Absolutely love how many Republicans stood up in front of the country and said, "Did the president lose? Yes. Did he lie about it? Constantly to this day. Did these lies endanger us? Physically and spiritually. Is he responsible for that? Yes. Will we do anything about it? No."
Then there were the Republicans who stood up and just read "Chuck Norris facts" with Donald Trump's name subbed in. We don't have a vaccine; Donald Trump built a wall for your immune system. Donald Trump didn't just fight MS 13, he fought MS 1 through 12 at the same time.
And somewhere in between were the ones who, predictably, just wanted to talk about what they thought was wrong with Democrats, as though the election *didn't* end and they're still running against them.
Which I guess is what's happening, in their minds.
But my favorite are the ones who spent a minute or more laying out just how much Trump sucks and how much responsibility he personally bears for what happened, only to veer at the end and say "but it would be wrong to hold him accountable."
Some of them literally said he was responsible before denying accountability. What is that? Responsibility without accountability. In what way is he responsible, if he's not accountable? That's just... absolute power.
Which, again, is I guess where their mind is. Why wouldn't Trump have absolute power? He's a Republican.
I sincerely hope the Democrats at least consider the wisdom of quoting from some of those Republican floor speeches when they make the case to the Senate because it demonstrates even a lot of the nays understand what Trump did and how it's wrong.
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It's hard to make out in that picture, but I'm pretty sure this mask says "molon labe", the quick and dirty romanization of the Spartans' "come and take them" and a popular rallying cry for murdertoy enthusiasts.
When I say this is a stunt I don't mean to trivialize it; she's trying to enhance a pre-existing narrative that Congress is exactly the kind of tyrants that our country revolted against at its inception.
But she created this scene for maximum calculated effect.
I don't care to try to parse out what the worst is, but him firing Comey and bragging about why he did it should have been enough for the country and for Congress.
And you know, just yesterday I told Comey to shut up forever and I meant it. I don't say this because I'm a fan of Comey. Comey *should* have faced more consequences than he did.
The right loves to play the game of "Oh you all hated Comey until Trump fired him and now you think he's an angel who could do no wrong." Nah. Fire Comey and Trump both.
The good news and bad news is that presidential libraries are privately funded, so we can't stop him from having one but we don't have to pay for it. He can grift his followers for it.
Which makes the obvious answer for the "Where will Trump's library be?" on one of his own properties, assuming he can hang onto them. That makes it easier for him to funnel donated funds into his own personal uses.
I went to a Hollywood wax museum in Branson, Missouri (Christian Vegas) that used a Charlton Heston exhibit just before the end to segue into "But the real leading man is Jesus Christ" and I kind of envision something like that but with Donald Trump.
So Ben Shapiro wants to know what the difference between Donald Trump saying the election was stolen and Stacey Abrams saying she was a victim of voter suppression is.
Donald Trump tried to coerce government officials and sent an angry mob to overturn the results.
Stacey Abrams did not do that. She acknowledged that Kemp was the winner under the system we have, and then went on to dedicate herself to the hard work of overcoming the bias built into the system in order to gain enough power to correct it.
There is also the fact that Stacey Abrams is right and Donald Trump is wrong, but for me the question Ben is asking is more about what they do. We can't fully rule out the possibility that Trump sincerely believes he's right, too.
I'm simultaneously shaking my head at the utter naive fabulism of imagining they could "arrest" congresspeople with no guns and the cynical ruthlessness of thinking the could sway Congress floor votes by implying they're killing reps.
I just... I'm trying to imagine the headspace of someone who believes they could rush the floor of Congress and abduct people off it and that they would then be left alone *and* Congress would keep counting votes and voting on accepting votes after that point.
And I want to say that there's no way a person could sincerely put that forward and this therefore is somebody who was trying to encourage people to storm the capitol by spinning out a non-violent fairytale where they get the vote overturned by "keeping them honest".
So Republicans purport to want to know what's the difference between Democrats and other politicians talking about "let's get out there and fight" and when Trump does it, and the answer is simple:
Trump has put in the work with his base so they'll understand him to mean violence
Early on in his political career, Donald Trump spoke glowingly of police roughing up suspects. He's directed violence towards protesters and reporters in his crowd. He's spoken about the need to "get tough" and made it clear he means physically.
It's true, there is a lot of metaphorical and hyperbolic talk about fighting in politics, and maybe post-Trump we'll see people back off from that for a bit, I don't know. Couldn't say.
But Trump took the time to clarify over the years that he's not being metaphorical.