It's Up to Us

 

I spent the last few days putting off writing about the "Pass the Torch" movement. Oh, I was getting ready. I was going to sit down and take names and call out the fuckery. People didn't start one minute from the first question during the debate before I think the "drop Biden" movement started, in a way that felt coordinated and desperately shitty to me. 

Who the fuck treats a decent man who just gave us an astonishingly successful 3.5 years like this? Why are Democrats even airing our laundry in public? I'm a fan of transparency on one hand, but on the other it felt disrespectful to the man and his honorable public service. 

Every dumb horserace "Here's what a contested convention would look like" article, every "who might we see in a blitz primary?" thumbsucker, seemed to be a repudiation of the primaries we just had. 

The last straw wasn't the has-been campaign mahoffs of yesteryear who have displayed the political savvy of brain-damaged lemmings in the rush to shaft the incumbent Democratic president, though, that was going to make me bleed my frustration all over the internet--it was the distilled self-parody of Sorkinism: suggesting Democrats nominate Mitt Romney. 

Big "not The Onion" energy, but why did my eyes water? 

Because much as my feelings about Mitt Romney have moderated from 2012--he still isn't a Democrat, and it felt defeatist. One major party is captured by racist, violent authoritarianism, and the other is consigned to irrelevance and mere "Never Trumpism"?  Fuck that. 

John Eastman and the Republican Fantasy

 

I wanted to expand a little bit on the admission of John Eastman that he did want an insurrection, actually.  His belief that the 2020 election was stolen is uninteresting to me, because I think it means nothing more than Eastman feels that there are some people whose right to vote he can't respect because they are doing it wrong. Once you let the franchise get beyond the possession of white, landed males, surely mistakes will be made. He voices desperation that the country will survive a Democrat in office. 

Well, why not? That's the Flight 93 election theory, isn't it? And John Eastman is a Claremont man. 

It's the idea that the Declaration of Independence is what gives the Trump Administration sanction to encourage an insurrection (or to be more precise, an autogolpe) that startles me. Of course, the Declaration is a fine historic document important to the revolutionary history of the United States. And he's citing it's provisions to...

Deny the right of some of the citizenry to representation because he has bad vibes about it? Let Donald Trump play the part of King George III and put down what Eastman and others assumed would be the actual "insurrection" for which the Insurrection Act would need to be called. (Jeffrey Clark is assumed to be co-conspirator 4 in the Trump indictment, who suggested that the Insurrection Act would be needed to put down the rioters in the places whose votes were denied. You know, like Detroit. Atlanta. Philadelphia. Places with certain demographics. Not dissimilar to the demographics of Washington D.C., where Trump really would prefer not to be tried for his attempt to deny some people their vote being counted.)

But that's what Claremont war-gamed. And maybe that's why some conservatives still want to think antifa or the Deep State was responsible for 1/6. The Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, now found guilty of conspiracy and sedition, sure thought the Insurrection Act was about to get called on--not them, but the leftists who didn't have any reason to be there. 

TWGB: Some Indictments for Those Incitements

 

The waiting for Trump's indictment over the attempted overturn of the 2020 presidential election is over, and I encourage everyone (even Ron DeSantis if he still hasn't!) to go ahead and read the indictment. It's not long, and it is pretty thorough in laying out the case that despite no evidence of voter fraud, Trump spread that lie and attempted to overturn the election by means of litigation alleging fraud, encouraging state legislatures and slates of alternate electors to act on the alleged fraud, to halt the lawful proceedings of Congress on 1/6 and to encourage Trump's faithful to wreak havoc on the day. 

Trump lost. There was no proof of voter fraud that would have changed the result of the election. And no, Trump's belief is completely irrelevant, because whether he chose to believe he won or not, he was informed on various occasions that his theories of fraud ("conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership") were bogus, as outlined in pages 6 through 8.

If Trump persisted in his belief, he was delusional, and we should not excuse people on the basis of being delusional--nor should we continue to entertain whether they are fit to lead a country if they are. 

It's also irrelevant whether he understood the law well enough to know exactly what he was violating--ignorance of the law has been determined to be no excuse long before this. 

