Pinocchio Has Stepped Over the Serpent
The left was just caught in a lie, and now they're trying to get another one past us
We all remember the story of Pinocchio—the naive puppet whose nose grows whenever he tells a lie—at least, that's how Disney portrays him. In the original story, Pinocchio is far more sinister, as his innate selfishness, disrespect, and aggressive behavior get him into extreme trouble.
To be honest, I have not seen the Disney portrayal of Pinocchio in years and have not read the original story. I am probably the last person who should be making a Pinocchio reference. But I recently read a synopsis of the original Pinocchio story, and a few parts stood out as applicable to today's political world.
Pinocchio's Near Death
About halfway through the story, before Pinocchio's nose ever starts growing, Pinocchio is almost killed at the hands of the fox and the cat. His foolishness, brazen disregard for the truth, and lack of respect for the institutions meant to govern him lead to him hanging from a tree, about to suffocate to death.
The left has already experienced this near-death moment in the United States. By "near death," I don't mean that the left, and by extension the mainstream media, was about to be dissolved. Instead, I mean that the general public nearly caught on to the way the mainstream media lies to us and how they have become so entrenched in the democratic party that they are essentially the PR wing for the left.
The near-death moment came in the summer of 2020. The coronavirus rocked the world in the spring, shutting down schools, churches, sporting events, concerts, and workplaces. By the time summer came around, some states were deciding to reopen as it became clear that the virus mainly affected those who were already at risk of severe illness or death. The left was enraged at these states. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was nicknamed "DeathSantis." CNN always displayed a "death tracker" on its shows. The left tried desperately to convince us that red states did not care about their citizens.
Then, the protests and riots started. Every night in our nation's biggest cities, thousands of people flocked to the significant areas to protest against police brutality. Major fires were started in Minneapolis, Saint Paul, D.C., Los Angeles, and Portland, just to name a few cities. In addition to the arson, stores were looted, police officers were beaten, and protestors were shot by other protestors. While this was going on, the left encouraged the protests. Some even excused the violence. Our current Vice President, Kamala Harris, posted a link for others to help post bond payments for those arrested. Many on the left decided the protests were necessary and excused the violence, as it was for a "good cause."
While they were out excusing violence, your grandmother lay there, alone on her deathbed.
That was the left's near-death moment. All it would have taken was for the rest of the country to wake up and notice what the left was doing. The rules didn't make sense. They were hypocritical. For once, the lies were happening right in front of our eyes. The left was foolish to think we wouldn't notice. We all could see it, yet they disregarded the truth right in front of us. Some on the moderate left were calling out the lies and the hypocrisy. The middle was beginning to see the problem. Those on the right finally had concrete examples of the left's hypocrisy and lies that everyone could easily recognize. Yet the media continued, showing no respect for the institution governing them—the American people. The media is here for us and put in place by us. But they took their power and used it against us for the sole purpose of advancing the interests of the left.
But, as with Pinocchio, a fairy in a white house came to save the left. The fairy in the real world? His name was Donald Trump.
The Fairy Saves Pinocchio
As Pinocchio hangs from the tree, a fairy he had previously met (who lived in a white house) rescues him. She brought him back to her home and nursed him to full health. Pinocchio's only side effect was that his nose grew when he lied. Whenever he lied, it became clear to anyone who paid attention.
Donald Trump was the fairy that the left needed. However, it wasn't his big heart that saved the left; it was his own foolishness that helped restore the left's credibility.
Before the 2020 election, election laws were being changed nationwide because of Covid. Many states were changing their mail-in ballot rules; some were mailing out ballots to every registered voter, and most added additional ballot drop boxes in places they previously had not been allowed. Many states changed their laws according to their Constitution, but some did not. For example, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court changed the voting laws in Pennsylvania when the Constitution required that the state legislature make voting laws.
And what did Donald Trump do? Nothing. At least, not until after the election.
The changes in these laws occurred well in advance of the election. If there had been a problem with the changes (which there were), Trump could have filed a lawsuit before the election occurred. The courts would then have struck down the changes, and the state legislature would have to pass the laws. Instead, Trump and his team waited until after he lost the election to challenge the new rules in these states. At that time, the only possible redress was to throw out all the ballots cast in those states and have the state legislature pick their delegates. No court in the country would go along with that without a clear showing of widespread fraud. And courts unilaterally changing the laws does not constitute voter fraud. The ballots were legally cast in accordance with state law. Throwing out all the votes in the swing states would deprive millions of people of their constitutionally protected right to vote, one of the most fundamental and inalienable rights in this country. No judge would want to be on the hook for that ruling.
