Lasting Impacts of Presidential Impunity

Officer, I know you found that half empty forty in the center console of my car, but my heart tells me I haven't been drinking tonight. You know? I obeyed the speed limit at all times. I wasn't going sixteen and fifty. Sly. Or as drunk people often do, they're going like twenty five in a sixty This is an IiHart podcast Guaranteed human If you've been sitting on an inspiring business idea, consider this your sign to take action and make it official By creating a website using Wakes harmony Tell Wix Harmony what you want and it will build the entire site for you That's right, all just from your own text prompts And of course, everything can still be edited by hand if you feel the need for distinct specifications. I mean It's your website, your call Try it at wix dot com slash harmony. That's wix dot com slash harmony. Cashflow Cunch, OndDeC's small business line of credit gives your business immediate access to funds up to two hundred thousand dollars right when you need it. cover seasonal dips, manage payroll, restock inventory, or tackle unexpected expenses without missing a beat With flexible draws, transparent pricing and control over repayment get funded quickly and confidently. Apply today at onndeck dot comot Funds could be available as soon as tomorrow. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OndDeck or Celtic Bank. Ondeck does not lend in North Dakota, all loans an amount subject to lender approval. This is Julian Nettleman from Games withith Names. You know how it is during big games There's so much prep, detail, and the little things people don't see. The small stuff around you matters more than you think. That's why I keep my food dialed in with Domino's best deal ever. An pizza, any toppings for nine dollars ninety nine cents. now including Parmesan stuffed crust, peepperoni sausage opinos and even bacon That reliable vet that plays well with anyone Personally, I like to keep it simple. The good oldl pepperoni pizza. Priceices is higher for some locations. exxcludes excelling specialty pizza. Select this offer from six fifteenth or seven hundred twenty sixth Size availability varies by crust height, max, seven topics six for hand and New York style crust. minimal purchase requred for delivery. pricices, participation, delivery area and charges may vary Hey everyone, I'm Ed Helmes and this is SnaFu, the show about histories. Gest screw ups. It's part chat show, part history lesson And a big old group therapy session for all of humanity. We're back for part two of the Iran Contra affair with our incredible guest, Robert Evans. Now if you haven't heard the previous episode, I strongly suggest you jump back and listen to that episode and then jump forward again to this moment right now and jump back into this episode because we are going to wrap up our incredible recounting of the Iran Contra affair. Robert Evans, of course, is the host of the incredible podcast Behind the Bastards, which I highly recommend tons of incredible episodes. The best two episodes are the ones on which I was a guest abbsolutely on that podcast. You should Certainly check out the one on Curtis Yarvin that you guessed for. Yeah, that was a fun one. That was a particularly interesting one. Robert, thank you so much for coming back. Thanks for having me back. I am going give a quick recap for our audience just in case there's been a little gap in time. So here's what went down Before we move on. It's the nineteen eighties, Reagan was president and quite simply he hated comis. like he really hated them. So he funded paramilitaries in Nicaragua called the Cantras through the CIA in the hopes that they would defeat the Kami government, run by the socialist group the Sandinistas. Separately, the U.S imposed an embargo on Iran due to their support of the group Hezbollah a U. S. designated terrorist group that had taken twenty five Americans hostage in nineteen eighty four. To save those hostages, Reagan's National Security Council guys, including Lieutenant Oliver North secretly decided to trade weapons in exchange for some cash and the release of said hostages. ret prettyty dodgy, especially considering that there was once again, a literal embargo against Iran. Yeah, that we applied a status to Iran that was these guys we absolutely shouldn't be selling missiles to. Yeah that was That was their legal status. Yeah. you could summ this up as Hey, we're never ever gonna sell missiles to Iran. but also Iran, Do you guys want some missiles? But like Yeah, sure. Iran was also at war with Iraq. And ye they needed weapons for this war. Oh yeah. and They had in fact secretly reached out to the US to ask if they could buy some weapons off us. And the answer, of course should have been no. We are not dealing with you.. There's an embargo going on. But Ollie North and his bosses at the National Security Council saw an opportunity here. They wanted to win for Reagan, thati. e. they wanted to free some hostages and avoid another Carter esque snaffoo. So they decided to go ahead and make a deal with the Iranians. They would secretly sell weapons to the Iranians on the condition that American hostages in Lebanon would be released That's yeah ye It's and people we don't talk enough about the Iran Iraq warar, like just so that people know. this is like a World War I like kind of conflict in terms of you've got these mass human wave charges like particularly that like Iran is doing because they have They lack so much else in terms of military infrastructure and these