It has been about an hour and a half since the news broke that the Trump legal team was distancing itself from Sidney Powell, the lawyer who had made the most far-ranging contentions about widespread voting irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.
The political left and its media friends can be expected to feast on the news as yet another crack in Trump’s case.
But the Sidney Powell situation, the details of which are yet to become public, actually illustrates intellectual honesty on the political right that the left lacks.
Consider that the past week Fox host Tucker Carlson had very publicly called out Powell for not being able to present evidence of her claims. Carlson immediately was lionized by some on the left, because anyone agreeing with them deserves an atta boy.
Of course, mostly the left media outlets have been and remain critical of Carlson, even when he was in the forefront of calling out attorney Michael Avenatti as a “creepy porn lawyer.”
As Carlson was doing this, Avenatti was at the time a lefty icon, appearing on CNN with great regularity to attack President Trump.
One one occasion with CNN host Brian Stelter (he of the head that looks like a Jiffy Pop popcorn tray after its date with the stove-top burner) Stelter, showing absolute tone deafness, said he was taking Avenatti seriously as a 2020 presidential contender.
Avenatti since has been in jail, and given temporary COVID-19-related release, awaiting a trial for embezzlement.
It is not clear if Stelter is taking Avenatti seriously for 2024. But Stelter’s bulbous bald head must be taken seriously if only for its visual grandeur.
Stelter does not seem to have apologized for being so wrong about Avenatti.
At the risk of repeating myself, I attempt to maintain intellectual honesty. I long ago stopped voting for Pat Toomey for U.S. Senate merely because he is listed as a Republican. Toomey didn’t walk the walk.
Predictably, of late Toomey showed up quickly to dismiss the Trump inquiry into election fraud. Toomey has said he will not run for re-election to the Senate and also will not run for the Pennsylvania governorship, although a cynic might see his rush to align against Trump as an indication of political positioning should he end up make such a gubernatorial run.
If Toomey runs for governor, I will vote for whomever his opponent might be, or simply make no choice. He will not gain my vote merely because he labels himself as a Republican.
It is fashionable to critique conservatives as incapable of making rational ballot distinctions, but I personally have voted for Democrats for offices such as U.S. House of Representatives (the late John P. Murtha several times) Ed Rendell for governor of Pennsylvania (the first term) and for various other lesser state, county or local offices.
Beyond political tags, there is the matter of ignoring self-interest for reasons of intellectual honesty. I voted against Barack Obama twice even though I knew his plans to shake up the health insurance industry would benefit me in the short run, albeit at the expense of healthcare in general.
And in Trump I voted for a guy who was determined to take out Obama’s misnamed Affordable Care Act, which would have been temporarily harmful to me monetarily, but much better for our long-term delivery of healthcare.
Too many members of the public, and the media, make the mistake of allowing their personal preferences to cloud their ability to think rationally.
The need to keep the two thought processes separate is very real.
It’s reminiscent of the Fox Mulder character in the science-fiction television series “The X-Files.” Mulder was played by self-confessed sex-addicted actor David Duchovny, who moved on later to a Showtime series “Californication.” Talk about art imitating life.
Mulder’s X-files office had a prominently displayed poster of a UFO and the words “I want to believe.” But Mulder wanted proof, too, of alien existence.
As much as one wants to believe, there is a need for proof.
Rudy Giuliani and members of the Trump defense team might yet produce their necessary proof – of voter fraud, not alien presence (at least not aliens in the extraterrestrial sense).
But time is short and Trump supporters would do well to reconcile themselves that yet another disappointment likely is on tap for them, just as Attorney General William Barr and special investigator John Durham have failed miserably to provide timely reports and disclosures on the investigation of the FBI’s Russia collusion harassment of Trump.
Wanting to believe is one thing. Having the subject of that belief justify it is something altogether different.
Despite the generally accepted Liberal dictate that the end justifies the means, it’s important to get results while staying within the rules.
Otherwise, we have anarchy, which would please Liberals for a time, until the mob came looking for them.
Sam Ross Jr's site 