Well, here we are. The ink’s barely dry on my last piece where I delicately suggested that perhaps, just perhaps, cheering on the government’s newfound enthusiasm for “housecleaning” our political opponents might be, shall we say, a touch imprudent. And lo and behold, the Justice Department, bless its ever-so-independent heart, has decided to provide us with a live-action demonstration of exactly what I was talking about.
George Soros. James Comey. Letitia James. The usual suspects for the right, and certainly not figures who inspire much sympathy in my circles. Soros, the boogeyman billionaire funding every progressive cause under the sun, often with, shall we say, disruptive results. Comey, the self-righteous former FBI director whose theatrical virtue signaling has been a national sport for years. James, the partisan attack dog of a New York AG, who seems to view going after Trump as her primary job description.
If there were ever a trio that conservative America would love to see wearing an orange jumpsuit, it’s these three. And now, the Justice Department, under intense pressure from the Oval Office, is reportedly scrambling to make that dream a reality. We’ve got Deputy AG Todd Blanche’s office pushing U.S. attorneys across the country to find charges against Soros’s Open Society Foundations, citing everything from arson to material support for terrorism. And in Virginia, a hastily appointed prosecutor with no prior prosecutorial experience is racing against a statute of limitations to indict James Comey for allegedly lying to Congress, despite career prosecutors having already found insufficient evidence.
Now, I can already hear the triumphant shouts. “This is it! This is finally holding them accountable! They did it to us for years!” And you’re not wrong that the other side has, for a long time, weaponized institutions. We’ve seen investigations dragged out, reputations destroyed, and legal gymnastics performed, often with a wink and a nod from the political establishm
But two wrongs, as even our government school system used to teach, don’t make a right. They make a perpetual cycle of political retribution. We spent Part III lamenting that we might be turning into the very thing we despise. This, my friends, is the moment of truth.
When the Justice Department, an institution theoretically dedicated to blind justice, starts taking marching orders directly from the President to investigate his “perceived enemies”—complete with explicit lists of potential charges ranging from the ridiculous to the grave—we’re not just cleaning house. We’re tearing down the foundations of due process.
When career prosecutors, the people who actually know how to build a case, say there’s “insufficient evidence,” and the response is to fire them and bring in a political loyalist to ram through an indictment before a deadline, that’s not justice. That’s a Star Chamber.
And when “material support for terrorism” is floated as a potential charge against a philanthropic organization simply because a president disagrees with its political leanings—citing a conservative watchdog report as primary evidence—we are opening a Pandora’s Box that will inevitably consume us all. Today, it’s Soros. Tomorrow, will it be the NRA? A conservative legal fund? A pro-life organization? Because once the precedent is set, once the cultural permission slip is granted, it can be applied to anyone.
The Constitution isn’t there to protect our friends; it’s there to protect our enemies, especially from the arbitrary power of the state.
It’s the only thing standing between political disagreement and outright political persecution. And when we cheer for the dismantling of those safeguards, because this time it’s “our guy” doing it to “their guy,” we are sawing off the branch we’re sitting on.
Remember our conversation about cultural change in Part IV? About building institutions and valuing liberty over vengeance? This is the ultimate test. It’s easy to preach about the rule of law when it’s being applied to someone you dislike. It’s much harder, but far more crucial, to defend it when it might protect someone you despise.
Because if we don’t, if we simply embrace the tit-for-tat, the “might makes right” mentality, then we’ve surrendered the moral high ground. We’ve admitted that our system isn’t about principles, but about whoever controls the levers of power. And then, we’re not a republic based on laws; we’re just another banana republic waiting for the next strongman to seize the prosecutor’s office.
The Justice Department isn’t supposed to be the president’s personal hit squad. It’s supposed to be blind. And when we lose that—when we exchange justice for political retribution—we don’t just destroy our opponents. We destroy ourselves. And that, my friends, is a price no “victory” is worth paying.
