So, the supreme court of Romania cancelled the previous Presidential election, ostensibly because of Russian interference.
The guy who won last time, however, will probably win the next elections in May. He recently stated:
š·š“ Georgescu will prosecute the judges who canceled the elections for high treason once he becomes president
“There will be a commission at the highest level to analyze these abuses, which amount to high treason and an attack on national security.
We are not playing with this.” pic.twitter.com/Wxe6JEHQ9q
ā Daily Romania (@daily_romania) February 19, 2025
Westerners don’t seem to get how you do lawfare. If Democrats and/or the deep state were going to prosecute Trump and his associates, they needed to make sure Trump wound up in jail and unable to run for President. The purges which have happened since his re-election are only logical: why wouldn’t he try and destroy the people and the mechanisms used to go after him?
Same thing with Romania. Cancel the election, then don’t lock Georgescu up? Were they smoking their own crack? Did they genuinely think something would change the numbers in the next election?
I think what Pakistan has done to Imran Khan is despicable, but once you break norms and go after someone who normally would be beyond bounds, you have to finish the job, which the Pakistani deep state (military) did: they threw him in prison on essentially bogus charges.
Western liberals are good at foreign coups and whatnot, but they haven’t quite figured out how to use lawfare properly against truly powerful people in their own countries. That, I suppose, is a good thing, but it is rather pathetic and it isn’t a weakness shared by their domestic opponents.
Oakchair
In Pakistan they also banned Imran Khan’s party in the next elections and then when people in his party ran as independents and were set to win the ballot boxes were stuffed.
Maybe the Romania election will be rigged but if not did they really expect that canceling the previous election would make the voters like them more and like the winner less simply because they screamed “Russia tik-tok”?
It’s reminds me of Harris bringing out Dick Cheney on the campaign. Did her campaign really think that would win her votes?
Feral Finster
The russiagate conspiracy theory was ludicrous on its face. The plan was to hamstring Trump’s foreign policy. This largely worked, at least from 2016-2020.
Similarly, the idea behind lawfare was to make Trump unelectable. This backfired, as the Establishment are so hated that their condemnation is ignored by much of the voting public, and is treated as an endorsement by some. The people who clutched their pearls “A convicted felon! Heavens to Obama, Save Us!” were already going to vote Team D.
Add in the fact that Biden/Harris were extraordinarily weak candidates trying to sell Thanksgiving to turkeys, and here we are.
The Romanian decision was intended to provide a precent for the european establishment to overturn election results that they don’t like. Of course, the establishment in Romania also are widely hated, and rightly so.
Still, plenty of time to “find” child pornography on Georgescu’s laptop or something.
Mark Level
I’ll mostly agree with Finster’s comment viz Russiagate, but will note in passing that there was actual Election interference via Israel, dragging “Russia” into it was a diversion that Rachel Maddow & all the State Stenographers demanded, ‘coz our “Aircraft Carrier” & Genocide Engine in the Mideast can never be called out. As to possible attempts to take Georgescu out, I’m also going to keep my eyes peeled.
As to “taking out the King”, there are 2 efforts directly relevant in the recent past. Slovakia’s PM Robert Fico (pronounced “Fitzo”) was directly warned by an EU Goon that if he wasn’t on board with attacking Russia he’d likely be a target for assassination. (Pretty sure that was in an email; if not, the phone call was recorded, and acknowledged by the threatening party later.) He was shot and badly injured by a Russophobe nutcase, but recovered and became even stronger in NOT giving in to the Unipolar EU powers.
The Deep State targeted Trump openly twice in the recent election. In the first case, that miserable Incel Kid was only openly associated with a Blackrock commercial he appeared in. That’s a pretty thin reed, I’d guess, the kid was ugly as sin and bullied at school, so he might’ve just wanted some “glory” or Fame like the Columbine Kids before self-deleting. Still, the Biden SS let him get off 2 shots from an open and widely seen position, the 2nd famously grazing Trump’s ear and allowing a heroic pose that helped (beyond Kamala’s complete uselessness.)
