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I know very little about baseball. The last time I went to a Dodgers game, Sandy Koufax was on the mound. But I do know that Pete Rose had an incredible career that came to an unseemly halt in 1989 when he was found to have been wagering on games — a big no-no for professional athletes. Then two years later, he received a lifetime suspension from being considered for the Hall of Fame. (To be honest, I had to go look up the exact years but I knew the rest of what I just typed.)

I also know that he spent his remaining years apologizing and begging and doing everything he could to get into the Hall of Fame and he was repeatedly turned down. In case you're wondering, Rod Carew — whose record was such that he shared the above baseball card with Rose — was inducted in 1991.

And I know one little thing that Mr. Rose did in his later years beyond petitioning to get into the Hall of Fame.  In Las Vegas, there is or was a sports memorabilia shop located along a walkway of stores between the Luxor hotel and the Mandalay Bay hotel.  One year, a decade or three ago, I spent a lot of time in Vegas and often had to walk down that row of shops and Pete Rose always seemed to be there signing autographs for what I suspect was a substantial fee.

One day, I had some time to kill so I browsed that shop finding absolutely nothing I would ever buy but I was fascinated to eavesdrop for a while on conversations Mr. Rose was having with a rather steady line of people who came by to meet him and buy something on which he would write his name. He was very nice to those folks and why wouldn't he be? They were telling him what a great ball player he'd been and how unfair it was that he was not in the Hall of Fame. Oh — and they were paying him an awful lot of money. Godzilla would be all buddy-buddy with you if you were forking over that kind of dough for his autograph.

I'm sure there are folks in and around baseball who think he did something against the rules and needed to pay the price for that. Okay, fine. But I couldn't listen to those chats for more than a few minutes without thinking, as Mssrs. Gilbert and Sullivan put it, that the punishment did not fit the crime.

Pete Rose was found dead at his home in Clark County, Nevada last Monday. He served out his "lifetime sentence" and now that that lifetime is over, it's time to give him whatever honor he deserved. We've had the public example of paying the price for doing wrong. It might be nice to now see a public example of the power of forgiveness.

Jonathan Chait explains why Donald Trump's latest economic proposals are just another part of the G.O.P. crusade to make sure that the richest people pay less tax and the poor and middle class pay more. 'Twas ever thus.

Steve Benen says that Trump wants business leaders who fail to support him to be fired. How does Benen know this? Because Trump wrote on Truth Social, "Business Executives and Shareholder Representatives should be 100% behind Donald Trump! Anybody that's not should be FIRED for incompetence!"

And Eileen Sullivan brings us the latest on Rudy Giuliani's crusade to see how much legal and financial trouble a man can be in at one time. Go, Rudy!

Philip Lacovara was once the deputy solicitor general of this country and president of the D.C. Bar and he has all sorts of other impressive credentials. He wrote this open letter to U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito about why it would be right and proper for Justice Alito to recuse himself from cases involving January 6 and the legitimacy of the last presidential election. Justice Alito probably won't read it and probably wouldn't do as suggested even if he did.

Kevin Drum explains that crime in this country is down. Those who wish to oust Joe Biden will never, of course, admit that.

Here is a link to Politico's rundown on all of the criminal cases against Donald J. Trump and where they currently stand. That man is still in — and will always be in — a heap o' trouble.

If I had to bet money — and I don't — I'd bet that Donald Trump will be found guilty in the Hush Money trial. And the main thing that makes me think that is that he obviously thinks that. He's ramping up his hysterical excuses about why the trial is rigged, unfair, a Witch Hunt, etc. He hasn't started attacking the jury yet because they haven't voted yet.

As I've suggested here, I'm skeptical of "analysis" of the current trial from folks who have never (a) set foot in that courtroom a lot and/or (b) passed the bar. So be skeptical of this post since I qualify in neither category.

