Yesterday after the Trump lawyers in the impeachment trial presented their pathetic defense of Trump’s January 6, 2020 coup attempt, details about a phone call between Trump and GOP House leader Kevin McCarthy began getting a lot of attention. The facts had actually been available for some time in the Longview, Washington Daily News, but hadn’t broken through in major media outlets until CNN broke this story yesterday: New details about Trump-McCarthy shouting match show Trump refused to call off the rioters.
In an expletive-laced phone call with House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy while the Capitol was under attack, then-President Donald Trump said the rioters cared more about the election results than McCarthy did.
“Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are,” Trump said, according to lawmakers who were briefed on the call afterward by McCarthy.
McCarthy insisted that the rioters were Trump’s supporters and begged Trump to call them off.
Judith Leyster, Two Children with a Cat
Trump’s comment set off what Republican lawmakers familiar with the call described as a shouting match between the two men. A furious McCarthy told the then-President the rioters were breaking into his office through the windows, and asked Trump, “Who the f–k do you think you are talking to?” according to a Republican lawmaker familiar with the call.
The newly revealed details of the call, described to CNN by multiple Republicans briefed on it, provide critical insight into the President’s state of mind as rioters were overrunning the Capitol. The existence of the call and some of its details were first reported by Punchbowl News and discussed publicly by McCarthy.
The Republican members of Congress said the exchange showed Trump had no intention of calling off the rioters even as lawmakers were pleading with him to intervene. Several said it amounted to a dereliction of his presidential duty.
Washington Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler was one of the Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, based on what she had learned about the phone call. From the Longview Daily News story linked above:
In a Friday interview with The Daily News, she said the events of Jan. 6 determined her course of action for the following week. Hiding with colleagues from the violent mob that was ransacking the U.S. Capitol on that day, she told how she was flooded with emotions.
“I was heartbroken. I was aghast. I was in disbelief,” she recalled. “I was praying. I was like, ‘We’ve got some pretty big angels, a couple of big angels, and we’re fine.’ Just knowing how badly outnumbered everybody was at that point, and how beaten everybody was, the fact that there wasn’t a mass casualty event to me just demonstrates, I feel like, I do think God, I do think God intervened.”
“When I look at the picture of the Capitol police officer on his face, with the crowd standing over him, or of someone being bludgeoned to death, I cannot express to you the feeling inside that says, ‘I will stand up to that any day of the week and twice on Sunday,’ ” she said.
Woman with a cat, Il Bacchiacca
“To me that’s what my vote represents. I will not tolerate that and nor will, I believe, a majority of the good people in my district, in our state and in our country.” [….]
On the House floor Jan. 13, Herrera Beutler said:
“I’m not afraid of losing my job, but I am afraid that my country will fail. I’m afraid that patriots of this country have died in vain. I’m afraid that my children won’t grow up in a free country. I’m afraid injustice will prevail.
“My vote to impeach our sitting president is not a fear-based decision. I am not choosing a side – I am choosing truth, she said. “It’s the only way to defeat fear.”
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., stood by his account of former President Donald Trump’s phone call to him during Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol despite Trump’s lawyers calling the account “hearsay.”
Tuberville’s account would mean Trump was aware of the danger Vice President Mike Pence faced before he tweeted an attack on Pence. Asked about the allegation by reporters, Tuberville said he was not sure exactly what time Trump called, but reiterated he had talked to Trump by phone on Jan. 6 and had told the president Pence was evacuated from the Senate chamber.
Tuberville recounted answering the phone, talking briefly to Trump, and then telling him, “Mr. President, they’ve taken the vice president out. They want me to get off the phone, I gotta go.” [….]
Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., asked Trump’s lawyers for greater clarity on the call but said Trump’s lawyers had “not really” answered his question.
Trump’s attorney Michael van der Veen had responded to Cassidy’s question by saying he disputed the “premise” of Cassidy’s question and called Tuberville’s account “hearsay.”
But the Secret Service would have informed Trump.
I worked with the Secret Service in the Clinton White House. It's unimaginable that agents with VP Pence would not have informed their counterparts at the WH in real time that VP was in danger. They, in turn, would have informed the President. Trump almost certainly knew.
Let me clarify – it is incredibly rare for a Secret Service protected principal to be in imminent physical danger.
As as soon as the decision to move Pence was made, security around Trump would have been bolstered, the President immediately informed. He knew immediately.
Hiding from the rioters in a secret location away from the Capitol, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) appealed to Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser. Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) phoned Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter.
Studies for Madonna with a cat, Leonardo Da Vinci
And Kellyanne Conway, a longtime Trump confidante and former White House senior adviser, called an aide who she knew was standing at the president’s side.
But as senators and House members trapped inside the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday begged for immediate help during the siege, they struggled to get through to the president, who — safely ensconced in the West Wing — was too busy watching fiery TV images of the crisis unfolding around them to act or even bother to hear their pleas.