Because of this, the left gained back some credibility with the people. This person, who they had been claiming was "Orange Hitler," was denying that he lost the election. Trump was convinced that he had won and was doing everything he could to prove that he had won. Although Trump pursued lawful means of doing so (in the courts), to the average person, the left had been correct about him. At least, accurate enough to be taken seriously. Then, throw in the ugliness of January 6th, and the average person was back in the loving embrace of the left, who had just finished lying to us about things happening right before our eyes.
Trump, the man in the White House at the time, saved the left. But four years later, they were just caught in another lie.
Pinocchio and the Serpent
A few chapters after the fairy saves Pinocchio, he walks through the forest when he comes across a giant serpent lying in the road. Pinocchio waits for three hours, hoping that the serpent will move along and let Pinocchio go his own way. Pinocchio eventually gets tired of waiting and decides he will politely ask the serpent to move. When he asks, the serpent appears to Pinocchio as dead. He decides to step over the serpent, and when he does, the serpent suddenly springs up, scaring Pinocchio. He falls backward and gets stuck in the mud. The serpent laughs so hard at the sight of Pinocchio stuck that he bursts an artery and dies. Then, Pinocchio went along his merry way, continuing as he had before.
In this example, we, the American people (specifically, those in the middle and on the right), are the serpent. Over the past few years, the left has been tiptoeing around, hoping that the rest of the country wouldn't catch on to their lies. They've lied about the Supreme Court, Donald Trump, and members of Congress, to name a few general topics. The most obvious lie was exposed last week.
Joe Biden is a senile old man. We all knew this, but the left had been trying to convince us for years that what we were seeing wasn't true. The lies about his senility increased as his presidency went on. They started by spinning his age and noticeable decline as "wisdom," but the lies became more extreme as time lapsed. None were as extreme as Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC's "Morning Joe," stating in April that Joe Biden is "better than he's ever been—intellectually, analytically… and F you if you can't handle the truth… this version of Biden is the best Biden ever." Three months later, the debate happened.
I saw the debate. You saw the debate. Everyone saw the debate. From the moment Joe Biden walked on stage, he looked lost. Twenty minutes in, the left was in shambles. Although Biden did get stronger as the debate went on (probably as the drugs kicked in), the damage was already done.
In the following days, those on the left, even Joe Scarborough, called for Joe Biden to step out of the race. They had to pretend that they weren't lying to us before. They had to pretend that they had no idea that Biden was as senile as he is. The problem for the left is that nobody believes them. We all had been seeing it for years. It didn't take a debate for the rest of the world to know that Biden was not with it.
The debate made the left stumble and get stuck in the mud. They lied about something right before our eyes, and it became clear they were lying the entire time. Now, we are the serpent laughing at the left.
But the left thinks that we have laughed so hard that we died, and they can go on ahead and get back to their regularly programmed lies. We can take the time to laugh at the left; they deserve to be laughed at. But if we forget what they just tried to get past us, they will continue to lie.
That is evident with the recent Supreme Court ruling in Trump v. United States. For those unaware, this is the case about presidential immunity in a criminal trial. Never before has a President been brought up on criminal charges for acts that occurred during his presidency. Donald Trump claimed he had complete immunity for anything he did while President, and Biden's DOJ claimed Trump had no immunity for anything. The Court came down in the middle, slightly changing the standard the Supreme Court has previously laid out in cases involving civil actions against presidents.
There are three categories of presidential actions, each getting a different level of immunity. Official acts are acts that the President has exclusive control over through powers granted to him by the Constitution. These acts receive absolute immunity, meaning that he cannot be prosecuted after leaving office for acts done while President if the power to do so was under his exclusive control. A second category is acts where the President shares his authority with Congress. These acts are given a presumption of immunity, but that immunity may be overcome. The third category of acts is unofficial acts, which are given no immunity.
The left has taken this ruling and lied about it. Even the Supreme Court Justices themselves are lying about it, as that is where the left's talking points are coming from. The most common talking point is that the President may now order Seal Team 6 to kill a political rival. That was an example used by Sonia Sotomayor in her dissent. And it is a blatant lie.
Please tell me where the President derives his authority to order a hit on a political enemy. You can't, because the President doesn't have that authority. The President does have the authority to direct and command the military, but that is against foreign threats. The President does have the power to go after criminals, but that is by using the Department of Justice to prosecute people who have violated the law.
So, what is there immunity for? There is absolute immunity for investigating and enforcing election laws. As we learned in grade school, Congress makes the laws; the executive branch enforces the laws. So, Trump asking Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate claims of election fraud cannot be used to prove a conspiracy to overturn the election. Crime investigation is a power granted exclusively to the executive branch, and there will be absolute immunity. For those on the left, the prosecution in this case even admitted that Trump's discussions with Bill Barr were his official acts. That is the only reason the Supreme Court stated this was an official act—because both sides agreed it was.
