I’m not feeling well today, so I’m just posting this as an open thread. Don’t worry, it’s not Covid; I’m having an issue with a condition I’m being treated for and I’m in touch with my doctor. Some stories to check out:
Have not heard many Democrats confront the evolution of the Trump-era GOP as candidly as Jamie Raskin does to @michelleinbklyn here: "more likely, they will become an autocratic political party that really does operate like a religious cult.” https://t.co/meFjODoihN
A WINTER NOT-SO-WONDERFUL LAND: Severe winter weather has sparked emergency declarations in at least seven states, including Alabama, Oregon, Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and Texas — which has borne the brunt of the cold weather. https://t.co/7xB0YhJxlE
Local GOP leaders are censoring Congresspeople who supported impeachment or conviction. This is incredible.
Actual quote from a PA GOP official, explaining why Sen. Toomey should be censured: “We did not send him there to vote his conscience. We did not send him there to ‘do the right thing’ or whatever” pic.twitter.com/p0sA960GEp
A new profile on Congressman Adam Kinzinger, one of the few House Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump, reveals that several family members actually sent him a handwritten letter criticizing his condemnation of the former president’s actions that led to the riots at the Capitol.
Kinzinger spoke to the New York Times about his efforts to get the GOP to move on from Trump, but the report also highlights how he’s received criticism not just from fellow Republicans but from family members.
The letter reads in part, “Oh my, what a disappointment you are to us and to God!… You have embarrassed the Kinzinger family name!”
The Times says this letter — which accuses him of joining the “devil’s army” — came from 11 members of his family.
At one point the letter says, “You should be very proud that you have lost the respect of Lou Dobbs, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Greg Kelly, etc., and most importantly in our book, Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh and us!”
Here we are again with another set of winter storms pummeling the country from sea to shining sea and also from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast. There’s a lot of other news too now that the second impeachment of Trump failed to bring a conviction. I’m not quite sure Republicans got what they wanted as they played to their White Nationalist Men(ace) base.
Americans’ desire for a third party has ticked up since last fall and now sits at a high in Gallup’s trend. Sixty-two percent of U.S. adults say the “parties do such a poor job representing the American people that a third party is needed,” an increase from 57% in September. Support for a third party has been elevated in recent years, including readings of 60% in 2013 and 2015 and 61% in 2017.
Meanwhile, 33% of Americans believe the two major political parties are doing an adequate job representing the public, the smallest percentage expressing this view apart from the 26% reading in October 2013.
The latest results are from a Jan. 21-Feb. 2 poll. The survey was conducted before recent news reports that dozens of government officials in prior Republican administrations were in discussions to form an anti-Donald Trump third political party.
On January 6, terrorists—encouraged by former President Donald Trump and enabled by his Republican supporters in Congress—attacked the United States Capitol. And as they came for the republic, they also came for something else: Beltway journalists.
This is true in the literal sense, as rioters etched “Murder the Media” into a Capitol door. But it is also true in a more challenging philosophical sense, as this violence imploded at the very altar of political journalism: the shrine of detached, “both-sides” reportage erected by media outlets to avoid specious accusations of bias and provide cover for Republican politics that were, at best, deeply shameful and, at worst, lethally illiberal.
Mainstream media editors of political coverage in Washington are at a crossroads, though they may not yet have fully realized their predicament. After years of investing in an approach to politics popularly characterized as the “view from nowhere”—in which “objectivity” is performed by reporters as a “he said, she said” dance without regard to either news value or truth—they have had their once-comfortable performance space invaded by the rioters. To move forward from here without confronting the long-deflating bubble of “both-sides” journalism, which is profitable for the D.C. book party circuit but ill-suited to maintaining both good government and a public trust in the media, is to ensure that illiberalism will continue to flourish.
It’s a bit of a long read so hunker down with a blanket and cuppa. So, if you’re like me and awaiting your second dose of a vaccine you may want to check out this article in The Atlantic.
— Irwin H Berkowitz MD 🌊, FBR, Proud Democrat, 🇺🇸, 😷 (@IHB_MD) February 15, 2021
cover art from “Dead Love Has Chains” (1907)
I keep being warned about this from some friends.