“He was hard to reach, and you know why? Because it was live TV,” said one close Trump adviser. “If it’s TiVo, he just hits pause and takes the calls. If it’s live TV, he watches it, and he was just watching it all unfold.”
Even as he did so, Trump did not move to act. And the message from those around him — that he needed to call off the angry mob he had egged on just hours earlier, or lives could be lost — was one to which he was not initially receptive….
Trump ultimately — and begrudgingly — urged his supporters to “go home in peace.” But the six hours between when the Capitol was breached shortly before 2 p.m. Wednesday afternoon and when it was finally declared secure around 8 p.m. that evening reveal a president paralyzed — more passive viewer than resolute leader, repeatedly failing to perform even the basic duties of his job.
It’s absolutely clear at this point that Trump deliberately aided the insurrectionists and knowingly put his own Vice President and members of Congress and their staffs in danger. Now House managers are face pressure to call witnesses in the trial, which they still can do. Greg Sargent writes:
Peter Paul Rubens, Detail from Annunciation,
Evidence is mounting that Donald Trump knew Mike Pence was in grave danger from the mob rampaging into the Capitol when the then-president sent out a tweet blasting his vice president.
During the Jan. 6 assault, Trump tweet-slammed Pence for lacking the “courage” to overturn the election, which further infuriated the insurrectionists. Trump essentially pointed the mob like a loaded gun at Pence — and newly unearthed facts suggest Trump may have understood what he was doing in exactly these terms.
These new circumstances hand Democrats one last big weapon to wield against Trump at his impeachment trial. They also impose on them an obligation.
Specifically, the impeachment managers can still call witnesses. And the case for this has gotten stronger, now that we are so close to showing that Trump may have knowingly endangered Pence’s life.
Read the rest at the WaPo.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is calling for witnesses in the trial.
A review of Trump’s abominable lawyers in which the authors did not yet know about evident lies. Pretty damning stuff, even without that. https://t.co/rTZgUqOcOb
One way to clear it up? Suspend trial to depose McCarthy and Tuberville under oath and get facts. Ask Secret Service to produce for review comms back to White House re VP Pence safety during siege. What did Trump know, and when did he know it?
It would have been Muses parade Thursday last night up town but instead we had a flood of rain and the French Quarter under a heavy shut down order. The Krewe of Muses was not to be left out of whatever fun we were trying to have at home. Operation Shoe Fairy was on last night! Glitter shoes were going to nurses and doctors and random people who bump into a muse driving her car full of glittery shoes around the city. Glittery Shoes from Muses and Glittery Coconuts from Zulu are the winning lotto tickets of parade throws.
“New Orleans is really resilient, and we rise to the occasion and we’re seeing that this year,” said Krewe Creator/Captain, Staci Rosenberg.
Rosenberg says not rolling this year is heartbreaking, however there is a plan in place to keep the magic alive. It’s called Operation Shoe Fairy.
“We’re going to be walking, driving, flying around the city, flitting around and landing in different parts of New Orleans giving glitter shoes to unsuspecting people,” she said.
All deliveries will follow COVID-19 safety guidelines. They’ll also be made at 12 local hospitals to recognize the heroic work being done during this tough time. They call it, “Heels for Healers.”
“We’re doing that because we so appreciate what the healthcare warriors at all levels have done for us this year,” Rosenberg said. “Their sacrifices have been unbelievable and if we can give them a tiny bit of joy, we want to do that.”
It’s not just New Orleans Krewes sending out love and support this time of year! Look what’s happening at the White House today! No morbid red trees! No ripping up trees and flowers! The First Lady Dr. Jill Biden sends out love for Valentine’s day!
Overnight, the First Lady’s surprise Valentine messages to the country were installed on the north lawn of the White House for the weekend! Happy Valentines, America…from @FLOTUS 💕 pic.twitter.com/HPHjFbDfhD
President Biden announced Thursday his administration has finalized an order for 200 million more doses of COVID-19 vaccine to be delivered by July 2021, adding to the 400 million doses that the Trump administration had already ordered from Pfizer and Moderna by that date. The two drug companies both produce a two-shot regimen, so the total 600 million doses will vaccinate 300 million people — most of the U.S. population.
“Within three weeks, round-the-clock work of so many people, people standing behind me and in front of me, we’ve now purchased enough vaccine supply to vaccinate all Americans and now we’re working to get those vaccines in the arms of millions of people,” Mr. Biden said in remarks at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The president also said the companies were on track to supply their initial orders of each vaccine weeks earlier, distributing their first 200 million doses each by the end of May.
“That’s a month faster,” said Mr. Biden. “That means lives will be saved.”
Though snafus with complicated vaccination scheduling systems and mishandled doses have hampered the vaccine rollout, local and state health authorities have insisted the key issue they faced was that demand far outstripped supply at most clinics.
The Muse Krewe’s Houses float entitled Cosmos.
Okay, so no we’ve really made some changes! There’s a FACT SHEET posted on the development at the White House website. Facts! What a concept!
