The Tribune

With CHARLIE HARPER

ALL the talk these days is about an election still 15 tortuous months away in the future. There’s breaking news out of Iowa, where the numerous Republican also-rans were scrambling to gain some traction – any traction – ahead of last evening’s first GOP debate of this endless political season and the looming first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses scheduled for January 15.

Donald Trump, wisely, has declared he won’t attend this or perhaps any debate this season: Let the others chew up each other. They’ll just talk about him, and he’s on the record that any publicity is, in his view, good publicity.

This seems to be a good strategy. All the polling continues to support two notions. First, Trump retains a hammerlock on the loyalty of his base of support within the GOP. Secondly, President Joe Biden’s poll numbers continue to sag. It is admittedly easy for voters to focus on his evident old manhood and ignore his administration’s considerable achievements.

But the theory is gaining ground that if any Republican can beat Biden next year, why not the four-times-indicted former president who most Republicans still trust. “He’ll never lie to me,” said one Iowan on national TV the other day. This concerns a man who has reportedly told over 30,000 lies in public since taking office in 2017.

America’s most famous journalist told a private audience in New York last week that “the 2024 presidential race will be contested between candidate X and candidate Y – neither of whom is named Trump nor Biden”. Bob Woodward, of “deep throat” fame and a man credited with bringing down former president Richard Nixon 50 years ago, raised some eyebrows with his prediction.

It says here that Woodward, the patrician pundit who has managed to remain at the centre of American political life for five decades with a series of much-celebrated insider books on recent presidents, is off-base with his dramatic forecast.

But what if he is correct? Who would be atop the major parties’ political tickets? Speculating on that at this point might supplant counting sheep or a late-night hot toddy as among the best sleep-inducers. Belying the fact that there are nearly 20 Republicans who might wind up as the GOP candidate if Trump somehow falters, prognosticating about alternatives to Trump is no easier now than to guess who an alternative to Biden might be on the Democratic side.

We’ll just have to wait with everyone else to see who stumbles or runs afoul of the law most egregiously. And if that really makes any difference to those who will vote in party primary elections next year.

Meanwhile, Trump faces his most serious charges in Washington in connection with the January 6, 2021 assault on the US capitol. The presiding judge is naturalised American citizen and US District Court judge Tanya Chutkan, now 61. She was born in Kingston, Jamaica. Chutkan has two siblings, both of whom are physicians. Her father is also a doctor, and her mother Noelle was one of the leading dancers at the National Dance Theatre Company of Jamaica.

As reported here earlier, Chutkan has already ruled against Trump in another matter related to January 6, and has been tougher than most other judges on the seditious thugs who actually broke into the capitol building that day. In fact, she is beginning to remind observers of the legendary John Sirica.

Sirica was a US district court judge in the early 1970s. He rose to national prominence when he ordered President Richard Nixon to surrender his recordings of White House conversations to Federal prosecutors. Sirica’s involvement in the case had begun when he presided over the trial of the original Watergate burglars, whose incompetence gave them as much chance of evading prosecution as did the televised felonies of the January 6 rioters.

Sirica did not believe the Watergate burglars’ initial claims that they had acted alone. Using provisional sentencing, Sirica strongly encouraged the burglars to give information about higher-ups before their final sentencing. Judges could give defendants a few months to ponder their sentence before it became final.

Sirica essentially urged the burglars to plea bargain, and used their information to help identify and prosecute the real villains in the White House. Sirica’s no-nonsense approach, impatience with legal shenanigans and firm sentencing preferences earned him the title “Maximum John”.

Sirica was a legal hero. Our Jamaican sister Tanya Chutkan has the potential to achieve similar status. And she’s already on her way.

At a hearing recently, she said the following in response to attempts by several of Trump’s regiment of lawyers to delay or dilute proceedings in her courtroom: “The fact that he (Trump) is running a political campaign has to yield to the administration of justice,” Chutkan informed Trump’s lawyers. “And if that means he can’t say exactly what he wants to say in a political speech, that is just how it’s going to have to be.”

This will be tough for Trump because, as David Axelrod says, “the sense that he is being tried for political reasons is the essence of his campaign.”  Axelrod, the former Barack Obama campaign manager and White House adviser, also spoke in New York recently.

Told of Bob Woodward’s election prediction, Axelrod rolled his eyes. “It’s hard in particular to see a credible Democratic Party alternative to President Biden,” he said.

Back in court, Chutkan chided Trump and his attorneys. “To the extent your client wants to make statements on the internet, they have to always yield to witness security and witness safety,” she ruled, adding: “I will take whatever measures are necessary to safeguard the integrity of these proceedings.”

“Maximum Tanya”, step forward!

Former Fox News executive argues to FCC that Fox News lacks ‘character’ to hold licence

As noted above, Trump has reportedly told approximately 30,500 public lies since assuming office as president. Most of those lies have been broadcast and amplified by Fox News. Perhaps it will turn out that one of the consequences of Trump’s serial mendacity will be prison time.

But what about Fox? Isn’t there some kind of obligation for the mass media to at least not promulgate information they know perfectly well is untrue? And if the media betray that obligation, should there not be some punitive consequences?

Trump himself, key Fox ally Texas Senator Ted Cruz, and others say no. To punish Fox for giving credence to lies would violate the network’s First Amendment right to free speech, they say. “To do so would be mad,” Cruz told reporters.

Further, a widely quoted industry insider told reporters that it’s very rare that the FCC would punish a network by, for example, requiring a hearing for a network licensee, let alone to rescind a licence. “The short answer is it almost never happens,” lawyer Andrew Schwartzman said. “It’s a torturous process.”

Nonetheless, a longtime staunch ally and acolyte of Fox owner Rupert Murdoch has joined a likely quixotic effort to persuade the US federal government to hold hearings on renewing the broadcast license of a Philadelphia-based Fox station in an effort to hold Fox accountable for broadcasting and supporting Trump’s lies.

Once a key Murdoch lieutenant, attorney Preston Padden is now arguing before the US Federal Communications Commission that Fox lacks the “character” required by the FCC to be a license holder, because of post-election misinformation spread by Fox News.

“Fox has undermined our democracy and has radicalized a segment of our population by presenting knowingly false narratives about the legitimacy of the 2020 election,” Padden wrote in a statement which accuses Fox of “intentional, knowing news distortion.”

“Never in the history of the FCC have they been confronted with an applicant who was found to have repeatedly presented false news by a judge,” Padden said, referring to the Fox network’s agreement to pay almost $8 billion to a voting machine company. “If the FCC’s character standard means anything, it means you can’t be guilty of presenting false news.”

Ironically, as president, Trump often threatened to weaponize the FCC to punish “‘liberal news media for their lies and hoaxes and witch hunts” directed at him.

Padden’s effort recalls Barack Obama’s musings during his presidency. He was reported to have seriously mulled over the idea of similarly going after Fox News for its blatant partisanship and general nastiness.

Obama held off, and Padden’s efforts probably will fail. Only lawsuits that succeed might tempt Fox toward responsibility.