In the 1997 Neil Labute film "In the Company of Men" there is an early scene that takes place in a men's room. The film's villian, Aaron Eckhart leans on a sink while his co-worker and best friend occupies a stall. When the friend lowers his pants, about a dozen coins fall out of his pockets and spread out over the floor. Eckhart teases him for a moment, then tells him not to worry about the coins. He stoops down to the floor and begins to pick up the scattered change. When he's done he looks at the accumulated coins and picks out three or four coins, worth no more than 45 cents. He puts them in his pocket and leaves the rest in his hand, presumably to return to his friend.
It's a small gesture, but very revealing. He's the kind of man who would steal a couple of dimes from his best friend. Over the course of the film, Eckhart becomes the clear villian and turns the friend into an unwitting henchman in a series of depraved acts against an innocent hearing-impaired woman. The theft of those coinss is easy to miss on first viewing but it establishes so much about where these characters are headed.
Eight days ago tape surfaced of the Republican nominee for president bragging about being able to get away with extremely lewd behavior towards women because he is a celebrity. Since then at least nine women have come forward to describe outrageous, lascivious agression by Mr. Trump. As a result, the campaign has descended into an argument about the meaning and boundaries of sexual assault versus behavior that is merely crude and boorish. I find some of these women very credible and I believe he has committed multiple sexual assaults. The accounts are horrific but they can't be independently verified.
Trump has responded, predictably, by assailing the veracity of the women's accounts and questioned both their character and (God help us) their physical attractiveness. Just two weeks ago we learned that Mr. Trump once claimed losses of nearly a billion dollars on one year's tax returns and less than a week since he admitted that he used those losses to not pay taxes for many years afterwards. This behavior was apparently legal under the convuluted tax code provisions in place at the time. In an oridinary election season, this would have been the defining moment of the campaign. But we have sunk only lower since then and there's little hope of a rebound.
But I write today to discuss a much smaller transgression. It is not a crime as serious as sexual assault or financial chicanery on the scale of Mr. Trump's tax dodge. You can't even buy a pizza for the amount of money involved. I write about this not becase I think it will change anyone's vote on October 15th. If you still intend to vote for the Republican nominee, it will take something unfathomable to change your mind. But petty crimes are sometimes the most revealing.
One of the few bright spots of the 2016 media coverage has been the yeoman work of David Fahrenthold. Writing for the Washington Post, he has doggedly tracked down every charitable contribution that Trump has claimed ot make and every single line item on the tax returns of the Trump Foundation. This week Mr. Faharenthold found an entry from 1989 for a donation to the Boy Scouts of America. The donation was in the amount of seven dollars. It was annotated with the word "Membership". Fahrenthold Tweeted this out to his followers and they pointed out that this number could have been for the membership fee for Donald Trump Jr. The younger Mr. Trump was 11 years old at the time of the donation. The Boy Scouts of America did indeed confirm that the annual membership for their organization was seven dollars in 1989.
That's who Donald Trump is. Rather than write a seven dollar check for his son's Boy Scout troop he wrote the check from his charitable foundation. This is a very minor violation of the tax code. But think of the families who have to scrape together the funds for their children to participate in extra cirricular activities. It is so revelaing of his character. Mr. Trump is a nasty, petty individual who will cut every corner to gain an advantage, however small.
It is a common trait among unsavory types. The boxing promoter Don King has been sued numerous times for having defrauded boxers out of various sums of money. Hector "Macho" Commacho was once called to testify at one of these trials and he testified to a variety of penny-ante ways that King swindled him out of money over a period of years. Asked at one point why he thought Mr. King would behave that way, Commacho said "Because Don King would rather steal a nickel than earn a dollar."
That case was settled out of court and Don King kept untold millions, some earned, some stolen a nickel or two at time. Don King is a prominent supporter of Donald Trump's campaign for president. They have been friends for a long time, going back to various boxing events held at Donald Trump's casinos in Atlantic City. They did a lot of business together and somehow never ended up in court against one another. I guess they got along in bussiness
In 1966 Don King was convicted of non-neligent homicde. He did nearly four years in prison. His victim, Sam Garrett worked for King at an illegal gambling den. King stomped him to death because he owed him $600.
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