Photos entered into evidence at the federal bribery trial of Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) are pretty eye-opening, depicting gold bars, jewels, and almost half a million dollars in cash - some of which was stuffed into a boot. Yes, really.

New photos shown at Sen. Bob Menendez’s federal bribery trial reveal over $600,000 in cash and gold bars stashed around his cluttered New Jersey home — including a stack of bills stuffed inside a Timberland boot.

Jurors at the Menendez trial, which began last week in Manhattan federal court, were shown dozens of photos taken inside the Garden State Democrat’s Englewood Cliffs house during a June 2022 raid by the FBI.

The pictures, presented in court Thursday, show gold bars small and large, some appearing to be older with nicks and scratches on the surface while others are wrapped in clear plastic packaging.

Thick stacks of cash inside various bags — and even a pile of money stowed inside a well-worn brown Timberland work boot, according to a report by NJ.com — can also be seen in the images.

Here's the important point: we are people who value and want to adhere to the Constitution, and Bob Menendez is as entitled to due process and the presumption of innocence as any other American citizen. But he's getting his due process right now in this trial, which is how we can view these photos.

And there is just an awful lot of smoke for there not to be some fire here someplace.

Previously on RedState: Bob Menendez Poised to Throw Wife Under the Bus With 'She Did It!' Defense in Bribery Trial 

Bob Menendez’s Defense Strategy Involves Arguing Alleged Bribes Were Actually Just Friendly 'Gifts'

This isn't Senator Menendez's first ride in the criminal justice spin cycle. In 2015, he was charged with bribery, fraud, and making false statements; after the jury deadlocked in the trial in that case, the judge dismissed charges remaining against Menendez.

The amount of currency and shiny things involved in this case, though, sure makes it look as though Bob Menendez and his wife Nadine took things to the next level.

Special Agent Aristotelis Kougemitros testified Thursday about leading the raid on the home the veteran Democrat shares with his wife, Nadine Menendez — who is also charged in the case but won’t be going on trial until later this year.

Agents found 13 gold bars worth $150,000 and over $480,000 in cash in closets, inside the senator’s jackets and in designer bags, Kougemitros said.

Kougemitros testified that there was so much money in the home, agents struggled to tally the $486,461 worth of bills by hand and he had to call for two cash-counting machines to be sent over from the FBI’s Manhattan office, according to NJ.com.

Somewhere, the ghost of Huey Long is chuckling quietly to itself.

It's hard to think of a better argument for dramatically reducing the scope and scale of the federal government. If there were little or no influence to peddle, these people wouldn't be peddling it, whether it be quiet deals for a senator's New Jersey pals to gain lucrative contracts with Egypt - or, let's say, just as a hypothetical, for a sitting vice president to get his ne'er-do-well son a plush position on the board of a Ukrainian oil company.

If the fire under Bob Menendez's cloud of smoke is as hot as it would seem, he would appear to have exceeded the boundaries of what even New Jersey pols can get away with. Some of Menendez's fellow Democrats, including New Jersey's other senator, Cory Booker, have called on Menendez to resign. Whatever the outcome of this trial, it sure looks like Bob Menendez's political career is over. 

But it's a crying shame that things had to get this egregiously and excessively bad for that to be the case.