when Trump claims to be “an innocent man” and his followers believe him, i don’t think the meaning of that is to deny that he did what he is accused of. instead the claim is that, by virtue of being Trump, by virtue of his nobility and the nobility of his intentions, his doing this does not constitute a crime where it might if others did the same. 1/

in the conservative imaginary, the protection offered by the state must be about persons rather than actions. it is futile, naive, to try to prevent or deter crime. we must catch and punish criminals. there are good guys and there are bad guys, and the edifice of law is a pretext by which we get the bad guys. going after the good guys, unless what they’ve done shocks the conscience in its harm to other good guys, is always a miscarriage of justice. /fin