War Party voices across the media are decrying Candidate Trump’s windfall from merchandizing his jail selfie. They’re convinced that a city and county jail should own the right to exploit the mugshots of its booking victims. Wait what?
Out of spite for the Trumpster, the antipopulist pundits would prefer that a justice system profit from spreading the likenesses of its detainees, innocent-until-proven-guilty be damned? What an unpopular opinion indeed.
Booking officers would have to mandate that arrestees sign releases for the public display of their mugs. That’s an interesting civil illiberty.
I’m sure intellectual property brokers love the idea because those rights could be contracted to IP horders like Getty Images for further control over what the public sees and can’t see. Next would be surveillance footage, doorbell videos, and traffic cams. To my mind the mugshot is overreach enough. If anyone has earned that image it’s the perp themself.
Trump elected to scowl for his jail portrait, apparently peeved at the injustice of his indictment. It seems a rather petty posture considering the theatricality at play. Maybe the Edward G. Robinson menace is his best look, but I always tried to smile for the occasion.
In my experience jailors wouldn’t let you smile. Apprehendees are expected to look glum. and you certainly feel it, being shouted at to stop smiling. I think Tom Delay’s famous car dealer smile mugshot broke the precedent, I told them as much, but wardens have different tools now to snap the expression they prefer. They don’t tell you when they’ve clicked the shutter, or they pretend they have until you stop mugging. With digital equipment they simply record a video and choose the frame of their liking. If you want to effect joviality you have to wear a smile through the entire booking process. For newcomers to our ugly penal system that’s not an easy thing to do.
Tax cuts for the rich. Higher deficit interest to the bankers. Less healthcare, Social Security and safety net for you. Ceaseless war for corporate imperialists, continued resource extraction for climate depopulation, and more austerity for the middle class. 21st Century oligarchs say: let the poor eat shitcake.
I would call them Academically Modified Organizers except that doesn’t relate their haunting similarity to agricultural GMOs. University-incubated community organizers are designed to share a tragic characteristic of killer crops: the terminator gene. And it self-selects for stupid.
Do we simply forgive ex-presidents as they become demented dirty old men? I would guess so. Groping is probably the least of their criminal white patriarchal behavior. The formal apology explaining H. W. Bush’s incapacity to interact with female guests anywhere but above the waist, which also clarifies the standby joke he makes, to excuse his move, or to illustrate his punchline: “Wanna know my favorite book? David Cop-a-Feel”, would suggest that HW’s lecherous groping is standard practice during his group photos. And it probably ALWAYS WAS. I say if Poppy Bush truly is disinhibited with dementia, somebody please ask him about his wildcat days of Zapata Oil and the Bay of Pigs and whatever intelligence activity he engaged in that qualified him to later be appointed director of the CIA. US intelligence agencies are stalling on the JFK document release because the revelations would still be too sensitive to parties yet to kick the bucket or curb the groping.