In case you’re unfamiliar with the somewhat archaic reference in the title of this post, it’s based on an old show biz term, “traditionally used to ask whether a given product, person, promotional theme, or event will appeal to mainstream…America, or across a broad range of demographic and psychographic groups.” In order to win a national election in this country, in what is still essentially a two-party system, a candidate needs a somewhat broad appeal (or, this year, a less broad disgust factor than his/her opponent) in order to win.
Parliamentary systems are different. Parties tend to proliferate, enabling a party to win with pluralities that are often significantly less than 50%, and then coalitions must be formed in order to govern. In our system there has been more of a tendency for the coalition to form within the party itself, and in the past this has been accompanied by a tendency to damp down extremism.
Something about that system has broken down, and it happened not that long ago. I’m not sure when I’d date it from, but certainly within my lifetime.
That’s all background to lead into a discussion of the statement of Trump’s in last night’s debate that if he were president Hillary would be in jail. If you look at the entire transcript, that was the last (and most extreme) statement of a much lengthier exchange that went like this [emphasis mine]:
When I speak, I go out and speak, the people of this country are furious. In my opinion, the people that have been long-term workers at the FBI are furious. There has never been anything like this, where e-mails ”” and you get a subpoena, you get a subpoena, and after getting the subpoena, you delete 33,000 e-mails, and then you acid wash them or bleach them, as you would say, very expensive process.
So we’re going to get a special prosecutor, and we’re going to look into it, because you know what? People have been ”” their lives have been destroyed for doing one-fifth of what you’ve done. And it’s a disgrace. And honestly, you ought to be ashamed of yourself.
RADDATZ: Secretary Clinton, I want to follow up on that.
(CROSSTALK)
RADDATZ: I’m going to let you talk about e-mails.
CLINTON: ”¦ because everything he just said is absolutely false, but I’m not surprised.
TRUMP: Oh, really?
CLINTON: In the first debate”¦
(LAUGHTER)
RADDATZ: And really, the audience needs to calm down here.
CLINTON: ”¦ I told people that it would be impossible to be fact-checking Donald all the time. I’d never get to talk about anything I want to do and how we’re going to really make lives better for people.
So, once again, go to HillaryClinton.com. We have literally Trump ”” you can fact check him in real time. Last time at the first debate, we had millions of people fact checking, so I expect we’ll have millions more fact checking, because, you know, it is ”” it’s just awfully good that someone with the temperament of Donald Trump is not in charge of the law in our country.
TRUMP: Because you’d be in jail.
I’m wondering which of Trump’s facts in that exchange Clinton would be able to specifically challenge as lies, because I don’t see any. Nor does she specify any.
If Trump had stopped just short of the “because you’d be in jail” remark, I doubt there would have been much controversy. But it was the “jail” remark that seems to have gotten most of the attention from both sides. On this blog, some commenters were very happy to hear it (and/or to hear he planned to appoint a special prosecutor, the less extreme of his statements), because they’re among those Trump was referring to when he said “the people of this country are furious.” And there’s plenty to be furious about.
I responded this way in the comments section:
I do not trust Trunp, his word, or his promises, and the only way I would ever trust him is if he had been president for several years and had consistently done what he said he would.
The only significance what he says has to me is that it helps me figure out his possible effect on other people, his style””what he projects to people, and whether it will help him win.
That’s where I’m at with Trump, and have been for months. It’s part of my observation that with Trump, everything is mutable. So to me the question of “how did it play in Peoria?” is the most important one (although not literally in Peoria), and I’m not sure of the answer. One small anecdotal bit of evidence came in today’s comment from “OM,” who said:
My 82 yr old father in law Republican from IL reaction to the debate :
“I watched the Creepy Clown Show on television last night. Oh, I was mistaken. It was the presidential election debate.”
By the way, Peoria is in Illinois.
As for what I wrote about the mutability of Trump’s promise, I offer this from Trump’s campaign manager:
Donald Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway dismissed as “a quip” the Republican nominee’s threat at Sunday night’s debate to “jail” Hillary Clinton for her handling of government secrets if he becomes president…
“That was a quip. And I saw in NBC’s own reporting it was referred to as a quip, so I’ll go with NBC on it. He had already finished his statement. She said something like ”˜that’s why you’ll never be president,’ and he said ”˜you’d be in jail.’ And so that was his answer,” Conway said Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
But Trump’s own social media director and senior adviser, Dan Scavino Jr., tweeted out the “quip” at about 2 a.m. Monday, complete with a black-and-white photo of a resolute-looking Trump standing at a lectern.
Conway said Trump was not joking about the special prosecutor but was instead “channeling the frustration he hears from thousands of voters out on the stump every day. And they’re very frustrated that she has a different set of rules for her.”
So Conway is saying that the special prosecutor was a real promise, the “jail” remark a joke. Who knows, though, whether Trump would actually appoint one? And could he?:
But former attorneys general under Republican and Democratic administrations said presidents don’t get to decide on the appointment of a special prosecutor.
“I don’t conceive of that as something that’s in the authority of the president,” said Michael Mukasey, who was attorney general under President George W. Bush and has been an outspoken critic of Clinton for her use of the private email server.
Mukasey and other former Justice Department heads said the president can request a special investigator be named, but it’s up to the attorney general whether to actually appoint one.
Federal law states: “The Attorney General, or in cases in which the Attorney General is recused, the Acting Attorney General, will appoint a Special Counsel when he or she determines that criminal investigation of a person or matter is warranted.”
Mukasey told ABC News, “The president can say what they want to happen, but the attorney general’s proper response would be, ‘That’s interesting, I’ll take a look. But I decide that, you don’t.’
On the other hand—as the Obama DOJ has clear shown—because the president gets to appoint the Attorney General in the first place, he or she can appoint a simpatico political tool to do his/her bidding. That knowledge is one of the clearest legacies of the Obama administration.
Trump’s opponents have been quick to seize on his statement (or quip) as evidence of his banana republic extra-judicial tendencies—for example, here’s Ezra Klein:
…[T]hreatening to jail one’s political opponents ”” is how democratic norms die…
…[W]e believe that political disagreement should be legal.
Donald Trump doesn’t seem to care about all that.
In his last line ”” “you’d be in jail” ”” he is outright saying that he would imprison Hillary Clinton in office (if he could). This comes despite the fact that there is no evidence Clinton committed a crime in her handling of the email servers, despite lengthy investigations that found evidence of carelessness and dishonesty. That would be a politically motivated prosecution ”” retribution for daring to run against Trump and attack him during the campaign.
This is everything we feared about Donald Trump.
It’s Klein who should be ashamed of himself, but I won’t sit on a hot stove till that happens. From the context it is crystal clear what Trump was talking about, and of course it wasn’t his opposition to Clinton politically, it was her conduct re not complying with a subpoena and the rest. And obviously he was not speaking of an extra-judicial proceeding, he was saying that under his administration a special prosecutor would have recommended charges, and Trump believes she would have been found guilty.
But he didn’t exactly say it that way, did he? And the way he did say it left him open to sophists like Klein. That’s what Trump often does, and you either like it or you don’t; you either think it’s great or you don’t.
I don’t like Trump; I think I’ve made that pretty clear. But what I’m concerned with here is how the middle of the road undecideds will see it, not how partisans see it. Will they believe someone like Klein? Or will they applaud Trump’s ballsiness?
Or aren’t they paying much attention at all?
[NOTE: By the way, it’s hardly the first time Trump has talked about Hillary and jail.]