huge tank battles that very much are like something out of the Second World War and hideous casualty numbers. And the US, by the way, we are heavily involved in both sides. We kind of helped push Saddam in the early stages of the war. We provided like targeting assistance and whatnot for him. And obviously we're about to do that for Iran. This is such a messy time in history for us in such a horrible war that doesn't get covered enough. Dameen. I find it interesting the you know, in a situation like this, you know, there's clearly political motivation to sort of protect Reagan from another you know from the fallout of a hostage situation. But then of course, there's the very human concern for these hostages and the predicament that they're in. Right. And again, this is sort of getting back to one of my earlier questions, but like, is it possible to parse the motives here You know, like is it is this more about the the political machinations uh, and and sort of protect protecting Reagan's political re election possibilities or is it We got to get these America home And again, it's Some of both. Some of bothepend The more cynical side of me is like, maybe it's more about the political I think at the level of like Ollie North and certainly like people in the Reagan White House, it's mostly politics, but you have a lot of people involved at different levels including folks who like knows some of the people who have been taken h. Of course. And so there's absolutely folks who are involved in this too, whose primary or at least a maor concern is like, well, but my buddy's captive too. And do think the American military has an incredible track record of just going after our own and like you know, fight, you know, this recent u important for morale What's that? It's important for morale, right? Well, sure. Yeah, you're right. But yeah, this extraction from Iran that just happened a month or two ago was was a was an incredible incredible story and does speak to it, I think is is a a pretty beautiful ethos in American general disposition, but certainly our military disposition of like, we don't we leave no one behind. We go back and get people It's this it's interesting because like the you also have around this time these these conspiracy theories about like soldiers left behind in Vietnam That really certainly by ' seventy nine was not accurate. Like there weren't huge numbers of Americans like in captivity in Vietnam. likeike they would have had nothing to benefit from just keeping those guys. But because there is this attitude, this deeply, especially among former servicemen, that like we don't leave people behind, the belief that there were all these guys so trapped in Vietnam is in this period of time a huge political like football, right? Like it's a thing that is like massively important to a lot of people. Just because like even though it's not accurate that those guys are there, because the idea that people were left behind was so offensive to someone. R Right. All right, well let's jump a couple of years later to the fall of nineteen eighty six. and we're actually now we're going to go back to Nicaragua. So in October of that year, a US military plane was shot down in Nicaragua The lone survivor of this this plane being shot down admitted to the Sandinistas that he was delivering weapons to the contras for the CIA. Oops. Then a month later, a Lebanese magazine Al Sira got a scoop that the U. S had been secretly selling missiles to Iran for the release of American hostages. And by the way, only three hostages had actually been released. So the efficacy of this whole scheme is like what is very much in question What did I never do you know the ratio of like missiles to guys we were getting? I actually don't know off the top my head. I don't think it was good because I'm assuming they said a lot of missiles. A lot of missiles. Anyway, this is quite a one two punch, right? This downed pilot confessing to the Sandinistas is that the CIA is helping Contras and then of course this article coming out in a Lebanese magazine basically exposing that that scandal. So in response Reagan did what he was best at. He got on TV Yeah. And on november thirteenth, he addressed America from the White House, and we actually have a little audio clip to play from that press conference here Now, my fellow Americans, there's an old saying that Nothing spreads so quickly as a rumor So I thought it was time to speak with you directly. Tell you firsthand about our dealings with Iran. But just a little taste of it. but I'll tell you later in the video, Reagan says he wasn't doing any back door trades with Iran. He says we did not repeat did not trade weapons or anything else for hostages. So I had to work in my Reagan voice. No, that was a good Reagan voice. Thank you very much U But he does say explicitly, we did not ade weapons or anything clear C have been clear. Couldn't have been cle more clear of course. Yeah. Well, it turns out straight up lying doesn't put an into things. And soon it will be revealed that these scandals actually had a lot to do with each other. Once all of this starts leaking, Reagan's attorney general, a man by the name of Edwin Mes steps in to figure out just what the heck is going on here. So a couple of weeks after this presidential address, on november twenty fifth, nineteen eighty six, Mese goes on TV to address the nation. And here's where things get a little wild. Mese confir that yes The U.S had actually been selling weapons secretly to Iran And yes, the US had been