Kizzmekia Corbett, an immunologist at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), is one of the scientists who in early 2020 helped to develop an mRNA-based vaccine for COVID-19. Developed in collaboration with biotech firm Moderna of Cambridge, Massachusetts, the vaccine is now being distributed across the United States and elsewhere. And Corbett is taking on another challenge: tempering vaccine hesitancy by talking about COVID-19 science in communities of colour.
Corbett is one of many Black scientists and doctors who are doing this outreach, often virtually, in their free time. Researchers say it’s necessary to make scientific knowledge accessible in public forums, to ease health disparities.
In the United States, COVID-19 has affected Black, Native American and Latino American people at higher rates than white people, for reasons rooted in racism and historical segregation. At the same time, people in these groups are more wary of COVID-19 vaccines. In a December survey by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 46% of Black adults said they probably would not get vaccinated against the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, compared with 30% of white respondents. Those who were hesitant cited worries about side effects, and the speed at which the vaccines were developed. A legacy of exploitative medical research, such as infamous syphilis studies in Tuskegee, Alabama — in which doctors withheld treatment from hundreds of Black men from the 1930s and 1970s — contributes to this scepticism.
Before the COVID-19 outbreak, Corbett was part of a team at the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland, and elsewhere, that was designing vaccines for other coronaviruses in collaboration with Moderna. The scientists’ mRNA technology delivers a piece of genetic code to a person’s cells to create immune-stimulating virus proteins. When the outbreak began, the team mobilized to quickly identify the SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequence it would need to make a vaccine for COVID-19, which Moderna then produced. Before trials began in people, Corbett designed tests of the vaccine in animals, and perfected assays that measured its effectiveness in clinical trials.
According allegations in the affidavit filed in support of the criminal complaint, between January 28 and February 1, 2021, Reeves contacted multiple times the White House switchboard via telephone and made threats against President Biden and others. The criminal complaint alleges that, on February 1, 2021, a Secret Service agent contacted Reeves to discuss the threats. Reeves allegedly called back the Secret Service agent multiple times throughout the day, and repeated the threats against the President, the Secret Service agent, and others. According to filed court documents, on the same day, Reeves also contacted the U.S. Capitol Police switchboard and communicated similar threats.
Following today’s hearing, Judge Keesler ordered Reeves to remain in custody.
The charge of making a threat against the President of the United States carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison, and a $250,000 fine.
Well, it seems a few Republicans have decided their political interests don’t link with KKKremlin Caligula.
“We need to acknowledge he let us down,” Haley, who served in her ambassador role under Trump, said. “He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again.”
Haley’s remarks are her strongest yet against the former president in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and come as Trump’s legal team is set to present its defense of Trump on Friday in his second Senate impeachment trial.
Muse float of notorious RBG waiting in its Den for another day in the sun.
What was more striking was Haley’s underlying position: that because Trump believed he had been robbed, he was therefore justified in saying and doing whatever he pleased.
“You have the president of the United States telling everyone that he was cheated, that the voting systems are corrupt, that we’re living in a banana republic where the deep state has rigged this election against him,” I told her. “Isn’t that dangerous?”
“He believes it,” she smiled.
Yeah, That just means y’all need to send the nice young men in their clean white coats to take him away. Just because he believes he’s following his oath means he should be absolved too. Enabling delusion when it basically brings the country’s democracy to its knees ain’t pretty. Just say no to any public life for Ms Haley. I’ve really had it with this tripe.
Here’s a real Muses Parade from 2018 if you want to see some of what goes on down here in a normal year. I have a feeling with Joe and Kamala and all the professionals they have surrounded themselves with that we will have a more normal Mardi Gras next year.
I would also like to wish you Happy Chinese New Year! Tashi Losar! Happy Valentine’s Day! And Best of Mardi Gras to you for the season that I consider the only Holiday season I recognize as worth the effort! And to all of you who know any one who is even thinking about coming here tell them we do not want them here. Auntie Latoya ain’t playing!
What’s on your reading and blogging list! And let us know how things are going with you on getting that vaccine!
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I watched quite a bit of the House managers’ presentations in the second Trump impeachment trial yesterday, and they were compelling. They revealed shocking new video evidence that showed how close Mike Pence and members of Congress came to being attacked and even killed by Trump’s mob along with precise timelines that showed Trump’s complicity with the seditionist rioters, including his refusal to authorize National Guard troops to help overwhelmed Capital and Municipal police. I can’t cover everything, but I’ll share some highlights of yesterday’s presentations.
WASHINGTON ― Donald Trump posted a tweet attacking his own vice president for lacking “the courage” to overturn the election for him ― enraging his Jan. 6 mob even further ― just minutes after learning that Mike Pence had been removed from the Senate chamber for his own safety.
Newly elected Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) told reporters Wednesday night, following the second day of the former president’s impeachment trial, that Trump had called for his help in delaying election certification the afternoon of the U.S. Capitol attack but he had told Trump that Pence had just been taken from the Senate and he couldn’t talk just then.