TWGB: What Rats Won't Do But Durham Might

 

So, a funny thing happened in the news that probably only makes sense to old heads who have been doing TrumpWorld for all this time--apparently, the hero that was going to save Trump from the whole Russia, Russia, Russia thing still hasn't found the no good dirty scoundrels who implicated Trump in a counter-intelligence investigation to the whole-ass nemesis people sometimes quite plausibly think Russia is, but along the way he did find Italian officials who said maybe Trump was up to some financial crimes. Because it was a day ending in "y" or something. I dunno. 

Now the TWGB stylesheet having one entire unpaid employee (me) insists I interject the following observation: if it looks bad, it is bad. The baddies who said Trump's campaign was probably likely breached by Russian operatives were George Papadopoulos to Alexander Downer. Don Trump Jr. himself via email telling all and sundry folks boasting they were from the Russian government and were here to help.  Paul Manafort changing the Republican platform re: Ukraine. (Look , that article throws a whole cast of characters around and to ease your minds, hush, you know who worked for Yanukovich and has Maidan blood on his ever-loving ostrich boots, it's Manafort. Shh. Don't get it too twisted.) 

Now, I think it's just great Barr was working with Durham, bustling about Europe, raising questions about why Trump was being treated like Russia targeting him was somehow between anyone else but Russia and the Trump campaign, exactly when the 2019 impeachment thing was happening and we were discussing how Trump was fulfilling Putin's best wishes for Ukraine by denying them military hardware in exchange for Trump being given a better shot at being re-elected. 

It's just great because how stupid is anyone who isn't connecting these dots just yet--Durham will never find the damn dirty folks who implicated Trump in the Russia matter because a lot of what implicates him is him. So what else can we have? Side quests. 

They just don't go anywhere great either.  Frankly, I'd love to know what the Italian government shared about Trump. And why Barr and Durham never followed up on it. Did they bury it, the way Barr tried to bury the Mueller report? So, a special counsel is supposed to be independent, but it looks to me like Durham and Barr were cheek and jowl for a while and they covered up Trump's dirt like cats kicking about in a litter box. 

Now, in whole other news, John Eastman is up for disbarment in California, and has some supporters who are sketch as hell.  Trumpworld is like purgatory for lawyers and where folks are tested and figured out in the balance. I say supporters of Eastman are not honest--their hearts are heavier than the feather of Maat and they must do penance before they see the after-Trump life. But that is just like, my opinion. 

UPDATE: Think about the sanctions/disbarment/suspensions/need for their own lawyers that so often confronts legal professionals who work for Trump. It really seems so not worth it eventually. I would love if more people realized working for Trump will get you gout before it gets you clout. 

TWGB: They Aren't Joking

 

There's a funny thing about Marjorie Taylor Greene saying that if she and Steve Bannon were at the head of the 1/6 insurrection, they would have won, and they would have been armed: she says she was joking, now. But she certainly was not.  We know this because we know her record. She was explicit about what she stood for--talking about "the price of blood" pre-election.  We know in December 2020 she was at the White House meeting with other GOP electeds. We know some 1/6 insurrectionists actually were armed.  What she seems to be saying, and pretending to walk back, is that she would want more bloodshed of Capitol police and possibly her own colleagues in congress. 

Ha ha. The conservatives are getting better at humor, and the libs don't like it, indeed. (See latest iteration thereof.)  Actually, we know what "only joking" means to fascists. (Can't you take a joke? Why are you punching yourself? I'm not the problem, you have no sense of humor. etc.)

When the NY Young Republicans, who I used to think were just twenty-somethings who looked like forty somethings and had the values of the 1950s and wanted to undo the civil rights movement, has VDARE's Brimelow and Posobiec, I start to think we've got people in their thirties and forties who look like they are traitors and have the values of would-be herrenvolk and want to undo Reconstruction. 

So, color me pretty alarmed by that. Also alarmed by Justice Kavanaugh hanging out with the Schlapps, you know, the CPAC wanna-be domestic terrorist Orban enthusiasts. Just a Supreme Court justice hanging out in the most partisan and kinda-fash-leaning crowd, and we're supposed to shrug about that? (And shouldn't RW SCOTUS justices be more on guard about their propriety since we know they are cozy as hell with activists? I mean, Clarance Thomas' wife is a whole activist, which is as cozy as things get.)  

It isn't a joke. 

TWGB: World of Discovery

 

Now, I have a guaranteed break-even strategy regarding gambling that has never failed at me not losing money--I don't bet. That's one way to never lose. The TrumpWorld folks aren't me, a working-class kid with a tenuous middle-class existence in adulthood. They are whales, machers.  They live whole lives of fucking around without the guarantee of finding out. They gamble. They risk a whole country. That's why I write about TrunpWorld, in part--the fascination for how they think. 