backing the contras in Nicaragua, but then he dropsed The real bombshell. These were not separate operations They were the same operation What? Yes, because Edwin Meese had found what is known as the diversion memo in Oliver North's office Now this memo showed that money from those secret arms sales to Iran wasn't just sitting around, it was being funneled Off the books to fund the contras. So suddenly, what looked like two different scandals snaps into focus as one tangled scheme. Attorney General Mese also had another very important point to make at this press conference And that was that President Reagan Did not know about any of this. No, of course. He was completely in the dark tootally innocent of any wrongdoing. So M press conferen is kind of like a confession and a cleanup all at the exact same time. Yeah, that's a remarkable line to try to cross. of like, well, we have to admit to breaking the law that the president said that we absolutely didn't do. And also these two things that we said weren't connected are connected The President didn't know But also he's still a good president. He just didn't know. Yeah exactly. I mean, does does does a scandal That goes from two bad things to one incredibly complicated, big bad thing, make it better or more efficient, more impressive? Yeah ye It's kind of like this feels like the usual suspect moment where you're just like, Oh, yes. Yeah. Kobayashi. I get it. He is Kaiser Soz and we all feel kind of smart and dumb at the same time. Yeah. What we expect from a president, like it feels a lot like it's declined over the last couple of decades rapidly But also like the I guess it's just shocking to me the degree to which A lot of people, including people who really liked Reagan, were willing to convince themselves Well, he can't, even though there's literally no way this could have happened without Reagan sign off, he must not have really known Like the amount of slack that he was given for this is always really surprised me. I' never understood it.. Well we are we will believe what we want to believe. Yeah, right? Like we're just so much of our what we think is our rational analysis is just motivated reasoning. Yeah. And I think you're that's a prime example of it. Do you remember what what Saturday Night Live was doing at this time They had they had a brilliant ongoing series of sketches in which Phil Hartman played Reagan. And and they really played with this dichotomy of him being perceived as just as just this sort of like, you know, Real friendly just kind of cowboy who was nice to everybody and but a little bit kind of maybe clueless, but that's okay because he's doing the right thing. his Hartw's in the right place. And so they'd have these scenes with Phil Hartman, you know, like doing a photo op with a girl Scout troop or something cute. And then he'd kind of usher them out of the Oval Office and then he'd be like Get in here, everybody. And he'd pull in all the everyone sit them down and pull down a map of Iran or whatever and be like, okay, this organ is editing just barking orders at everybody and just sort of highlighting that extreme dichotomy of like the performance of a kind of like a guy who, hey, he got sort of taken for a ride on thisran His memory's not great, but his heart's in the right place and then this like blood soaked madman. Yeah. Yeah. goo back and watch these old Phil Hartman Reagan sketches. they're incredible very sort of emblematic of this moment. So Edwin Mes's press conference turned out to be one of those classic moments of trying to put out a fire by throwing gasoline on it. He sent Congress completely spinning out. They're like, wait, wait, wait what This was one giant conspiracy. You got to get to the bottom of this. This is way worse. Yeah. Also worth noting that Mese and Reagan were old pals. So it's pretty crazy to think that an attorney general appointed by a president could do a thorough job of investigating his boss, right? Yeah. Naturally, everyone in Washington immediately spun into investigative overdrive. The House launched an investigation. The Senate launched an investigation. Reagan, not to be outdone, also appointed a commission led by ex Senator John Tower to investigate. And just for good measure, he brought in independent spepecial prosecutor Lawrence Walsh to investigate and bring charges. Now Robert, when everyone is investigating everyone else this hard, is that due diligence or just like a kind of Shakespearean level of thou dost protest too much? Yeah, that's like ass covering on a grand scale, especially. mean I guess it's I'm sure because like you do want some of those investigations seem like they're appropriate, right? Like Congress investigating the president seems like it's something that Congress ought to be doing. The president having his own investigation to like what his guys were doing is a lot of like, we're going to make sure the foxes really get a good line on what's happening in this h house. you know? Like that strikes me as fucky. Just the sheer volume, I mean, it starts to feel like like layers upon layers. of nothing to see here Right, right? Yeah. It's just we're all investigating so hard that you can no longer see through the mess. Right. And it's also like you don't need to look. like nobody else needs to be looking like're gonna we're gonna to keep an eye on this. Don't worry. Like the truth will come out for sure. We've got it. And we got this ONDeck is built to back small businesses, like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, ONDecks loans up to four hundred thousand dollars help make it happen fast. Rated A plus by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five star trust pilot reviews, ONDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at onndDeck dot com d Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OndDck or Celtic Bank. OndDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amount subject to lender approval. When it comes to looking your best, Beachbum Tanning does it better. 