Anti-Trump Instagram pic of seashells now enough to indict ex-FBI directors
Anti-Trump Instagram pic of seashells now enough to indict ex-FBI directors
一张反特朗普的贝壳 Instagram 照片，如今足以起诉前联邦调查局局长
In my misspent youth, I once worked a summer job as a waiter at Shoney’s. It is an experience that I do not recommend. But it did teach me two valuable things: 1) How not to drown in a puddle of my own embarrassment when marching around the dining room with my fellow servers and singing a birthday song that began, “Happy, happy birthday, we’re so glad you came”; and 2) That when the surly line cooks ran out of chicken fried steak, they would shout “86 the chicken fried steak!” through the pass. 在我虚度光阴的青年时代，我曾在 Shoney’s 餐厅做过一份暑期服务员的工作。那段经历我不推荐任何人尝试。但它确实教会了我两件有价值的事：1）当我和同事们在餐厅里走来走去，唱着那首以“生日快乐，我们很高兴你来了”开头的生日歌时，如何不让自己淹没在尴尬的泥潭中；2）当脾气暴躁的厨师用完了炸鸡排时，他们会对着传菜口大喊：“把炸鸡排‘86’掉！”
To “86” something, in restaurant slang, is to say that it is out, finished, gone, through, not on the menu anymore. This is the only sense in which I have heard the term used in my entire life. But according to Wikipedia, which naturally has an entry about the term, two further meanings do exist. “86” can also be applied to people a restaurant refuses to serve, and some slang dictionaries say it can refer to murder. Which brings us to former FBI director James Comey, Instagram, and a picture of seashells. 在餐饮业俚语中，“86”某样东西意味着它卖完了、结束了、没了、不再供应了。这是我一生中听到的该词的唯一含义。但根据维基百科（它自然有关于这个词的条目），它还有另外两种含义。“86”也可以指餐厅拒绝接待的客人，一些俚语词典甚至称它可能指代谋杀。这就引出了前联邦调查局（FBI）局长詹姆斯·科米（James Comey）、Instagram 以及一张贝壳照片的话题。
86 the shells! In 2025, Comey posted to Instagram an image of shells arranged in the shape of two numbers: “86 47.” Trump, our 47th President, has long harbored a grudge against Comey, going back to Comey’s investigation of Trump’s possible Russian ties. Trump famously fired Comey in 2017—then, for good measure, fired his prosecutor daughter in 2025. Trump has been clear for years about his desire to use the power of the federal government to make life more difficult for Comey, and federal officials in his second term have been willing to comply. “86”掉这些贝壳！2025年，科米在 Instagram 上发布了一张照片，照片中的贝壳被排列成两个数字：“86 47”。我们的第47任总统特朗普长期以来一直对科米怀恨在心，这可以追溯到科米对特朗普可能与俄罗斯存在关联的调查。特朗普在2017年解雇了科米，随后在2025年又顺手解雇了他担任检察官的女儿。多年来，特朗普一直明确表示希望利用联邦政府的权力让科米的日子不好过，而他第二任期内的联邦官员们也乐于配合。
Fortunately, they have also been pretty stupid. Through a series of staggeringly incompetent actions, the administration already had its first Comey indictment tossed out in Virginia—a loss so epic that it got Trump’s interim US attorney for Virginia booted, too. Today, on completely new and unrelated charges, the Department of Justice has indicted Comey again, this time in North Carolina. The charge is nothing less than a threat to murder the president. And it’s all based on that single seashell image. 幸运的是，他们也相当愚蠢。通过一系列极其无能的操作，政府在弗吉尼亚州对科米的第一次起诉已经被驳回——这次失败如此惨重，以至于特朗普在弗吉尼亚州的临时联邦检察官也被解职了。今天，司法部以完全不同且毫无关联的罪名再次起诉了科米，这次是在北卡罗来纳州。指控的罪名竟然是威胁谋杀总统。而这一切仅仅基于那张贝壳照片。
The new indictment says that Comey “did knowingly and willfully make a threat to take the life of, and to inflict bodily harm upon, the President of the United States, in that he publicly posted a photograph on the internet social media site Instagram which depicted seashells arranged in a pattern making out ’86 47,’ which a reasonable recipient who is familiar with the circumstances would interpret as a serious expression of an intent to do harm to the President of the United States.” 新的起诉书称，科米“蓄意且故意地发出威胁，意图剥夺美国总统的生命并对其造成人身伤害，因为他在互联网社交媒体网站 Instagram 上公开张贴了一张照片，照片中贝壳排列成的图案显示为‘86 47’，任何熟悉情况的理性接收者都会将其解读为对美国总统造成伤害的严重意图表达。”
You might expect more details in a case this serious and against such a high-ranking former official; there are none. The DOJ held a 15-minute press conference in which three men in suits tried to make this all sound normal and natural. 你可能会期待在如此严重的案件中，针对这样一位高级别前官员，会有更多的细节；但事实并非如此。司法部举行了一场15分钟的新闻发布会，三名身穿西装的男子试图让这一切听起来正常且自然。
Get in the clown car. A case this ridiculous, and about such a weighty matter, may be the bulbous red nose that completes the full-on beclownment of the Department of Justice under Trump. (The DOJ is currently run by one of Trump’s personal lawyers.) Popular legal blog Above the Law, for instance, called today’s move a “new low point for DOJ integrity.” 坐上小丑车吧。这样一个荒谬的案件，涉及如此重大的事项，或许正是那颗红鼻子，标志着特朗普治下的司法部彻底沦为笑柄。（司法部目前由特朗普的一名私人律师掌管。）例如，知名法律博客 Above the Law 将今天的举动称为“司法部诚信的新低点”。
As we have learned just in a single day, the federal government is willing to come after your broadcast licenses if you make a joke that Trump doesn’t like… and your freedom if you make social media posts that Trump doesn’t like. These are apparently the ways in which Trump is fulfilling his promise to halt government “censorship” of US citizens. 正如我们仅仅在一天之内所了解到的，如果你开了特朗普不喜欢的玩笑，联邦政府就愿意吊销你的广播执照……如果你发布了特朗普不喜欢的社交媒体帖子，他们就愿意剥夺你的自由。这显然就是特朗普履行其停止政府对美国公民进行“审查”承诺的方式。
Trump himself is, of course, a famously peace-loving—sorry, “peace prize”-loving—man, most recently seen warning Iran that “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again” in a social媒体 post so unhinged even the pope had to step in and tell him to knock it off. But apparently, it’s James Comey’s restaurant-slang seashell Instagram image that’s the real crime, the sort of thing stopping America from being truly great again. 特朗普本人当然是一位著名的热爱和平——抱歉，是热爱“和平奖”——的人，最近他还在社交媒体上警告伊朗称“整个文明今晚都将消亡，永远无法复原”，其言论之疯狂，连教皇都不得不出面劝他收敛。但显然，詹姆斯·科米那张带有餐厅俚语含义的贝壳 Instagram 照片才是真正的罪行，才是阻碍美国再次真正伟大的原因。