Alina Habba repeatedly clashed with New York judge Lewis A Kaplan in court for the former president’s civil defamation trial
Remarks made by Donald Trump lawyer Alina Habba in a recent interview about “faking being smart” resurfaced after she endured two tough days in court during her client’s civil trial for defamation damages.
Ms Habba repeatedly clashed with New York judge Lewis A Kaplan in court on Tuesday and Wednesday, during the former president’s civil trial to determine damages for defaming columnist E Jean Carroll.
These included the response to repeated objections, and her failure to stand up when making them, as well as continuing to petition for a postponement of the trial so that the former president can attend the funeral of his mother-in-law.
After a further attempt of the latter on Wednesday, Ms Habba was issued a sharp rebuke from Judge Kaplan. She responded by asking the judge not to speak to her in that way.
“I don’t like to be spoken to that way. And we are going to be here for several days,” she said. “I am asking your honour to please refrain from speaking to me in that manner.”
How is everything related to this man such a fucking joke and HOW IS HE SO POPULAR
I remember feeling like this in junior high. There was this group of athletic dudes who were mind numbingly offensive to everyone. Shoving people, locker stuffing, knocking books out your hand, tripping kids on stairs… Just constant abuse and scorn on anyone not in their group. And these guys were popular. I won’t say every girl liked them because there were lots of smart girls. But a lot of girls liked them and guys thought they were cool, etc. It blew my mind that we weren’t all ostracizing them for being obnoxious, abusive bullies.
It was junior high. I get it. I moved on.
But Trump’s success brings that feeling back. There’s no logic to it. It’s a creepy mammalian subconscious need to stay on the good side of the bully so you don’t end up targeted. Or maybe you see someone acting like you would like to act but can’t get away with it.
I have no idea but I blows my mind every time I think about and I know it’s what is wrong with the world. No question about that.
There is a logic to it. They demonstrate their power by behaving badly without consequence, and the worse they behave the more powerful they must be. The one thing Trump is right about is that he’s treated very unfairly by the courts.
How has trump been treated unfairly by the courts?
I think by not having his ass thrown in jail. Very unfair.
It’s unfair, but not unfair to Trump, it’s unfair to the rest of us.
Think about what would happen if you behaved like Trump and compare it to how the courts treat him. It’s clearly unfair in his favor.
I have lost respect for many people in my life because of this, and their inability to see reality somehow when it comes to this one single issue.
I guess people see themselves in a dumb guy just coasting through and seemingly succeeding against all odds. Obviously, they didn’t get billions of dollars from daddy to enable that.
His 2016 campaign was initially seen as a joke (Even by Trump, who just wanted to use it to launch his next grift anyway). It essentially became a meme that quickly spiraled out of control. People voted for Trump “for teh lulz” early on, the same way they voted for the 15 year old kid, “Deez Nuts”, and other joke candidates. The problem is that unlike those other joke cases, Trump didn’t go away once the joke was over. He started winning.
He started ramping up the bigotry and racism, and just started spewing out what people wanted to hear. And then when the racists and bigots realized that “one of them” actually had a non-zero chance of winning the primary, they started jumping on board. Then you add in a whole bunch of people who liked everything he was saying but hadn’t yet learned that he had no way of actually delivering on his promises, and suddenly you’ve got the “everyman”. The man who’s going to “tell it like it is”. And he got away with it because nobody had ever peeked behind the curtain, and there was no appetite to do so so long as this man continued telling them what they wanted to hear.
Even beyond the dedicated MAGA base, he has been very successful in finding a boogeyman to point to to get even moderate Republicans to begrudgingly support him. If it’s not those dirty Mexicans coming up here to take your job away, it’s kids who want to pretend to be the opposite sex so they can enter the girls’ bathroom and molest your daughter. Or its about a woman who actually has the audacity to want to murder their baby without at least getting the blessing of their local politicians (remember Dr. Oz?) first. Or the gays that are using rainbows to recruit your children. Whatever it is. But Trump knows that if you give a man a “them” to blame for all of his troubles, he’ll follow you anywhere. And Trump is a master of blaming everyone else.
Having exposed exactly how many racists and bigots are in this country, he was able to start threatening the rest of the party into submission by (correctly) pointing out that those racists and bigots now dictate their political careers and that their choices are to either march in lockstep behind him or commit political suicide. Most chose to either get on board or retire. The rest saw the end of their careers in Congress.
I ask myself this almost daily.