Gilead
Donald Trump
Fig. 1. Donald Trump, depicted in an orange jumpsuit, reportedly by the Drudge, via Mediaite,[1] fair use.
[Donald Trump] has neither a law degree nor formal legal training, but over the course of that long history, he has become notorious in legal circles for thinking he knows better than the lawyers he hires — and then, very often, fires — and frequently is slow to pay if he does at all. . . .
Mr. Trump’s intensely litigious nature has made his strategy more visible over the years than it might otherwise be. He has long used delay tactics in legal matters that emerged from business disputes, and since becoming a politician he has repeatedly tried to throw sand in the gears of the legal system, using the resulting slow pace of litigation to run out the clock until seismic events shifted the playing field. . . .
The disputes chewed up time — for briefings, arguments and then the period judges took to craft opinions — and while Mr. Trump often lost those decisions, he would simply appeal again and restart the process.
In that way, Mr. Trump effectively won despite losing . . .
Mr. Trump also has a lengthy history of conflating legal problems with public-relations problems, treating every matter as one that can be dealt with in terms of a media strategy.
While in office [as president], he talked often about investigations he faced — so much so that some of his comments became possible acts of obstruction of justice scrutinized by a special counsel, including tweets in 2018 suggesting that Mr. [Michael D.] Cohen, whose home and office had just been searched by the F.B.I., would never turn against him.[2]
William K. Rashbaum et al., “Donald Trump’s Time-Tested Legal Strategy: Attack and Delay,” New York Times, April 2, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/01/nyregion/trump-bragg-legal-defense-strategy.html
Hush money
Fig. 1. Cartoon by Jesse Duquette, undated, via “Minneapple23” [pseud.] on Imgur, April 1, 2023, fair use.
William K. Rashbaum et al., “Donald Trump’s Time-Tested Legal Strategy: Attack and Delay,” New York Times, April 2, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/01/nyregion/trump-bragg-legal-defense-strategy.html
Banking
Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank, and Credit Suisse, 2023
Fig. 1. “The monument sign in front of the parking lot of the Silicon Valley Bank headquarters at 3003 West Tasman Drive, Santa Clara, California.” Photograph by Minh Nguyen, March 13, 2023, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Nouriel Roubini, “‘Most U.S. banks are technically near insolvency, and hundreds are already fully insolvent,’ Roubini says,” MarketWatch, April 1, 2023, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/most-u-s-banks-are-technically-near-insolvency-and-hundreds-are-already-fully-insolvent-roubini-says-18b89f92
Alexander Saeedy and Laura Cooper, “SVB Collapse Complicates Banks’ Efforts to Unload More Than $25 Billion of Junk Debt,” Wall Street Journal, April 2, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/svb-collapse-complicates-banks-efforts-to-unload-more-than-25-billion-of-junk-debt-a19ae78d
- [1]Alex Griffing, “Drudge Puts Trump in an Orange Jumpsuit as Site Monitors His Potential Indictment,” Mediaite, August 29, 2022, https://www.mediaite.com/news/drudge-puts-trump-in-an-orange-jumpsuit-as-site-monitors-his-potential-indictment/↩
- [2]William K. Rashbaum et al., “Donald Trump’s Time-Tested Legal Strategy: Attack and Delay,” New York Times, April 2, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/01/nyregion/trump-bragg-legal-defense-strategy.html↩