Trump's Dreams Of Invading Chicago Dashed By Bill Barr, Federal Law, Reality

But he can have some 'surge,' as a treat.

Mean Bill Barr! President Bloodlust wants a race war, and Uncle Bill says "no." UNFAIR!

Ensconced in his Fox News bubble, Trump is apparently under the impression that sending the goon squad into Portland is going well, as opposed to galvanizing opposition to his administration and making local police departments look slightly less awful in comparison. It's an easy mistake to make when you spend literally half your waking hours bragging about a test for dementia which you "aced" two years ago.

The Daily Beast reports that there's been a battle playing out behind the scenes at the White House. On one side is the president, who wants to turn the streets of every Democratic city into a war zone. On the other said are his advisors, who may be stupid, but they're not crazy.

According to three people familiar with the president's private remarks, Trump previously envisioned an ostentatious, camera-ready show of force. He wanted to go after what he saw as violent gang leaders, flush them out of hiding in ways that would have them "shaking in their boots" like they never had before, and have alleged perpetrators marched out in front of the news cameras.

While Bill Barr waddles out to the podium promising to "surge" federal agents into American cities and show those cop-hating Democrats what's what, behind the scenes he's trying to talk Trump down from his wankfantasies of using federal troops to invade America. Which probably means that Portland-style occupations of Chicago, Detroit, and Baltimore are not in the cards. So thanks for that, Bill Barr, we guess.

Is that why Barr lied his ass off Wednesday about arresting 200 dangerous criminals in Kansas City when in reality it was just one dude who had warrants on him and got picked up with a couple guns in his car? Does he have to shout GRRRR ARRRGHHH!!! DOING LOCK HER UPS TO SO MANY BAD GUYS! to appease that orange fool, because he knows that the "surge" is just an attempt to increase federal law enforcement presence so as to take credit for any ebb in crime that might occur in the fall when the weather cools down and the economy starts to recover?

Because the president, as usual, is confused about any question tougher than "Which one is Camel?" He thinks racial justice protesters are all criminals, and can't understand why people don't applaud when he teargasses yellow-shirted moms linking arms to protect their kids. He doesn't know the difference between federal and state jurisdiction, so he blithely promises to send in storm troopers to do state-level law enforcement. He assumes that beating his chest like a silverback will solve every problem, no matter how complicated and intractable, "very easily, and very quickly." Just the way he did with North Korea, Iran, the opioid crisis, the wall, the trade war with China, and of course the coronavirus pandemic.

But the people around Trump can't very well admit that the leader of the free world is a babbling ignoramus who doesn't know shit about the basic principles of federalism and small government which conservatives pretend to hold so dear. So instead they excuse his behavior as "letting off steam." You know, like sometimes you're so upset about the tragic spate of shootings in Chicago that you threaten to send in troops to take over the city and perp walk a bunch of brown kids for the camera so the Real Housewives of America will get scared and come running back to the GOP.

"There was rarely a time I spoke to him about violent crime when two things didn't come up: Number One, that it's all happening in Democrat-run cities, with Chicago being shorthand for that kind of [blight]," said one former senior Trump administration official. "And Number Two, if it were up to him, we would return to the old days where it was eye-for-an-eye, tooth-for-a-tooth—or we would forget about proportionality altogether. He would talk about lining up drug dealers and gang members in front of a firing squad...If it were solely up to him, that is how the country would solve crime in Democrat-run cities [such as Chicago and Detroit]."

Yay, President Biglybrain wants to bring back the firing squad. Or as Samantha Zager, one of the eleventy hundred people getting paid by Trump's campaign to practice performative indignation, put it, "Joe Biden and the Democrats would normalize the string of violence and destruction we've seen from their supporters instead of stand up to it. President Trump will continue to enforce law and order to protect the fabric of our nation, even as Democrats do everything in their power to avoid holding these criminals accountable."

Be afraid, American Housewives. Be very afraid!

[ Beast ]

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