🏴‍☠️NO ACCOUNTABILITY: ONE YEAR AFTER PUBLICLY INSTIGATING A FAILED COUP, TRUMP CONTINUES TO OPENLY PLOT TO OVERTHROW DEMOCRACY, AS NEO-FASCIST GOP & ITS TOADY POLITICOS LINE UP BEHIND THE “BIG LIE!” — THE GOP, & THOSE WHO SUPPORT & ENABLE IT, HAS ACTUALLY BECOME THE BIGGEST THREAT TO THE FUTURE OF OUR REPUBLIC!🤮👎🏽🏴‍☠️

S.V. Date
Senior White House Correspondent
HuffPost
PHOTO: HuffPost

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-coup-attempt_n_61c2733fe4b04b42ab6602a2

SV Date on HuffPost:

WASHINGTON — What if you attempted a coup but people were unwilling to wrap their heads around what you had done?

A year after Jan. 6, 2021, that is the peculiar situation in which Donald Trump finds himself. Instead of being carted off in handcuffs for inciting an insurrection against the United States, or even just being banished from federal office for life by the Senate, the former president instead remains the leader of one of the two major political parties and is openly considering another run for the White House in 2024.

. . . .

*******************

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/05/capitol-attack-january-6-democracy-america-trump?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Cas Mudde on The Guardian:

The government is finally taking the threat of far-right militia groups seriously. But the larger threat are the Republican legislators who continue to recklessly undermine democracy

One year ago, he was frantically barricading the doors to the House gallery to keep out the violent mob. Today, he calls the insurrection a “bold-faced lie” and likens the event to “a normal tourist visit”. The story of Andrew Clyde, who represents part of my – heavily gerrymandered – liberal college town in the House of Representatives, is the story of the Republican party in 2021. It shows a party that had the opportunity to break with the anti-democratic course under Donald Trump, but was too weak in ideology and leadership to do so, thereby presenting a fundamental threat to US democracy in 2022 and beyond.

The risk of a coup in the next US election is greater now than it ever was under Trump | Laurence H Tribe

Clyde is illustrative of another ongoing development, the slow but steady takeover of the Republican party by new, and often relatively young, Trump supporters. In 2015, when his massive gun store on the outskirts of town was still flying the old flag of Georgia, which includes the Confederate flag, he was a lone, open supporter of then-presidential candidate Trump, with several large pro-Trump and anti-“fake news” signs adorning his gun store. Five years later, Clyde was elected to the House of Representatives as part of a wave of Trump-supporting novices, mostly replacing Republicans who had supported President Trump more strategically than ideologically.

With his 180-degree turn about the 6 January insurrection, Clyde is back in line with the majority of the Republican base, as a recent UMass poll shows. After initial shock, and broad condemnation, Republicans have embraced the people who stormed the Capitol last year, primarily referring to the event as a “protest” (80%) and to the insurrectionists as “protesters” (62%), while blaming the Democratic party (30%), the Capitol police (23%), and the inevitable antifa (20%) for what happened. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of Republicans (75%) believe the country should “move on” from 6 January, rather than learn from it. And although most don’t care either way, one-third of Republicans say they are more likely to vote for a candidate who refuses to denounce the insurrection.

Advertisement

Upgrade to Premium and enjoy the app ad-free.

Upgrade to Premium

The increased anti-democratic threat of the Republican party can also be seen in the tidal wave of voting restrictions proposed and passed in 2021. The Brennan Center for Justice counted a stunning 440 bills “with provisions that restrict voting access” introduced across all but one of the 50 US states, the highest number since the Center started tracking them 10 years ago. A total of 34 such laws were passed in 19 different states last year, and 88 bills in nine states are being carried over to the 2022 legislative term. Worryingly, Trump-backed Republicans who claim the 2020 election was stolen are running for secretary of state in various places where Trump unsuccessfully challenged the results.

. . . .

At the same time, the Republican party has become increasingly united and naked in its extremism, which denies both the anti-democratic character of the 6 January attack and the legitimacy of Biden’s presidency, and is passing an unprecedented number of voter restriction bills in preparation for the 2022 midterms and 2024 presidential elections. As long as the White House mainly focuses on fighting “domestic violent extremism”, and largely ignores or minimizes the much more lethal threat to US democracy posed by non-violent extremists, the US will continue to move closer and closer to an authoritarian future.

***************************

You can read both articles in full at the above links.

If you are counting on AG Merrick Garland to “lead the charge” on establishing accountability, your optimism might be tempered by his own failure to “clean house” at DOJ and in particular by his failure to reform his wholly-owned Immigration Court system that was front and center in assisting and carrying out the Trump/Miller White Nationalist assault on the rule of law, primarily targeting individuals of color and the “world’s most vulnerable” seeking justice in our system.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-06-22

🏴‍☠️☠️🤮GOP TREASON! — AS TRAITORS TRUMP🦹🏿‍♂️, REP. SCOTT PERRY (R-PA)🦹🏿‍♂️, & DOJ POLITICAL HACK JEFFREY CLARK 🦹🏿‍♂️ PLOTTED TO OVERTHROW ELECTION RESULTS & FILE FRIVOLOUS LITIGATION AT SUPREMES, DESPERATE OFFICIALS THWARTED PLOT FOR DOJ TAKEOVER, BUT THEN FAILED TO REPORT IT TO PUBLIC, CONGRESS, OR VICE PRESIDENT! — Failing To Report Threat Against Nation’s Security, Covering For President Plotting Treason Is Crime! — The 25th Amendment Should Have Been Invoked! — Conviction Of Trump, Life Bar From Office Should Be Immediate & Unanimous Following Expulsion Of Perry & Other GOP Traitors Who Promoted (& Continue To Promote) Fraudulent Attempts To Undermine Elections & Democracy!

