Sailing to Oblivion: June 10, 2017

It’s like this professor: I didn’t intend to make a “D” on that paper. It’s just that I’m new at this. I should get a “A.”

It didn’t work. Nor did it when I received my first traffic ticket. And I was new at it then, driving that is. Needless to say, it didn’t work in my marriage either. I found that, “You knew I was an idiot when you married me” works better.

I can only assume that had Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Paul Ryan had been my professor or the police officer, the defense of “new at this” would have carried more weight. After all, he did use it this week to excuse some fairly troubling instances of incompetence by the President of the United States. As Mr. Spock would say, “fascinating.”

Allow me to submit a proposal that I thought of when I read about this.

First, some background would help. There is a legal defense of sorts that used to be taught in the law schools of my state. It may still be, I haven’t heard lately, and I don’t go there, Law School that is, except occasionally to speak on how urban planners respond to the law.

Anyway, the defense is named after a prominent attorney and state legislator from Hope, Arkansas in a case years ago. Accused of some malfeasance or other rising to the level of potential illegality, he formed a uique line of reasoning. The logic employed was remarkable. It ran something along the lines of

“I’m accused of doing something that, on analysis, is very stupid. Am I stupid? No. I graduated from college and law school, and passed the bar exam. I’m savvy enough to be elected to our state legislature, perhaps no great, but certainly no mean, feat. I have a successful law practice. So, I’m not stupid. When one considers that what I’m accused of would be a stupid act, and one sees that I am obviously not stupid then, ipso facto, (a legal term meaning: darn tootin’) the chances of my guilt are zero.”

I seem to remember that it worked but I’m not sure.

So now we have what I propose to label the “Donald Trump Defense.” It would run, in contra-conception to one mentioned above, along the lines of

“I’m accused of doing wrong. I’m new at this. Being new at something, there is no way a person can be held to the standard of what is right or wrong. Therefore, libet dicere (rough translation: bite me) my innocence is assured beyond a shadow of a doubt.”

A few words of caution bear noting. As I mentioned earlier, wise men will avoid this defense with spouses. Also, members of progressive political parties should eschew its use as they labor under the legal assumptions of intelligentes estis and  competentsus est assurdant. (legal terms meaning: don’t try this crap with us).

There exist many examples where the efficacy of the “Donald Trump Defense" would not prove appropriate, getting caught parked in Mike Tyson’s spot for example. And, in the event of accidently initiating a nuclear war, don’t bother considering its use. We’ll then be operating under another legal principle, id est moot, (a legal term meaning alle ist kaput).

Oops.