No one is stopping by in front of the house carrying a search warrant. The only vehicles to stop by today have been the newspaper delivery service, depositing three papers on the front lawn: a pink wrapper for The New York Post, a white wrapper for The Wall Street Journal, and a blue wrapper for The New York Times.
Additionally, since it's Tuesday and it's summer, the lawn people were here. And at some point before I awoke, the town garbage truck was here to take things away left at the curb. It's not recycling day, or yard waste day, just household trash. They thankfully come twice a week for that.
In other words. The F.B.I. did not stop by and raid the place looking for something incriminating. No one is after me, and when I read of all the people who someone is after, I take pride that I'm anonymous to those who might be trying to throw those in the slammer. Not that I've done anything to warrant that kind of attention, but that's the point. No one is after me. Like Frank Costello, I pay my taxes.
The headline across the front page of today's print edition of The New York Times is not as large as the Monday evening online edition. It's above the fold, two-column spread in the upper right hand corner that tells us: TRUMP SAYS F.B.I. SEARCHED HOME IN SOUTH FLORIDA. The sub-heading goes: Focus Said to Be on White House Files—Sign that inquiries Are Widening.
Yeah, you think so?
The story jumps to page A13. There are no photos. Thus, we do not see a phalanx of F.B.I. agents in blue slickers with yellow F.B.I. lettering on the back pouring out of Suburban vehicles charging the place.
The Wall Street Journal carries the story on the front page, above the fold, centered between the left and right columns. They do have a photo, that carries the caption "Secret Service agents stand at the gate of Mar-a-Lago after FBI agents searched the home of former President Donald Trump." One agent is talking into his fist; the other agent is poised with an assault rifle as they flank a parked Suburban.
The headline beneath the large photo stretches four columns and goes: FBI Searches Trump's Home In Probe of Classified Records. No sub-heading
[Note: The WSJ and The NYT style guides obviously differ. The WSJ does not insert commas after the initials in F.B.I. No big deal.]
Neither story carries any reporting on how many agents might have been searching the home. both papers report a quote from Mr. Trump, "They even broke into my safe." It's good to know they came prepared.
The WSJ reports that a Trump lawyer, Christina Robb was present during the raid, which started Monday morning and continued into the evening for nine hours. It is a big place.
The New York Post carried the front page headline: FEDS RAID MAR-A-LAGO. The sub-heading goes: Seize Documents, Open Trump's safe. Inserted after the word RAID is a photo of Mr. Trump in a pose that could be used for Mount Rushmore if there were even any thoughts of adding to it. Not likely.
The Trump news is at the bottom half of The New York Post front page, sharing space with a photo of Olivia- Newton-John who just passed away: So Long Sandy. The Sandy reference is of course to her character in the musical 'Grease.'
The New York Post story is by far the more descriptive of the three papers.
"A source who was at Mar-A-Lago at he time of the FBI raid told The Post that it was 'like a scene of a Die Hard Movie' as armored cars came screeching up to the Palm Beach residence Monday morning 'and at least 100' FBI agents charged into Trump's home." Now we get the picture.
This is not a one-day story. Wednesday's New York Post carries a full front page headline/story: Exclusive: Inside the Trump raid. They even searched Melania's closet."
Oh-oh. The hope is that there was not an opportunistic agent who carried off Melania's Manolo Blahnik shoes or underwear for sale on the Dark Web. Or worse. Sniff, sniff We've all watched television.
Did The Donald, Melania, or the kids and grandkids have overdue library books from The Library of Congress? There have been reports over the years of zealous searches for overdue books.
The official statements goes that the search was for classified documents which would not be allowed to leave the White House. Time will tell all. Maybe.
I once attended a fraud conference umpteen years ago and the closing speaker was a retired F.B.I. agent who commented that he picked up the newspaper that morning and there were 17 accounts of people being sought or investigated for fraud that day. Sounded like a lot.
No matter the number, the point is a stroll through the news of any day will yield stories on any number of miscreants.
And so it goes if you try and count the number of people who are being sought for something, whose lives are complicated enough that we're reading about them.
And that's not considering the fictional ones that populate movies, TV and books. A complicated life makes for a good plot. I often marvel at these stories how complicated these lives are, and mine is not.
A former president is perhaps that most extreme example of someone in trouble, but for Mr. Trump, it's just another day at the office, wherever his office is these days. I have little in common with the former president other than we're about the same age, and were born in Queens, a New York City "outer borough" as the NYT loves to tell us. I have a pretty good head of hair as well. However, it's not orange.
I've been retired these days for 11 years now. No one is even looking for me to show up at work. Life is good, which coincidently is the name of the recent winner of The Whitney Stakes at Saratoga this past weekend. It's a good feeling, and he's a pretty good horse.
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