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/23/us/politics/scott-perry-trump-justice-department-election.html

From The NY Times:

Pennsylvania Lawmaker Played Key Role in Trump’s Plot to Oust Acting Attorney General

The congressman’s involvement underlined how far the former president was willing to go to overturn the election, and Democratic lawmakers are beginning to call for investigations into those efforts.

Representative Scott Perry first made President Donald J. Trump aware that a relatively obscure Justice Department official was sympathetic to Mr. Trump’s view that the election had been stolen.

Credit…

Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York Times

By Katie Benner and Catie Edmondson

Jan. 23, 2021
Updated 10:15 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON — When Representative Scott Perry joined his colleagues in a monthslong campaign to undermine the results of the presidential election, promoting “Stop the Steal” events and supporting an attempt to overturn millions of legally cast votes, he often took a back seat to higher-profile loyalists in President Donald J. Trump’s orbit.

But Mr. Perry, an outspoken Pennsylvania Republican, played a significant role in the crisis that played out at the top of the Justice Department this month, when Mr. Trump considered firing the acting attorney general and backed down only after top department officials threatened to resign en masse.

It was Mr. Perry, a member of the hard-line Freedom Caucus, who first made Mr. Trump aware that a relatively obscure Justice Department official, Jeffrey Clark, the acting chief of the civil division, was sympathetic to Mr. Trump’s view that the election had been stolen, according to former administration officials who spoke with Mr. Clark and Mr. Trump.

Mr. Perry introduced the president to Mr. Clark, whose openness to conspiracy theories about election fraud presented Mr. Trump with a welcome change from the acting attorney general, Jeffrey A. Rosen, who stood by the results of the election and had repeatedly resisted the president’s efforts to undo them.

Mr. Perry’s previously unreported role, and the quiet discussions between Mr. Trump and Mr. Clark that followed, underlined how much the former president was willing to use the government to subvert the election, turning to more junior and relatively unknown figures for help as ranking Republicans and cabinet members rebuffed him.

Mr. Perry’s involvement is also likely to heighten scrutiny of House Republicans who continue to advance Mr. Trump’s false and thoroughly debunked claims of election fraud, even after President Biden’s inauguration this week and as Congress prepares for an impeachment trial that will examine whether such talk incited the Capitol riot.

It is unclear when Mr. Perry, who represents the Harrisburg area, met Mr. Clark, a Philadelphia native, or how well they knew each another before the introduction to Mr. Trump. Former Trump administration officials said that it was only in late December that Mr. Clark told Mr. Rosen about the introduction brokered by Mr. Perry, who was among the scores of people feeding Mr. Trump false hope that he had won the election.

But it is highly unlikely that Mr. Trump would have known Mr. Clark otherwise. Department officials were startled to learn that the president had called Mr. Clark directly on multiple occasions and that the two had met in person without alerting Mr. Rosen, those officials said. Justice Department policy stipulates that the president initially communicates with the attorney general or the deputy attorney general on all matters, and then a lower-level official if authorized.

As the date for Congress to affirm Mr. Biden’s victory neared, Mr. Perry and Mr. Clark discussed a plan to have the Justice Department send a letter to Georgia state lawmakers informing them of an investigation into voter fraud that could invalidate the state’s Electoral College results. Former officials who were briefed on the plan said that the department’s dozens of voter fraud investigations nationwide had not turned up enough instances of fraud to alter the outcome of the election.

Mr. Perry and Mr. Clark also discussed the plan with Mr. Trump, setting off a chain of events that nearly led to the ouster of Mr. Rosen, who had refused to send the letter.

After The New York Times disclosed the details of the scheme on Friday, the political fallout was swift. Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois and the incoming chairman of the Judiciary Committee, told the Justice Department in a letter on Saturday that he would investigate efforts by Mr. Trump and Mr. Clark to use the agency “to further Trump’s efforts to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election.”

. . . .

**************

Uh, seems like criminal schemes to interfere with free and fair elections, manufacture false claims, pressure Government officials to falsely endorse clearly baseless claims, file bogus suits before Supremes are acts of treason, even if eventually thwarted!

“The beginnings of a Congressional investigation by Dems” seems like a totally inadequate response! These are crimes, and all who participated, particularly Trump, Perry, and Clark belong behind bars. Action should also be taken against the officials who stopped them, but failed to disclose the plot to those who might have taken immediate action to remove the unhinged, patently unqualified to serve Traitor/President.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever! Treason & Insurrection, Never! No “Bogus Unity” With Insurrectionists!

PWS

01-23-21

🏴‍☠️HISTORY & THE GOP PARTY OF TREASON — “The lie outlasts the liar.” — Historian Professor Timothy Snyder On Why The GOP Is, & Will Remain, A Repudiation Of & An Existential Threat To Truth & Our Democracy!

Timothy Snyder (Professor für Geschichte, Yale University), Foto: www.stephan-roehl.de — Timothy Snyder (Professor of History, Yale University), Photo: www.stephan-roehl.de
Creative Commons License

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/magazine/trump-coup.html?referringSource=articleShare

From The NY Times:
. . . . .

The lie outlasts the liar.

The idea that Germany lost the First World War in 1918 because of a Jewish “stab in the back” was 15 years old when Hitler came to power. How will Trump’s myth of victimhood function in American life 15 years from now? And to whose benefit?

