A fictional view of what Twitter is doing to the world. It's based on the real tweets of one of my favorite prosecutors and those of my least favorite presidents.
The Twittler Files
There’s nothing like the sound of steel doors clanking shut behind you. It’s a chilling reminder that you’re in a place where steel bars stand between you and freedom. This time it’s a little different, but I’ve felt it many times when I’ve visited jail cells to take pleas from criminals who’ve decided to do the wise thing and take what they could get instead of going through a trial. Sentences are usually much tougher when criminals lose trials. That’s just reality.
I am a prosecutor. My job is to examine the facts that may constitute a crime and then present them to a judge or jury for a determination of whether or not the individual accused of the crime is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. That’s a tough thing to do. The standard is high because we take freedom seriously in America. I can almost always meet that standard because I never take a case to trial if I don’t believe the facts are there to support a verdict in favor of the State. I win most of the time.
Most prosecutors are decent people trying to serve their country by giving respect to the law and order to the process by which we live our lives. For me, there’s a bonus. I get to rescue innocent victims from the brazen acts of hardened criminals. I know that’s not my job. I represent the State, not the victim. But I have to admit that it feels good to stand for those who have been injured by bad people. It makes me feel like I’m doing good things in the world. I confess a penchant for King Arthur and the tales of chivalry that surround the Knights of the Round Table. I live the life of a Knight of the Legal Order, riding the white horse, rescuing those who can’t protect themselves.
It’s important to remember that my real client is the State … but, in reality, the State is nothing more than the collective body of the citizens who live in this country. That’s why it’s so important to be sure of the facts before you prosecute. My duty is to the people … the people as a whole. That duty requires me to make sure the awesome power of the State is not turned on an innocent person as much as it demands that I do my best to make the guilty pay for their crimes. The decision to prosecute is a power that must be used with great respect because just filing a criminal charge can destroy a person’s life. Any prosecutor worth his weight would tell you that.
Because of the power inherent in my job, I’ve always tried to keep away from spouting politics in the public forum. I want to make sure there isn’t even a hint of impropriety in how I do my job. I guess I could make political statements outside of the office, but it’s just not something I’ve ever done … at least it wasn’t until the last presidential election. My sense of ethics was so disturbed by one of the candidates that I couldn’t help myself. I got involved.
I don’t know when I first began the descent into Facebook and Twitter rhetoric, but it was long before the election. Maybe it was when he tweeted:
“I should have easily won the Trump University case on summary judgment but have a judge, Gonzalo Curiel, who is totally biased against me.” 4:55 P.M.-May 30, 2016.
In addition to the fact that he’d clearly bilked thousands of innocent people trying to get an education, which should be considered criminal conduct, you just don’t talk about judges that way. His vicious racism and totally self-centered behavior were becoming more apparent with each passing day. Even worse, it was becoming evident that he really would be the Republican candidate for President of the United States. I didn’t think he’d win, but I was appalled that my party could possibly allow that to happen. I was horrified that I’d probably have no choice except to vote for Hillary Clinton. I’m not a fan, but she was a much better choice than a man who so lightly defrauded students, bilked contractors, and denigrated the handicapped and minorities. She clearly understood the gravity of the job she was seeking, the seriousness of the presidency. He clearly did not … that became more evident with each passing day, with each passing tweet.
There was so much more that I didn’t know back then, all of it bad. But I put on my prosecutor’s hat and began to review the facts like I would if someone brought in a complaint against him. I decided to start a file on him … sort of like the files I keep when I’m prosecuting a criminal. I wasn’t sure he’d violated any law at the time, but he clearly was violating every possible morality code in a big way. I don’t mean the cheap shots like affairs, but really important things like making choices that hurt others to line your own pockets. The list of egregious acts grew with every day. He claimed to be for the little guy, but he routinely refused to pay little guys for their work. He walked all over any woman who came his way. He had a history of racist behavior. He was a bad man beyond any reasonable doubt, but I wasn’t sure there was a prosecutable crime. I’ve seen hundreds like him, people who walk the line but don’t actually cross it. They trample other people, but don’t do the things that would make them pay for their actions. He was scum, but maybe not criminal scum.
I became a little suspicious of actual criminal behavior when he tweeted:
“If Russia or any other country or person has Hillary Clinton’s 33,000 illegally deleted emails, perhaps they should share them with the FBI! 11:16 A.M.-July 27, 2016.
It just seemed like he might be in touch with those who would do our country wrong. That was bad enough for any ordinary citizen, but he was running for the highest office in the land.
