#DershowitzLogic is trending on twitter because people can’t believe that he was arguing that It’s OK for Trump to do what he was doing because he was doing it to get re-elected, and that is for the public good. Yes, I know that it’s absurd, but if you stop halfway through his argument, you might notice that, in the process of trying to defend the presidents actions, he didn’t just figuratively shoot him in the foot, He figuratively shot him in the head by not just admitting, but actively arguing for one of the critical elements of the charges against Trump. .. and then implicitly blows up the second half of his argument.
So, let’s just do that. Dershowitz argued that it was OK for the president to do what he did, because he was doing it to get elected. But what was he doing to get elected? He was asking (OK, blackmailing) the Ukrainians for a favour. … So let’s put these parts together:
Dershowitz argued that Trump was asking a foreign government (Ukrainian) for help with the election (and then the garbage about it being for the public good). He didn’t just admit it, he affirmatively argued it.
But asking a foreign government for electoral help is so illegal that it’s also unconstitutional. Something like that cannot by definition be in public interest. Dershowitz’s logic might have held a half teaspoon of logic if Trump had been blackmailing my American cousin Viney, but he wasn’t. By arguing that Trump was asking The Ukrainians “for a [electoral] favour”, he blew up the argument that it was for the public good.
So now, we’re just left with the fact that Dershowitz just legally shot Trump in the head by admitting and arguing a critical element of the charges against Trump.