On Jan. 7, Trump called for a peaceful transition of power, implicitly conceding that his putsch had failed. Even then, though, he repeated and even amplified his electoral fiction: It was now a sacred cause for which people had sacrificed. Trump’s imagined stab in the back will live on chiefly thanks to its endorsement by members of Congress. In November and December 2020, Republicans repeated it, giving it a life it would not otherwise have had. In retrospect, it now seems as though the last shaky compromise between the gamers and the breakers was the idea that Trump should have every chance to prove that wrong had been done to him. That position implicitly endorsed the big lie for Trump supporters who were inclined to believe it. It failed to restrain Trump, whose big lie only grew bigger.

The breakers and the gamers then saw a different world ahead, where the big lie was either a treasure to be had or a danger to be avoided. The breakers had no choice but to rush to be first to claim to believe in it. Because the breakers Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz must compete to claim the brimstone and bile, the gamers were forced to reveal their own hand, and the division within the Republican coalition became visible on Jan. 6. The invasion of the Capitol only reinforced this division. To be sure, a few senators withdrew their objections, but Cruz and Hawley moved forward anyway, along with six other senators. More than 100 representatives doubled down on the big lie. Some, like Matt Gaetz, even added their own flourishes, such as the claim that the mob was led not by Trump’s supporters but by his opponents.

Trump is, for now, the martyr in chief, the high priest of the big lie. He is the leader of the breakers, at least in the minds of his supporters. By now, the gamers do not want Trump around. Discredited in his last weeks, he is useless; shorn of the obligations of the presidency, he will become embarrassing again, much as he was in 2015. Unable to provide cover for their gamesmanship, he will be irrelevant to their daily purposes. But the breakers have an even stronger reason to see Trump disappear: It is impossible to inherit from someone who is still around. Seizing Trump’s big lie might appear to be a gesture of support. In fact it expresses a wish for his political death. Transforming the myth from one about Trump to one about the nation will be easier when he is out of the way.

As Cruz and Hawley may learn, to tell the big lie is to be owned by it. Just because you have sold your soul does not mean that you have driven a hard bargain. Hawley shies from no level of hypocrisy; the son of a banker, educated at Stanford University and Yale Law School, he denounces elites. Insofar as Cruz was thought to have a principle, it was that of states’ rights, which Trump’s calls to action brazenly violated. A joint statement Cruz issued about the senators’ challenge to the vote nicely captured the post-truth aspect of the whole: It never alleged that there was fraud, only that there were allegations of fraud. Allegations of allegations, allegations all the way down.

Image

The big lie requires commitment. When Republican gamers do not exhibit enough of that, Republican breakers call them “RINOs”: Republicans in name only. This term once suggested a lack of ideological commitment. It now means an unwillingness to throw away an election. The gamers, in response, close ranks around the Constitution and speak of principles and traditions. The breakers must all know (with the possible exception of the Alabama senator Tommy Tuberville) that they are participating in a sham, but they will have an audience of tens of millions who do not.

If Trump remains present in American political life, he will surely repeat his big lie incessantly. Hawley and Cruz and the other breakers share responsibility for where this leads. Cruz and Hawley seem to be running for president. Yet what does it mean to be a candidate for office and denounce voting? If you claim that the other side has cheated, and your supporters believe you, they will expect you to cheat yourself. By defending Trump’s big lie on Jan. 6, they set a precedent: A Republican presidential candidate who loses an election should be appointed anyway by Congress. Republicans in the future, at least breaker candidates for president, will presumably have a Plan A, to win and win, and a Plan B, to lose and win. No fraud is necessary; only allegations that there are allegations of fraud. Truth is to be replaced by spectacle, facts by faith.

Trump’s coup attempt of 2020-21, like other failed coup attempts, is a warning for those who care about the rule of law and a lesson for those who do not. His pre-fascism revealed a possibility for American politics. For a coup to work in 2024, the breakers will require something that Trump never quite had: an angry minority, organized for nationwide violence, ready to add intimidation to an election. Four years of amplifying a big lie just might get them this. To claim that the other side stole an election is to promise to steal one yourself. It is also to claim that the other side deserves to be punished.

Informed observers inside and outside government agree that right-wing white supremacism is the greatest terrorist threat to the United States. Gun sales in 2020 hit an astonishing high. History shows that political violence follows when prominent leaders of major political parties openly embrace paranoia.

Our big lie is typically American, wrapped in our odd electoral system, depending upon our particular traditions of racism. Yet our big lie is also structurally fascist, with its extreme mendacity, its conspiratorial thinking, its reversal of perpetrators and victims and its implication that the world is divided into us and them. To keep it going for four years courts terrorism and assassination.

When that violence comes, the breakers will have to react. If they embrace it, they become the fascist faction. The Republican Party will be divided, at least for a time. One can of course imagine a dismal reunification: A breaker candidate loses a narrow presidential election in November 2024 and cries fraud, the Republicans win both houses of Congress and rioters in the street, educated by four years of the big lie, demand what they see as justice. Would the gamers stand on principle if those were the circumstances of Jan. 6, 2025?

To be sure, this moment is also a chance. It is possible that a divided Republican Party might better serve American democracy; that the gamers, separated from the breakers, might start to think of policy as a way to win elections. It is very likely that the Biden-Harris administration will have an easier first few months than expected; perhaps obstructionism will give way, at least among a few Republicans and for a short time, to a moment of self-questioning. Politicians who want Trumpism to end have a simple way forward: Tell the truth about the election.

America will not survive the big lie just because a liar is separated from power. It will need a thoughtful repluralization of media and a commitment to facts as a public good. The racism structured into every aspect of the coup attempt is a call to heed our own history. Serious attention to the past helps us to see risks but also suggests future possibility. We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. Democracy is not about minimizing the vote nor ignoring it, neither a matter of gaming nor of breaking a system, but of accepting the equality of others, heeding their voices and counting their votes.