The 2nd attempted assassin on the Golf Course (somebody told him Trump’d be there) was a pretty typical MK-Ultra type of “lone nut” candidate. A nutty old man with an extensive criminal and psychiatric commitment portfolio who’d been in Ukraine trying to recruit Jihadis and others to fight for the great Savior Zelensky. Strange that Trump could be convinced by the CIA’s “The Iranians tried to off you” lies, for which I expect not even fabricated evidence exists . . . But perhaps he did keep Killer Wannabe 2’s profile in mind given the treatment that Zelensky is now getting. On the other hand, Trump has no respect for “Losers” and that’s exactly what Z set himself up for by taking on the Russian Empire. “A moderately successful comedian” is exactly what the Kiev Coke fiend was. Also, those of us who studied the Ukraine Mitrovirets website of “Enemies of Ukraine” targeted for extermination know that as soon as Tulsi Gabbard was approved as DNI, the Ukies had to take her name off the Mitrovirets Kill List (which previously included Henry Kissinger, Max Blumenthal’s wife Anya Paranpil and others who bucked the Narrative. )
No fan of Trump, mostly, but it is a new world, glad to see many of the failed Monsters being put out to pasture where they belong.
Purple Library Guy
I actually have a lot of sympathy for Zelensky. He didn’t start any of this stuff. He was, yes, a moderately successful comedian, and he ran for president on a peace platform, only to find once in office that if he tried to follow through the Ukrainian Nazis would murder him and until that happened the West would crush what was left of the Ukrainian economy. So he followed the line dictated to him, and the result was his country got invaded. Since then, he’s been playing the cards he was dealt, knowing all the while that the mark at the poker table was him, the cards were marked, and there were people with guns to prevent him leaving the table. And he’s played them pretty well.
Sure, I understand why Putin attacked Ukraine; really, he had little choice. But Zelensky had even less choice–he’s the president of Ukraine, Ukraine is invaded, he tries hard to fight back, including doing everything he can to get allies to help. That’s his job and he’s on the spot, what else can he do? Even some of his showboaty military tactics which don’t make much sense as military tactics made perfect sense in the broader picture: The reality that Ukraine’s war effort was entirely dependent on aid from childlike Westerners who want to see a flashy video. So if you don’t do some stupid stuff to give them a flashy video, you’re toast. And now, the ally he’s been counting on all this time, the ally that has all this time insisted he has to fight to the last Ukrainian but they’ll have his back don’t you worry, is stabbing him in the back. His days are numbered even though none of it is his fault.
Zelensky has done a pretty good job overall. I’m not on his side in the war, but that doesn’t mean I need to insult him.
It will be over soon. All this stuff with Trump and Putin, and Zelensky talking back to Trump, and the Europeans saying “Well, maybe we’ll just supply him ourselves” even though they pretty much can’t . . . I don’t think any of it matters. The Russians have most of the territory Putin wants, except Odessa, and will soon be in territory Putin doesn’t want and so will be able to just use as leverage. The Ukrainian army is hanging tough as best they can, and it’s a surprisingly good best, but they keep on losing fights, losing territory, losing men, losing materiel; every important town seems to fall a little faster than the one before. The Ukrainians’ stubborn refusal to retreat from key points often means that by the time they do have no choice but to retreat, their forces are nearly surrounded and either get mauled as they move or just can’t retreat at all and get killed or captured in place. They have courage, they still manage to pull off little counterattacks here and there, but the writing is on the wall at this point. Negotiations are just going to codify this reality, because Putin and Lavrov are not going to give anything away pointlessly.
End result: Russia will get the Donbass, Ukraine will be neutral, Russian will be an official language in Ukraine, there will be no Western “peacekeepers” (duh), and there will be a purge of Ukrainian Nazis.
Anon
thought experiment for you Ian: Trump was always the plan! They very well know how to make political prisoners; but thatās not his function. They made him the belle of the ball, complete with senile Biden and lame duck Momala for contrast. You really do have to try, in order to be as stupid as the Democrat Party of the last 8 yearsā¦ or the Romanian politicos!
Georgescu is more of the same: an āantiā-establishment candidate, āharanguedā by the powers that seem to be, but really put forth BY the establishment to legitimize its failing authority (again, failing on purpose, as per the neoliberal model) just in time to purchase our compliance as we transition to the new modeā¦
The Heretic
To Purple Library Guy-
If Zelensky saw himself cornered by Ukro Nazis on one hand and Deep state U___ A and by Enxxxxland on the otherā¦ he has to ask himself thisā¦ do I save myself? Or do I save the Ukraine from war? If he cannot choose to the path that protects the people of the Ukraine, should he remain the President and Chief Cheerleader of the Conflict, knowing that it would send many thousands into the meat grinder? To do the wise choice would be heroic, indeed require heroic sacrifice on his part; but then why would he choose to become president in a time of great crisis? Is he a PMC careerist, and just wants the money and luxury thereafter?