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Crack a coun and listen to our full conversation at IBM. com slash smartTalks This is Matt Roggers from Los Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Boen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Los Culturistis with Matt Rogers and Boen Yang. Hey, Boen, is it just may or Do it feel like nothing is actually what it says it is Yeah, like when you order chicken fingers, you don't get fingers, you get mystery nuggets. Exactly Except hotels dot comot I was gonna say, hotels dot com because they do hotels. Refreshing. and when booked as a member, rewards are earned every stay. notot points that disappear, rewards that work like cash and can actually be used. So the name checks out and the perks dude too. Yep, members can get up to twenty percent off, tons of hotels with no blackout dates, just works with real travel. Okay That tracks hotels. com. It's all in the name. Allright, so a few months later, in February of nineteen eighty seven, the Tower Commission released their report confirming what the diversion memo said and stating that the National Security Council needed reforms after acting far too independently of Congress.. The level of criminal lawbreaking in the NSC had become so undeniable that Reagan gave his follow up to his earlier statement, and I'll forego my Reagan imitation this time, just to get this language across. He said, a few months ago, I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. Amazing, amazing sentence. How incredible is that language? I mean you've been in more than a few writers' rooms, Ed, canan you imagine how long it took to break that line? Becauseuse Reagan wasn't writing that himself. Like there was a room full of guys up until like four in the morning being like, how do we put all this in a sentence? Yeah. This is not just a word salad. This is like a word salad bar. It is full on buffet of words scrambled up into some what's supposed to be delicious But it's still kind of leaving a terrible taste in your mouth. I just want to go back to this. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true. But don't tell me this thing that I said to you that I know is a true. But the facts and the evidence, in other words, he's externalizing this. He's not saying like, my own analysis is of what I said is revealing that I lied to you. He's saying that these other things, these facts and this evidence are telling me that what I told you before,'s not true. Yeah. ye. Officer, I know you found that half empty forty in the center console of my car My heart tells me I haven't been drinking tonight, you know? And my best intention is tell me that that doesn't even exist. That he's not even there sloshing around in the backseat. Yeah. And I obey I obeyed the speed limit at all times. I wasn't going sixteen to fifteen.. Or as drunk people often do, they're going like twenty five in a sixty. Right Wh one of the two. All right, In July of this year, Oliver North and other members involved in the Iran cont affair testified before Congress. in live televised hearings as part of both the Senate and House led investigations What came out led to wave after wave of indictments from Lawrence Walsh against Oliver North, John Poinddexter, and others who had clearly been involved. One of the most insane reveals was that while Mese had claimed to be investigating the NSC's activities, He had actually given Oliver North and John Poindexter a heads up that he would be coming by And this gave Oliver North Enough time to host a quote paper shredding party. and destroy or alter thousands of pages of documents before Mce and his team could collect them. Now this that is the actual language The for shredding He party. Shredding party What does calling it a shredding party do to the way we hear something like that? Because it's very different from destroying evidence. It is It is a shredding party I think it sounds worse because that just sounds like you're deliberately like you are thumbing your nose at any idea of accountability, right? As opposed to like, well, we had a crime party. And'd be like, well, yeah, you did commit some crimes, but at least you're saying it, right? I think but I do think in this way, Like language is powerful and it sort of sets us sets a tone that this was sort of a casual thing and not that big a deal. But it was such a big deal. It a really big deal. North's shredding spree didn't erase the scandal, of course, but it erased enough of the paper trail to keep the full story just out of reach The diversion memo exposed the basic scheme, but anything that might have clearly implicated higher ups? likeike for example, Ronald Reagan, all that stuff was gone So all of this came out in the congressional investigations, North and Pointxter got their comeu andances and justice was served, right Right In the same way that like if the mafia appoints a fall guy to take the pin for like a crime, then like was justice serv. Well, yeah, that guy did something right But there's other guys that aren't gettingon