Timothy Snyder is the Levin professor of history at Yale University and the author of histories of political atrocity including “Bloodlands” and “Black Earth,” as well as the book “On Tyranny,” on America’s turn toward authoritarianism. His most recent book is “Our Malady,” a memoir of his own near-fatal illness reflecting on the relationship between health and freedom. Ashley Gilbertson is an Australian photojournalist with the VII Photo Agency living in New York. Gilbertson has covered migration and conflict internationally for over 20 years.

**********

Read Professor Snyder’s entire, rather lengthy, analysis at the link.

Democracy is under attack from one of our two major parties. It will take a concerted effort, determination, and courage by the majority of us to preserve our nation in the face of GOP led and enabled treason and insurrection that is fueled by their web of lies, racism, selfishness, and false narratives,

Tour the Holocaust Museum for a glimpse of the future of our nation if the GOP prevails!

Also, remember that as all the GOP-induced distracting disorder of this week roil Washington, 4,000 plus Americans a day, disproportionately African Americans and Latinos, continue to die, many unnecessarily, as a result of the “malicious incompetence,” false narratives, and anti-science, anti-American lies actively promoted and endorsed by Trump and his GOP party of treason!

Professor Snyder’s last sentence encapsulates my own view of what 21st Century American Democracy should look and act like:

We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. Democracy is not about minimizing the vote nor ignoring it, neither a matter of gaming nor of breaking a system, but of accepting the equality of others, heeding their voices and counting their votes.

I still hear GOP politicos falsely claim that “nobody could see this coming.” What total unadulterated BS! 💩 Trump planned and instigated this insurrection of thugs in public, even while his goons Cruz, Hawley, and McCarthy were actively promoting it in Congress and Moscow Mitch was more or less “in his shell” looking the other way. Many of us have been “calling out” GOP fascism for the last four years. A party that thrives on lies can’t survive truth!

🇺🇸🗽⚖️Due Process Forever! The GOP 🥷🏻⚰️☠️Never!

PWS

01-11-21

🏴‍☠️RNC CHAIR AND SYMBOL OF WHITE NATIONALIST PRIVILEGE RONNA McDANIEL, OTHER LEADING GOP TRAITORS, TAKE “TIME OUT” FROM INSURRECTION 🥷🏻 TO REAFFIRM LIES, RACISM, COMMITMENT TO TREASON AND ERADICATING AMERICAN DEMOCRACY!☠️👎🏻 — “That even after Wednesday’s events Republicans in Congress and in the media are still clinging to the ‘radical socialist agenda’ narrative shows they haven’t changed — though they are scurrying to launder their tattered reputations.”

TRUMP MAGA MORONS — Attribution: MAGA Hatters by Pat Bagley, The Salt Lake Tribune, UT
Republished under license

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-01-08/republican-party-extremism-insurrection-capitol

Kurt Bardella in the LA Times:

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel was unanimously reelected on Friday for another term. Her message to the party: “I am mad and I’m not going to let socialism rule this country.”

. . . .

Newsflash: It wasn’t the radical left that stormed the doors of the Capitol on Wednesday. It wasn’t the radical left that told a group of known white nationalists to “stand by” during a nationally televised presidential debate. It wasn’t the radical left that addressed the soon-to-be rioters and declared to members of Congress that “we’re coming for you.” It wasn’t the radical left who on the eve of the Capitol siege announced their plans to walk the path to sedition.

The only “radical” elements America sees now are the words and actions of the Republican Party. Yet Republicans have forever gotten away with throwing around the label “radical” to characterize the Democratic Party.

How many times in political ads have Republicans used the words “radical” and “dangerous” to describe their Democratic challengers? How many Fox News segments have Sean Hannity and friends devoted to the Democrats’ “radical extreme socialist agenda”?

What happened on Wednesday was an inevitable culmination of years of extreme and alarmist rhetoric from the Republican Party and their propaganda platforms. Watching Republicans act shocked that the people they have relentlessly and unapologetically pandered to for years is appalling.

With every tweet, every soundbite, every campaign ad, Republicans have been signaling to their supporters that it’s time to take matters in their hands. When you label something as “radical” or “extreme” or “dangerous,” you are telling people they need to defend themselves against a threat. You are telling them they need to be ready to fight. You are telling them their impulse to resort to violence and destruction is justified and righteous.

There is absolutely nothing radical or extreme about protesting racial inequality, social injustice and a culture of police brutality in America. There is nothing radical or extreme about speaking out for gender equality and women’s rights. There is nothing radical or extreme about advocating for universal healthcare coverage. There is nothing radical or extreme about supporting action to address the growing threat of climate change. There is nothing radical or extreme about wanting corporations to pay their fair share of taxes. There is nothing radical or extreme about embracing the need for gun reform in the wake of mass shootings. There is nothing radical or extreme about wearing a mask and social distancing amid a global pandemic that has taken the lives of more than 365,000 Americans.

The extremists are the ones who egged on the insurrectionists with four years of lies. Republicans may be abandoning the sinking Trump ship, but don’t let this 11th-hour maneuver fool you. That even after Wednesday’s events Republicans in Congress and in the media are still clinging to the “radical socialist agenda” narrative shows they haven’t changed — though they are scurrying to launder their tattered reputations.

Don’t believe me?

Just watch how many of them will vote to support articles of impeachment if the Democrats bring those to the House floor next week.

