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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 14, 2024

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I agree that politics was a motivation

It was the sole motivation. If you don't understand that you don't understand the moment.

Trump's organization did, in fact, engage in "creative" (i.e. fraudulent) accounting

No one was harmed. New York brought a civil case, not a criminal case, because no laws were broken. The banks involved had all their loans paid back, and testified in Trump's defense. So what creative accounting? That the appraised and assessed values of Trump properties are not the same thing? This is like if I accused you of having child porn on your computer, and someone said: Well, it can't be denied that there's porn on his computer.

You're trying to turn this into a both-sides case. It isn't. Political actors who promised to bring Trump down brought him in court, declared that his assets weren't worth as much as he said they were, then used their own valuations to accuse him of

So it is for Republicans who are staking their political future on someone as unreliable as Trump.

This is a form of victim-blaming: Democrats prosecute Trump to an unprecedented degree, and the logic says Republicans have to abandon Trump because he's the risky one. Do you think other Republicans will not be subject to these same attacks in future? This is a one-off? The Great Trump Exception?

New York brought a civil case, not a criminal case, because no laws were broken

The case was a civil action brought under New York Executive Law § 63(12), which explicitly enables the Attorney General to bring suit against someone engaged in repeated fraud. Not all fraud is criminal; most is a civil matter.

So what creative accounting? That the appraised and assessed values of Trump properties are not the same thing?

One of Trump's properties jumped in reported value from $80 million to $150 million between 2005 and 2006 without explanation. He admitted under oath in 2007 that he overstates property values and thinks most other people do as well. Trump's former attorney, Michael Cohen, testified before Congress that Trump regularly inflated or deflated the values of his properties for ego or tax purposes. Trump's own CFO testified at trial that Trump had overstated property values by hundreds of millions of dollars (around double their value). In facilitation of this, he also falsely reported other data about his properties, such as reporting a 10,000 sq. ft. apartment as 30,000 sq. ft. These are not small technical discrepancies, but a repeated pattern of massively fudging numbers for financial and tax benefits.

Do you think other Republicans will not be subject to these same attacks in future?

The ones that engage in decades of systematic fraud, yeah.

Got it. The Democratic prosecutor who campaigned on going after Trump for political purposes is a one-off that will only be used when Republicans deserve it. Incidentally, Trump deserved it. Maybe if they prosecuted literally anybody else for financial crimes in the State of New York, I'd believe you.

Maybe I'd take your position a little less skeptically if you were arguing that every politician in the stock market, or every banker behind 2008, should also be charged with fraud. I'd still think it was convenient, since none of those people are actually getting prosecuted, and likely never will. But at least you could claim that your claim to principles is principled.

Maybe if they prosecuted literally anybody else for financial crimes in the State of New York, I'd believe you.

Are you suggesting that Trump is the first person to ever be found liable for fraud in New York? I'm willing to bet a large amount that's not true.

If you are going to keep making this claim you need to show another victimless fraud case that occurred that had zero pressure from an victim pushing for prosecution.

We can avoid discussing whether Trump did fraud. Just show me a victimless fraud case in NYC.

Here.

There is like 30 pdf in there. Explain relevance and how it applies.

You asked for

another victimless fraud case that occurred that had zero pressure from an victim pushing for prosecution.

I provided it. If you don't want to read it, don't ask for it.

Generally providing a summary of the case etc are considered proper form.

Assuming you are providing an equivalent case that would mean it’s been used twice - once to target an oil company which is a blue tribe political enemy and once to target Donald Trump a blue tribe political enemy.

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