Here's the best part Be it's even like the accountability is even worse than you think. I mean, that's part of the that's part of the beauty of SnaFu is that is that accountability is just this ephemeral con It doesn't actually apply to anything. You remember there are multiple simultaneous investigations going on here. In a way, they unintentionally undermined each other, which all became sort of its own snaffoo Despite the fact that Walsh brought charges against Oliver North and Poindexter and other members of the National Security Council Congress had already offered North and Poindexter immunity from charges in exchange for their testimony. So that meant that eleven individuals were found guilty in either carrying out the plot or in trying to slow down the investigations, but not Oliver North. or Poinexter or whether or not they were found guilty They were they got off. complepletely gotot free. due to their immunity. Make this make sense to me. Items fair to me. I mean, the sense is that like the people running the government really wanted to do this and they didn't want their friends to get in trouble for breaking the law. right? Like's that's the sense. I mean, it's not so different than the way things work now. Like it's it's the problem with investing people with power like this and then having the accountability also be them right? Like ideally, I get what the foundounding Fathers were trying to do with a separation of powers. and there's a, you know, there's a lot of wisdom in there. It worked out in some ways for a while, but maybe we need like another separate power, like a guy who like doesn't have any other power, but if the president's like Fucking up he can like spritz him with like like, you know, little pepper water, right? Like you would with like a like a misbehaving cat or something like that.. Yeah, like the guy who whose job is to like hold the president to account, some dude who can who who's like an appointed law enforcement type thing representing the people whose job is to make sure that shit like this doesn't happen, but we'll never do that, right? L because nobody in power would want that to happen. I don't know. I'm not a legal theorist and I but I would love to kind of hear from a legal expert Some of the theory behind offering immunity to people for their testimony It seems like a fair trade, but then you open yourself up to these situations where the person you just offered immunity to might have committed like such a more horrendous crime than you ever even realized And maybe you got some evidence to help you in this other area But it's not Yeah And in this case It's eleven people lower on the totem pole that got You know Rped across the deed over it. And was that worth it? Like was that was that a worthy trade off to like get those people busted if the ring leaders are getting off. I think it's a reasonable concept offering immunity in a situation where like, for example, you're going after like an organized crime r and you have some guys that you've caught, you know doing street level dealing or like pimping or whatever and they're kind of like street level criminals are willing to roll on their bosses. So you offer them immunity to the lower crimes you can get the bigger. This is kind of the opposite. likere you're exonerating bas or you're giving immunity to the guys nearer to the top in order to fuck the people at the bottom who didn't really make much of it like who weren't like the power players, right? Yeah. it seems like it seems like you want to be real savvy about who you're offering immunity to. Like if you like I would have And I don't know not knowing what those eleven people were specifically you know, charged with. I still my my feeling is I feel like I would have rather given all of them immunity in order to bust Oliver North and Pointexter. Right. Yeah and the other way around Yeah It would almost be like if years from now we get like criminal prosecutions as a result of like the doge stuff that was happening and they like give immunity to big balls or whoever his name was that was stealing people's data In order to bust like a security guard who like improperly didn't lock up one night. like, Well, that doesn't seem right? Exactly There's a crazy case where a guy was accused of murder And And someone who was there was given immunity to testify And once he was given immunity, He claimed to have committed the murder. Which was which was pretty demonstrably untrue, but it enabled the actual murderer to be get off the hook That's really funny. Isn't that wild? Yeah, That's great. It's like Th these are sort of unwieldy things when we unleash them out there Cashlow Crunch, OnDeck's small B business line of credit gives your business immediate access to funds up to two hundred thousand dollars, right when you need it, cover seasonal dips, manage payroll, restock inventory, or tackle unexpected expenses without missing a beat with flexible draws, transparent pricing, and control over repayment. Get funded quickly and confidently. Apply today at onDck dot com d Funds could be available as soon as tomorrow. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OndDeC or Celtic Bank. Ondeck does not lend in North Dakota, all loans and an amount subject to lender approval. When it comes to looking your best, Beachbum Tanning does it better. Beachbum delivers advanced sun and spray tanning, luxury skincare, and an elevated salon experience designed around you. It's why so many guests trust Beachbum for flawless color and real confidence. And now Beachbum is expanding wellness services to many locations. with red light therapy and infrared sauna, with more on the way. recharge your body, refresh your skin, reset your day. Beeachbum isn't just tanning, It's full spectrum wellness. Visit beachbum dot com to find a location near you So there's a lot of noise about AI Timeess too tight for more promises So let's talk about results. At IBM, we work with our employees to integrate technology right into the systems they need Now, a global workforce of three hundred thousand can use AI to fill their HR questions, resolving ninety four percent of common questions Not noise of how we can help companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off in the work that moves the business Let's create smartter business IBM. This is Matt Rogers from Lost Culturist, with Matt Rogers and Bo and Yang. This is Bo and Yang from Losost Culturistis with Matt Rogers and Boen Yang. Hey Bo, P pointint of order. It feels like nothing is what it says it is anymore. Point of answer. It's because everything has a catch. Hey, or turns out to be something else entirely like a total catfish situation. Exactly, Bau. Except for hotels dot com Yeah, that one's pretty literal because it's hotels dot com d in the domain You go there, you book hotels, hundreds of thousands of them. And hold up, that's It, That's it. And when stays are booked as a member, rewards are earned every time. Every stay, every stay, no tracking or managing, just rewards that can be used like cash on future bookings. Which by the way already feels nicer than most rewards programs. okay? Yeah. members can also get up to twenty percent off booking. so savings start right away. Does that mean no weird restrictions? and no blackout dates. Book what works when it works actually really fitting of real travel. So the name is honest, you're saying And the rewards are too. Exactly. hotels d. com It's all in the name So even after this whole media circus ended, new evidence was still leading to new revelations and new trials well into the nineteen nineties during George H W Bush's presidency They revealed that many of the National Security Council members who testified before the conongressional committees had committed perjury by lying and making false statements in their testimony, attempting to cover up what had really happened Damn, you just you can't trust anybody. In fact Some previously hidden notes revealed that Bush himself was involved in the scheme as vice president He of course was Reagan's vice president, but in one of his last acts as president George H W. Bush pardoned everyone involved before further trials could reveal anything more incriminating There' got probably nothing to look into there. Yeah, nothing you can do acccountability Not not just not not a thing Now and I don't think that was the purpose of presidential pardons when they started being a thing, but that certainly seems to be where what we've zeroed in on is the best reason to have presidential pardons is to like keep your cronies from getting in trouble. Amen. Now, it it's really interesting. I haven't dug into this this aspect enough, but there are a lot of people who still to this day think Ollie North was a hero And that some of these things that they were undertaking were were for the best reasons and that they were effectively, obviously they were breaking the law and they were violating congressional mandates and so forth. U, but they were doing so with the right motives and the right intentions and that really all of their lawbreaking could be Categorized as just cutting through the red tape to get something done. I was raised to believe that. Yeah, it was very much how my family taught me about it.ure. Like when I first heard about Iran contontra, it was described to me as like unfortunate and some people botcheduff some aspects of it, but it was the only option available to them and like, you know, when you're the president, you have to make tough decisions, like illegally trading missiles to a country we're not supposed to trade missiles to. You know it was very Like Oliver North was a hero in my house as a kid, right? Like that was exactly how I was raised to think about this. Of course. It's so fascinating. Really? It really is just kind of depends on where you're standing, the way the way that we look at these things. That is the tangled knot of the Iran ontra affair. Any larger takeaways, Robert Evans I mean, I think my takeaway from Iran Contra is my same, honestly, very similar to my takeaway with Watergate and to a number of like presidential scandals that we've had over the last fifty or so years, which is that When you repeatedly make it clear that there aren't consequences for lawbreaking at this level in American politics, that if the president says it or does it, it can't be a crime. And if the president orders people to do it, or if people are working towards what the president told them he wanted and they commit crimes then that's okay and that there's accepted ways to smooth over that and ensure that people don't face punishment for what they did. That's why we're where we are today. Like all this just begats greater and greater levels of corruption and greater senses of impunity by these actors who already, just kind of by default, by the fact that they're working in the West wing, they're working for the president have a degree of legal immunity, right that is conferred to them just by the fact that like that's how you know we do things in our system of government. and