I tried so hard not to allow myself to descend into what seemed like a conspiracy theory. I like to think of myself as well balanced and fair. And I didn’t want my background to impact how I thought about another individual. I’m gay and Jewish. Both make it hard to justify being a Republican. I don’t like the party’s position on most privacy issues, but I do consider myself a conservative. I support a balanced budget, free trade, a strong military … all of the things the traditional GOP stands for. I don’t think a give-away is good for anyone. It’s demeaning to those receiving it and unfair to the tax-payers. So you can see why I chose to be a proud Republican.
I guess I’m what they call a Log Cabin Republican, but I strongly support the principles that make a democracy strong. One of them is a free press. His treatment of the press really started getting to me when I read:
“This election is being rigged by the media pushing false and unsubstantiated charges and outright lies in order to elect Crooked Hillary!” 6:45 A.M. Oct. 15, 2016.
That one went into the file. The Fourth Estate is what keeps the three branches of the government answerable to the people they represent. Sometimes it seemed like he was encouraging his supporters to actually physically attack the reporters in the room. That can’t help but be a deterrent to reporters. That can’t help but erode the strength of a democracy.
I started out on November 8 with a knot in my gut. I went to the voting booth and forced myself to mark the Hillary Clinton spot on the ballot. It hurt like hell to do that. But I knew by then that she was the only hope of avoiding a catastrophe. I live in a swing state so my vote was important. I did my duty to my country. I wasn’t especially worried. I just knew the Democrats would take Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Ohio and they would keep the White House.
There’s another reason that time of year is hard for me. My parents died in a car crash when I was just ten years old. I was raised by my grandparents. My grandfather was the most important man in my life. He was my mentor and best friend when I was growing up in a small Southern town. I’m not sure why we stayed, but maybe it was because he had a successful medical practice there. There were no other Jewish children in school, and I was something of a target although I got through it by tutoring some of the jocks who credited me with keeping them on the football team. They made me team manager and I was set. But it was hard to get a date and I didn’t really get invited to too many parties. Of course, I didn’t really mind that much since girls terrified me. I was afraid they’d realize I was gay. I hadn’t come out at that point in my life although sometimes I felt like other people suspected it. I was so scared I’d be outed that I didn’t even really kiss anybody until I was well into my twenties and living in a place where it wouldn’t be such a big deal.
Anyway whatever slings and arrows I felt, it was nothing compared to what my mentor endured in life. He made it through life in a concentration camp during World War II. He lived in a state of starvation for years and then continued to starve even after he escaped from captivity. He made his way as a penniless immigrant to this great country after the war. With no money and nowhere to live, he found a way to make a living and provide for a family. He considered America the greatest thing that had ever happened in the history of the world. He died on November 10, 2010, just six years before the election. I was still feeling the pain. And the last thing he said to me was that he’d survived another anniversary of Kristallnacht and each one was a victory over tyranny.
I don’t know if you’re aware of what Kristallnacht was. It’s also called the Night of the Broken Glass. It marked the real beginning of Hitler’s plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Bands of Nazi brown shirts roved through Berlin breaking windows and looting Jewish businesses. Concentration camps came next. My grandfather was one of the kindest men who ever lived. He could always find a kind word for everyone, even stone cold killers. But even he hated Adolph Hitler. He said Hitler was a joke to the German people at first. Then he became an answer to the threat of a Communist take-over. But once he seized the power of the Reichstag in 1933, he began the path toward genocide which shifted into high gear on that night of terror in 1938 and ended the lives of over ten million people.
My grandfather carried scars from the fear of that terrible night all of his life. I’m just glad he didn’t live to see what happened on the 2016 anniversary of Kristallnacht. It would’ve scared him, not for himself but for me and all Americans. It would’ve chipped away at his faith in the American democracy that he loved so much. The shining beacon, the safe haven for the oppressed, was about to be handed an existential challenge like none that had ever been faced before. And that’s what made the election especially strange to me. It was called on the anniversary of Kristallnacht. That’s right, the Night of the Broken Glass, the night when Hitler’s plans for genocide of Jews all over Europe came into focus, started on November 9, 1938. The election was called in the early morning hours of November 9, 2016, seventy-eight years later. I’m not saying it means anything, but my grandfather would have thought it did. He was always looking for signs in numbers and dates. He believed it imperative to examine your life frequently and in context with the lives of those around you. This would have been big for him.
After he was elected, I became even more diligent in keeping my file, but I did something else too. I began my own twitter battle with him. I created a site I called “The Twittler Files,” my sort of sarcastic recognition of the similarities between what he was doing and the rise of a dictator’s power, a sort of off-handed reference to Hitler by way of Twitter … Twittler if you will. It seemed especially appropriate because so much of his power seemed to be derived from his vile behavior on Twitter.