So, you all know about Alex Jones' phones and the specter of some "intimate conversation" with Roger Stone? (Yes, I had to do a third-eye wash to not see the word "intimate" and "Roger Stone" together and be like "Ewwwwwww." It's probably way more like Stone's entirely not weird caught on documentary video conversation with Matt Gaetz about pardons than the way my brain tried to interpret "intimate".)  Yeah, I think there's more there though. There's supposedly two years worth of communications, and it's not like Jones is in the Secret Service and has the incriminating bits extremely intentionally wiped, right? 

The worst thing about a conspiracy is that the people in on it have to communicate to keep their cover-up alive. Is that why Trump isn't supposed to talk to Mark Meadows anymore? This is a reasonably fraught thing--it might very well legally benefit Mark Meadows to shrive himself before the DOJ or the 1/6 committee, but there is hardly anything in this world Trump loves like he loves loyalty tests and witness tampering. 

It's clear that Trump's current legal team understand the circle is tightening. Former White House Counsel Pat Cipollone has been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury regarding his knowledge of events re: 1/6, and claims of executive privilege regarding Trump are basically really slim. Trump is not president and preserving his time in office is a campaign goal, not an official task of the executive office. 

And then there's the funny old thing about the revelation that Trump DOJ lawyer (oddly working on behalf of the Trump campaign) John Eastman was still looking for the very elusive proof of the voter fraud that didn't exist weeks after 1/6.  He was also looking to get paid. This is so amateur. Trump believes he should be defended because his cause is always sanctified and is its own reward because he is who he is, and I don't know how Eastman (or Giuliani, or anyone else) failed to notice that. Also, too, Eastman and Giuliani and other lawyers never did get pardons, because like a Trump wife or girlfriend, he expects his lawyers to get themselves off. 

But while Eastman never secured a pardon, it's pretty clear people thought his plot was probably legally contentious if not treasonous. They knew it was wrong in Arizona.  They knew it was wrong in Wisconsin. 

Even Trump's 1/6 rioters know the buck should stop with him. It's his "privileged" associates who are late to understanding their legal jeopardy in all this. 

Trump is at the center of this, and it's his party, and he should cry if he wants to, but all signs point to his culpability. And if he doesn't get served, boy, I don't know. I just don't.  But I don't like what that implies. 

Trump's Still at It?

 

It's one thing when perennial weirdo and pillow empresario Mike Lindell continues to promise that with One Weird Trick, Donald Trump will be reinstated as president. It's kind of hard to say whether Lindell is a huge grifter or actually potty, but he definitely seems, uh, a rare creature. Ditto some of the so-called "prophets" who from time to time maintain that Trump never really lost.

It's another when participants in the initial Big Lie/election reversal scheme are still trying to work over state legislatures a year and a half late--as John Eastman tried to do a few months ago. 

But it is something quite else to hear that just last week, Trump was still himself working on getting WI Asssembly Speaker Robin Vos to decertify Biden's win. This is why Trump is now calling him a RINO--and um. Trump seems to believe his not being president is still an "everyone else" problem. 

We know Trump running in 2024 will be in part because he wants to put a stop to his current assorted legal woes. (Yeah--that won't work.) But I guess he believes if he can get back into the White House before 2024, he can wish everyone he doesn't like into a corn field. 

Or something like that. But it is definitely very Twilight Zone. 

This TrumpWorld Grab Bag Doesn't Want to Be Friends With You Anymore

 

This quote from Woodward and Costa's book, "Peril" came up in the 1/6 hearing today; Trump told Mike Pence "I don't want to be your friend anymore if you don't do this." This is what a child says in the midst of a temper tantrum. "We won't play GI Joes together and watch He-Man on the basement tv." It isn't what a grown man says. A grown man can accept he lost a fair fight. A toddler cries "Unfair!" when things don't go his way. Trump wanted Pence to violate the law, and he Tweeted to his angry followers in a way that suggested they should treat his VP like a traitor. He wanted them to hang Mike Pence.

Little kids don't have power like Trump did--we wouldn't give that power to an actual small child. But Trump is the baby-brained amoral asshole who delighted in his tantrum spilling over to thousands of other people, just because he didn't get his way. Mike Pence isn't a hero necessarily for going against Trump, although it did take some amount of physical courage--he was simply being a grown person who could see that the fantasy world where you just get new electors because you don't like how people voted was not reality. 

