Well, Trump being acquitted was always the default assumption, even if the blatancy and enormity of his crimes made it more likely (but, as we see here, not likely enough) that even the Republicans would turn on him.
The US constitution has a fundamental assumption that everyone involved has an actual interest in governing the country, instead of just wanting to watch the world burn. And honestly, this kind of shit would have been unthinkable not very long ago – especially given how Trump’s insurrection put the GOP senators in real genuine personal physical danger!
There’s going to be a lot of interesting scholarship on the degenerate state of the right wing of US politics in the coming years, I’m sure.
Republican Senators care about money, power and re-election. If they voted against Trump, they lose Trump’s base and can’t get re-elected, and so can’t be quite as rich, nor powerful. So there was zero chance they would vote against Trump. They are beholden to the Trumpists, without whom they can not be re-elected.
I’m amazed that 14% did what was right for the country, for American ideals, and for honesty - that’s 14% more than I expected.
From my standpoint, the success of the impeachment will only be known 10-20 years from now, when all of the details are forgotten by the general public.
If the average American hears “Trump” and instinctively curls their lip in the same way that most Americans do now when they hear “Nixon”, then the impeachment hearings will have done everything that could be done.
Just like Nixon is “that Watergate guy” even if they don’t know what Watergate is, I want Trump to be “the Capitol riot guy” long after most of the population has forgotten anything about the riots themselves.
Fine. Bury the Republican Party so deep the Whigs will point and laugh. They’ve truly earned it. Bury them in voters rights so strong that denying one voter the right to vote means a prison sentence. Bury them in Civil Asset Forfeiture such that the party is starved of cash. Bury them in legislation that forces absolute transparency for all Federal-level positions, in terms of both personal finances and campaign contributions.
And finally, bury them in such good government that the majority of people wake up and see them for what they are: selfish greed pigs who don’t give a shit about anyone except for themselves.
It is, though. In theory, that’s not necessarily the case, but right now, in reality, it totally is.
Not just that, but Democrats aren’t just still playing by the rules and following norms, and holding their own members accountable, but there’s now two completely different standards for the two parties (among themselves, voters and the press). Everyone now expects Democrats to be like that, and Republicans to be like that, and somehow they’re treated as equivalent.
@Melizmatic I’m finding that my ability to be disappointed but completely unsurprised is reaching incredible new heights (or depths, perhaps).
He’s still doing damage, though. And more than that, this leaves open a big ol’ door for future Trump-alikes to do much worse.
Less a split than an erosion. There is no split when the party is full on trump. This has just been a test. This has only been a test. Please do not adjust your TV sets.
republican majorities control both houses of the state legislatures plus the governors in 22 states, additionally there are republican controlled state legislatures in another 7 states. these bodies set election rules and they have already begun working on the problem of “too many democrats voting”. for example, in georgia the legislature is already working on legislation that would eliminate absentee ballot drop-boxes, excuse-free absentee voting, reducing the number of days of early voting, and reducing the number of early voting locations because of the extreme number of fraudulent, that is democratic votes cast in the most recent presidential and senatorial elections.
even if the story is “republicans in disarray” it won’t matter if you make it hard enough for democrats to vote.
This is what the Dems need to focus on fixing. If they do not there will be ample opportunity for Trump II (whoever it may be) to win next time. IT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING THEY MUST FOCUS ON RIGHT NOW AND FOR THE NEXT 4 YEARS.
when mcconnell’s entire position – one he took to cover for everyone who voted to acquit – hinged on his interpretation of the word “shall”. he, the very person who delayed the process in the first place…
i just can’t even.
the only thing worse was hearing the defense argue that racial justice protestors were the ones who incited the attack on the capitol by normalizing rioting.
the republicans just gave white supremacists a free pass to continue both “lone wolf” and coordinated attacks for years to come.
“There’s no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day,” McConnell said shortly after the Senate voted 57-43 to acquit the former president.
He admits Trump was fully responsible for the insurrection.
And he voted to acquit anyway.
Does he really think history will forgive him just because he had some disapproving words for the President who almost got him killed?
Edit to correct: Schumer praised the seven Republicans for doing the right thing, not McConnell.
One take is that this was a missed opportunity to finish fighting the civil war. Actual and effective censure of Trump would also have gone a long way towards censuring shit like “the south will rise again”.
So what do we have now? The south did rise again, and … well, it didn’t exactly fail? Or at least not entirely? The message is, “better luck next time”, maybe?
Considering that Georgia is the state that just delivered the Senate back to the Democrats it’s probably past time to draw a distinction between “The South” from “The Confederacy.”
The goal shouldn’t be to keep the South down. The goal should be to encourage the South to ascend as something better than it was before.
This kind of rote party over country self interest would have (and has) sunk just about any system imaginable. It’s not “the system”, or “politicians” or “division” doing this. It’s Republicans.
Don’t let them off the hook. At least half of those people think what Trump did was a good thing. Some of them were involved.