I filled my website with his tweets and film clips of rude and potentially treasonous behavior. I included my analysis of the danger he presented to modern democracy. I tweeted back from my site every time he issued a stupid overstatement, every time he tried to bully someone who didn’t have the power to stand up to him. I started getting a lot of attention after a while. I went viral when I wrote and posted Twittler’s Anthem to Power set to Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries. I hit one million followers after just a few weeks and I kept rising.
I kept my focus on things that impacted the judicial system and the protection of democratic ideals, but my file was growing at an alarming rate. After a judge enjoined his unconstitutional immigration plan, he tweeted:
“Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens, blame him and court system.” 3:39 P.M.-February 5, 2017
Another jab at the judicial system which he doesn’t seem to understand has a constitutional duty to rule based upon the law and facts before it. The courts are the check that protects the citizens from a government careening out of control. He obviously wanted nothing more than to take this country on the equivalent of Toad’s Wild Ride into his obscene vision of the world.
Then he went after the press again, tweeting:
“The FAKE NEWS media(failing .nytimes, .NBCnews, .ABCnews, .CBSnews, .CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!” 4:45 P.M-February 17, 2017.
He was so arrogant, so sure of his control of the base that he loved, so drunk on power. I’m not sure if he’s a brilliant satirist who realizes that he is the true enemy of the people and his target, the press, is the only thing that’s protecting the people … if he’s so diabolical that he’s intentionally doing what it takes to realize absolute power … or if he’s too stupid or uncaring to understand what he’s doing. It’s unquestionable that he’s already corrupt, but giving him absolute power would take things to a new level.
His tweets are outrageous lies, but they’re also a reminder of the path of a dictator to absolute power. Hitler disempowered the judicial system and paralyzed the press with his own propaganda service in his rise to power. He used fear and prejudice to fuel support for his barbaric ideals. As the year progressed, it looked more and more like our president was taking a similar path. But our beautiful system was holding him in check and the Justice Department was going after him for what I’m sure were illegal acts.
I started a timeline and posted it using his tweets the way a prosecutor would. I could see him in my mind squirming on the stand as his plan to enhance his own wealth at the expense of the country he was supposed to be serving was constructed to an imaginary jury. The people on Facebook and Twitter started sharing my timelines as they became more and more complete. It was impossible that any jury wouldn’t convict … for obstruction, for conspiracy, for treason.
Then I began noticing some strange things. My computer would go out of my control with no warning. I’d lose data and my place during searches. I changed my passwords and forged on, but it kept happening. I wasn’t sure if it was my imagination or the President’s Russian buddies playing tricks on me. I was sure that the special prosecutor was getting closer to the truth with each passing day and that the president was acting like a cornered animal.
It seemed like every day was another step toward chaos, toward irreparable damage that would be difficult to overcome even after he was out of office. I worried every day that he’d fire the special prosecutor and things would go even further off the tracks. His behavior seemed more and more erratic as the days passed and more witnesses were called to the grand jury. Every time something significant happened, like an indictment or plea from his friends and supporters, he’d fire someone else. All of the people who everyone agreed might be able to keep him in line were disappearing.
Then the day we’d all been waiting for came. The special prosecutor released his report. It was clear from the data I’d already seen and the facts presented in the report that the whole thing had been about money laundering and its fallout. It was clear that the Russians had him and were playing him like a Pinocchio doll. His miserable treasonous behavior was revealed in such a way that no one could deny it. Congress acted quickly. No one wanted to be pulled into the net that surrounded the guilty co-conspirators who had sold out for money and power. The Republicans finally realized that they owed as much loyalty to him as he’d shown to us … none. The president was impeached. Before he could be indicted and arrested, he disappeared. There’s talk that he lives in somewhere in the wilds of Russia. He was able to secure a very large amount of cash when he disappeared so it’s possible he could still be useful to Putin. Or maybe Putin keeps him like a court jester … that’s about how he treated the man when he held the most powerful office in the world.
I didn’t like that he got away, but at least he wasn’t seen in the world as the representative of the American people, at least he didn’t have his finger on the button and a pen that could destroy national parks and people’s lives on a whim. There was a lot of concern that he’d give the Russians top secret information, but I’m not too worried about it. Oh, I’m sure he would if he could, but I don’t think he even kept up with the important things about his job in the White House. I thought we were safe. I thought we could get past the damage he’d done in a relatively short time. I knew he’d torn the fabric of the democracy, but I had faith we’d bounce back. I was wrong.
