)
What’s the game theory on this? Tit-for-tat?
If there is no punishment for the Left to stop the leaking and other criminal activity then it will just continue.
Bolton, Comey, Brennan and the rest of them need to pay a price so that this stuff stops.
Regarding the issues around the handling of classified documents, I have a few thoughts.
First off, I’m getting the impression that there seems to be a fair amount of daylight between the way classified documents are supposed to be handled versus how it appears they actually are often handled by people in the highest echelons of power. At minimum there certainly seems to be a distressingly cavalier attitude presented by powerful politicians and high level fed employees with top level clearences about dealing with sensitive information. Going back at least to Hillary Clinton’s infamous bathroom closet email server, it seems as if certain people feel that they’re entitled to do whatever they want without consequence.
Conversely, I also know that there’s a whole lot of stuff that gets classified that probably doesn’t really need to be. I suspect a whole lot of fairly inconsequential, routine information gets labeled as classified by default. A problem with this is that it may engender an irreverent attitude by the intelligence community and powerful politicians about the importance of procedures for handling classified information. Since so much of the stuff that is classified really isn’t that conseqential, people may tend to feel that it’s not really that important to go through the effort of handling it all properly.
I realize that of course there are all sorts of levels of classification and the top levels include stuff about technical details about weapons systems and black projects and operations that obviously need to be treated differently than information about MRE ingedients or recomended humvee tire pressures. But I can’t imagine that classifying too much information engenders proper attitudes about handling the most senstive stuff.
the left does not understand this.
Well, they’ve certainly never seen it before. I think you and BenDavid have hit on something important. Trump is the first to come along that has no interest at all in “winning them over.” That, if nothing else, has them on their heels.
Adding my $0.02 on classified information – I was an engineer for many years at a company that worked with a lot of, ahem, “three-letter agencies”. Often what was classified was not the information itself but the association of that information with a specific agency or project we were working on. This led to some ambiguity as to what you could or could not have or talk about outside the SCIF (facility where you handled classified info). Having said that, the nature of classified information given to high-level government officials is probably pretty different from my experience.
About the loan fraud, I hope that the DOGE IT team have written a search program to check for loans with same name and SSN and are doing a review of all the documents. They should start with the people in government who should have known better, but then deal with the small fry.
Most of the conservatives I know would not think of committing such a fraud.
@Nonapod:Since so much of the stuff that is classified really isn’t that conseqential, people may tend to feel that it’s not really that important to go through the effort of handling it all properly.
There’s a third thing, that access to classified information can be exploited for profit, and the more stuff that’s classified the more opportunity there is.
Right now media does not get in trouble for publishing classified information that is leaked to them. Consequently, they make money from some people having access to classified material. Our gracious hostess probably gets very little, if any, classified material leaked to her; she’s stuck with talking about what she sees in the news and what she actually hears about from other people. The New York Times and the Washington Post have people lining up around the block to leak to them, and if you want to read about it you have to get it from them. That has value.
It’s my understanding that the investigation of Bolton began during the presidency of Joe Biden, but it was quashed by his DOJ (or FBI ?).
Since Biden’s people would never, ever investigate anybody in their camp – regardless of how severe the infraction – there must be something to the accusations.
Regardless, if you are playing basketball, and you follow the rules of basketball, but your opponent plays by the rules of rugby, you have no choice but to follow rugby rules or just walk away.
The mistake the dumbpublicans have made – seemingly forever – is to follow basketball rules while the demonkrats follow rugby rules.
And not just any rugby rules; the Dems always play dirty rugby.
but I find it nearly impossible to believe that the only politicians playing it fast and loose with their mortgage papers happen to be Democrats.
==
I don’t.
Bumping the last comment from the Bolton tread:
bu on August 25, 2025 at 9:39 am said:
That Bolton’s case is mere revenge is an assertion of a type made by the left in many cases. They know they’re lying but they will make you waste your time proving it. To no avail, since they know they’re lying, not merely misinformed. And they’ll do it again….
See miguel’s link to Julie Kelly for the QED.
Whether there are any Reps who have committed mortgage fraud or not, it’s great that some Dems who Have Committed criminal fraud are getting investigated. Small kudos to Trump-Bondi DoJ.
Since the Dem media would likely have been looking for such fraud from Reps, it wouldn’t be a surprise that all the guilty fraudsters are Dems, tho also no surprise if some 5-10% of those guilty are Reps.
Cornhead is so right: Tit for Tat. That’s how cooperation evolved. But with 90% of govt bureaucrats being Dems, it wouldn’t be a surprise that 99% of real crimes of govt are by Dems, who’ve been allowed to get away with it. And have been quick to punish Reps for any, even smaller, illegal or immoral action.
We all know that prosecution, even without conviction, is part of the punishment. Every single illegal action by every Dem politician or govt official should be investigated and, even with expectation of no conviction, tried so as to get the evidence public.
Attacking illegal behavior of govt & ex-govt is never “simply X”, because so much effort needs to be mobilized. Tho I certainly believe Trump is looking more closely for crimes of his enemies, it also fits in the No One Is Above The Law.
If there are too many laws, as I think there are, like too much classified stuff, a key way to get those who support all the laws to change their minds is to punish them for violating some law. It might be that supporting lots of laws is a Luxury Belief, by elite who don’t expect to really be hurt when they violate some silly law. (Rob Henderson hasn’t said this, but might.)
