How can we recover America recover after Trump crashes and burns, and the criminal Republicans are finally driven out of power?  (Assuming we can ever get Trump’s wide-load butt out the White House door.)  First, there’s the Trump legacy of unbridled ego and.  And after he’s gone, we’ll still be stuck with whole damn rafts of guilty people in pressing need of some succinct criminal prosecution.

[This is another post in a multipart effort.  See the earlier posts here, here, here, and here.]

There are Many Criminals

I know we always focus on President Donald “I need a favor though,” Trump.  And we should, I suppose.  Trump’s a lousy criminal in a dual sense: he commits a lot of crimes, but he’s amazingly inept about it.  I can’t even count his felonies.  But he’s not the only one.

Following very close behind Trump (because his nose is jammed deeply between the Presidential cheeks) is Attorney General William Barr.  Again, obstruction and corruption, along with selective law enforcement, lying to the American people, using his authority unethically, and more.  Behind Barr are the self-dealing Cabinet officials who lied, obstructed, and acted against the national interests. The rough-looking crowd behind them are the many who perjured, lied, obstructed justice as if that wasn’t a crime, conspired, and more. Behind them are the many clueless instances of witness tampering, conspiracy, mild corruption and abuse of office, and we’re not even out of the felonies yet. 

We can’t pretend nothing happened.  We need a strict accounting – yes, a criminal judgment – of what just happened to our nation.  And, if we ever plan to restore the rule of law, this needs to be legally adjudicated and based on evidence and actions as laid out in the Constitution of the United States.

<Sigh>  And yet….

Here’s my problem: formal investigations, indictments, and court trials are warranted, but they would be impossible.  Hell, criminally prosecuting officeholders isn’t even advisable, almost no matter how guilty they might be.  None of that will work.  But we need some level of formal, legal judgments if we don’t want miserable liars hiding behind the false claims.

Criminal Prosecutions Aren’t Possible

Yeah, sorry. There’s a political cost to each prosecution.  Doesn’t matter if the officeholder publicly proved they’re despicable villains; each one costs public confidence.  Eventually, people will start seeing the next as revenge, not justice.

It’d be hard to get convictions in most courts, too.  I can’t imagine any jury would be hungry to throw people in jail over what could arguably have been vile but legal political reasons.  To avoid that, we’d have to limit prosecution to the worst and most blatant criminals with airtight evidence.  Anyone particularly clever could hide behind obstruction, lies, and half-truths, and stay untouchable.  Add to them the broader group of moderate criminals and faithless oath-breakers.  None of them could be touched.  In the end, almost nobody who broke their oath of office will be exposed.  If we don’t make that matter now, it’ll never get better.  They’ll just do it again later.

Much worse, though, is the damage from criminalizing elected office.  Even if it was only once, and highly justified, it would still unleash disastrous results.  How quickly might some future President not entirely unlike Trump decide that criminal prosecution would suit their political goals?  Hell, AG Barr is trying to do that now, and it’s one of his worst crimes.  We should be doing less of that, not more.

We can’t recover America after Trump by indulging our worst impulses.

Criminal Prosecutions Aren’t Practical

Criminal prosecution isn’t even advisable.  It breaks my heart to say it.  I desperately want to watch that perp walk of shame, but no, it would be a poor choice.  This was a widespread, systemic, deliberate corruption of the American government by a criminal enterprise acting for their own benefit.  Landing hard on one or three or even a few dozen individuals won’t touch the structural problem that caused it. 

This is too big.  We’re looking at the results of a generations-long Republican effort to twist our democracy.  They decided to undermine fair governance for their personal advantage and for the benefit of their patrons.  And it worked; they’ve been wildly successful.  Having an unfair playing field is terrible for America

We need to show that our democracy can overcome when political parties change into criminal enterprises.  And it’s still a question if we can uncover all the awful parts of this disaster.  None of this is assured.  We might fail.

