Love him or loathe him, most Donald Trump watchers recognize that the former president is incapable of refraining from responding to what he perceives as personal attacks, regardless of how big or small the perceived slight. Such was the case on Saturday after former Speaker Nancy Pelosi took a shot a Trump.

As we reported on Friday, Pelosi described Trump as looking like a “scared puppy” after he emerged from his car before entering the federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., on Thursday for arraignment on his second indictment by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

To see the president of the United States be arraigned, it was interesting to hear Mr. Dunn talk about how it felt for him in the courtroom. I wasn’t in the courtroom, of course but when I saw his coming out of his car and this or that, I saw a scared puppy. He looked very, very, very concerned about his fate. I didn’t see any bravado or confidence or anything like that. He knows. He knows the truth, that he lost the election, and now he has to face the music

Bravado or not, when one is surrounded by law enforcement officers and about the be escorted into a courthouse to face a federal indictment that includes serious charges, that has to be a sobering moment. Besides, Trump has always done his “best” work on social media.

Anyway, given that Pelosi delivered her shot across Trump’s bow on Thursday, he must not have been aware of it until Saturday, because no one calls Trump a “scared puppy” and gets away with it without a reciprocating beatdown. Ladies and gentlemen, the former president of the United States:

I purposely didn’t comment on Nancy Pelosi’s very weird story concerning her husband, but now I can because she said something about me, with glee, that was really quite vicious. “I saw a scared puppy,” she said, as she watched me on television, like millions of others, that didn’t see that. I wasn’t “scared.” Nevertheless, how mean a thing to say! She is a Wicked Witch whose husbands [sic] journey from hell starts and finishes with her. She is a sick & demented psycho who will someday live in HELL!

No word if Pelosi responded with: “Oh, yeah, well Melania wears combat boots!”

https://t.co/Mx9NQT2stt pic.twitter.com/Db8Gp5eXfg

— MikesRight (@RealLibSmacker) August 6, 2023

Anyway, that’s enough of the ad hominem attacks — yes, including Pelosi’s — for now.

In a rare instance of unintentional agreement, both Democrat lawmakers and Team Trump itself have now called for the presumably upcoming 2020 Election trial to be televised. As we reported on Sunday, such an extravaganza would dwarf all reality television shows combined.

Trump lawyer John Lauro told “Fox News Sunday” that he would “love” to see the court proceedings televised. Host Shannon Bream asked Lauro:

Would you be OK – would the president support a televised trial? It would have to go through all sorts of hoops and rule changes and those kinds of things, but, let the American people see every minute of it and decide for themselves?

Lauro was all over it:

I personally would love to see that. I’m convinced the Biden administration does not want the American people to see the truth. They acted on it by filing this protective order, which is an effort to keep important information about this case from the press.

I’m shocked, actually, that all the networks haven’t lined up and filed pleadings already objecting to this very broad attempt by the Biden administration to keep information away from the American people.

Well, shocked or not, more than three dozen House Democrats on Thursday called on the policymaking body for federal courts to permit live broadcasting of court proceedings in the Justice Department’s cases charging Trump with federal crimes.

In a letter led by serial-liar California Rep. Adam Schiff, who served on the House select committee that investigated the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Democrats asked that the Judicial Conference “explicitly authorize the broadcasting of court proceedings in the cases of United States of America v. Donald J. Trump.”

It is imperative the Conference ensures timely access to accurate and reliable information surrounding these cases and all of their proceedings, given the extraordinary national importance to our democratic institutions and the need for transparency.

Given the historic nature of the charges brought forth in these cases, it is hard to imagine a more powerful circumstance for televised proceedings. If the public is to fully accept the outcome, it will be vitally important for it to witness, as directly as possible, how the trials are conducted, the strength of the evidence adduced and the credibility of witnesses.

Are you thinking what I’m thinking?

There isn’t enough popcorn on the planet to satisfy the multitude of people who’d be clamoring to watch that stuff — many of whom would no doubt be glued to their TV sets like lonely housewives watching the Hallmark Channel ad nauseam. Hey, — that was a joke! Barely, but a joke, just the same. [sarc]

The Bottom Line

Our country is in uncharted waters, as a former president of the United States faces federal criminal charges — whether politically motivated, valid, or somewhere in between — while a sitting president faces allegations that make Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal look like child’s play.

Despite all of the bloviating, prognostication, and ultracrepidarianism on all sides of the above realities, one question stands above all others — in my book, at least: Can America and its political system ever return to even a semblance of what, not at that long ago, seemed “normal”?

Unfortunately, I have serious doubts.