People voted for this immature jackass, and there are people who would vote for him again. He will not mature. He will not suddenly gain some new appreciation and respect for the law that he did not have on 1/6. He will still be the guy who extorted Zelenskyy, who denied his 2016 campaign had anything at all to do with Russia, that had several cabinet members whose exit he greeted with scorn and insults because they were "losers" (except--didn't he hire them in the first place?) and he will be the same dim bulb who pretended to believe insane conspiracy theories might keep his toddler ass in the White House even after 81 million people and the actual Constitution said they wanted him gone. 

TWGB: Meetings of the MAGA Minds

 

It's been a weird Trump World kind of day for a day when a scheduled 1/6 Committee Hearing had been postponed, but we nonetheless got very good 1/6 information. In my heart of hearts, I feel like the postponement isn't just some technicality thing, but probably is (fingers crossed) something more interesting, but I will take what I can get. 

I think the penny being dropped on Rep. Loudermilk's 1/5 Capitol tour is pretty interesting because of all the different stories he had about it. Does someone tell several different stories and file an ethics complaint against people trying to tell the truth on them just to get showed up like this, ever? Someone needs to be Whey Quieter, am I right? Ok. That sucked. I am having one of those days. And I do not believe that some totally innocent people are just super-excited about sconces. I remember a lot of people had stories post 9/11 about law enforcement getting freaked out about people taking photos at out of the way places around national landmarks. In the criminal vernacular, these folks are casing the joint--

(Although they didn't apparently take note of security cameras?) 

Now, interestingly, this idea that people expecting to go "wild" on 1/6 would infiltrate and occupy government buildings was backed up with a document, "1776 Returns", that was filed as a part of a Proud Boys' sedition case. Here is the meat of it:

The nine-page document, filed in federal court Wednesday, lays out a plan to fill buildings “with patriots and communicate our demands." Its stated goals include maintaining control "over a select few, but crucial buildings in the DC area for a set period of time" and getting as "many people as possible inside these buildings." 

 “These are OUR building, they are just renting space,” the document reads. “We must show our politicians We the People are in charge.”

Loudermilk's tour group was casing the area for the benefit of people like this, who wantedto do domestic terror to accomplish deeply misguided (because Trump lied to them about the election) goals. And the 1/6 Committee says there were other tour groups, and since at least one member Tweeted "This is 1776" I would be very interested to know more. 

As it was, we had people like this guy and his son and their Confederate flag showing up where they had no business being. 

That image will never fail to rouse something in me--maybe about how the past isn't even the past--but maybe about how we need to put the ghosts of the past all the way down if we want to move forward. 

Does it seem, after all this, gratuitous that we learn that the committee has emails showing that Ginni Thomas and her husband's former clerk, John Eastman, corresponded? Or should we have already fully expected as much? I would think that additionally raises the likelihood that the current Supreme Court Justice should try and make himself a former Supreme Court justice, because his foreknowledge of his wife's interference in the lawful transition of power seems awfully likely. If he wouldn't do that for the benefit of the dignity of the court, at least he could consider it for his own historical legacy? 

What I am seeing here is a meeting of the MAGA minds--people so far gone that the law was no longer a barrier to trying to continue Trump's reign of error because they felt they were at active warfare with the existing government for simply--not substituting actual reality with their own, warped version. 

It's like Pete Navarro's perverse idea that people who disagreed with him were part of the "deep state"--a charming (not!) idea that people who maintained the rule of law and acted as guardrails against the mayhem of abuse of power were just being...meanies. Their insistence on the law applying to all was the real way Nazi Germany got started! (Extreme and painful eyeroll.) 

And yet--there is a paradox to what should look like the obvious story that the 1/6 shitfit was ugly and out of pocket. When Ryan Kelley got picked up for his involvement in the 1.6 insurrection attempt, my first thought was, ok, next do Doug Mastriano. (His Reichstag theory is amusing because I think something similar--except the GOP wanted to blame antifa to take over the way the Fascists blamed Commies--and I think I have the right of that one, TBH.)  But I am not so sure anymore, because the way butthurt Republicans deal with adversity is apparently to circle the wagons. (I don't want to belong to a party that acts like a cult, but when Democrats are in a little trouble why aren't we more like this, right?) 