When the immune system detects a virus, it will dispatch cells and molecules to memorize its features so it can be fought off more swiftly in the future. Vaccines impart these same lessons without involving the disease-causing pathogen itself—the immunological equivalent of training wheels or water wings.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines accomplish that pedagogy via a genetic molecule called mRNA that’s naturally found in human cells. Once delivered into the upper arm, the mRNA instructs the body’s own cells to produce a coronavirus protein called spike—a molecule that elicits powerful, infection-fighting antibody responses in people battling COVID-19.
To ensure safe passage of mRNA into cells, the vaccine makers swathed the molecules in greasy bubbles called lipid nanoparticles. These strange, fatty spheres don’t resemble anything naturally present in the body, and they trip the sensors of a cavalry of fast-acting immune cells, called innate immune cells, that patrol the body for foreign matter. Once they spot the nanoparticles, these cells dispatch molecular alarms called cytokines that recruit other immune cells to the site of injection. Marshaling these reinforcements is important, but the influx of cells and molecules makes the upper arm swollen and sore. The congregating cells spew out more cytokines still, flooding the rest of the body with signals that can seed system-wide symptoms such as fever and fatigue.
“It’s the body’s knee-jerk reaction to an infection,” or something that looks like it, Mark Slifka, a vaccine expert and an immunologist at Oregon Health and Science University, told me. “Let’s spray the area down with antiviral cytokines, which also happen to be inflammatory.”
Claude Monet reading a newspaper, 1872 – by Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Don’t waste time mourning the Senate’s failure to convict Donald Trump for crimes so dramatically and painstakingly proven by the House impeachment managers. The cowardice of the vast majority of Republican senators was both predicted and predictable.
Led with extraordinary grace by Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.), a diverse and able group of prosecutors laid out an indelible record not only of what happened on Jan. 6 and why, but also Trump’s irresponsibility throughout his term of office: his courting of the violent far right; his celebration of violence; his habit of privileging himself and his own interests over everything and everyone else, including his unrequitedly loyal vice president.
This record matters. We often like to pretend that we can move on and forget the past. But our judgments about the past inevitably shape our future. Every political era is, in part, a reaction to the failures — perceived and real — of the previous one. The Hoover-Coolidge Republicans loomed large for two generations of Democrats. Ronald Reagan built a thriving movement by calling out what he successfully cast as the sins of liberalism.<
By tying themselves to Trump with their votes, most House and Senate Republicans made themselves complicit in his behavior. And Trump will prove to be even more of an albatross than Hoover, who, after all, had a moral core.
Given the chance to cast a vote making clear that what Trump did was reprehensible, only seven Republicans in the Senate and 10 in the House took the opportunity to do so.
But, then there is this.
The only way to prevent another Jan 6 type terrorist attack is by ensuring swift, certain and severe justice for all involved–especially the man whose rhetoric incited that attack: Donald J. Trump. My new @CNNOpinion article https://t.co/JKBdHjN9xk
I still want him and his family and his presidential library of porn in some wing of Fort Leavenworth.
President Joe Biden should follow his own sage advice from the statement he released hours after the “not guilty” vote by 43 Republican senators in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial led to his acquittal. Biden implored us to be vigilant in protecting our “fragile” democracy and noted that “each of us has a duty and responsibility as Americans, and especially as leaders, to defend the truth and to defeat the lies.”
To that end, the most effective way Biden can defend our fragile democracy is by calling for a full criminal investigation into the role Donald Trump played in the January 6 attack on our Capitol.
At the outset, let’s be 100% clear that no criminal prosecution should ever be commenced for political reasons. That’s illegal and truly un-American. Conversely, no prosecution should ever be rejected for political reasons either — such as hoping that by not prosecuting a political figure it will foster more “unity.” That approach is just as wrong.
But look at the facts surrounding the January 6 deadly attack, which appears to meet the legal definition of “domestic terrorism” since it was intended to “to intimidate or coerce a civilian population” and affect the conduct of government by measures that included mass destruction.
After this week’s impeachment trial, there’s no denying Trump’s significant role in inciting the attack on our Capitol. Even GOP Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell declared after the trial that, “Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day,” suggesting that Trump could indeed face criminal charges for his role in the attack.
“We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation,” said McConnell. “And former Presidents are not immune from being held accountable by either one.”
Have a great week Sky Dancers! Stay warm and dry!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
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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.
The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
Good Day Sky Dancers!
There also may be some indication that the press may give up the both-siderism that was a major part of getting Trump elected to begin with. T
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. 
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
mablue2
Mama Lopez
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
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