"They wanted to know what Trump was up to with the Russians — which of course is nonsense. This whole thing was a complete setup."
— GEORGE PAPADOPOULOS, "HANNITY"
Two years of witch hunting. Eighteen Trump-hating angry Democrats. Forty-nine FBI agents. Five hundred interviews. Thirty-five million dollars. Four hundred pages of total exoneration. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.
In its desperation to find an excuse for Hillary Clinton's humiliating defeat in the 2016 presidential election, the Democratic Party and its allies in the corrupt media establishment promoted an unethical investigation into alleged "collusion" and "obstruction" that spent millions of your hard-earned tax dollars to deliver a verdict that was already obvious to patriotic Americans of robust intellect: President Donald J. Trump is innocent. Hillary Clinton failed because she is, quite simply, the worst candidate to ever receive a major party's presidential nomination in American history.
As is often the case in our hyper-politicized, social media-driven culture, the real victims have been overlooked, buried under mountains of slung mud. Nevertheless, Trump persisted.
Despite the exhaustive efforts of his enemies to bring down his presidency on phony pretenses — a Failed Coup for all intents and purposes — Our President worked tirelessly to deliver historic economic prosperity to the American people. Just imagine what he could have achieved absent the structural forces of oppression bearing down on him. There is no ceiling to the heights Our Country might have scaled in those Lost Years of Attempted Treason.
Fortunately, we can still reach those heights of American Greatness. We can put aside our differences, and come together as a country to acknowledge and repair the damage the inflicted by these unscrupulous individuals, and the deeply-ingrained structural forces of Bitterness and Jealousy that aided and abetted their deviant behavior.
One possible solution, proposed by the Christian entrepreneur Jerry Falwell, Jr., deserves serious consideration.
After the best week ever for @realDonaldTrump - no obstruction, no collusion, NYT admits @BarackObama did spy on his campaign, & the economy is soaring. I now support reparations-Trump should have 2 yrs added to his 1st term as pay back for time stolen by this corrupt failed coup
— Jerry Falwell (@JerryFalwellJr) May 5, 2019
Falwell's diagnosis is spot on, from a factual standpoint. His proposed cure — reparations in the form of an extended presidential term — is interesting, but might not go far enough. There is a reason judges and juries often award "punitive damages" in cases of egregious misconduct: to make a statement, and to ensure that certain vile acts are never repeated. If the American people can't agree that a "corrupt failed coup" should be adjudicated on these terms, than we don't deserve the prosperity President Trump has labored so diligently to deliver in the face of such venal opposition.
Here's a counterproposal: Cancel the 2020 presidential until we can figure out what the hell is going on, and decide on a fair and honest reparations package. Thoughtful consideration should be given to punitive damages, as mentioned above. But what form should this disciplinary restitution take? Money is of no value to a man who has already agreed to forgo his $400,000 presidential salary, not to mention all the money he could be making in real estate as a private citizen. Such is his commitment the noble ideals of public service.
If justice is our ultimate aim, President Trump must be repaid in the currency of that which was stolen from him: Time.
By any honest accounting, two years would hardly suffice as adequate restitution for the misdeeds in question. Two years is merely the baseline from which our pursuit of justice should commence. The time sheets for every member of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team must be handed over to determine the exactly quantity of man hours squandered on a fruitless investigation. Same goes for Democratic lawmakers and their staff members, who have wasted countless hours conducting their own "investigations" since taking control of the House of Representatives earlier this year.
Preliminary calculations suggest the extent of this "time theft" could total as high as 4 years, 7 months, and 13 days. That figure would merely represent a new baseline from which to apply "punitive" considerations. The final number must be multiplied, but by how much? A factor of three sounds like a fair compromise. That would mean extending President Trump's first term in office by approximately 13 years, 9 months, and 10 days. Needless to say, further investigation could reveal previously unknown misconduct that would require a double-digit punitive multiplier.
The better angels of our nature command us to choose the right path, even when it's the most difficult option available. Fortunately in this case, the easy path and the right path are the same path. Reparations are in order. Allowing Donald Trump to continue his historically successful presidency indefinitely until an adequate temporal restitution can be agreed, and the arc of history bent ever so slightly in the direction of justice, is only fair. It's the right thing to do.