I understand why Merrick Garland is staying quiet--I do. But the answer isn't to not prosecute these SOBS anyway. You only just have to get enough of them to make them know the law is the law. 

TWGB: Are We New to This?

 

Trump "ReTruthed" a comment regarding civil war on his lil' Mastodon knock-off, and yes, it is pretty serious that he's endorsing the idea after an attempted coup and on the same weekend he's shared a CPAC event with a notorious racist (I mean, among other notorious racists, c'mon....) but to be quite honest--there have been echoes of civil war with Trump for a very long time. This is definitely not the first time, and it hasn't even been subtle. 

"Civil War" was even a branded clothing item worn at the 1/6 insurrection. This isn't new, and long past disturbing. 

This is why I don't doubt the story that Trump suggested that MI elections official Jocelyn Benson be tried for treason for not overturning the results in that state. It is partially a joke to call Trump the "MAGA king", but in his mind, this person who likes to talk about shooting people in the legs--is it too far out to think he might declare "Off with her head!" like some demented monarch? 

It also isn't so far out to think he directed State Department officials to meet with activists pushing, let's be entirely clear, fraudulent election fraud narratives. How in the hell is that State Department business? you might ask, if you didn't already know Trump's attitude was "L'etat c'est moi." 

TWGB: "Actual Fraud is Irrelevant"

 

Politico dropped a story about John Eastman's emails that show that he was working with state legislatures regarding strategies to overturn the election, vis getting the alternate elector slates approved in the states where the vote totals demonstrated Trump lost. The plan? Basically, throw out the number of votes you don't like the look of, and just count the ones you actually want. Easy peasy! 

PA State Rep. Russ Diamond understood the assignment pretty well, I think:

(click to embiggen)

He basically said, welp, the Trump attorneys didn't prove their case and at least once totally lied, but why prove actual fraud if you don't agree with the election.  Apparently "there oughta be a law!" against people voting against Trump.  And yes, I hate it, because that's my vote they were talking about throwing out so casually. I didn't even give my ballot to a Soros-funded mule. I mailed the SOB by mailbox. Russ Diamond voted for Act 77  (he was for it before he was against it) that made voting this way possible.

See why I don't trust Republicans? I was born in the election year of the Watergate break in. They have been like this my whole life. 

But anyway, the bigger message is--the Trump side hasn't ever actually proved fraud--they basically have been throwing spaghetti against the wall this whole time. When you list the claims, they get ridiculous:  the Venezuelan software, the Italian satellites, the German servers, the Chinese thermostats, the Chinese ballots (with bamboo in the fibers, even!), and the South Korean jet planes, etc.

The claims never had to make sense. Time was of the essence and all they wanted to do was get everything finagled into place by 1/6th. Here in Pennsylvania, in Georgia, in Arizona, etc. All the "audits" and stuff after the fact are more about 2024. I mean, they worked so hard to find fraud--it would be silly to think states forked over a bunch of money to prove something that never really existed at all right?

HAHAHAHAHA! Yeah. but this is TrumpWorld. It's funny that way.

TWGB: "More Likely Than Not"

 

A federal judge ruled Monday that President Donald Trump “more likely than not” attempted to illegally obstruct Congress when he tried to subvert the 2020 election on Jan. 6, 2021.

from @kyledcheney @joshgerstein & mehttps://t.co/7hAY1gvB1J

— Nicholas Wu (@nicholaswu12) March 28, 2022

More likely than not that Trump committed some felonies? You know, people are saying that. All over, actually. So what are we talking about:

Carter, who sits in federal court in California, said that the plan Eastman helped develop was obviously illegal and that Trump knew it at the time, but pushed forward with an effort he says would have effectively ended American democracy. 

“If Dr. Eastman and President Trump’s plan had worked, it would have permanently ended the peaceful transition of power, undermining American democracy and the Constitution,” Carter wrote. “If the country does not commit to investigating and pursuing accountability for those responsible, the Court fears January 6 will repeat itself.”

Trump and his little friends committed felony obstruction pursuant to the fraud they perpetrated that the election was "stolen" from Trump, to steal the election for Trump.  And by spreading that fraudulent message far and wide, they framed it in words that indicated violence would be necessary. 

And what is additionally disgraceful is that US senators and congressional representatives were actively helping.  In my opinion, that makes them accomplices--more likely than not. 