So right now, we're kind of in the middle of the cross-examination of Michael Cohen and the Defense has probably convinced at least some members of the jury — or will soon convince them — that Michael Cohen is a man for whom "The Truth" is whatever statement Michael Cohen thinks will benefit Michael Cohen at the moment. Someone in that jury box might well be thinking, "Okay, that guy lied a lot and often because that was a job requirement of working for Trump, and maybe now he's learned his lesson and is coming clean." But I don't think anyone — juror or not — thinks Mr. Cohen is a pillar of honesty.

That may or may not matter. Most of what he has to say of substance has already been substantiated by others whose credibility is not so fragile. Then again, there was that jury in the first O.J. Simpson trial.

Much of what makes me think Trump will be found guilty is in the writings and interviews of George Conway, who is usually identified as a "conservative lawyer" to remind you that he is not reflexively on Trump's side and used to be a big Trump supporter married to the biggest Trump supporter. He's been putting out a newsletter that could be subtitled "Why Trump Is Heading For The Slammer" and you can read the latest installment of it here and sign up to have future ones sent to your e-mailbox.

And in the interest of hearing another view, here's a link to a column by attorney Stacy Schneider who once thought Trump would be found guilty but has now changed her mind. We link, you decide.

Following this case, it helps to remember that we're mostly getting our accounts from (a) reporters who were in the courtroom and (b) newsfolks in studios who are basing their views of what's going on in the courtroom by listening to reporters who were in the courtroom. And ultimately what matters will not be what either group thinks. What matters is what the ladies and gentlemen of the jury think.

All the accounts of the folks in the first two groups say it went well today for the prosecution, not so good for the defense. But this is direct testimony that has been more-or-less rehearsed. It's supposed to go well. The question is how things will go when they get around to cross-examination…but even then, we'll only get the perceptions of the folks in those two groups that don't count.

I have to keep reminding myself of these things. In the process, I may keep reminding you of these things.

In following the trial — something I often wish I could resist doing — it helps to remember that the trial is not being directly televised. What we hear is coming from observers who were in the room and who may or may not be interpreting it the way you or I would. And a lot of it is coming from folks on a newsroom set who are repeating and perhaps paraphrasing what folks at the courthouse are telling them. And there's a whole mess of mind-reading going on.

So as I'm watching, I'm thinking that…and also how uncomfortable Jake Tapper looks as he keeps having to quote the term "orange turd" that was spoken in the courtroom.

This morning, Stormy Daniels was being cross-examined and if the reports are correct, Trump's lawyers were trying to push the fact that Ms. Daniels has made a lot of money off her alleged encounter with Trump. I guess that's supposed to suggest she has a solid motive to lie but I would think that if she was lying for money, she would make a lot more by making the encounter sound a lot less consensual than she seems to be doing. She does seem to have made the point that Donald Trump is out to make money every possible way he can.

If I understand correctly, the Defense position is that the sexual encounter absolutely did not happen and also that it was absolutely consensual. Meanwhile, CNN seems obsessed with telling us when Trump is whispering to his lawyers. I have no idea why that information is supposed to be of interest to us.

They're on now to less — shall we say "colorful?" — witnesses. I'm going to try to not follow this case, at least until they put Michael Cohen on the stand. That's the exchange I wish they would televise.

It was easy today to not pay a whole lot of attention to the Trump Trial as Stormy Daniels testified. Every time I turned on the news to hear the newscasters repeat what was being said in that courtroom, I said to myself, "The jury has to listen to that but I don't" and turned it off.

The witness on the stand just before her was an executive from the publishing firm that issued Donald Trump's books. He had to testify that they were indeed books written by (or at least approved by) Donald Trump because Trump and his legal team refused to stipulate that this was so.

Yes, it's hard to look away. Donald seems to be simultaneously complaining that the trial is going too fast and that it's taking forever. To the extent the latter is the case, a lot of that is because his side is refusing to concede anything, no matter how trivial. If the prosecution wants to show a video of Trump saying something in a speech, the Trump side won't agree to stipulate that the clip is legitimate and that Trump said what he said on the tape.

The prosecution has to bring in a witness to swear under oath that the clip is real. Some of the lawyers analyzing the trial for the media are saying it would shave a week or two off this trial if Trump's team would just concede little undeniable things like that.