Kurt Bardella is a senior advisor to The Lincoln Project. He is a former aide to California Republican Congressmen Darrell Issa and Brian Bilbray and was an aide in the California State Senate and Assembly. @KurtBardella

*****************

Read the complete op-ed at the link.

The opposition to be sure! “Loyal” — no way! The “Party of Treason” — the GOP — is exactly what its lies, vile rhetoric, lack of values, and insurrectionist actions tell us it is — the gravest existential threat to our nation and our national security since the Confederacy of Traitors.

Beware and be prepared for their continuing assaults on our democracy, our nation, truth, and humanity!

I’m angry, too, Ronna, about your lies, false narratives, and scurrilous attacks on my country! I’ll do everything possible to insure that your party of cowardice, immorality, treason, disloyalty, studied stupidity, racism, and insurrection is removed from political power at every level of our democracy. Clearly, American democracy and equal justice under law are “radical” concepts to you, Cotton, and rest of your party of lying, cowardly Putinist puppets and traitors!

🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-10-21

U.C. DAVIS LAW DEAN KEVIN R. JOHNSON SPEAKS OUT ON TRUMPISTS’ ASSAULT ON OUR DEMOCRACY!🇺🇸⚖️🗽

From ImmigrationProf Blog:

On the unprecedented events at the U.S. Capitol

By Immigration Prof

Share

Earlier today, I shared this message with the UC Davis School of Law community. I share it with you as we try process the events yesterday:

Dean Johnson addresses unprecedented events at the U.S. Capitol

A message from Dean Kevin R. Johnson

Jan. 7, 2021

Yesterday was a deeply troubling day in one of the most challenging times in U.S. history. But make no mistake: We will get through this as a community.

Our nation saw an unprecedented and appalling assault on the rule of law and our deep and enduring democratic traditions. As Congress carried out its constitutional duty of accepting the certified results of the 2020 presidential election, a mob stormed our Capitol. Whatever our political views, we should all condemn such behavior. There is a stark difference between peaceful protest, which is constitutionally protected, and violence designed to undermine democratic processes.

As we process this traumatic challenge to our democracy, please take to heart the observations of Chancellor Gary S. May. He reminds us of something incredibly positive that greeted us all yesterday:

. . . I awoke this morning . . . buoyed by the thoughtful reflection shared by newly elected Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock, who said that the hands of his 82-year-old mother that were once “used to pick somebody else’s cotton” were just used to vote for the first African American senator in the history of his state. I lived much of my adult life in the state of Georgia. . . . I have attended several services in Ebenezer Baptist Church, where he is pastor and Martin Luther King Jr. once was. I always enjoyed his sermons and was uplifted by the progress his story represented. . . .

There are other reasons for optimism. Our institutions are strong. Our commitment to the rule of law, which is more important now than ever, is unwavering. Although yesterday saw an unprecedented challenge to the rule of law, we also witnessed its triumph. After a violent mob stormed our Capitol, the rule of law prevailed. Following the process set forth in the Constitution, Congress accepted the results of the Electoral College. A new president and vice president will be inaugurated in a matter of days. These events demonstrate why the law and what lawyers do matter so much. Let us try to focus moving forward constructively and positively.

I am hopeful that we as a community can schedule a time to discuss the serious issues facing the nation. We will be in touch as plans develop. Please stay healthy and take good care.

KJ

January 7, 2021 in Current Affairs | Permalink | Comments (0)

*************

Thanks Dean Johnson!

Due Process Forever!🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼

PWS

01-08-21

NEWS FROM THE FASCIST ☠️CLOWN🤡 — “After Multiple Deaths And A Mob Riot, Trump Finally Admitted His Presidency Is Ending”

Storming The Capitol by Randall Enos, Easton, CT
Republished under license

Trump Clown — Donald J. Trump
Famous American Clown
(Officially titled “Ass Clown”)
Artist: Scott Scheidly
Orlando, FL
Reproduced by permission

In a video otherwise filled with lies and inaccuracies, the president said a new administration would take over on Jan. 20.

Read the report from Matt Berman @ BuzzFeed News here:

After Multiple Deaths And A Mob Riot, Trump Finally Admitted His Presidency Is Ending

**************

After four years of non-stop lies, malicious incompetence, unbridled racism, cruelty, stupidity, sedition, corruption, grift, graft, unnecessary deaths, and other “crimes against humanity,” the evil 🦹🏿‍♂️ clown show 🤡 pulls out of town leaving Joe, Kamala, and the decent folks in America (their supporters — i/o/w, us) to deal with The Party of Treason, its scumbag “core traitors,” (Cruz, Hawley, McCarthy, et al), toady enablers of treachery (McConnell, Graham, et al), and anti-American supporters.

🗽⚖️🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-07-21

🏴‍☠️TREASON: THE MAN IS A TRAITOR, 👎🏻 PLAIN AND SIMPLE — The GOP & Their Supporters Bear Total Responsibility For Inflicting This Toxic Miscreant & His Band Of Fascist Thugs On Our Nation!☠️⚰️

https://apple.news/AfH8nr2UlTMOZNJbTDT2YEQ

Charles Pearce in Esquire:

Donald Trump Cannot Be Allowed to Be the President* of the United States For a Single Second Longer

Any elected officials who do not agree with this simple and obvious fact dishonor the offices they hold with every second they decline to do it hereafter.

He has to go. Now. This moment. Donald J. Trump cannot be allowed to be President* of the United States for a single second longer. It’s not simply that he is unfit for the office he holds. I mean, that’s true of Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz, too. Trump is something worse. He has proven himself to be a national security threat, the most serious one in Washington since the Royal Marines burned the place. He’s a traitor to his oath and to his country. He needs to be forced out, either through the provisions of the 25th Amendment or through an accelerated impeachment process. Any elected officials who do not agree with this simple and obvious fact dishonor the offices they hold with every second they decline to do it hereafter.

