We feel obliged to express our principled disagreement, with an essay, currently appearing in “THE ATLANTIC.” The writing at issue was authored by Richard W. Painter, an ethicist, and professor at Minnesota Law School.
The article relates to the contrived and entirely specious, application, by Trump’s attorneys, to disqualify Georgia D.A. Fani Willis, from the continued prosecution of the voter interference case, based on a romantic affair with a member of her legal staff. Professor Painter, concerned about public propriety as well as the effect on the jury’s objective perception [N.B., the crime was broadcast on public television] observes that Georgia District Attorney, Fani Willis should, indeed, recuse herself “even if the judge rules in her favor and denies the issue raised by the defense.”
With appropriate respect for the eminent author, we could not disagree more. The normally appropriate concern for moral sensitivity and aesthetic discretion is not merely unwarranted in the case of the sui generis persona of Donald J. Trump, but is an act of compliant appeasement and a hapless surrender to the cynical manipulation of that psychopathic actor; not analogously dissimilar to Neville Chamberlain’s feckless appeasement in the 1930s of Adolph Hitler.
In the most liberal and unrestrained exercise of imagination, any conception that the private life of Fani Willis is, in some bizarre fashion, relevant to the prosecution against Trump for his egregious acts of voter fraud, (let alone constitute a basis for a rationally acceptable claim of conflict of interest) is beguiling and is characteristic of the singular mindset and conventional, tactically based, actions of Donald J. Trump. He has eternally been a manipulative puppeteer, notably, not only of the thoughts and actions of his hapless, MAGA supporters but, incomprehensibly, at times, the intellectually gifted and well-informed. The latter run the occasional potential to unwittingly project their high standards of ethical sentiment upon non-deserving toxic personalities like Trump. It is our view that Trump instinctively relies upon this well-intentioned phenomenon of naïve and undeserved ratification and tactically uses it as a self-assured weapon that dynamically functions as a ubiquitously utilitarian, manipulative wire in his egocentric, imperious, and autocratic puppetry.
The ethical considerations ideologically expressed by Professor Painter are undoubtedly emblematic of a commendable sensitivity and moral compass. However, as generously utilized in this singularly contextual case, amounts to an undeserved accommodation to the ongoing tactical puppet show, produced by the neurotic and professedly autocratic, snake-oil salesman, Donald J. Trump.
-p.
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