He’s so guilty but he’ll walk free,astounding that he’ll try to run again too,the worrying thing is they’ll be people wanting to vote for him too,you can only imagine what type of people they are.
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Do you believe Donald Trump is criminally culpable for events on or around January 6th 2021?
- Thread starter fantome profane
- Start date
No, not criminally causative.
For example I might tell my son the I believe the current president should die or that I wished someone would assassinate them. And, my son my kill the president because he believed he was carrying out my specific wishes. Unless there is specific evidence that I gave specific instruction to my son to kill the president, I don't think you could hold me criminally accountable. Even though my son 100% believes he was acting on my instructions.
One could argue my actions were causative of what happened, but not, IMO, criminally causative.
I may express my desires, my beliefs and someone else may decide to act because of my expression of those beliefs, but the individual decides for themselves to take action based on my beliefs. They are responsible for their own choice to act.
I often express a desire/wish for some specific event to happen. Even something something against specific laws. That is not IMO a crime. However, I would have had to give them specific instructions to act against the law to be criminally responsible. Even if I was aware of the crime taking place and didn't tell them I never held any intention for them to act criminally.
I think we need to be held accountable for our actions, not our beliefs or desires even if others decide for themselves to act on our beliefs or desires.
So a lot of people think he is guilty even if there’s little agreement on what exactly is the charge. 
Meanwhile a sitting member of Congress running for Governor in New York is openly attacked and stabbed in full public view at a campaign event, yet the attacker is promptly released. Lee Zeldin attacker quickly released from jail
Meanwhile a sitting member of Congress running for Governor in New York is openly attacked and stabbed in full public view at a campaign event, yet the attacker is promptly released. Lee Zeldin attacker quickly released from jail
If there is a history of you imposing influence on your son then there is a case that YOU knew you could coerce your son to do acts for you. Did you order your son to do it? No. Did you use your power of influence and manipulation? Yes. You are accountable for that influence. This is how they convicted Charlie Manson of murders he didn't do himself.
But we know many people are easily manipulated to do things they would not do themselves. There is whole areas of psychology that study influence and how influence its on the subconscious. Ultimately people may regret their acts and being manipulated, as we see with many who have been indicted for their actions on Jan 6. Some of these folks insist they believed they were following orders of Trump. Do you really think Trump didn't know and understand he held influence over these people?
And that includes how Trump used his influence to coerce gullible people to do what he wanted them to do.
Would it make any difference if in this scenario you were a member of the Secret Service and were assigned to protect the life of the President? And further if while you were on duty you knew your son was attending to kill the President you did nothing. If while this was happening you sat down and watched TV for 187 minutes. And the only action you took was to send a text message to your son encouraging him. Would these facts change your assessment?
exchemist
Veteran Member
The legal presumption of innocence does not prevent a person being charged with a criminal offence.
If it did, nobody could ever be charged with any crime.
Guitar's Cry
Disciple of Pan
I think this is true for many, but I highly suspect that with the poster I originally quoted, there's a belief that leaders are not subject to the same laws. This is due to other posts that suggest this.
Could be.
I wouldn't know.
No one ever wrote that. Even after someone is charged they are still presumed innocent until convicted. President Trump has even been charged. He is presumed innocent.The legal presumption of innocence does not prevent a person being charged with a criminal offence.
If it did, nobody could ever be charged with any crime.
Of course you can change the scenario/known facts that would force a different decision.
It is easy after the fact to connect dots to create a narrative of what you or anyone involved could have done different.
Even the video you link pointed of the difficulty of connecting the facts to make a solid legal case.
If I was judging myself, I see an area of reasonable doubt. Doesn't matter to me that it was Trump.
That case against Manson was actually pretty thin. That they were able to convince a judge jury of his guilt doesn't mean it was the truth. Maybe he did but any certainty is very limited. They created a narrative around Manson and everyone bought whether it was true or not, now so that nobody questions it.
I can't read minds, I chose not to pretend otherwise. If however there is actual evidence of intent to cause others to act illegally that is a different matter.
It's just how I work. I give everyone the benefit of the doubt unless the is solid evidence against them regardless of how I personally feel about them.
You missed the point. I didn’t change the scenario to “force a different decision”, I changed it to better reflect reality.
Trump had a responsibility to protect Congress, he had knowledge about what was happening, he had the ability to do something, and he decided to do nothing. He decide to watch tv, for 187 minutes. The only thing he did was to send a tweet directing the mob’s anger towards Mike Pence.
But this is only one of the multitude of crimes to consider. If you still don’t think Trump is guilty of inciting an insurrection, what about election tampering? What about wire fraud? Or witness tampering? There are so many crimes to consider.
Most of them addressed in the video you provided a link to which also talks about the difficulty of making any of them stick.
But is he guilty?
Was Charlie you old roommate that owed you money, you seem sympathetic?
The evidence was good enough to send him away for life. I'm not sure what you think was thin. He wanted a race war, and he told his "family members" to murder people. Bugliosi was the prosecutor and wrote a book about the murders. Pretty grizzly.
Fun fact: Steve McQueen was supposed to be at the party at Sharon Tate's house the night of the murders, but his wife didn't feel well so they didn't go. It rattled him quite a bit.
Well not only was there no evidence of election fraud, there was massive agreement that it was a secure election. Yet thousands of Trump followers believed his lie, and they had a rally at the Capitol on Jan 6. Many hundreds broke the law, and some regret their acts, insisting they trusted Trump and were following his orders.
Yes individuals have their own agency to think and act. But not all people are mentally strong and capable of reasoning. They have bad mental habits and are easily convinced to do things that feel good emotionally. This is a type of immaturity and naivte. They know know they are not quite savvy thinkers and have been weakened to the fact Trump duped them. And they let Trump dupe them, which is part of the co-dependent relationship of charismatic leaders and weak minded people.
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber & Business Owner
If that were true manipulators, conmen, and charismatic religious leaders would get nowhere. But it is true and the case against Manson was pretty solid.
exchemist
Veteran Member
Someone who commits a murder remains presumed innocent in law until conviction by a court. But that does not mean that he or she really is innocent, obviously - durrh. Law enforcement agencies treat such a person as a suspect, not as "innocent". Suspects retain most of the rights of an innocent person, except that they can be arrested, held by law enforcement and can have certain rights curtailed until brought to trial.
The evidence, from his own team, strongly suggests Trump was trying to mount a coup by overturning an election result that was legitimate (approx spurious 60 challenges to its legitimacy have been rejected by the courts). I very much hope that a court of law considers this and decides whether or not Trump committed a criminal offence.
Secret Chief
Vetted Member
They could have invented the term stochastic terrorism just for t****.
"
- A leader or organization uses rhetoric in the mass media against a group of people.
- This rhetoric, while hostile or hateful, doesn’t explicitly tell someone to carry out an act of violence against that group, but a person, feeling threatened, is motivated to do so as a result.
- That individual act of political violence can’t be predicted as such, but that violence will happen is much more probable thanks to the rhetoric.
- This rhetoric is thus called stochastic terrorism because of the way it incites random violence."
Guitar's Cry
Disciple of Pan
And what if you were also found to have plotted out the whole thing with other people (including lawyers), and in fact, you tried to be there when he did kill the President but were prevented by the Secret Service?
Parenthetical aside....
This is a common legal pronouncement, but the reality
of treatment imposed upon the accused is very often
identical to punishment as though already convicted.
If one can't make bail, then being in jail awaiting trial
is little different from serving a prison sentence.
And prison can even be a lesser sentence than an
(supposedly) innocent person awaiting trial.