“He didn’t get a chance to say a whole lot because I said, ‘Mr. President, they just took the vice president out. I’ve got to go,’” Tuberville said.
According to video footage from that day, Pence was removed from the Senate at 2:14 p.m. after rioters had broken into the Capitol, meaning that when Trump lashed out at Pence at 2:24 p.m., he already knew Pence’s life was in danger.
Portrait, Rene Magritte, 1935
“Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution,” Trump wrote in his tweet.
Videos shown by Democratic House members presenting their impeachment case document that rioters were aware of Trump’s tweet. Some had erected a gallows outside the Capitol. Others roamed the halls, chanting, “Hang Mike Pence.”
The exact time Pence was taken from the Senate following the breach of the Capitol by the mob Trump had incited to try to overturn the presidential election was known the day of the attack, as was the time of Trump’s tweet. What was not known until Tuberville’s statement was whether Trump was aware of the danger Pence was in at the time he posted his tweet.
Never before released video showed that Pence narrowly escaped the mob as he and his family were evacuated. The Washington Post:
House managers introduced previously unpublished security camera footage of the Jan. 6 Capitol siege on Wednesday during the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.
The video included body camera footage from an officer struggling to keep rioters from breaching an entrance on the west side of the Capitol. It also showed Vice President Mike Pence, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other members of Congress rushing to evacuate the building. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), one of the House impeachment managers, said the new video showed rioters were 58 steps away from lawmakers.
The Washington Post analyzed the security camera videos, which shed new light on how close lawmakers came to danger.
“I was very fortunate indeed that Officer Goodman was there to get me in the right direction,” Romney, R-Utah, told reporters Wednesday after the video demonstrated how close he came to the pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol.
The Giantess, Leonora Carrington
Delegate Stacey Plaskett, D-Virgin Islands, one of the House managers prosecuting Trump at his Senate trial, showed the new security camera video, which had no sound. It featured Goodman rushing to confront the mob — but first scrambling to guide Romney to safety.
The video shows Goodman rushing through the Ohio Clock Corridor outside the Senate chamber toward Romney, waving him to turn around and take a different path. Romney then turns and hurries back toward the Senate chamber.
Romney was in the chamber Wednesday as Plaskett played the video, and he watched intently.
He told reporters afterward that he hadn’t been aware of the identity of his guardian angel.
“I did not know that was Officer Goodman. I look forward to thanking him when I next see him,” Romney said.
“You’ve got a group of about 50 charging up the hill on the West Front,” a police dispatcher can be heard saying in one recording. “They’re throwing poles at us,” an officer responds.
The new audio was presented in the Senate on Wednesday by Del. Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands), one of the House impeachment managers for former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial.
In one recording, dispatch advises officers at the Capitol that “the speech has ended,” referring to Trump’s rally remarks in which he told his followers to “fight like hell” shortly before they headed toward Congress that day.
“They’re approaching the wall now,” dispatch warns as Trump supporters begin to scale the Capitol building.
“They’re starting to dismantle the reviewing stand,” an officer says.
Moments later, a panicked voice shouts out to dispatch: “Cruiser 50, give me DSO [Domestic Security Operations] up here now! DSO! Multiple law enforcement injuries! DSO, get up here!” [….]\In a recording played by Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), another impeachment manager, an officer tells dispatch that he and his fellow officers have been overrun by the mob.
“We lost the line. We’ve lost the line,” the officer can be heard saying. “We have been flanked and we’ve lost the line,” he yells.
Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, hammered the former president over his initial response to the riot at the U.S. Capitol being carried out by his supporters….
“You heard from my colleagues that when planning this attack, the insurgents predicted that Donald Trump would command the National Guard to help them,” Castro said in his presentation on the Senate floor. “There’s a lot that we don’t know yet about what happened that day, but here’s what we do know: Donald Trump did not send help to these officers who were badly outnumbered, overwhelmed and being beaten down.” [….]
“Two hours into the insurrection, by 3 p.m., President Trump had not deployed the National Guard or any other law enforcement to help, despite multiple pleas to do so,” Castro said. “President Donald Trump was, at the time, our commander in chief of the United States of America. He took a solemn oath to preserve, protect and defend this country and he failed to uphold that oath. In fact, there’s no indication that President Trump ever made a call to have the Guard deployed or had anything to do with the Guard being deployed when it ultimately was.”
Using video of the riot, tweets by the former president and news reports detailing the delayed deployment of Guard troops, Castro pressed his case that Trump initially didn’t want the insurrection to stop as it had successfully interrupted the certification of his loss against Joe Biden. Notably, Castro said, acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller had listed the officials he spoke with as the riot unfolded who had requested the deployment Guard troops. Trump was not one of them.
