Could have been a big, juicy, scandalous, civics lesson for America

There was news of a snowstorm crossing Texas, so I took a look at the Weather Underground map. Dallas and Fort Worth are in the thick of it. Even Austin is getting dusted. And Detroit is warmer than Dallas!

I am a contributor to Gaslit Nation on Patreon (their host platform) and can get the bonus episodes. I rarely listen to them. I haven’t blogged about them before because there isn’t a transcript and because for you to get more than my summary you have to be a Patreon contributor (which is a good thing). I’m interested in this half-hour episode because Sarah Kendzior and Andrea Chalupa recorded it the same day as (the title tells us) Republicans Acquit Trump. It is unedited, so profanity is included. I eventually figured out the first speaker was Kendzior. The first delight for those who want transparency was the news that there would be witnesses. When something as violent as the Capitol attack with democracy in the balance, we want as much evidence as possible. We also want firsthand accounts to get a timeline of what happened and to get the trauma of those who were affected. Yes, some of that was in the presentations, but it was second-hand. The American public needed those first-hand accounts and every trial lawyer knows the power of witnesses. These witnesses were opposed by the Democratic leadership. It would have been possible to have witnesses at the trial, lengthening its duration, and also still conduct Senate business. The claim to the contrary is a lie. So a big disappointment that there would not be witnesses. Which sounds like another case of Democrats snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The were about to fight for us and for democracy, but then didn’t. It made no sense to wrap up in less than a week a trial about sedition and insurrection, something that struck at the very core of our democracy. Who made this decision? Lead prosecutor Jamie Raskin said it was his. But such reversals are common under this Democratic leadership. One thing that happened between the vote for witnesses and the statement that there wouldn’t be any was that the GOP (Cruz?) wanted Speaker Nancy Pelosi be one of the witnesses. After Pelosi’s office was entered, her laptop stolen, and her life threatened, one would expect her to jump at the chance to face down GOP senators. Perhaps one reason why the Capitol Police were unprepared was because of something Pelosi did (even if the greater blame goes to the nasty guy)? And why was Chuck Schumer, head of the Democrats in the Senate, so eager to go on vacation? Democrats need new leadership. There was such a gap between the quality of work by the impeachment managers and that of the Democratic leadership. On to Chalupa speaking: If you’re too tired to fight, if you really need that vacation, Dem leadership, step aside and let others be the Nazi hunters. We’re trying to stop the second, more successful coup. The nasty guy and his movement are coming back. If you can’t face a subpoena and be cross examined, you should not be in power right now. There needs to be accountability on the Democrat side. They had a chance to hold some compelling reality TV (the nasty guy’s background) with a big, juicy, scandalous, civics lesson for America. Many Americans have the opinion that if the nasty guy’s background is as bad as some people say somebody would have done something about it. A big juicy TV production could have said look, here we are finally explaining why the nasty guy is so bad. This could have been the accountability that is needed. Of course the GOP was going to bring in all the low-life witnesses and turn the whole thing into a circus. Of course they were. But if you can’t face that, step aside and let someone else, who has snarling teeth, face them. Dems need to go to war because the GOP has already shown they are at war with Dems. We all deserve a better better government, one that gives us safety from the violence and offers accountability. Kendzior: The Democrats could have rejected each of the bad faith witnesses called by the GOP. The Dems could have controlled the circus. For them to give it up was emotionally devastating. A preemptive surrender in the face of autocracy is permanent surrender. This erodes trust and could lead a lot of people to give up on Democrats. We know the GOP is attacking the country, but it’s dispiriting when the people we have to rely on don’t come through, especially after several days of showing such confidence. Chalupa: Why are Democrats afraid of their power? Is it because they’re up against the nasty guy mafia? Are they complicit, taking money from the same (foreign) donors? The current fear of power smells of Pelosi. Schumer cringes like one beaten into submission. Kendzior: A recent article showed a birthday party for Roy Cohn in the 1970s was attended by mafia families (whom Cohn was representing), a young nasty guy, … and Chuck Schumer. That means at least Schumer’s finances should be checked. News keeps leaving out

Trump is a Kremlin asset. Trump is a career criminal. Trump has been working with transnational organized crime since Roy Cohn introduced him to that world in the 1970s and he never stopped and he brought all of those elements into government, where many of them were already there.

These are the baseline things that should have been brought up in the trial. GOP complicity should also have been brought up. Each of the potential witnesses before the first impeachment trial were threatened. Is that way Democrats caved on witnesses? Are various GOP members of Congress acting like nasty guy lapdogs because they’ve been threatened or compromised? And no one wants to talk about it. The impeachment trial was a place to talk about it. The Capitol coup would not have been possible without the transnational crime syndicate. The nasty guy called for violence – that’s what this trial was all about. The case would have been a lot stronger if the prosecutors had examined the links between the nasty guy and the insurrection leaders. This included Roger Stone, who met with the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers. Michael Flynn was the QAnon hype man. Steve Bannon, though his podcast, promoted violence and government overthrow, and named the date. That alone would have been incriminating. Stone, Flynn, and Bannon are convicted felons who had been pardoned by the nasty guy so they would be available to do those jobs. Linn Wood was the nasty guy’s personal lawyer and was banned on Twitter for promoting insurrection, the most blatant actor directly linked to the nasty guy. Wood was doing it because Stone had already been banned. The responses were first do we really need to do this? And Wood argued that yes, it was necessary. Wood was a big liaison to these violent actors, even suggesting the nasty guy would bail them out and they wouldn’t go to jail. So why was all that left out of the trial? Chalupa: So when, over the next week, Democrats offer various excuses on why they conducted the trial the way they did, recognize it does not hold up. The Democrats controlled the strategy, which was a massively missed opportunity with democracy on the line. The Republicans turning the trial into a circus works in the Democrat’s favor because they would have been shown as the adults in the room. Midterm elections tend to be a backlash. That campaign for 2022 begins now. If the GOP takes back either chamber they’ll turn it into a massive investigation into every little thing Democrats ever did (and, as I heard elsewhere, impeach Biden). There’s no point in presurrendering. Their lives will be hell anyway. So what are you afraid of? Our democracy is up to us.