He is responsible for all of it. He is responsible for the assault on the Capitol and for the incredibly lax response from the Capitol Police. He created an atmosphere in which the worst impulses in the worst cops all over the country are inflamed and encouraged until the Capitol Police refused to defend…the Capitol. He has to go. Now. This moment.

MORE FROM ESQUIRE ON APPLE NEWS

This Will Really Send Trump’s Georgia Rally Monday Night Into Crazytown

He is responsible for all of it. He is responsible for everything that comes of it in the future, too. He is responsible for whoever the next authoritarian who comes along is, and that person is likely to be a smarter and more competent authoritarian than this dangerous charlatan. He has to go. Now. This moment.

He is responsible for all of it. This country has a serious fascism problem now. It has a fascism problem that is fed and encouraged by what is at best a fascist-adjacent media ecosystem and, at worst, a communications network that would embarrass Goebbels. There is a genuinely subversive rightwing movement in this country that found its focus in this president*, and that will be rested and ready when the next one comes along. There is no Republican politician with either the courage or the clout to cure the prion disease that has now eaten away all of the party’s higher functions and reduced it to a rough beast that is no longer anything but an accumulation of base and abandoned appetite. History has turned down a dark alley and he sent it there. He has to go. Now. This moment.

Everybody knows it. By seven o’clock Wednesday night, rumors ricocheted all over Washington that powerful people were meeting in whispers, making plans to pry the government out of the crazy man’s hands. Leaving him in place even for an hour would be the final dereliction of duty, and we have had far too many of those. Force him out. Do it now. Complicity is its own dark reward.

**************

I’d never want to minimize Trump’s treason. But, Charles, it’s really the GOP and their supporters who are responsible for this grotesque “mini-Mussolini” who has brought our democracy to its knees.

Hearing Moscow Mitch and (some of) his fellow spineless GOP toadies self-righteously protest the violent attack on democracy today made me want to puke! Moscow and his GOP cohorts were more than happy to “go along to get along” and enable “The Demented Traitor” for the past four years.

In addition to failing to legislate in the public interest and covering for Trump’s grift, overt corruption, cruelty, stupidity, racism, nepotism, and immorality, they “rubber stamped” scores of unqualified righty judges, including some of the worst Supremes’ nominees since Thomas and Alito.

The abject failure of the Supremes’ GOP majority to stand up against subversion of our Constitution by “The Demented Traitor” and his racist cronies has a lot to do with the attack on our Republic today! The “Robert’s Six” should tender their resignations as of noon on Jan. 20! There are only three qualified Justices on today’s Supremes.

Yeah, we need a “loyal opposition.” But, today’s spineless, corrupt, nihilistic, anti-American GOP doesn’t fit the bill. Not even close!

Take back our America from the GOP traitors! It’s finally time for some competent, humane, honest majority rule in our downward spiraling nation! Thank goodness for Joe and Kamala and those of us who gave our nation “a shot for survival” by voting them in and “The Demented Traitor” and his neo-Nazi regime of thugs and malicious incompetents out! We have to work like hell to make sure the GOP traitors never get political power over us again!

“Rev up” NDPA! Your and your kids’ futures are at stake in overcoming the ugly, immoral nihilism, ignorance, selfishness, hate, and misgovernance of today’s GOP and making due process, equal justice for all, and a better world a reality!

Due Process Forever! Traitors and their enablers, never!

PWS

01-06-21

🇺🇸⚖️🗽AMERICAN DEMOCRACY, GEORGIA VOTERS, WARNOCK, OSSOFF, BIDEN, HARRIS, ABRAMS, AFRICAN AMERICANS BIG WINNERS — Racist Grifters Loeffler & Perdue Ousted, Mitch Dethroned, Trump Biggest Loser In US History, GOP Sedition Thwarted, Even As Trump, “Traitor Ted,” & Other Anti-American Lowlifes Seek To Destroy Our Democracy!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/01/06/georgias-voters-end-trump-era-definitively/

E. J. Dionne in WashPost:

Thanks to the voters of Georgia, the 2020 election looks very different than it did 48 hours ago. Barring a highly unlikely shift in the vote count, President-elect Joe Biden will now govern with a Democratic Senate and a Democratic House. The margins will be thin, but the power of Republicans to obstruct has been sharply diminished.

And the political map of the United States looks very different, too. Four years ago, it was unimaginable that Democratic control of the elected branches of the federal government would be cemented by victories in Senate races in Georgia. The Rev. Raphael Warnock won and Jon Ossoff leads in a state that had not elected a Democrat to the Senate in two decades.

The likely outcome put an exclamation point on Biden’s success and a dagger into the Trump era. President Trump almost certainly hurt Republicans Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, both directly and indirectly.

Trump’s insistence, against all the evidence, that the November vote in Republican-led Georgia was fraudulently counted split his party and may have discouraged GOP turnout on Tuesday. And Republicans will confront the reality that some voters drawn to the polls when Trump is on the ballot have no interest in participating when he’s not. They are more Trumpublicans than Republicans.

But the president did still more damage to his party by denigrating the $600 stimulus checks in the recently passed economic relief package and calling for $2,000 payments instead. His unexpected veto threat played directly into the argument made by both Warnock and Ossoff: that only Democrats could be trusted to deliver relief to the economically ailing, including the middle class.

