RadixJournal - May 08, 2023


＂They Let You Do It＂


Episode Stats

Length

19 minutes

Words per Minute

133.8343

Word Count

2,624

Sentence Count

191

Misogynist Sentences

13

Hate Speech Sentences

6


Summary

Donald Trump's civil case against E. Jean Carroll is in New York City, and the jury is deliberating. I talk about why I think the case is fraudulent and why Trump should have renounced his earlier claims against her. I also talk about the immediate political fallout from the case, and why I don't think Trump should take the stand.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello, everyone, and welcome back to my journal.
00:00:04.780 I am going to talk briefly about the civil case that Donald Trump is involved with.
00:00:14.420 He is being sued by E. Jean Carroll.
00:00:19.940 It's taking place in New York City, and both the plaintiffs and the defense have rested,
00:00:27.220 and the jury is deliberating, so I want to get this in before we know the verdict.
00:00:35.000 I think the verdict might very well be for the plaintiff.
00:00:40.360 That is, Donald Trump is going to be responsible for renouncing his earlier claims against E. Jean Carroll,
00:00:52.300 and he might be responsible for a lot of money.
00:00:56.420 We will see, but I want to talk about why I think this type of case is fraudulent in itself,
00:01:05.700 and that's a more complicated argument, and I want to also talk just about the immediate political fallout from all this,
00:01:16.260 so I will start there.
00:01:18.300 Whatever the verdict is, this case has been an absolute disaster for Donald Trump,
00:01:27.300 personally, for Trump world, etc.
00:01:31.160 The chickens have finally come home to roost with the grab-em-by-the-pussy tape
00:01:38.380 that, of course, was revealed in 2016, an October surprise,
00:01:44.320 and was damaging then, although Trump pulled out a miraculous win.
00:01:49.280 And I think this is a point at which, again, the chickens have come home to roost,
00:01:55.240 that Donald Trump is ultimately having to pay for those comments,
00:02:00.500 because I do think that this is a political case.
00:02:04.640 It's being done by Roberta Kaplan, it's being funded by Reid Hoffman, Netflix fame,
00:02:15.820 and it ultimately derives from what was a political act and not necessarily a criminal act.
00:02:24.920 That is, it ultimately derives from the grab-em-by-the-pussy tape,
00:02:28.440 and it doesn't necessarily derive from a crime.
00:02:32.520 And I think that's the real problem, and that's why I think everyone,
00:02:37.520 no matter how you feel about Trump,
00:02:39.440 I was famously very excited about Trump at one point.
00:02:43.560 I'm much less so now, to say the least.
00:02:48.520 But I think someone should take his defense on this matter,
00:02:54.440 in the sense that this type of case is fraudulent in itself,
00:02:58.600 and could be misused in a whole host of different ways.
00:03:04.800 But anyway, let's get back to the immediate political fallout.
00:03:09.660 Trump never took the stand.
00:03:12.440 You don't have to in a civil matter.
00:03:15.080 And he didn't even show up in court.
00:03:17.980 Again, you don't have to in a civil matter.
00:03:20.460 He did show up via videotape of his deposition,
00:03:24.640 and the highlights that we've seen from that deposition,
00:03:27.880 which I'm sure was hours upon hours,
00:03:30.440 but we're only seeing a few minutes here and there.
00:03:33.140 Anyway, those highlights are disastrous.
00:03:37.360 And I agree that they might be funny on some level,
00:03:44.120 but they are super disastrous.
00:03:47.140 And I think Trump, in many ways, couldn't help himself.
00:03:51.200 He just had to act like an edgelord and say these things.
00:03:56.120 It's part of his personality.
00:03:57.800 It's, in a way, what made him great
00:03:59.420 and what might very well bring him down.
00:04:03.400 So just some highlights of these.
00:04:06.000 He misidentified E. Jean Carroll
00:04:08.660 and his own ex-wife, Marla Maples.
00:04:10.980 So he was shown a photo in this deposition.
00:04:16.820 And he, first off, there was an odd way
