They've already compromised their positions

Aldous J Pennyfarthing of Daily Kos listed several GOP leaders who were humiliated by the nasty guy – plus Mike Pence whom the nasty guy attempted to murder – yet they still stand by him.

Do Republicans feel some weird frisson of excitement when Trump brutally attacks or betrays them? Is this something we mere mortals simply can’t understand? Because if any of my bosses had ever treated me this disrespectfully, I’d have immediately FedEx’d them my company-issued gimp costume (without dry-cleaning it first!) and never spoken to them again. But Republicans keep coming back for more. Why?

As an example of the candidates for most gutless toady…

Despite knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that Trump is the human equivalent of dumpster sushi, Mitch McConnell gladly wolfed down every rancid, mealy bite for years.

Kos of Kos added that some of those toadies want us to forget they’re toadies. But …

I don’t think anyone doubts that Trump would be convicted by the Senate in a secret vote. The fact that Republicans couldn’t publicly pull the trigger is all the evidence you need that the Republican Party hasn’t moved past Trump or his supporters. They remain held in thrall by them. ... So yeah: Good luck, GQP, trying to pretend that they can move on and pretend Trump is irrelevant, and that their own actions enabling him to the very end should be shrugged off. No one is ready to move on.

As mentioned above Moscow Mitch is one of those toadies, though a bit more calculating than the rest, trying to have both sides. Hunter of Kos reported Mitch voted to acquit, then gave a big speech declaring the nasty guy was indeed guilty of all the things prosecutors said in the trial. Great speech, except for that vote to acquit and all that maneuvering to delay the trial until the nasty guy was out of office so being out of office could be used as an excuse not to convict. If you thought he’s guilty you should vote him guilty. But this type of action isn’t new. Hunter wrote:

This is the part of the well-worn program where Sen. Mitch McConnell knows a member of his party has done an unforgivable and evil thing, and thus prepares his dual defenses. To preserve party power and cultivate a base that has grown ever more willing to accept any crime in service to their cause, McConnell maneuvers to sabotage whatever accountability is being attempted. To preserve the money flow from donors horrified that the party would go so far—but who still count tax breaks and corporate deregulation as more urgent needs than flushing out white supremacist-laced, propaganda-fueled fascism—McConnell seeds stories about his personal frustration with the behavior, assures the donor class that he is absolutely not on board with the new horror he himself worked to protect.

Michel Martin of NPR talked to Jason Stanley, author of How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them. Part of their discussion was that the impeachment trial showed evidence on how close many senators were to danger during the attack on the Capitol. Martin asked:

So how, then, do you understand the fact that all of these people were witnesses and all of these people were in harm's way and that wasn't enough?

Stanley replied:

So Trump has been laying the basis for political violence for weeks, months and years. We know from the past that it doesn't happen immediately. It takes a while to happen. What we saw with the Republican Party is we saw this fealty to a leader. Everyone is talking about this. How could people whose very lives were placed in danger by the rhetoric of the commander in chief still shows such fealty to him? That's because they've already compromised their positions. And this is how a cult of the leader works. This is why we've gone beyond the ordinary Republican Party and we can start talking about something like fascism, because there's a cult of the leader, where even those who follow are so in thrall to the leader. And they've made so many compromises already, these kinds of loyalty compromises of accepting the lie, that they've themselves become compromised. And so they have to go down with the leader.

Jessica Sutherland of Kos gathered several tweets in reaction to the trial’s verdict. Here’s a few of them: From Irishrygirl:

House Managers did an amazing job proving Trump’s guilt. Republicans did an amazing job proving that they don’t care.

From Robert Reich:

To: President Joseph Biden From: Every American who saw what the GOP did today. Forget unity. Forget bipartisanship. Forget compromise. This is Trump's mob. Eliminate the filibuster and get everything America needs done now.

Joe Scarborough of NBC tweeted:

Donald Trump destroyed the Republican majority in the House, Senate, and their control of the White House. The vote to turn a blind eye to the instigation of sedition, cop killing, and treason will forever haunt their party and lead to their collapse. Remember this day.

To which Bree Newsome replied:

Ppl saying this are overlooking how Republicans are already at work to prevent next election. Y’all think you’re going to defeat them electorally because Americans are outraged but they’re not trying to win electorally. It’s going to be a raw power grab w/ more political violence.

Limericking tweeted:

Republicans, making their pick, Concluded acquitting him quick. They have no dispute They kneel at his boot; They want to continue to lick.

As several of my posts have shown I regularly, almost daily, read the Twitter feeds of Sarah Kendzior and Leah McElrath. I read Ben Franklin’s feed only occasionally, and when I do I usually want to quote a whole bunch of them. So, here we go. One: Franklin quoted Bree Newsome:

A lot of people still not ready to confront how the mob that attacked the Capitol included police officers, military members, folks with high security clearance & FBI informants, so there’s no way this was an intelligence “failure”. But I’m sure we’ll cross that bridge soon.

