Thank You, Alvin Bragg

Thank you for advancing the principle that in America, even today, no one is above the law. May our oligarchs pay attention.

Thank you for putting your career and your legacy on the line to show America and the world that we are still a democracy ruled by law, not men.

Thank you for being the first to dare to do so, and so for setting an example for Fani Willis, Jack Smith, and Merrick Garland.

Thank you for fighting to show that—after Michael Cohen, a lawyer, was disbarred and sentenced to three years in prison—the powerful man for whom he said he committed his crimes should not escape justice just because he once was president.

Thank you for making possible a series of compelling distractions from the nascent campaign of a man who built his own political career on distractions from injustice, inequality, poverty, misery and unfinished business in America.

Thank you for facilitating a trial that will show good Christians how a former president broke at least three of the Ten Commandments: committing adultery, bearing false witness, and putting the false gods of wealth, power and domination (aka “Mammon”) before the single, just God that Christians claim to worship.

Thank you for trying to teach us that distorting reality, even if only about “personal behavior,” is not a minor matter, let alone for one who aspires to be our supreme leader, and let alone in an age of rampant, innovative technology of deception. (They did get Al Capone for tax evasion, not his gangland murders, massacres or numberless crimes against ordinary people.)

Thank you for trying to teach that a man who seems to use women like tissue paper is not fit to lead us.

Thank you for trying to teach the same of a man who demands absolute fealty from his underlings, both male and female, but seems to treat them like tissue paper, too.

Thank you for seeking to stem the endless flow of lies and misleading claims (reportedly 30,573 over his presidency), of the Man Who Would be King, by bringing just one well-documented cover-up under scrutiny in a court of law.

Thank you for showing, by your diligence and tenacity, that a good Black man can dispense justice in America when others, so far, have failed.

For all these things and more, thank you, Alvin Bragg. May what you’ve begun help end this madness.

[Happy note to readers: Among the bookmarks that I use to file links to articles for later reference, the one entitled “GOP Rot” has been much used the last few years. Yesterday, for the first time, I created a new, more propitious, counterpart: “GOP Comeuppance.” Its first link is to an op-ed about the Demagogue’s indictment and the federal conviction of a social-media troll for trying to keep people from voting by falsely claiming that Dems had been voting via their phones.

Of course it’s still too early to tell. But maybe the tide is finally turning. Maybe there are rules of civilized and proper behavior, after all. Maybe we as a society are actually beginning to enforce them again. Maybe lies, a manipulated “rep,” and “likes” on Facebook and Twitter are not the new measure of a man. Again, thank you, Alvin Bragg and others working toward that happy end.]


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