00:04:20.900 in which Trump was either playing dumb
00:04:22.800 or he's having serious memory issues.
00:04:25.480 He couldn't quite remember, you know,
00:04:27.400 when he was married to Ivana,
00:04:30.100 when he was married to Marla,
00:04:31.060 when he was married to his current beautiful wife, Melania.
00:04:34.580 And he was shown this photo and he said,
00:04:40.000 oh yeah, that's Marla.
00:04:42.280 And he was corrected.
00:04:44.540 No, that was, in fact, E. Jean Carroll.
00:04:46.900 And they're different people,
00:04:48.340 but they look fairly similar.
00:04:51.040 So his claim after this accusation was made
00:04:58.440 was basically the same claim
00:05:01.080 that Sorghum of Arkad made,
00:05:04.100 that is Carl Benjamin,
00:05:05.620 on Twitter at some point,
00:05:07.700 where he said,
00:05:08.300 I wouldn't even rape you,
00:05:10.700 which is, I guess,
00:05:13.880 a backhanded compliment if there ever was one.
00:05:17.360 Very, very much an edgelord comment.
00:05:20.080 And he said that,
00:05:21.320 oh, she's not my type,
00:05:22.580 so I wouldn't sexually assault her.
00:05:24.480 Well, again, that's a very odd thing to say
00:05:26.880 as opposed to just a blanket denial.
00:05:29.640 No, I didn't do this.
00:05:30.800 That would have been a lot easier,
00:05:32.100 but Trump had to kind of twist it.
00:05:35.540 Well, it seems like she very much was his type.
00:05:38.720 He thought she was Marla Maples, in fact,
00:05:41.560 whom he had a long-term affair with throughout the 80s.
00:05:44.980 It was played out in the tabloids.
00:05:47.320 I can remember as a kid
00:05:48.560 going to the supermarket
00:05:50.140 and seeing People magazine
00:05:51.720 and Trump and Marla and Ivana
00:05:54.740 and all this kind of stuff going on.
00:05:58.120 So that was a huge disaster.
00:06:02.940 The other thing,
00:06:04.120 he said something that was truthful,
00:06:07.980 but obviously doesn't really serve him.
00:06:13.500 And he said that he basically affirmed
00:06:17.600 the grab him by the pussy tape
00:06:18.860 because a lot of people listen to that tape
00:06:22.080 and they said,
00:06:22.840 oh, look, he's confessing to a sexual assault.
00:06:25.040 Well, it was locker room talk in many ways.
00:06:27.740 He was talking very generally.
00:06:29.460 He was not confessing to a specific crime.
00:06:36.320 But there's also this interesting quality to it
00:06:40.920 where it's like, okay, is he being offensive?
00:06:43.480 Yes or no.
00:06:44.020 But is he right or not?
00:06:45.440 Yes or no.
00:06:46.040 And he affirmed this,
00:06:47.460 that for the last million years,
00:06:49.040 if you were a star of some kind,
00:06:51.760 I guess a star in the age of the cavemen,
00:06:54.180 and you were really good at clubbing
00:06:56.580 the other tribe or something,
00:06:58.980 that basically they let you do it.
00:07:01.920 And so it's a comment on female nature
00:07:04.440 and not just man's nature.
00:07:09.120 All of this might very well be true,
00:07:11.740 but it's just not the thing to say in a deposition.
00:07:16.260 And so I think that also was a disaster.
00:07:20.780 So, again, even if he gets out of this,
00:07:25.320 even if he wins on appeal,
00:07:26.840 I still think this is highly damaging.
00:07:28.860 But I want to talk more about the case itself
00:07:32.740 and why it's fraudulent.
00:07:35.260 And I think it's being,
00:07:37.100 it's not necessarily being misrepresented by the media,
00:07:40.820 but it's being misrepresented in headlines
00:07:42.920 and how people talk about it.
00:07:44.380 So it's often referred to as the Trump rape trial.
00:07:48.840 Well, it's not a rape trial.
00:07:52.720 It is a defamation trial.
00:07:55.480 So we're distanced already by a valence
00:07:58.720 away from the actual alleged crime.
00:08:03.180 The rape, or it sounds a little bit more
00:08:06.760 like a sexual assault to me,
00:08:08.220 but I don't want to split hairs here.
00:08:11.180 But the crime occurred in the mid-90s.
00:08:15.940 Trump's lawyer made something of the fact
00:08:18.120 that E. Jean Carroll couldn't quite remember
00:08:20.560 when it happened.