Then he replied:

I feel that the fact that the attack could not have happened without the help of the security apparatus is being lost in the court drama - our government is essentially in a civil war with itself. Certain factions within the government working directly with the GOP in an effort to kill democratically elected politicians who got in the way is too big a pill for most to swallow, in part because it’s precisely the mirror image of the GOP’s animating ideology. Yet, the facts.

Two:

Let me state the implications of Epstein, Craig Spence, and Larry King bluntly - the GOP establishment is filled with people who have been caught on tape committing sex crimes against kids, and the people in control of those tapes control those people. Just the facts. Everyone tries to quarantine these scandals from our discourse for misguided reasons but there are real consequences to it, beyond just the victims. These fully owned people aren’t free to do the right thing even in the most extreme circumstances. Some voted to acquit Trump today. These blackmail operations have been going on for decades which means that some of the people who have been caught up in have risen to the highest levels of power. To say this is a fringe statement is to reject all reporting and victim testimony. Illogical and wrong.

Three:

our greatest enemies at this point are not the republicans, but the fools and cowards who maintain the fiction that there is some sort of inevitable accountability coming to trump et al at the hands of a constantly shifting enforcer which has not yet appeared … as long as we continue to underestimate the will to power, the willingness and ability of our opponents to wield violence and lawlessness in service to their agenda, we will be like dodo birds waiting to be clubbed to death. in the end, all politics is physical. … the lesson should not be that somewhere in the wings there are heroes waiting to save us, the lesson is that we should recognize that we are in a moment of crisis and act - to become the heroes, not as superhumans but as ordinary humans doing our best under crisis circumstances

Four:

We are guaranteed another physical assault on the government now that it’s clear there were no consequences for the first one.

Five:

This is a government that is going to get overthrown, it's just a question of who does it.

Six:

Doesn’t matter if you catch them lying. Doesn’t matter if the truth is on your side. Doesn’t matter if you expose them. Only matters if you can hurt them. Otherwise it’s all just a joke to them, a joke on you for thinking otherwise.

Ari Berman, who speaks on voting rights, tweeted:

Shocking stat: 57 senators who voted to convict Trump represent 76.7 MILLION more Americans than 43 senators who voted to acquit Senators voting to impeach represent 61.6% of Americans (202 million) Senators voting to acquit represent 38.2% of Americans (125 million) Via @atausanovitch

Alas, that’s still not 2/3. Now to relax. Eric Whitacre is a contemporary choral composer and he writes some gorgeous stuff! He has also been doing virtual choirs and did so way before the pandemic. For each he sent out the music and asked each participant to video themselves singing their part as they listen to a guide track and watch him direct. He and his team then combined the audio into a massive choir that sounds like they’re in a cathedral and the video into a massive Zoom grid (though Zoom wasn’t a thing when he started). The first one was ten years ago (!) and featured 185 singers from 12 countries. They sang his piece “Lux Arumque” (light of gold). It’s gotten 6.6 million views. I had seen and heard this particular video before. I enjoyed hearing it again. The second one was the following year. It had 2052 participants from 58 countries. They sang his piece “Sleep.” It’s a nice piece, but I don’t think it’s as good as some of this other pieces. The last four minutes of the video are the credits, listing all the singers. I had heard the piece, but not in this format. The third was “Water Night” and included 3736 singers from 73 countries. This one was from 2012. The credits take six minutes. I hadn’t heard this one before and didn’t enjoy it as much as the others. The fourth was “Fly to Paradise” sung by 5,905 singers from 101 countries. This one featured animation and had a bit of story to go with it. That made it more interesting. There were also soloists and instruments, more of a pop feel. It’s had almost 2.5 million views. I had seen this one before. Credits took 8 minutes. The fifth was done in 2018 and is titled “Deep Field, the Impossible Magnitude of Our Universe.” This begins as an orchestral piece with video of stars, including the Milky Way, moon, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, sun, various nebulas, and galaxies, all beautiful images. The choir comes in at minute 19, singing without words as we see Earth from space. The music is 23 minutes, then six minutes of credits. There are more than 8,000 singers from 120 countries. This one was a lot more ambitious in the music (full orchestra and longer) and in the imagery. I hadn’t seen it before. Now to the reason why I delved into all this. Virtual Choir 6 came out last July. This one is “Sing Gently” (full words are in one of the comments). The choir is 17,572 people from 129 countries. The music is wonderful and the imagery is critically important for this time. I encountered it yesterday and knew I had to share. In this one they even credit ASL interpreters, though they’re not always visible. I’ve watched the video, then played again, not watching, just to listen to the music. Just … relax.