TWGB: The Call Came From Inside the White House

 

So here's a funny thing--the batshit idea that dead Hugo Chavez elected Joe Biden from beyond the grave by being backdoor-hacked into the Dominion voting machines is apparently a whole thing once authorized under the White House auspices. Like, Pete Navarro, the dude who openly admitted to the Green Bay Sweep plan, was the boss of the office where someone, somehow, determined that maybe foreigners could be fucking with the election. 

Wow. 

That feels convenient. 

It's almost like someone used the office of the presidency to construct a narrative where the election was invalid because they already knew they would not win outright, and wanted to create a distraction that would arouse partisans to their fabricated cause.

The idea was so weird that they couldn't decide who to consider the plausible author of it.

And this thing was apparently worked on before the election, but wasn't used to halt the election or create an amendment to how it was carried out, just to provide a cloak of fuckery when Trump ultimately lost.

He was always going to lose based on the polls, but I guess hope springs eternal in the mind of the true-believer? 

Long story short: I guess Trump used the office of the presidency to also create a basis for the lie that the voting machines were wrong, just in the same way he encouraged lawyers to create a narrative for invalidating the vote, and ultimately, put into play a narrative where Pence would have a justification to  follow the Eastman plan. Trump and his supporters seem to be anathema to the concept of democracy. 

Trump needs to be held accountable for any violations of the law, but I don't know how to correct the culture that was so willing to overthrow democracy for the sake of this ignorant and arrogant person. He is and was a dumbass and hardly a person I would sacrifice any principle for. 

I guess many Republicans felt differently. 

TWGB: Sometimes You Need A National Security Emergency, Is All

 

Former Trump COS Mark Meadows might not actually be the sharpest ball in the ball pit, because damn, he seems to have incriminated himself by giving "just the tip" of information to the House January 6th Committee, because it looks like the "but her emails" crew learned nothing about properly digitally maintaining and giving over records required to be kept. Also, they may have just gotten enough to pretty much nail Meadows' involvement down, anyway. And you, know, besides all that, he did undercut himself about wanting to keep privilege about certain details by a) Writing a book and b) going on news shows to talk about just what he wasn't willing to talk about. 

And all this before he knows exactly how the courts are going to come down ultimately on the executive privilege claim--but it doesn't look great for him. Because we only have one president at a time, Trump isn't it right now, and OMG YOU ASSHOLES TRIED TO STEAL AN ELECTION. And left a detailed PowerPoint about what the fuck?

So, before I go all Stringer Bell about taking notes on a criminal conspiracy (again! because I'm pretty sure I did that reference before) I have to note there are similarities between the PowerPoint and the Claremont war games. The really hilarious things are how the PowerPoint definitely leans on the Chinese Thermostat/Italian satellite kind of conspiracy theories for what happened to give the election to Biden (instead of like, the COVID-19 disaster, the unemployment and the fucking constant drama) and relies on "a national security emergency" on or about January 6 that means the military totally has to take over. So sad!

TWGB: The Eastman Problem

 

I just want you to think about John Eastman for a minute, because in ordinary times, that's a name you never would have known. There is no reason to. A John Eastman would just be a cipher, a small man with some strong ideas about how government can perpetuate itself, but, of course, he's a kind of crank. 

But in the world in which we live, he taunted the VP of the US for not violating the norms of his office, telling him the Capitol riot was his fault, literally, like a bully smacking Pence for hitting himself. Why was Pence hitting himself? 

That's a big problem. I don't fathom how deep Claremont and Federalist Society counts for just this minute, but I know it's a big deal. But I definitely see it as something to think about--why is such a cranky idea as Pence's ability to change the election given credibility? Why listen to Eastman's far-fetched notion (in rather the way Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and others' wild claims of voter fraud were listened to?)

Because he said Trump won. It's what separates Eastman from the losers--the willingness to say a thing so untrue that no objective reality easily permeates the bald-facedness of the lie. Trump wanted to hear that there was a way that he won.

But what Eastman represents for our purpose is the fact of the collusion, There was a reason for every communication and act that day. John Eastman tells us it was to make Mike Pence grow a spine for Trump,. I think was a stupid ask, and side with Pence that he did not do it, because that day wasn't about Mike Pence's fidelity to the Constitution, but the failure of so many to consider what small d democracy was about. 

So many people who would lie for Trump. It needn't make you think, even. But you should think about that.