00:08:21.960 Was it 95 or 96 or something like that?
00:08:24.780 Well, I think that's actually fair.
00:08:26.960 I was in high school in the mid-90s.
00:08:29.740 And, you know, did this event happen senior year?
00:08:32.660 Was it sophomore year?
00:08:33.680 I can't quite remember.
00:08:34.380 I think that's fair.
00:08:36.020 And I also don't think E. Jean Carroll
00:08:40.700 is making it up, actually.
00:08:42.280 And I'll go into more of that a little bit later.
00:08:45.580 But what happened, according to Carroll,
00:08:47.900 and she wrote this in an autobiography,
00:08:51.120 and she actually didn't mention Trump by name,
00:08:54.140 but it acted as a kind of Romana clef.
00:08:57.260 Everyone knew it was Trump and, you know,
00:08:59.620 so on and so forth.
00:09:00.480 So they were at Bergdorf Department Store Fancy Place,
00:09:08.980 and he asked her to help him buy a present.
00:09:15.040 And he said, oh, I want to get this woman a fur cap.
00:09:19.240 And she said, oh, you should never put an animal
00:09:20.980 on your head, and then maybe we'll do a bodysuit
00:09:23.120 or something like that.
00:09:23.740 One thing led to another, and Trump pushed her up
00:09:26.920 against the wall and apparently digitally penetrated her.
00:09:32.920 So I guess you could call this rape on some level.
00:09:38.700 Now, what do I think of this?
00:09:43.160 I think that E. Jean Carroll is, in all likelihood,
00:09:49.260 being truthful.
00:09:50.780 In other words, I believe her.
00:09:53.740 Now, I don't believe all women or something like that.
00:09:57.220 I think there certainly are many cases of lying
00:10:00.440 to get revenge or so on.
00:10:02.740 But I believe E. Jean Carroll.
00:10:04.380 I think she's a credible person.
00:10:06.380 She strikes me as a rather, you know,
00:10:10.340 she's exuberant and kind of a goofy woman,
00:10:14.580 but I almost say that as a compliment.
00:10:17.460 She's kind of the fun girl that you would want to talk to
00:10:21.120 or, you know, be friends with or have at a party.
00:10:23.660 I think she's fairly, I think not fairly,
00:10:26.480 I think she's credible.
00:10:27.520 I don't think she's lying.
00:10:29.240 I think something like this might very well have happened.
00:10:33.560 I tend to believe her.
00:10:35.360 You know, we don't, no one has firm evidence here,
00:10:37.240 but I tend to believe her.
00:10:38.300 I don't think she's on the war path.
00:10:40.400 Now, you could ask,
00:10:44.060 why didn't she go to the police immediately afterwards?
00:10:49.100 You could ask a lot of questions about that.
00:10:52.380 This wasn't a rape like, you know,
00:10:58.260 you would think of in, say, Central Park
00:11:00.420 where someone grabs you, knocks you over the head
00:11:03.060 and takes you behind the bushes or something like that.
00:11:04.920 It wasn't nearly that violent.
00:11:08.380 Perhaps in the world of Donald Trump,
00:11:12.340 this kind of thing is fairly normal.
00:11:14.960 He certainly makes it seem that way.
00:11:18.080 He's done this to many different women.
00:11:21.480 And maybe E. Jing Curl wasn't quite sure
00:11:27.400 that it was a crime.
00:11:28.920 Maybe she was embarrassed by the whole thing.
00:11:31.040 She didn't want to be scandalized.
00:11:33.620 Maybe she had some mixed feelings herself
00:11:35.920 about the matter.
00:11:37.880 Maybe she felt a little guilty
00:11:41.260 about being aroused by it.
00:11:44.500 And I don't say that
00:11:45.800 to make some kind of edgelord comment.
00:11:48.340 Human sexuality is a very complicated thing.
00:11:52.180 And Freud was right in many ways.
00:11:54.860 We often fear what we desire
00:11:56.780 and we desire what we fear.
00:11:59.720 So maybe she had some ambivalent feelings about this
00:12:02.740 and didn't want to come forward.
00:12:04.220 And then in retrospect, you know, 30 years on,
00:12:08.180 she's able to process it and describe it.
00:12:13.260 Again, I'm not saying this in any way
00:12:15.880 as an insult towards E. Jing Curl.
00:12:18.580 I think it's a very human response.
00:12:25.300 But the fact is,
00:12:27.080 there is no direct evidence of this.