“Shortly after 3:04 p.m., the acting defense secretary announced that the Guard had been activated and listed the people he spoke with prior to this activation, including Vice President Mike Pence, Speaker Pelosi, Leader McConnell, Sen. Schumer and Rep. Hoyer. But that list did not include the president,” Castro said. “This omission of his name was not reportedly accidental. According to reports, ‘Trump initially rebuffed requests to mobilize the National Guard and required interference by other officials, including his own White House counsel.’ And later, ‘as a mob of Trump supporters breached police barricades and seized the Capitol,’ Trump reportedly was ‘disengaged in discussions with Pentagon leaders about deploying the National Guard to aid the overwhelmed U.S. Capitol police.’
And how is Trump reacting to the case against him?
One of the new clips shows then-Vice President Mike Pence and his family being hustled away by Secret Service as the siege was under way. That affirms what Pence aides told CNN in the days following the deadly insurrection. Some of those aides were outraged with Trump and believed he had put his own vice president in danger….
As for the siege, an adviser said Trump wanted to see a show of force from his supporters that day. “Trump likes force,” one adviser said. “He saw people forcefully fighting for him,” the adviser added. That lines up with what a former senior White House official told CNN about Trump’s reaction to the siege. The official said Trump was “loving” watching the mob.
Yesterday Dakinikat posted one of those typical Politico “both-sidesy” “Democrats in disarray” articles about second Trump impeachment trial, which begins today. Supposedly Democrats are torn about whether they should go all out to convict trump or just give up because the whole thing is a “lost cause.” Why call witnesses and make a big scene when Republicans hold all the cards anyway? Of course Politico ignores the fact that a clear majority of Americans support conviction. CBS News:
As former President Trump’s second impeachment trial begins, a 56%-majority of Americans would like the Senate to vote to convict him, and the same percentage say he encouraged violence at the Capitol — views that are still somewhat linked to Americans’ presidential votes in 2020, reflecting ongoing partisan division.
To those in favor of conviction, this trial is described as holding Mr. Trump “accountable” and “defending democracy.” To those Americans (mostly, Republicans) opposed to it, the trial is “unnecessary” and a “distraction.”
As the impeachment curtain rises in the Senate today, with Trump being charged with “incitmdent of insurrection” for his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, the D.C. press once again seems to think the impeachment of a Republican president poses political problems…for Democrats. It’s a strange prism through which to view the historic proceedings, as Trump becomes the first president in 240 years to be impeached twice — and in the span of just 13 months….
Overall, the press seems much more focused on the fact that Democrats likely won’t win a conviction, than they are on the swelling movement nationwide in favor of conviction. Republicans are clearly out of step with the public, but it’s Democrats who are portrayed as being boxed in and “muzzled.”
As for Republicans and the political consequences impeachment poses for them? Politico wasn’t interested, and made no suggestion that the GOP stands at the crossroads regarding Trump and the murderous mob he inspired to ransack the U.S. Capitol. The GOP, apparently, faces no impeachment fallout, only Democrats.
This is the type of coverage we saw during Trump’s impeachment last year, when news outlets flipped common sense on its head and became wed to idea that an unpopular Republican president being impeached represented a political problem for his opponents. The Washington Post insisted “hand-wringing” Democrats were “bracing” for scores of impeachment defections in the House. In the end, exactly two Democrats defected. Meanwhile, adopting Republican talking points, the New York Times reported that the first impeachment was “a political plus” for Trump, and “risky” for Democrats.
Talk about turning the tables. Back when Democrat Bill Clinton was impeached in 1999, the overriding political story was how badly would the historic proceeding damage Democrats? That, despite the fact that polling showed Americans overwhelmingly opposed the impeachment of Clinton, whose approval rating swelled into the 70’s while being persecuted by the GOP. Yet last year when it was Democrats who were doing the impeaching, and when they had the support of the public, the press assumed they’d be the ones to pay a high price. Same is true again this year.
For Democrats, it’s heads you lose, tails you lose.
Read the whole thing at the link. As the trial plays out, we need to remember that there really is no liberal media. In fact, the “savvy” DC press always works hard to find a “both-sides” narrative, no matter how bad things get for Republicans.
As the GOP contends with its future and Trump’s role in it, Democrats are seizing on the deep divisions within the Republican ranks over its right wing and seeking to define the frontline of the party by its most extreme members.
House Democrats’ campaign apparatus deployed $500,000 for an advertising campaign tethering Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., the minority leader, and seven vulnerable House Republicans in districts President Joe Biden won last year to Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s extremist rhetoric and the QAnon conspiracy theory.
The opening shot by Democrats accuses the swing district Republicans of standing “with Q, not you.
“Washington Republicans have made their choice — they chose to cave to the murderous QAnon mob that has taken over their party,” said Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, D-N.Y., the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. They are “refusing to hold those responsible for the attack on the Capitol accountable, offering nothing but empty words after years of hyping up lies and conspiracy theories.”
The timeline would allow the trial to wrap up as early as next week, if both sides agree not to call witnesses.
Under the deal, the Senate will debate and vote on Tuesday on whether the trial is constitutional. The effort to declare the trial unconstitutional will fall short after Rand Paul (R-Ky.) forced a vote on the issue late last month. Forty-four GOP senators supported his effort.
