TWGB: All His Trials

 

Despite the miserable reviews that Trump's own lawyers in the impeachment trial have received, even from Trump himself, I found myself tinged with wonder the six whole Republican senators agreed with the Constitution and precedent and found the proceedings to be constitutional. As many as that! Six! Because while the acquittal of Trump is perceived as likely given the Republicans' great moral failings, how much more preferable it might have been for them to dispense with a trial at all, and go on ignoring how much blame there is to go around.

Mitch McConnell certainly knew he didn't want a piece of this when he blocked Chuck Schumer's request for an emergency session while Trump was still in office. He still didn't when he voted that it was too late to go trying Trump now, even though this is only taking place now because he ensured it didn't happen while Trump was still in office. Republicans might like us to forget that part, too. 

But truth, justice, and the whole damn American way aren't served by forgetting these things. 

There will be focus on Trump's speech right before the attempted insurrection--but there's more to what happened than that. Trump and his team put the focus on the date, but Trump was undermining the results with his fabrications not just since the voting had ended, consistently using language that used words like "rigged" and "stolen", but had begun undermining the validity of the vote, especially the mail-in vote, well beforehand. (His bitching and moaning about a "rigged" system has been a constant, at least since Ted Cruz "stole" the Iowa caucuses from him in 2016.) Trump laid a foundation. brick by brick, for his supporters to think "they" (the evil Democrats) were out to get Trump, and by extension, them,

Take the last impeachment as an example--Trump's surrogates tried to assert that impeaching Trump was the same as impeaching his supporters. Even now, they are trying to claim such absurdities as Trump is being impeached not for what he did, but for who he is, or that somehow, by winning the election, the Democratic ticket has disenfranchised the 74 million Trump voters. (The latter strikes me as really rich considering my vote could have literally been thrown out as a Pennsylvanian if they had their way.)

What's more, Trump et als, even though they frame their argument (such as the 60 plus cases that were lost/laughed at of court) in terms of "election integrity" now, the rhetoric was often more apocalyptic: "Fight or you won't even have a country." "Save America." They were using a "Flight 93 election" narrative. Even if Trump didn't have the votes (and he looked, and he asked others to look!), what he wanted, and wanted his followers to want, was that the election be overturned for him. By force if necessary. 

And here's how you know: Trump had been hinting about use of force for a long time. He mused about "second amendment people" during the 2016 race. During 2019, he talked about the military, police, and Bikers for Trump as if he had his own militia. He has regularly used "civil war" language about out current-day divisions. He infamously told the Proud Boys to "stand by" in his first debate with Biden. And near to the events of the day in question, his recently-pardoned longtime associate, Roger Stone (accepted by the Proud Boys as one of their own), was seen palling around with Oath Keepers. 

And there's more where that came from. The House impeachment managers assure us that they will be presenting evidence that we have not seen before. And I believe they certainly will, because there is more to that story. 

(For what it's worth, there's more to the Russia investigation and what Giuliani and pals were up to in Ukraine that could all be aired in a bit.) 

Trump might still get acquitted in the Senate. But the public trial is, FWIW, where I think Trump's star implodes. And if there's justice, it drags several other truly deserving people down into it as it goes.