Ossoff was unabashed in appealing directly to voters’ immediate interests: “You send me and Reverend Warnock to the Senate, and we will put money in your pocket.” Biden was equally direct when he campaigned for the Democratic duo on the eve of the election. “If you send Jon and the reverend to Washington, those $2,000 checks are going out the door, restoring hope and decency and honor to so many people struggling right now,” Biden said. “If you send Sens. Perdue and Loeffler back to Washington, those checks will never get there. It’s just that simple.”

Last November, exit polls showed that voters most worried about the pandemic tended toward Democrats, while those worried about the economy leaned Republican. This led critics on the Democratic left, but also from elsewhere in the party, to argue that its candidates had failed to define a clear economic message.

Warnock and Ossoff did not make that mistake when they were given a second chance in the runoffs. Their defining issues were economic, and their victories would make it far easier for Biden to enact a large new relief package, a major infrastructure program, and expansions in health-care coverage and child care — as well as democracy reforms and voting-rights protections.

Georgia’s outcome also showed that the swing of middle-class suburban voters toward the Democrats was not a one-off reaction to Trump. Democrats feared and Republicans hoped that, with Trump defeated, at least some Republican-inclined anti-Trump voters would come home to the GOP on Tuesday. They didn’t — and were likely put off when Perdue and Loeffler embraced Trump’s efforts to nullify the November votes of their own state and elsewhere.

The contest also lifted up the power of organizing. Led by Stacey Abrams, the Democrats’ 2018 gubernatorial candidate, civil rights and voting rights groups registered hundreds of thousands of new Georgia voters. They lifted Biden to his 11,779-vote victory in the state and then went back to work, registering more voters for the runoff and getting them to cast ballots. The result: turnout for the runoff that came remarkably close to matching November’s levels while Warnock and, likely, Ossoff secured margins larger than Biden’s.

. . . .

****************

Read the full article at the link.

Thank you, Georgia!

With the “Demented Fascist Sore Loser” and “Traitor Ted” Cruz & company stoking the fires of sedition in the streets and revving up an attack on the Capitol through their knowingly bogus anti-American, White Supremacist hate speech, false narratives, vile lies, and baseless conspiracy theories, it’s time to put the GOP to bed for good.

There also should be a move to censure and eventually remove from office through the ballot box Cruz, Hawley, McCarthy, Johnson and the rest of the GOP clowns and traitors whose lies and pandering to Trump stoked this outrage and have brought our nation to the precipice of anarchy. The voters of Georgia have showed us how with hard work, the right pro-humanity message, even against the odds, the anti-democracy GOP can be removed from office at all levels.

Not surprisingly, the Traitor Trump Treason Twitter Account has been “locked.” Too little, too late!

Moscow Mitch and other GOP toadies’ protestations in support of American democracy are far too little, far too late! They are the nihilists who have joined Trump in subverting American democracy and committing “crimes against humanity.” They should not escape accountability!

Then there are still GOP scumbags who refuse to condemn Trump or acknowledge the crimes of his thug rioters! They must be removed from public office, now!

The 81 million of us who saved American democracy need to work hard through legal means to make sure that the anti-democracy minority (“GOP”) never seizes power again! The GOP has proved its disloyalty to our Constitutional order.

It’s time for the GOP to be dissolved and replaced by a legitimate opposition. Even now, scummy GOP legislators insist on delaying the electoral process with bogus claims. I’m tired of indulging these evil clowns and subversives, and particularly, their ignorant anti-American supporters.

⚖️🗽🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-06-21

👍🏼🇺🇸MICHAEL GERSON @ WASHPOST: EXPOSING THE GOP’S COWARDLY ANTI-DEMOCRACY TRAITORS🤮🏴‍☠️☠️: CRUZ, HAWLEY, JOHNSON, MCCARTHY, ET AL🦹🏿‍♂️👎🏻 — “They have demonstrated their unfitness for office and called their own patriotism into question.“

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/let-the-anti-constitutional-republicans-reveal-themselves/2021/01/04/d3fafee0-4eb6-11eb-83e3-322644d82356_story.html

Opinion by Michael Gerson

January 4 at 2:32 PM ET

The great virtue of President Trump’s smoking subversion tape is that it clarifies the goals of all concerned.

The president’s stated objective is not to expose abuses in the electoral system. It is to pressure the Georgia secretary of state into manipulating the electoral system to squeeze out 11,780 additional votes — Trump specifies the exact number — in his favor. His cynical, delusional justifications are beside the point. He would say anything — invent any lie, allege any conspiracy, defame any opponent, spread any discredited rumor — to perpetuate his power.

This, in turn, illuminates the motives of his congressional enablers. In light of Trump’s clarifying call, the term “enablers” now seems too weak. When Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and their GOP colleagues try to disrupt and overturn a free and fair election, they are no longer just allies of a subversive; they become instruments of subversion. They not only help a liar; they become liars. They not only empower conspiracy theories; they join a conspiracy against American democracy. They not only excuse institutional arson; they set fire to the Constitution and dance around the flame.

Their pathetic motivations no longer matter. Some are simple cowards, frightened by angry people wearing red hats. Are we supposed to indulge their cravenness out of pity? Are we supposed to sympathize with people who want to keep their jobs at the cost of their country? Others eventually want the angry people in red hats to support their political ambitions. Are we supposed to humor people who seek the presidency by spitting on the institution of the presidency? Are we supposed make allowances for a selfishness so comprehensive that it eclipses duty, loyalty and love of country?