Opening arguments will start on Wednesday. Under the deal, the House impeachment managers and Trump’s team will have 16 hours over two days each to present their case to the Senate….
The deal also leaves the door open to calling witnesses. The House impeachment managers previously invited Trump to testify under oath, an offer his attorneys rejected. They haven’t yet said if they will try to get the Senate to call other witnesses.
Today the Senators will debate the constitutionality of trying a president who has left office. Trump’s lawyers claim that is unconstitutional, but the expert they rely on for their arguments says they are misinterpreting his scholarship.
A constitutional law professor whose work is cited extensively by former President Trump’s lawyers in their impeachment defense brief says his work has been seriously misrepresented.
In a 78-page brief filed in the U.S. Senate Monday, Trump’s lawyers rely heavily on the work of Michigan State University Professor Brian Kalt, author of the seminal article about impeachment of a former president. His work is cited 15 times in the Trump brief, often for the proposition that the Senate does not have the authority under the constitution to try an impeached ex-president.
The problem is that Kalt’s 2001 book-length law review article concluded that, on balance, the historical evidence is against Trump’s legal argument.
“The worst part is the three places where they said I said something when, in fact, I said the opposite,” Kalt said in an interview with NPR.
Trump’s lawyers argue that the Senate lacks jurisdiction because the president is already out of office, making an impeachment trial pointless. Kalt argues that impeachment is about more than removal; it’s about accountability and deterrence. “The framers worried about people abusing their power to keep themselves in office,” he adds. “The point is the timing of the conduct, not the timing of the legal proceeding.”
[D]espite the the deja-vu-ness of this been-there/done-that impeachment and the absence of a possible political death sentence, the second Trump impeachment is far more important than the first, for it ultimately is about securing and protecting the defining ideal of the United States: that this nation is a democracy that honors principle not power….
The core issue is a president jeopardizing American democracy. For the first time since the republic was born, the United States did not experience a peaceful transfer of power following a presidential election. (Yes, there’s an asterisk for the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln that led six months later to the Civil War.) Trump spent weeks prior to the election plotting how to subvert it should he lose, and then he put his scheme in motion, pushing the big lie that massive fraud had occurred and a nefarious cabal had stolen his victory. He falsely declared victory before all the votes were counted. He and his allies refused to accept legitimate and certified results, filing frivolous lawsuits that were routinely tossed out and spreading baseless conspiracy theories. They lied—over and over—about vote tallies and supposed irregularities that did not exist. It was a psyop campaign, information warfare—similar to the covert attack waged against the 2016 election by Vladimir Putin. And evoking his infamous Ukraine phone conversation, Trump called Georgia state officials and pressured them to “find” him just enough votes to secure a victory in that state. Coercing local officials to falsify election results can be a crime.
This all happened before the seditious and murderous attack on the US Capitol on January 6. For months, Trump had waged war against the election and the American political system, seeking to discredit it so he could retain power, misleading millions of America, and exploiting paranoia, fear, and political division. His impeachable acts did not begin on the that dreadful day. “The full story is a crime story, a long crime story,” one of the House impeachment managers tells me. The attack on Congress—which aimed to overturn the election results—was the product of a lengthy stretch of disinformation and incitement.
I was also greeted by my cat spilling my coffee all over my laptop. So far it appears to be doing okay but we’ll see how long that lasts. I scrambled to get it turn upside down immediately. I also have to finish grading a bunch of things. So, how’s your day going?
Today’s pictures are of the Mardi Gras House floats that have been popping up all over the city. It’s easy to guess which ones are uptown and which are downtown by me! I’m behind on mine because of this class I’ve been teaching and all the assorted headaches. I get my covid-19 vaccine on Wednesday afternoon and I still won’t have a day off until Friday so this week seems absolutely frazzled compared to the last year where sitting at home was de rigueur.
Rep. Ron Wright (R-TX) has died. Wright tested positive for coronavirus several weeks ago. Wright had also battled lung cancer last fall. Wright was 67 years old. Wright succeeded fmr GOP TX Rep Joe Barton in 2019 after Barton retired.
However I have found some interesting tweets including a deathbed crusade to fully open schools. Since the debacle with the empty stockpile, we’ve had quite a few teachers unable to get their vaccines. Anecdotally, I know several who are now home with the virus. UNO is supposed to start opening campus in March. Fortunately, I’m pretty much zoom bound in this class but at least I should have both doses if I have to go back.
Dallas Morning News: Republican Rep. Ron Wright of Texas died Sunday night after a battle with COVID-19. https://t.co/AbhhWVQxrT
It’s really hard to imagine that Republicans are still pushing free range herd immunity but pictures in Tampa Bay after the Super Bowl seem to show that it’s a different world out there in places with Republicans in charge. Our Mayor is doing everything possible to keep people out of the Quarter including closing bars down. Last night, however there was still a convergence to the bars all over. I watched the parade to bars by young white couples while walking Temple and chatting with my neighbor who already got her double dose as she hit the 70 year mark last year. I just don’t get how anything is more important than keep you and your healthy but I guess I’m officially on old coot now.