Yet I should admit that if Trump did try to find some legal violation against each of his enemies, especially handling & leaking of classified documents, I’d support indictments for any of them. Revenge isn’t simply my only motive, but it IS a motive.
I have absolutely no sympathy for those who used lawfare against Trump for a decade who now find that particular gun turned around on them now. They opened that Pandara’s box after all. There was a time when I would’ve been the first to call for civility and not decending to their level. No longer. After years and years of the shameless, colossal hubris displayed over and over again by the deep state I no longer feel that rising above the fray is the smart thing to do. It’s sad. Tragic even. But that’s the world we live in now.
Here’s yet another fraud that Dems allowed a (big Donating) Dem to do
https://www.dailywire.com/news/california-anti-poverty-activist-and-dem-mega-donor-pleads-guilty-to-massive-carbon-credit-scam
Most #MeToo guilty men were Dem donors or supporters.
There should be two new offices in the DoJ, 1) against Republican crimes, and 2) against Democrat crimes. Filled by investigators & lawyers of the other party, whose job is to go after the criminal behavior of politicians.
Thanks if memory serves shipwrecked a fmr veteran doj prosecutor last in the civil rights division before holder purged it has had some spirited debates with julie kelly (over jan 6th and related matters) but those sources who got this story wrong from the outset should sit this one out
“If there is no punishment for the Left to stop the leaking and other criminal activity then it will just continue.
Bolton, Comey, Brennan and the rest of them need to pay a price so that this stuff stops.” Cornhead
Bingo with nothing less than lengthy terms in a Federal Prison.
It took me reading comments consecutively until Cornhead at 2:07 pm until someone hit *my* nail square on the head.
And then AesopFan at 3:31 pm, and then Tom Grey at 3:48 pm, and then Nonapod at 3:49 pm, and then Geoffrey Britain at 5:53 pm. [If I omitted anyone, I do apologize.] Let the cascade continue!
I don’t give a rat’s patootie about anyone’s personal grudge or lust for revenge. It’s far past time for this sh!t to STOP.
I do give a rat’s patootie [more than just one, truth be told] about the right shoving it back at the left, “good and hard” (to quote Mencken*). It’s not Trump (or even some Trumpkins) versus some short list of leftie actors: it’s our values and norms versus those other guys’ values and norms, such as they are.
Cornhead summed it up very well, albeit in nicer terms than I’m using:
“If there is no punishment for the Left to stop the leaking and other criminal activity then it will just continue. Bolton, Comey, Brennan and the rest of them need to pay a price so that this stuff stops.”
It’s far beyond grudge or revenge, personal or otherwise. Enough is enough, d#mmit.
And I’m very grateful that people like Trump and Gabbard have the gargantuan cojones to make it happen and (we hope) make it *stick*.
* https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/51436-democracy-is-the-theory-that-the-common-people-know-what
I’m tired of the fear of “bad optics” line of reasoning which gives way too much power to corporate media. The media is going to twist and distort anyway. If you’re telling the truth, full speed ahead!
Nonapod on August 25, 2025 at 2:10 pm: good comment on features of classifying.
Mike Plaiss on August 25, 2025 at 2:34 pm: “Trump is the first to come along that has no interest at all in “winning them over.” That, if nothing else, has them on their heels.”
I gather Vance and DeSantis are learning (or have learned) this lesson. That attitude ought to be a prime factor in picking our R candidates going forward, given the Left’s success of co-opting the media, academia, etc. Haley, Lindsey Graham, and too many others still want to be liked in DC, but don’t want to get a dog.
Davemay at 8:16pm appears to be saying the same basic idea.
I am having some difficulty understanding why some former federal employees with clearances get to retain their clearance when they leave govt. service. Or that they could realistically believe they should have access to sensitive materials at that time, either.
Perhaps presidents and some others realistically need to retain their clearances for a period of time (90 to 180 days max?) to sort out what goes to their libraries or for other reasons, but they should never be allowed to move the classified material to personal homes, etc.
Also, deny clearances to folks doing “consulting” or lobbying unless needed for contracting, etc.
Get, and take, that big VP or CEO job after leaving the govt. because you demonstrated superior leadership, not because you have “contacts” in the govt.
I’m enjoying a big, hot cup of intellectual inconsistency right now!
The left throws the word “retribution” around as if it means an unjustified vengeance. In fact, the definition is: a justly deserved penalty. So, IMO, the word actually justifies the resulting reaction. FAFO!
Trump won in 2016 half on the chant “lock her up.”
Then once in power he was magnanimous and spared Hilary Clinton any investigation or lawfare.
As a thanks for this, the Dems turned around and spent the last decade hounding Trump and his allies.
Including trying to disbar attorneys who worked for him!
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/597163-group-trying-to-disbar-lawyers-who-worked-on-trumps-post-election/
(A move beyond the pale IMO. The essence of a lwayer is that they should be available to the guilty.)
So at this point, no. This is no longer lawfare. This is the new game and they have established the rules. The Left needs to learn that you can’t go breaking the rule of law and then yell “time out” when the punch-back approaches. They need to learn and they need to learn hard or they will keep escalating their antics.
The Left doesn’t consider itself above the law rather it considers itself ” the law”, the difference is important!