bruce wilder
I am a bit disturbed by āCancel the election, then donāt lock Georgescu up? Were they smoking their own crack?ā and āWestern liberals are good at foreign coups and whatnot, but they havenāt quite figured out how to use lawfare properly against truly powerful people in their own countries. That, I suppose, is a good thing, but it is rather pathetic and it isnāt a weakness shared by their domestic opponents.ā
The weakness of American capital-D democrats is the absence of integrity. They do not believe in the rule of law as anything but performative justice. Trump is a rapist because they managed to find unlimited legal financing for the grievances of a deeply neurotic woman and thus sustain a civil claim of sexual assault and injury to reputation. Trump is a felon 39 times over because his bookkeeper labeled a payment to a lawyer as legal expenses and that misdemeanor is a felony after the statute of limitations has passed because . . . blah, blah . . . election interference by a candidate or something.
It isnāt just that the lawfare wasnāt swift enough or ruthless enough force a legal outcome. The core problem was that the cases were not designed to convince partisans on defense to give ground. The goal was always just to push the scrum in the red jerseys a bit downfield and nothing more. A better goal is NOT to simply jail everyone in a red jersey. A better goal is jail people for genuine crimes.
Trump does not strike me as an innocent. Effective lawfare, imho, requires prosecuting an actual crime, that is, the unjust violation of principles embodied in law.
I am sure everyone here has seen the tweet where Obamaās 8 years in office āwithout a scandalā is touted, as if Obamaās official policy was not scandalous enough to silence the saints. If your faith in etiquette is so profound that you cannot see Obamaās malevolence, then of course, you are not going fault persecuting Trump for non-crimes. Trumpās vulgarity is crime enough and you simply do not care about justice in any case.
The old George Burns joke comes to mind: the key to success in life is sincerity; if you can fake that you have it made.
I am old enough to remember Watergate, the Ur scandal of American political overreach and subversion.
The key strategy there was the only one that can work and reinforce democracy: integrity.
Democratic deliberation at base cannot be solely or primarily about ācontrolling the narrativeā. It has to be about respectfully (for some practically loose definition of respect) reconciling and resolving political ambivalence and arguing abstract principles. Amoral ruthlessness does not end well for the collectivity. Fighting over resources and raw power with no reference to abstract rules-of-the-game makes the game increasingly nasty, brutal and short.
The key in going after Nixon was to uphold the rules-of-the-game idealistically. The core accusations against Nixon were about crimes even tireless partisans could not excuse. āShared valuesā but for real. Not faux outrage and performative virtue-signalling. Not lying and hoping to make the lies stick against ritual denial, to swing a swing state, but actually doing the heavy lifting to force āthe other sideā to live in a shared reality, rather than a cable news battle of targeted audience demographics.
mago
Interesting predictions PLG, and good attempt at a sympathetic portrait of a corrupt, greedy and malicious coke head who sold his country down the river while hundreds of thousands died as he reaped fame and filthy lucre.
Other than that heās probably a good enough guy. After all, he can play piano with his dick. Thatās gotta be worth something.
All that aside, as Ian has noted many times, world leaders donāt get where they are by being nice guys, or gals.
Itās a dirty game, and youād better know the rules, or better yet, how to make and enforce your own.
Oakchair
Similarly, the idea behind lawfare was to make Trump unelectable. This backfired
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It did, but maybe perhaps it could have worked if it was done seriously instead of as a marketing ploy.
Did they focus on Trumps financial and tax fraud, rape allegations? No they focused on him using campaign money to pay off a porn star he raw dogged.
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Establishment are so hated
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The entire Dem apparatus has failed to grasp this despite it being so obvious the Sentients in Alpha Centauri have known it since at 2015.
Harris spent her campaign reminding everyone how establishment she was. While Trump sought out anti-establishment voters.
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Biden/Harris were extraordinarily weak candidates
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Who would have thought that candidates who couldn’t manage over 1% of the vote when they weren’t “Obama’s vice president” would be bad candidates?
Purple Library Guy makes a very good point that can be applied near universally not only to presidents of countries but individuals and workers in organizations and corporations. Even if we don’t recognize we all know what tends to happens to those who go against the system.