US Politics

This is all about forcing Republicans to own as much as this shit as possible. Rubbing their noses in it.

This is the game for sure. If they’re going to vote along party lines - have them own as much dirt as possible.

Well, that didn't last long. dubtap-style partial info tease, go and Google it yourself

Reading the twitter points put up on the guardian live feed, the democrats are taking a battering for not calling witnesses when they won the chance to do so.
But if the republicans are going to vote not to impeach what would the point be?
Seems like that are damned if they do, damned if they don’t..

They’ve all got holidays booked next week, it a recess

Yeah but I’d give the republicans a good kicking for making this a foregone conclusion rather than the democrats for not stretching it out for as long as possible to still get the republicans not voting to impeach trump..

Trump won, great. The only double innocent president or something.

This is what I’m talking about. What would calling witnesses have achieved? If this is the position of McConnell and his republican cohorts.

Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said on Saturday that Donald Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for the insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January – minutes after voting to acquit the former president in his impeachment trial for that very same act.
McConnell, like the Senators who voted in favor of impeachment, was deeply critical of Trump’s conduct leading up to the attack. “They [the mob] did this because they’d been fed wild falsehoods by the most powerful man on Earth because he was angry he lost an election,” McConnell said.

But McConnell argued the Senate could not convict Trump because he had left office before the Senate trial began – a timeline McConnell orchestrated as Senate majority leader after refusing Democrats’ requests to call the Senate into an emergency session in January.

From this article
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/13/mitch-mcconnell-trump-republicans?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Yet it appears that McConnell and his cohort are experiencing zero cognitive dissonance, it all makes perfect sense and is a totally reasonable stance in their warped world.

And that's before getting to the "we acquitted because this impeachment was unconstitutional" despite the vote only days before that it was constitutional.....

This is not going to end well. Wait until some truely evil, and smarter president comes into power.

Yeah, it’s ridiculous. It means any ex-president is effectively unaccountable, in that in the month before leaving office he can do any old mad shit and not be held responsible for it.

We all knew he’d never be impeached, I can only think the idea was to try and show the republicans up for the shitshow they are, which has happened.

They can still face criminal prosecution, as McConnell alluded to.

just reminds me of the quote: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
Are the republicans who voted against impeachment, even though they know Trump incited that insurrection "good men"?
Are those lining up to make a presidential run in 2024 Cruz, Hawley, Rubio, "good men"?

This just makes me so angry, in terms of their bad faith arguments, whataboutism, and the blatant white privilege inherent in voting against impeachment for their own advancement. If this isn't a sign that Biden's hope for working with republicans and a return to bipartisanship won't work I don't know what is.
I'm also hoping that these republican's are put to the sword come the midterms and no one lets them forget that they voted to acquit trump, that it's a stick used to beat individual politicians and the party for the foreseeable.

Yet it appears that McConnell and his cohort are experiencing zero cognitive dissonance, it all makes perfect sense and is a totally reasonable stance in their warped world.

I wonder if there’s an actual medical condition where someone’s capacity to feel cognitive dissonance is lower than the norm.

They’re Machiavellian. Any amount of lies and criminality are justified if it helps them achieve their end goals: retain and increase their power. They’ll readily play with the hellfire that is a politically active trump as long as they judge it ultimately benefits them.

Sociopathy?

Mrs JJ72 reminded me of this -

Why do so many people take an instant dislike to Ted Cruz?

Because it saves time.

Lol’d!

I did wonder whether there was something I was missing in that saying that an ex-president couldn't be impeached was also removing presidential immunity in some way.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/us/politics/adam-kinzinger-republicans-trump.html

Members of his family wrote a letter saying he should be removed from office for voting against Trump - he's a conservative Republican, by the way.
The letter includes the following criticism:
You should be very proud that you have lost the respect of Lou Dobbs, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham Meg Kelly etc, and most importantly, in our book, Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh and us!

all that matter is the midterms.
and voter suppression leading up to that point.

(not a very useful comment, but it's what I've been thinking about)

I do love how they preach about God so much and ignore that Trump doesn't give a fuck about religion.

Rush Limbaugh, pioneer of extremist propaganda and hate speech masquerading as news radio, has bitten the dust.
https://www.reuters.com/article/BigStory12/idUSKBN2AH2G5

Hope the door doesn’t hit him on the way out.

^ excellent

Net worth of $600 million dollars. Guess he’s redistributing the wealth after all.