Trump and his toadies are trying to rewrite history so that he’s not an insurrectionist

OJ Simpson decided he could make some “blood money”, as he called it, by writing a “hypothetical” book on the murders of his estranged wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman entitled If I Did It. When it was announced in 2006, the outrage was so overwhelming that the publisher, HarperCollins, owned by Rupert Murdoch, fired the editor, Judith Regan, and cancelled a scheduled Fox network special. The OJ book fiasco appeared to be a rare moment of Murdoch sensitivity, but he was concerned that the association besmirched his own reputation.

A week after Donald Trump’s attorney argued in the DC district court that he could not be prosecuted for his attempted coup culminating in the January 6 assault on the Capitol and could order the assassination of any opponent, Trump took to his Truth Social account on 18 January to insist that he “MUST HAVE COMPLETE & TOTAL PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY” even for “EVENTS THAT ‘CROSS THE LINE’”. If the glove fits, you must still acquit.

Trump’s If I Did It moment was followed, not with repulsion, but instead with his former warm embrace by Murdoch’s Fox News, reflexive bended knee by the entire Republican leadership, and Polonius-like advice from JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon to Democrats to “grow up” and “listen” to Maga.

After 6 January2021, Murdoch swore that Trump was an “asshole”, “a fucking idiot” and a “loser”. Fox News itself agreed to pay $787m to settle a case alleging that Fox News broadcast falsehoods to advance Trump’s lies about the Dominion Voting Systems company. The day after Trump’s OJ-like confession, Fox News host Brian Kilmeade said: “He’s gone out of his way not to look back,” and “there’s a sereneness about him.” Fox’s Laura Ingraham urged Ron DeSantis “to step