A more contagious variant of the coronavirus first found in Britain is spreading rapidly in the United States, doubling roughly every 10 days, according to a new study.
Analyzing half a million coronavirus tests and hundreds of genomes, a team of researchers predicted that in a month this variant could become predominant in the United States, potentially bringing a surge of new cases and increased risk of death.
The new research offers the first nationwide look at the history of the variant, known as B.1.1.7, since it arrived in the United States in late 2020. Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that B.1.1.7 could become predominant by March if it behaved the way it did in Britain. The new study confirms that projected path.
“Nothing in this paper is surprising, but people need to see it,” said Kristian Andersen, a co-author of the study and a virologist at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif. “We should probably prepare for this being the predominant lineage in most places in the United States by March.”
So, will we get another huge surge? Dr Fauci did say we need to keep an eye on those variants and some of the vaccines do better than others with them.
Democrats who’ve struggled for years to hold DONALD TRUMP accountable are at a crossroads again: Do they go all out to convict Trump by calling a parade of witnesses to testify to his misdeeds? Or do they concede it’s a lost cause, finish the trial ASAP — and get on with President JOE BIDEN’S agenda?
Several of the House impeachment managers wanted firsthand testimony to help prove their case that Trump incited the Jan. 6 riot, our sources tell us. But Senate Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER, Speaker NANCY PELOSI and Biden administration officials have been eager for the process to move quickly, we’re told.
It’s been a source of frustration for some Democrats privately. Trump, these people have noticed, is already on the rebound politically, at least among Republicans. The GOP base has rallied to his defense, and many Republican lawmakers who witnessed the terror of the Capitol invasion are back in Trump’s corner.
That’s why there had been talk among the managers about calling individuals who could change minds — if not the minds of 17 GOP senators needed to convict, then perhaps a slice of the GOP electorate that still supports Trump. Some of the ideas floated: having Capitol Police officers tell their stories about fighting the mob, or inviting Republican officials in Georgia who were pressured by Trump to overturn the state’s election tally.
There’s also been chatter about bringing in formerWhite House officials who observed Trump on the day of the riots.
Schumer and other Senate Democrats argue, however, that they don’t necessarily need witnesses since Trump’s crimes were in plain sight and documented in videos and tweets. Privately, senior Democrats also note that 45 Senate Republicans have already decided they think the trial is unconstitutional because Trump is no longer president, so why bother dragging this out?
Many legal scholars disagree, and the Senate has previously held an impeachment trial of a former official — though never a former president. But 45 Republican senators, including Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader who is said to believe that Mr. Trump committed impeachable offenses, voted last month to dismiss the trial as unconstitutional on those grounds.
Mr. Cooper said they were misreading the Constitution.
“The provision cuts against their interpretation,” he wrote. He argued that because the Constitution allows the Senate to bar officials convicted of impeachable offenses from holding public office again in the future, “it defies logic to suggest that the Senate is prohibited from trying and convicting former officeholders.”
Mr. Cooper’s decision to take on the argument was particularly significant because of his standing in conservative legal circles. He was a close confidant and adviser to Senate Republicans, like Ted Cruz of Texas when he ran for president, and represented House Republicans — including the minority leader, Representative Kevin McCarthy of California — in a lawsuit against Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He is also the lawyer for conservative stalwarts like John R. Bolton and Jeff Sessions, and over his career defended California’s same-sex marriage ban and had been a top outside lawyer for the National Rifle Association.
At this point I do not care who agrees that he can be impeached I just want to see his ass in place where he can never run for public office again. I’d also rather hear from the staffers who saw what he was saying and doing at the time. I never what to see his fat freaky face on TV again nor do I want to hear his icky voice.
The WSJ is reporting that Senate leaders are reaching an agreement on what the next schedule in the Trial will look like.
On Monday, Mr. Trump’s lawyers said that in that speech Mr. Trump only used the word “fight” a “little more than a handful of times and each time in the figurative sense,” and noted that he urged supporters to march peacefully and made no explicit mention of rioting. The lawyers said the president was exercising his rights under the First Amendment.
They also argued that news reports that law-enforcement officials had missed warnings about an attack on the Capitol indicated the riot had been planned in advance and “therefore had nothing to do with the president’s speech.”
The Senate trial begins on Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are closing in on an agreement for a resolution that would outline the rules and schedule for the trial, according to the person familiar with the talks.
I can at least report that purging Trumpist policy is still on the Biden/Harris team platter. Chait has never been a favorite of mine but here is a bit of analysis that at least provides some hope.
Chait writes this about the ongoing deficit size fixation Obama inherited compared to Biden who inherits a new situation following Trump. I still personally expect the republicans to suddenly get deficit size religion again but here’s is argument.