On most other allegations, the Supreme Court found at least a presumption of immunity but did not rule on whether the government overcame the presumption. Rather, the Court sent the case back to the lower courts to determine if prosecuting the President for those acts would "pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch." And that leads to the next point, explaining why immunity exists in the first place.
Presidential immunity has long been a standard practice in our country. This is because you don't want the President worried about future lawsuits while he is carrying out his duties. As Justice Roberts wrote in this opinion:
A President inclined to take one course of action based on the public interest may instead opt for another, apprehensive that criminal penalties may befall him upon his departure from office. And if a former President's official acts are routinely subjected to scrutiny in criminal prosecutions, "the independence of the Executive Branch" may be significantly undermined. The Framers' design of the presidency did not envision such counterproductive burdens on the "vigor" and "energy" of the Executive.
This reasoning was the reasoning behind protecting former presidents from civil liability. As Justice Roberts noted in this new opinion, the reasoning behind immunity for civil liability applies to criminal prosecution, as "prosecuting a President for official conduct undoubtedly poses a far greater threat of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch than" a civil judgment.
The Court went on to deny Trump the complete immunity he was asking for and even gave him less immunity than he would enjoy in a civil suit. As Roberts points out, criminal law "seek[s] to address a 'wrong to the public' as a whole, not just a 'wrong to the individual.'" This means that acts on the outer bounds of what could be considered an "official act" are not offered absolute immunity but rather a presumption of immunity. In a civil suit, even official acts on the outer bounds of a President's authority are granted absolute immunity.
In reality, this is precisely the ruling that was expected. It may have been even more favorable to the prosecution than expected because it doesn't offer absolute immunity for all official acts. Even more, this decision should be cheered by the Democrats. It will protect both Republican and Democrat presidents. As Roberts states in the opinion:
The dissents' positions in the end boil down to ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers and the Court's precedent and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President "feels empowered to violate federal criminal law." The dissents overlook the more likely prospect of an Executive Branch that cannibalizes itself, with each succssive President free to prosecute his predecessors, yet unable to boldly and fearlessly carry out his duties for fear that he may be next. For instance, Section 371—which has been charged in this case—is a broadly worded criminal statute that can cover "any conspiracy for the purpose of impairing, obstructing or defeating the lawful function of any department of Government." Virtually every President is criticized for insufficiently enforcing some aspect of federal law (such as drug, gun, immigration, or environmental laws). An enterprising prosecutor in a new administration may assert that a previous President violated that broad statute. Without immunity, such types of prosecutions of ex-Presidents could quickly become routine. The enfeebling of the Presidency and our Government that would result from such a cycle of factional strife is exactly what the Framers intended to avoid.
In other words, if this ruling didn't come down this way, future President Trump could then prosecute Joe Biden for failing to enforce immigration laws. He'd bring Biden up on Section 371 charges—the exact charges that Biden brought Trump to court on. Outside of Section 371, Trump could charge Biden for murdering a family of Afghan citizens after the failed pullout from Afghanistan. He could charge Obama for the murder of Anwar al-Alaqi, a United States citizen turned terrorist who was killed by a 2011 drone strike in Yemen.
Those two examples should make it clear that presidential immunity for official acts is necessary. Biden made a massive mistake in ordering a strike that ultimately killed an innocent family rather than terrorists. For as bad as Obama's foreign policy was, I will never criticize a President for taking out a known terrorist if it doesn't lead to widespread war. But both of those things are murder under United States law. However, they should not be prosecuted for it, just as Trump should not be prosecuted for asking his DOJ to investigate claims of election fraud. The power to do so is expressly granted to him by the Constitution, and the President should not fear criminal prosecution for carrying out those powers.
So, back to Pinocchio. The left hopes that we will be like the serpent. They hope that we laughed so hard at their lies about Biden's cogency that we die, that we lie there and let them carry on as they had been before. They are testing it out with this Supreme Court case. We cannot let them lie to us like this.
While it may be impossible for a wooden puppet to actually suffocate, it will also be impossible to stop all of the lies coming from the left. However, we can hinder their influence on the American people by calling out those lies. The only way to let the left know that they no longer have the influence and control that they have enjoyed over the past two decades is to vote. Show them that the majority of people see right through their lies.
Even if Donald Trump wins in November, which is becoming increasingly likely, the left won't stop. The institutions controlled by the left will keep spreading their lies. Trump got elected once, and the left was able to fight him for four years and get Biden elected. They will try to fight through Trump's next four years and get a Democrat put in office in 2028. They won't stop their lies until they know that they have lost the American people. And they won't accept that they have lost the American people until at least 2028.
So it may take another four years before we know whether or not we are the snake that died from laughing so hard. But right now is a dangerous time for the left, and they risk losing the people every time they lie about something new. It's time to keep the pressure on and expose them. Let them know that they no longer have control.
Don't laugh so hard you die.