But we must uncover this conspiracy.  It’s the best for Democrats, the best for America, and even the best for the morally stunted Republican party.  Everyone needs to know misdeeds will be exposed.  And, honestly, while it’s a Republican Party now, any party with a lock on power will eventually become criminal.  (I live in “famously corrupt” Maryland.)  For American democracy to succeed, we need to regularly expose faithless charlatans for the cretins they are.  They should be humiliated for their actions. 

And for all of my love of the rule of law, criminal justice isn’t always the best tool.  We want to create honesty and open behavior, not martyrs.  We want to convince people, not convict them.

(OK,  sure.  Yes, I want to convict these idiots, too.  But I have to be realistic.)

Criminal Prosecutions Wouldn’t be Fair

We can’t be fair if we don’t start with the man directing the worst efforts: President Trump.  He’s a lousy, obvious, compulsive, and incompetent repeat offender.  If people hadn’t protected Trump, he’d have been a felon long ago.  He can’t stop himself from blurting out the honest truth.

But no party can prosecute the outgoing President of the opposition.  It would be so terrible for America, our democracy might not survive it.  It pains me to say it, but we can’t even consider that option.

And if we can’t touch the worst criminal – the admitted leader – then we can’t prosecute the people who followed his orders.  Prosecuting Michael Cohen but not even naming Trump was a miscarriage of justice.  More of that would be immoral and, importantly, ineffective.

Convene an American Truth Commission

That’s what I’m leaning toward.  Look to examples like the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission for a working example.  We don’t have to build anything new, just follow other successful models.

Here’s the core idea: anyone who testifies under oath about what they saw and did will be immune from prosecution for those acts.  There are limits and conditions, but if you’re truthful, that will protect you.   If someone hides crimes or lies, of course, all bets are off.  I can’t say it’s entirely fair, but it’s a good deal for America.  Trade full testimony for immunity.

I guarantee that we won’t just get the people with vague moral qualms.  Immunity will convince almost everyone complicit to talk loud and often.  All except the stupidest zealots will spill their guts, and most people aren’t idiots.  They’ll know they have two options: get super-honest or get massacred in court.  If we do it right, the depth and breadth of the problem will be there for everyone to see.

We can recover America from Trump, and this would be a good start. Except….

(Come on!  You knew it wasn’t that simple.)

The Importance of Legal Judgments

We’ll need ‘em at some level.  The truth alone won’t set us free.  We can’t assume the critical parts can’t be obscured by enough shouting from Fox News.  Not every criminal action will be blatant, and even the stuff that was seriously evil.  Some of this stuff is technical and complex.  Not everyone will be honest or forthcoming.  These are the original Merchants of Doubt.  There are so many examples but think about Trump’s defense against the Emoluments Clause, or the excuses Barr concocted about his mangled version of the Mueller Report.  We already deal with Republican mealy-mouthed nonsense every day.  “Oh, gosh, I never saw that!”  “Gee willikers, Howdy Doody, who knew they’d follow my documented order? Deary me, that’s not my fault!”

Those lying excuses cannot stand.  We need some kind of judgment, an objective evaluation that carries weight.  We need a legitimate authority to comb through things and issue their findings.  And we need something like a court for fairness, too.  People should have a forum to argue their own case.  It may not be a criminal proceeding, but each person’s honor is at stake.  They should have the chance to make their best argument for innocence.

I want my Truth Commission

That’ll work much better than Congressional hearings or federal prosecutions. 

I know that the newly elected President Biden will have a lot on his plate on Day One.  It’s not as if Trump will allow a smooth transition.  And the new President will land in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, the civil rights crisis, the economic depression, the climate crisis, and whatever other trash fires the Republicans light on their way out the door. 

But America needs the Truth Commission started as early as feasible.  The Republicans have broken our shared government, and the faults they created are splitting worse.  We need to focus on essential governance first, but we can’t fix much until we know what’s damaged and what still works.

We can recover America after Trump. It’ll hard without alienating the forty percent of us who think he’s their hero.  We can’t take any action casually, just because Democrats swept the election.  A truth commission may be an answer. Honesty will be critical.