00:12:30.620 There was a legal battle about the dress that she wore.
00:12:34.300 She claimed she didn't launder it.
00:12:36.760 And there might have been Trump's DNA
00:12:39.820 left there in some way.
00:12:44.040 I don't even want to go into
00:12:47.200 where that DNA would come from.
00:12:50.820 But there was some deal
00:12:53.420 between the plaintiffs and the defendants
00:12:55.660 where they were like,
00:12:56.680 well, we'll give up Trump's DNA
00:12:59.480 if you show us all of the DNA
00:13:02.780 that's on the dress.
00:13:04.140 And so on.
00:13:05.400 The judge said,
00:13:06.620 well, it's too late for all this.
00:13:08.000 The trial has to go forward.
00:13:09.180 So we, you know,
00:13:10.820 the jury never heard about the dress.
00:13:12.720 We don't get to, you know,
00:13:15.400 reiterate the famous dress
00:13:17.040 that, you know,
00:13:18.060 reminds us of another infamous episode
00:13:21.120 from the 1990s.
00:13:23.220 That is the Bill Clinton,
00:13:24.900 Monica Lewinsky affair.
00:13:28.120 Anyway,
00:13:29.020 we don't have an actual crime.
00:13:33.080 Whatever her reasons,
00:13:34.600 she never,
00:13:35.460 Carol never went to the police.
00:13:36.980 We don't have any really firm evidence.
00:13:40.420 What we do have evidence of
00:13:42.840 is that Donald Trump is a jerk
00:13:47.000 and that Donald Trump is the kind of guy
00:13:50.520 who would do something like this.
00:13:52.960 We also have evidence
00:13:54.560 that E. Jean Carroll
00:13:56.060 is a kind of an interesting lady
00:13:59.760 and I would say credible witness.
00:14:02.760 So we have evidence of that.
00:14:04.780 Of that, we can be sure.
00:14:07.640 But we don't have any evidence of the crime.
00:14:10.580 And this is the real issue
00:14:12.520 of the civil suit.
00:14:14.060 Again,
00:14:14.680 you could file a civil suit
00:14:16.960 about something that was a crime.
00:14:19.180 For instance,
00:14:19.560 there's a wrongful death civil suit.
00:14:22.960 It's not murder in the criminal sense,
00:14:25.700 but it obviously involves death.
00:14:27.800 You could have a civil suit involving rape.
00:14:29.840 But again,
00:14:30.480 this isn't a civil suit involving rape.
00:14:32.640 The statute of limitations is long past.
00:14:35.700 And again,
00:14:36.420 could you prove
00:14:38.000 that Donald Trump did this
00:14:39.940 beyond a reasonable doubt?
00:14:42.500 There have been some famous rape cases
00:14:44.360 in which the only evidence
00:14:47.160 was the word of the victim.
00:14:50.220 So you could,
00:14:51.740 but I think it's very unlikely.
00:14:54.720 And they're not even trying that.
00:14:56.860 So it's all moot.
00:14:59.100 So we have this layer above
00:15:01.260 the alleged crime
00:15:03.520 that is a civil suit of defamation.
00:15:08.120 Now,
00:15:09.020 there are different standards
00:15:10.460 in civil and criminal cases.
00:15:13.060 As you know,
00:15:14.140 I'm sure in a criminal case,
00:15:15.700 it has to be beyond a reasonable doubt.
00:15:18.120 In other words,
00:15:19.760 he did it.
00:15:20.580 You know,
00:15:22.260 no sensible person
00:15:27.920 could dispute this.
00:15:29.120 We got him dead to rights.
00:15:30.280 That should be the standard
00:15:31.460 for any kind of crime,
00:15:32.980 whether it's a speeding ticket
00:15:34.340 or whether it's murder
00:15:35.320 or a sexual assault
00:15:37.860 like what is being alleged.
00:15:41.020 In a civil trial,
00:15:43.080 the threshold
00:15:44.760 they have to reach
00:15:45.600 is lower.
00:15:47.040 It's more,
00:15:47.840 it's not a reasonable doubt.
00:15:49.100 It's more like,
00:15:50.200 did he probably do this?
00:15:52.740 It's 51%.
00:15:54.280 It's not 99%
00:15:56.120 certainty.
00:15:58.920 So
00:15:59.640 they build
00:16:01.100 a civil case
00:16:02.360 on
00:16:03.280 top
00:16:04.660 of
00:16:05.240 an alleged crime
00:16:06.500 that has never really been proven.
00:16:08.720 And I fear
00:16:09.940 that
00:16:10.880 because of this
00:16:12.500 mixing
00:16:13.580 of the thresholds
00:16:15.520 to reach a verdict
00:16:17.180 that
00:16:18.700 Donald Trump
00:16:19.860 is going to be
00:16:21.840 excuse me,
00:16:24.720 that the jury