The Vice-President was sworn in the day the President disappeared. Within a few weeks all of the cabinet posts were filled with the most outrageous evangelical leaders. They started what they continued to call “draining the swamp.” To them, that meant imposing what they called Christian values on every phase of life. They gave the oil companies all of the American parks to drill or mine or frack. They abolished any law that favored or protected minorities, women, trans-genders, trans-sexuals, or gays. They declared any religion not based on a core of Christian beliefs to be illegal unless approved by a national religious council. Finally, they were able to get a bill through Congress that made being gay a crime unless the individual agreed to conversion.
I didn’t agree. That’s why I’m here.
My name is Tony Jacobson and I want you to remember that name. I’m a non-Christian gay man and proud of it. I was arrested when I refused to sign a conversion therapy agreement. I’m pretty sure I was one of the first arrested because of my website … the Twittler Files. I was a gay man with a voice. The new regime didn’t like what I was saying. The new anti-gay federal law wrested from me my freedom and liened all of my possessions. The law includes a clause that requires the unconverted gay to pay for his life in prison and provides an automatic lien that goes into effect at the time of arrest.
I stand alone in a jail cell in a federal penitentiary. I have no money to hire an attorney to fight my incarceration. But I have hope for my country. I have hope for the democratic principles that form the basis of this country that I love, of this republic that has led the modern world with a beacon of hope for all people. I have faith that the checks and balances created by our forefathers will ultimately work. I will be free again. It’s going to take a while, but I will be free. And it’s because of the judicial branch of the government, the branch that was created to check the power of the elected branches to uphold the basic principles that are the building blocks of our nation.
I have no money, but lawyers have poured into my cell to offer their help. Every lawyer in the public defender’s office, many of whom have battled with me in court, came forth to offer their representation. Their counterparts in the federal system have been here to promise they will get me to court as soon as possible. Lawyers from the private sector have come here to tell me they will recover my property and will take me all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to make law that will prevent this from ever happening again. I will be free.
That’s why I want you to remember my name. You will see it blazoned across the newspapers and shouted from the flat screens when the U.S. Supreme Court does its job and declares the actions of the government unconstitutional. That’s what they do. They protect the essence of who we are … and we are the beacon of light, the measure of hope for the human race.
For now, I sit in my cell and think of my grandfather. I realize in wonder that the government of the country that allowed Adolf Hitler to release his insanity on the world is now standing in our shoes as the leader of the free world. Perhaps a part of why they were able to reach that height is because of the aid we gave after the war. But I think it’s a statement about the human existence. I think it answers the age-old question about whether man is essentially good or evil in a positive way for the good. We may struggle with our darker selves, but good will ultimately prevail.
I think of my grandfather and feel his presence as I contemplate my life inside a prison where I won’t be allowed to make any real decisions for myself. I will miss my glass of milk before bed. I will miss my walks in the park on the grass and gazing at the stars. I will miss eating food that I want to eat and taking a nap when I want to nap. I will miss privacy of any kind at all. I know he had it a thousand times worse. He had no real food and was subject to the possibility of instant death at any given time. But there are similarities. I think of the innocent gay people wearing pink triangles like the yellow stars forced on the Jews. They were Hitler’s victims too. They were imprisoned for being something they couldn’t help being … themselves. I think my grandfather would understand the similarities. I think about how many friends and relatives he lost to Hitler’s madness. I think about his forced starvation for six years in a place of desolation, never knowing if he’d live to the next day. And even after all of that, he was a firm believer that man is essentially good. He could still smile and love and give to those around him. I only hope I can do the same.
I hear the buzzer and know it’s time for me to march to the cafeteria for a dinner of reconstituted potatoes and almost rotten bologna. I will eat my dinner. I will hope others who share my sexual orientation escape this punishment. I will keep my mind fixed on the system that will assure our ultimate freedom. I will recognize that goodness lurks in the hearts of even the worst of men and women. I will trust the process.
"Riveting" is an understatement. It's been a long time since I read a story that had me reading every word as though it were the last word I would ever read. You were the perfect person to write this with your background in the law. You have made a case that the special prosecutor may be trying to make right now. A very brave and powerful exposé of what Twitter has done to give a man a bully pulpit to wield his lies and broken promises. A way to build power and his power base.
So perfectly written, especially with that revelation near the end, that I couldn't find anything but something that may be merely semantic. I would use, "worth his salt," instead of worth his weight.
Fourth Book in the Southern Swallow Series finds the Academician Li K'ai-men in exile on Hai-nan Island. China has a new invasion threat. A showdown between ingenuity and technology explodes as the Sung Dynasty tries to preserve itself.
Book I of Southern Swallow Series – 12th Century scholar Li K'ai-men takes command of his first official assignments during a time of political unrest and barbarian invasions.