Some of those analyst-type attorneys are saying that the prosecution doesn't need to call Karen McDougal and Stormy Daniels to testify because everything they could add to the record has been or will be said by other witnesses. But other pundit-lawyers are saying the prosecution should call them because Trump wants his lawyers to savage them on the stand and that will just make the jury think a lot less of Donald.

Or they say it will drive home the point that Trump, in accord with his "never concede anything, just attack, attack, attack" policy is a liar. Does anyone still believe he never knew either, let alone both of those ladies?

"Never concede anything, just attack, attack, attack" probably worked well for Trump in other battles in other venues but it doesn't seem to work when he's a defendant in a court of law. In some kinds of disputes, it enabled him to control the dynamics of the battle and to make others play on his turf according to his rules. That doesn't work so well in a courtroom with rules and a judge.

The New York Times says Trump is furious that his lawyers — Todd Blanche, especially — aren't aggressive enough. Sounds like he wants less legal procedure and more name-calling. The prosecution showed some old clips of Trump calling Michael Cohen a great, trustworthy lawyer. You get the feeling that as Counselor Blanche watched those clips, he was thinking, "Hey, that's what my client was saying about me a few weeks ago"?

I'm not spending a whole lot of my life watching or thinking about Donald Trump but when I do, it's with more curiosity these days than anything else. He's starting to remind me the fleeing car in one of those police chases where you see the auto disintegrating — tires shredding, bumpers falling off — and you're just watching to see how long it's going to be before he crashes or gives up. His speeches are getting more incoherent, filled as some of them are with mystery words and demands that everyone feel sorry for the poor, abused zillionaire who's being treated worse than any of the great martyrs of history.

What I really don't get are the tweets…or I guess they're now called "truths" in the same reverse nomenclature that gave us a bald Stooge named Curly. You would think that even the stupidest person in the world — and I never thought Trump was that — would have some menial who would proofread them before sending. Or some built-in time delay where he writes them and has to wait two hours to post them so he or someone can ask, "Is it a good idea to send this?"

Someone with all the legal problems he has would (you'd think) have some lawyer check out his tweets/truths before transmission so they could advise him when applicable, "Hey, this one could conceivably be used against you in a court of law." Because some of them will be. And some of them, like when he gets a name wrong or confuses Jimmy Kimmel with Al Pacino just make him look sloppy and reckless. Is the man really so outta control that he doesn't care about such things? I've never thought he was honest but I thought he was smarter than this.

I'm fascinated by how the phrase "fake electors" is even being used by those who are claiming no laws were broken. This is from the Fox News website…

Fake electors met in Wisconsin and six other battleground states where Trump was defeated in 2020, attempting to cast ballots for the former president even though he lost. Republicans who participated in Wisconsin said they were trying to preserve Trump's legal standing in case courts overturned his defeat.

How could someone be a "fake elector" without breaking some law? You could be an "alternate elector," I suppose though in this case, there doesn't seem to have been any formal, official way of becoming one. Each of the seven states designated a slate of real electors. A "fake elector" is by definition "fake."

I probably won't watch the G.O.P. Debate tonight and I certainly won't watch Tucker Carlson's exclusive interview with You-Know-Who. It will be hard though to avoid endless replays of the juicier moments from either.

I'm assuming Chris Christie will not miss an opportunity to challenge the other candidates for the Republican nomination to be clear on where they stand with Trump. Will they support him through all indictments and convictions? If so, why are the running against him? I would expect a lot of statements from Christie that start with the phrase, "I'm the only person on this stage who…"

You know, Chris Christie would be a great candidate if only he weren't Chris Christie.

The last few days, it seemed like Trump was trying to get some judge to throw him in jail so he'd have an excuse for not showing up for the Republican debate. In truth, he seems to have agreed to do some sort of show with Tucker Carlson opposite the debate. Me, I think he'd be better off in jail but it's a close call.

William Saletan summarizes some of the revelations of the Georgia Indictment. My, there sure was a lot of lying going on.