00:16:25.400 will find
00:16:26.140 for the plaintiffs
00:16:27.940 on the basis
00:16:29.060 that they are pretty sure
00:16:30.940 that Donald Trump
00:16:31.880 is the type of guy
00:16:33.300 who would do something
00:16:34.180 like this.
00:16:36.700 Now,
00:16:37.320 there's another
00:16:37.960 matter
00:16:39.120 involving this
00:16:40.200 that I think
00:16:40.540 is a little bit
00:16:40.960 less interesting,
00:16:41.780 which is,
00:16:42.200 you know,
00:16:42.460 what kind of defamation
00:16:44.020 has actually occurred,
00:16:46.020 what kind of damages
00:16:47.160 has Carol
00:16:48.140 suffered
00:16:49.180 due to
00:16:50.740 Donald Trump's
00:16:52.000 defaming of her.
00:16:53.660 Now,
00:16:53.880 again,
00:16:54.380 it's not the damages
00:16:55.700 that she suffered
00:16:56.660 due to the alleged crime.
00:16:58.760 It's the damage
00:16:59.340 that she suffered
00:17:00.260 from Donald Trump
00:17:01.440 lying about her.
00:17:02.500 Those are very different things.
00:17:04.740 And we're just
00:17:05.620 mixing these two
00:17:07.300 and mixing the thresholds
00:17:09.740 where I don't think
00:17:11.660 such a case
00:17:13.420 should be allowed
00:17:14.540 to take place.
00:17:16.000 I'm not saying this
00:17:17.500 as a Trump fanboy.
00:17:19.340 I'm saying this
00:17:20.700 as someone
00:17:21.280 who actually cares
00:17:22.280 about how this kind of thing
00:17:23.540 could be used
00:17:24.360 in the future.
00:17:28.300 Let's say
00:17:29.340 that
00:17:30.280 it's not Donald Trump.
00:17:32.480 It's some
00:17:33.700 college guy
00:17:35.280 who
00:17:36.520 is
00:17:38.040 being accused
00:17:39.520 of defaming
00:17:40.380 someone
00:17:41.000 for
00:17:41.960 the fact
00:17:43.120 that he denied
00:17:43.960 that he raped her.
00:17:45.640 And they have evidence
00:17:46.580 that,
00:17:46.940 oh yeah,
00:17:47.300 they were at this
00:17:47.880 frat party together.
00:17:48.980 Oh yeah,
00:17:49.400 they were both drinking
00:17:50.520 and he was hitting
00:17:52.300 on her
00:17:52.920 really hard.
00:17:54.940 And
00:17:55.420 when she went
00:17:56.740 out to get
00:17:58.080 something from her car,
00:17:59.680 he followed her.
00:18:01.340 So,
00:18:01.980 hmm,
00:18:02.480 it looks like he raped her.
00:18:03.560 He definitely could have done it.
00:18:04.740 Well,
00:18:05.300 that level of evidence
00:18:07.180 wouldn't really
00:18:08.720 pass mustard.
00:18:10.560 Pass mustard,
00:18:11.700 excuse me.
00:18:12.980 Wouldn't pass mustard
00:18:14.140 in a criminal case.
00:18:19.560 Yet,
00:18:20.480 we are now
00:18:21.660 in a situation
00:18:22.520 where
00:18:23.320 you could basically
00:18:24.720 impugn
00:18:25.740 this man's character
00:18:26.720 and say,
00:18:27.220 well,
00:18:27.680 this is the type
00:18:28.960 of frat boy
00:18:29.960 jock
00:18:30.640 asshole
00:18:31.240 who would do
00:18:33.080 things like this.
00:18:35.500 So,
00:18:35.980 what are you really
00:18:36.800 supposed to do
00:18:37.920 in cases like this
00:18:39.220 other than
00:18:40.260 deny
00:18:41.120 that you committed
00:18:42.080 a crime?
00:18:44.480 I mean,
00:18:44.900 it's,
00:18:45.560 of course,
00:18:46.200 you're going to call
00:18:47.020 someone a liar
00:18:48.280 to some extent
00:18:50.800 if they
00:18:52.800 accuse you
00:18:53.740 of a crime
00:18:54.420 that you didn't commit.
00:18:56.700 So,
00:18:57.460 what exactly
00:18:58.320 are you supposed
00:18:59.360 to do
00:19:00.140 outside of
00:19:01.480 risking
00:19:02.000 a civil trial
00:19:03.820 in which
00:19:04.540 denying
00:19:05.520 a criminal
00:19:06.400 act
00:19:07.000 is
00:19:07.640 in itself
00:19:08.380 defamation?
00:19:10.340 I just think
00:19:11.080 these things
00:19:11.620 are so
00:19:12.360 twisted.
00:19:14.000 The whole
00:19:14.900 reasoning
00:19:15.740 behind this
00:19:16.400 case
00:19:16.800 is so
00:19:18.180 convoluted
00:19:19.180 that I just
00:19:20.040 don't think
00:19:21.080 it should
00:19:22.220 ever
00:19:22.740 have seen
00:19:23.580 the light
00:19:23.920 of day.
00:19:24.320 play.
00:19:31.940 .
00:19:32.560 .
00:19:32.920 .
00:19:33.520 .
00:19:35.860 .