The rise of Donald Trump is the largest single cause of the transformation. It was obvious to some of us all along that Republican claims to have a passionate concern for fiscal probity were insincere. Trump has made it impossible to ignore. The beliefs that sincerely animated reporters and officials in Washington during the Obama era — that the Tea Party was a reaction to debt levels, that Republican leaders were willing or able to deal with Obama — were turned into a running joke by a Republican president who won the nomination in part because he never fooled himself into believing any of these things. Trump’s ability to blow out the budget deficit and wantonly pick winners and losers without any shame or meaningful Republican blowback destroyed the whole premise.
Democrats in Congress also learned an important lesson from the Obama era. Many moderate Democrats shared a belief with the mainstream media that bipartisanship was both possible and necessary. Democrats in Congress squandered much of their time pursuing fruitless negotiations with Republicans, chasing a deal they were sure lay just around the corner. Only in retrospect did they realize that Republicans were stringing them along to allow opposition to build while they ran out the clock.
One of the biggest obstacles Obama faced in 2009 was the excessive confidence of his putative congressional allies that they could strike an agreement with Republicans. Biden’s congressional allies have fewer illusions about the incentives of their Republican counterparts.
Economic thinking itself has changed in important ways over the last decade. Economists previously feared that the federal government floating trillions of dollars in additional debt would cause interest rates to rise. (Indeed, this seems like a straightforward application of supply and demand.) Instead, interest rates have failed to budge, eliminating the austerity pressure that exerted such a powerful impact in the 1980s and 1990s.
This is the center piece of my House float. It’s a painting by a friend Rex. She does some nice work. All the people will have surgical masks and the assorted critters will have Mardi Gras masks. You have heard of the Mardi Gras Penguin? Right? Just have to get them all up.
I can say that the entire deficit fixation was more of a political fixation than economic thinking. Most main stream economists have know for some time that a deficit has a place in the policy box and that it’s necessary to run them up in desperate times. What the deficit chicken hawks showed was that even in good times deficits can be run up as long as it’s the name of tax cuts to businesses in the wealthy. This is anathema to any serious student of economics. But then, the proved what we though all along. Deficits are fine with they comport with Republican values like unnecessary. They’re just not to help regular Americans. That’s Roosevelt socialism!
Anyway, I’m off to grade and praying that my little laptop survives Dinah’s leap into my coffee cup disaster.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
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Happy Friday Sky Dancers!
Oh, and if you’re wondering, Why YES! I am actively ignoring the Trump side show on the senate floor today. They may not give him the guilty verdict but we know what he’s done and what he is not done and why things like the following are happening. 
As for Republicans and the political consequences impeachment poses for them? Politico wasn’t interested, and made no suggestion that the GOP stands at the crossroads regarding Trump and the murderous mob he inspired to ransack the U.S. Capitol. The GOP, apparently, faces no impeachment fallout, only Democrats.
House Democrats’ campaign apparatus deployed $500,000 for an advertising campaign tethering Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., the minority leader, and seven vulnerable House Republicans in districts President Joe Biden won last year to Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s 
At NPR, Nina Totenberg interviews that expert: 
The core issue is a president jeopardizing American democracy. For the first time since the republic was born, the United States did not experience a peaceful transfer of power following a presidential election. (Yes, there’s an asterisk for the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln that led six months later to the Civil War.) Trump spent weeks prior to the election plotting how to subvert it should he lose, and then he put his scheme in motion, pushing the big lie that massive fraud had occurred and a nefarious cabal had stolen his victory. He falsely declared victory before all the votes were counted. He and his allies refused to accept legitimate and certified results, filing frivolous lawsuits that were routinely tossed out and spreading baseless conspiracy theories. They lied—over and over—about vote tallies and supposed irregularities that did not exist. It was a psyop campaign, information warfare—similar to the covert attack waged against the 2016 election by Vladimir Putin. And evoking his infamous Ukraine phone conversation, Trump called Georgia state officials and pressured them to “find” him just enough votes to secure a victory in that state. Coercing local officials to falsify election results can be a crime.
Richard H. Pildes at The Atlantic: 
Good Day Sky Dancers!
It’s really hard to imagine that Republicans are still pushing free range herd immunity but pictures in Tampa Bay after the Super Bowl seem to show that it’s a different world out there in places with Republicans in charge. Our Mayor is doing everything possible to keep people out of the Quarter including closing bars down. Last night, however there was still a convergence to the bars all over. I watched the parade to bars by young white couples while walking Temple and chatting with my neighbor who already got her double dose as she hit the 70 year mark last year. I just don’t get how anything is more important than keep you and your healthy but I guess I’m officially on old coot now.
So, will we get another huge surge? Dr Fauci did say we need to keep an eye on those variants and some of the vaccines do better than others with them.
Trump’s team continues to argue that the Senate cannot impeach a former President. However, a top Republican lawyer has disagreed publicly. 
At this point I do not care who agrees that he can be impeached I just want to see his ass in place where he can never run for public office again. I’d also rather hear from the staffers who saw what he was saying and doing at the time. I never what to see his fat freaky face on TV again nor do I want to hear his icky voice.
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