{"id":13862,"date":"2022-09-03T04:59:16","date_gmt":"2022-09-03T14:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/?p=13862"},"modified":"2022-09-03T04:59:18","modified_gmt":"2022-09-03T14:59:18","slug":"transparency-is-killing-fpotus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/2022\/09\/03\/transparency-is-killing-fpotus\/","title":{"rendered":"Transparency Is Killing FPOTUS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Emil Guillermo

<\/em>Hawaii knew what to do when our democracy seemed in crisis.

People voted in free and fair elections. Candidates won and lost.\u00a0 They accepted their fate. There were no reported election deniers. It was both affirmation and confirmation that our system still works. It just doesn\u2019t work for crybaby would-be tyrants.

We are now entering an era when the greatest threat to our democracy is one FPOTUS.

FPOTUS?

That was the description on the affidavit attached to that historic\u00a0search warrant<\/a>\u00a0on the property of The Former President of the United States, a.k.a. FPOTUS.

But why stop at one F when there\u2019s a foultitude of F-words. (That\u2019s French for \u201clots\u201d or \u201coodles.\u201d)

But there\u2019s also: \u201cFalsifying.\u201d \u201cFailed.\u201d \u201cFunky\u201d even works metaphorically in a most foul way. All of them come to mind. Add your favorite adjectival \u201cF\u201d word. Just not \u201cFilipino.\u201dWe\u2019ve never seen this in U.S. history. A figurehead of the world\u2019s greatest democracy becoming the target of a search warrant. And it\u2019s all official and legit. One that\u2019s signed off by a judge who believes there is probable cause that a crime has been committed by a former president of the United States.

Jimmy Carter is an FPOTUS, but you know we\u2019re not talking about him. Carter builds houses, not federal criminal cases that make him a threat to our country.

And now that a redacted affidavit has been unsealed\u2014something that FPOTUS said he wanted\u2014things do not look good for FPOTUS.

Even with a redacted affidavit released recently, there\u2019s nothing positive for FPOTUS in the new document.

Yes, there\u2019s a lot of black ink covering the facts, but there\u2019s enough that still adds up to probable cause that a federal crime was committed by FPOTUS.

And he wants a second inaugural? More likely he\u2019ll get a federal indictment.

We aren\u2019t talking about the kind of \u201chigh crimes and misdemeanors\u201d political crime that Congress has used twice already in the impeachment process against him.

We\u2019re talking about real crimes in the U.S. code that normal people get thrown in jail for. Like the oddly named Reality Winner, a former NSA contractor who got prison time for leaking a single classified document to the media.

That\u2019s the seriousness of the possible charges here, the biggest one perhaps involving potential violations of the Espionage Act.

If you are found with the most top secret of government documents, the kind that you need to open in a safe room, and they\u2019re sitting in a basement at your Florida resort, that could be considered \u201cmishandling\u201d and get someone up to 10 years in prison.

Then there\u2019s the possibility of obstruction of justice charges that could fetch up to 20 years.

And as the topper, there\u2019s the possible charge of destruction or mutilation of federal records, which could potentially disqualify a person from ever holding public office.

Essentially, FPOTUS would have to understand that a realistic run again for president in 2024 has practically been made moot. Unless Republicans really want to vote for an indicted candidate.

Hard to understand why FPOTUS would personally house top-secret materials in unsecure circumstances at Mar-a-Lago. For souvenirs?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His first response was the extreme tack of claiming political persecution. It\u2019s political victimhood!

Hey, wait, isn\u2019t that what people say Asian Americans and other BIPOC folks do? No, FPOTUS is not like us. He understands victimizing others. But being the victim? Not FPOTUS.

He\u2019s also taken to blaming another F-word, the FBI! Of course, the FBI agents were just doing their job, and in a lowkey way after discussions to obtain the documents began in 2021, then were brought up again in 2022, reports say. And a search warrant was required only after certain documents appear to have been omitted the first-time documents were handed over.

Don\u2019t blame the FBI. But that seems to be the preferred tack of the Republican Party, which can\u2019t seem to quit its loving embrace of FPOTUS.

\u201cThe FBI raid of President Trump is a complete abuse and overreach of its authority,\u201d said House member Elise Stefanik (R-NY). Overreach? The paperwork was signed by a judge.

Others like Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) just tried to raise doubt even to suggest that documents may have been planted. Plant-based documents by meat-eater FPOTUS? Doubt it.

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colorado) called the FBI tyrants. Sen Rick Scott (R-Fla.) went even further. \u201cThe way the federal government has gone, it\u2019s like what we thought about the Gestapo, people like that, that just go after people.\u201d

No, Sen. Scott, our FBI isn\u2019t like the official secret police of Nazi Germany.

This is the desperate Republican Party trying to defend their FPOTUS, who earlier this month, in a deposition with the New York Attorney General, pleaded the Fifth more than 400 times.

Instead of choosing America, the GOP has chosen FPOTUS, and that is not good for America.

Already one FBI office drew the attention of a Jan. 6 insurrectionist, who was recently gunned down in a standoff in Ohio. It may not be the last if insurrectionists see anything FPOTUS says as a call to arms.

We may be coming up to Jan. 6 the Sequel. And all because the FPOTUS in question can\u2019t show anything but a disgraceful love of self. Certainly, there\u2019s no love of country.

And now that the redacted document released recently shows nothing to exonerate or give FPOTUS any kind of innocence narrative. Just politics? No, there are real documents he had no right to possess. They only add to the weight around his neck that a crime was committed.

One can easily downplay it all as insignificant. But FPOTUS possessed documents that among other things, contained the names of people who had cooperated with the U.S. These people gave information to the U.S. and would be jailed or killed if their identities were known.

It\u2019s serious business. And it no longer concerns Trump, who isn\u2019t president for life but is now a mere private citizen. This is not normal in the presidential history of our country ever. We shouldn\u2019t begin now.

If you are a Filipino who has stayed loyal to FPOTUS and were just waiting for an optimal time to jump off the Trump train, now would be that time.

EMIL GUILLERMO<\/strong> is a journalist and commentator. He was an editorial board member for the Advertiser and a columnist for the Star-Bulletin. The former host of \u201cAll Things Considered\u201d in Washington, DC, writes from California.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Emil Guillermo Hawaii knew what to do when our democracy seemed in crisis. People…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[29,20],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1.webp",1581,1054,false],"thumbnail":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-300x200.webp",300,200,true],"medium_large":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-768x512.webp",640,427,true],"large":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-1024x683.webp",640,427,true],"1536x1536":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-1536x1024.webp",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1.webp",1581,1054,false],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-1200x800.webp",1200,800,true],"ultp_layout_landscape":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-870x570.webp",870,570,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-600x900.webp",600,900,true],"ultp_layout_square":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-600x600.webp",600,600,true],"covernews-slider-full":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-1536x1020.webp",1077,715,true],"covernews-slider-center":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-936x897.webp",522,500,true],"covernews-featured":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-1024x683.webp",1024,683,true],"covernews-medium":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-720x380.webp",540,285,true],"covernews-medium-square":["http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1-675x450.webp",375,250,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Candid Perspectives<\/a> Featured<\/a>","tag_info":"Featured","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/donald-trump-4-1.webp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13862"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13862"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13865,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13862\/revisions\/13865"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}