Donald Trump and his attorneys have lost a staggering number of challenges and motions and attempts to change the dynamics and/or timing of all the trials they're facing. Still, I have friends who are going to panic if/when Trump and his motley crew of office temp lawyers win one battle even if it's like one out of a hundred.

I may not watch the debate. I have a feeling it's going to look like one of those old Dean Martin Roasts if all the jokes were written by Alex Jones. It's too bad Greg Garrison — who produced and directed Dean's show — is gone. We could have him direct the debate and put in lots of obvious edits and every so often, cut to the stock footage of LaWanda Page and Charlie Callas laughing uncontrollably. I have the feeling Ron DeSantis is studying the DVDs of those roasts and is copying down all the Orson Welles insults to use on Chris Christie.

And someone will do a line like, "Ron DeSantis beating Joe Biden? Are you kidding? Ron had his ass handed to him by Mickey Mouse!"

Devin "Legal Eagle" Stone is probably working hard now on a video that will explain the Georgia Indictments in the way that he explains things. If you can't wait, here's an article that seems to do a pretty good job of it.

Some folks who've written me seem to think I was trying to say that Rudy Giuliani was a good man who went bad. No. I was trying to say that Rudy Giuliani was a man with a good reputation, warranted or not, who pissed it all away in the service of a bad man who went badder. Here's a piece about how Trump is refusing to pay all of Giuliani's crippling legal bills. Hope you think it was worth it, Rudy.

As this article notes, lots of different political observers are offering theories as to the identity of the unnamed sixth conspirator in the Georgia case. The indictment describes this person as "a political consultant who helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding" and that description could fit a lot of people. It could, as the article notes, be Ginni Thomas…and wouldn't that have interesting ramifications? I, of course, have no clues; just wondering why none of the guessers are mentioning the name of Roger Stone — no relation (that I know of) to Devin.

If you're concerned about polling that says Biden and Trump are neck-and-neck in the presidential race, remember how worthless polls are this far ahead of Election Day. And if you insist on following polls, follow this one: As Ben Mathis-Lilley notes of a recent AP poll…

Overall, about both Georgia's vote count and "what happened at the U.S. Capitol," 64 percent of American adults said Trump's conduct was either illegal or unethical. And only 21 percent said he did nothing wrong in relation to Jan. 6, while 15 percent said he did nothing wrong in Georgia. If you boil things down to "what he did was bad" or "what he did was OK," Trump is a loser by margins of 64–21 and 64–15.

Those would be pretty lopsided scores in the United States' beloved sport of American football! And the numbers aren't even that great for Trump among Republicans. A combined 42 percent of Republicans told the AP that Trump's conduct in Georgia was illegal or unethical, while only 31 percent said he'd done nothing wrong. Regarding Jan. 6, 38 percent of Republicans said Trump behaved illegally or unethically, with 46 percent coming down on the side of "nothing wrong."

Trump may well get the G.O.P. nomination just because a whopping majority of Republicans are fierce about seeing someone of their party win and they don't see any other Republican who would have a chance. All they've got is this one guy who couldn't beat Joe Biden the last time around…and that was before that one guy was out on bail in four different matters and facing possible (maybe probable) prison time. Do we really think that one guy can win the presidency back if that much of his own party thinks he's unethical and/or a criminal?

I continue to be stunned by how Rudolph William Louis Giuliani went from being "America's Mayor" and a widely-respected figure to a laughingstock lawyer who's being disbarred one state at a time, an indicted co-conspirator in a major crime, an unindicted (so far) co-conspirator in another major crime, a guy who's likely to lose a huge defamation suit and the target of a huge sexual harassment lawsuit…and I think there are a few more charges and lawsuits beyond all this — or there will be. I feel like I've used this line here before but nobody likes this man. Democrats dislike him because he tried to steal the election for Trump. And Republicans don't like him because he did such a bad job of it.

One of my favorite online writers, Fred Kaplan, writes about the irony of Rudy, the King of RICO prosecutions, becoming the target of a RICO prosecution. Meanwhile, Andrew Kirtzman and David Holley write about how far Giuliani has fallen and Bess Levin writes about Giuliani's financial woes. It may not sound like it but I really find this very sad.