We are witnessing what happens when treacherous politicians run in packs. A solitary betrayal of the constitutional order by a member of Congress is a source of shame and, perhaps, a cause for expulsion. When 100 and more Republicans join hands and betray the constitutional order, it is a populist cause. They gain the confidence, even the thrill, of shared disloyalty. But their oath of office — in every single case — has been dishonored. They have demonstrated their unfitness for office and called their own patriotism into question.

So maybe it is for the best that they stand up and be counted. Maybe it is best for Americans to know who will “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic” — and who will not. By all means, let’s engrave their names into a marble slab — a roll call of those who failed the most important test of self-government in our lifetimes. There are a lot of monuments honoring bravery. Let’s have one dedicated to abject cowardice.

. . . .

It is fortunate for the country that Trump is a clownish figure. In his subversion tape, he ricochets between ominous threats and pathetic lunacy. He is not capable of an organized thought, much less an organized coup. Any revolution with Rudolph W. Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Lin Wood in the vanguard is likely to end in the joke bin of history.

And yet: Trump and his congressional implementers have purposely placed a virus in the public order. A significant portion of the country has expressed support for the triumph of anger over institutions. These are potential recruits for anarchy. Trump, Hawley, Cruz and the others may be laying the path for a rougher beast slouching toward Washington. They are shredding the careful work of America’s founders. And they deserve nothing but contempt.

*********************

Read Michael’s full op-ed at the link.

Evil clowns🤡, cowards🤮, traitors🏴‍☠️, all of them! American needs an opposition party with some integrity. But, the hopes of getting one out of the debris of today’s anti-democracy, corrupt GOP seems pretty slim. The majority of us are going to have to figure out a way to move forward into the future even with this ballast dragging us down. Hopefully, it’s not “mission impossible.”

Biden and Harris are much smarter, more capable, and better qualified than Trump & Pence. But they can’t do it alone. They are going to need lots of help from the majority of us who still believe in our national democracy and are willing to stand up for it. (The “New Due Process Army” for one).🇺🇸

Due Process Forever! ⚖️🗽

PWS

01-05-21

🏴‍☠️👎🏻TREASON IN THE WHITE HOUSE: Unhinged Trump Still Illegally Pressing To Falsify Georgia Election Results, Undermine Constitution, Interfere With Biden Presidency! — GOP Legislators Continue To Coddle The Biggest National Security Threat Since The Civil War! — Disloyal, Immoral Prez Continues To Attack Constitution!🏴‍☠️🤮⚰️

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-raffensperger-call-georgia-vote/2021/01/03/d45acb92-4dc4-11eb-bda4-615aaefd0555_story.htm

Amy Gardner reports for WashPost:

‘I just want to find 11,780 votes’: In extraordinary hour-long call, Trump pressures Georgia secretary of state to recalculate the vote in his favor

President Trump urged fellow Republican Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, to “find” enough votes to overturn his defeat in an extraordinary one-hour phone call Saturday that election experts said raised legal questions.

The Washington Post obtained a recording of the conversation in which Trump alternately berated Raffensperger, tried to flatter him, begged him to act and threatened him with vague criminal consequences if the secretary of state refused to pursue his false claims, at one point warning that Raffensperger was taking “a big risk.”

Throughout the call, Raffensperger and his office’s general counsel rejected his assertions, explaining that Trump is relying on debunked conspiracy theories and that President-elect Joe Biden’s 12,779-vote victory in Georgia was fair and accurate.

. . . .

Trump’s conversation with Raffensperger put him in legally questionable territory, legal experts said. By exhorting the secretary of state to “find” votes and to deploy investigators who “want to find answers,” Trump appears to be encouraging him to doctor the election outcome in Georgia.

But experts said Trump’s clearer transgression is a moral one. Edward B. Foley, a law professor at the Ohio State University, said that the legal questions are murky and would be subject to prosecutorial discretion. But he also emphasized that the call was “inappropriate and contemptible” and should prompt moral outrage.

“He was already tripping the emergency meter,” Foley said. “So we were at 12 on a scale of 1 to 10, and now we’re at 15.”

Throughout the call, Trump detailed an exhaustive list of disinformation and conspiracy theories to support his position. He claimed without evidence that he had won Georgia by at least a half-million votes. He floated a barrage of assertions that have been investigated and disproven: that thousands of dead people voted; that an Atlanta election worker scanned 18,000 forged ballots three times each and “100 percent” were for Biden; that thousands more voters living out of state came back to Georgia illegally just to vote in the election.

. . . .

*********

Read Amy’s complete report on the ongoing crimes by the Traitor-in-Chief at the link.

Sure sounds like treason to me!

This is “not normal” no matter how much corrupt, immoral GOP seditionists like Hawley, Cruz, Johnson, et al falsely and maliciously claim otherwise!

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼Due Process Forever! Traitors never!🏴‍☠️👎🏻

PWS

01-03-20

REALISTIC POSSIBILITY OR JUST MORE “WISHFUL THINKING” FROM LIBERALS? — Could Romney, Sasse, Collins, Murkowski, The Lincoln Project, & A Few Others Start A New Conservative Opposition Party, Leaving The GOP’s Racist Nonsense, Religious Bigotry, Anti-Science, & Anti-American Sedition 🏴‍☠️ Behind? — “Adults don’t point a loaded gun at the heart of legitimate self-government.” But, 11 GOP “So-Called Senators” & Dozens Of GOP “So-Called Representatives” Do!

Professor Heather Cox Richardson writes in “Letters From An American” (01-02-20):

. . . .

It seems clear that, with no chance of proving this election fraudulent, Trump is now trying to incite violence. Nonetheless, Republicans who are jockeying for the 2024 presidential nomination want to make sure they can pick up Trump’s voters. While McConnell doesn’t want Senators to have to declare their support either way, those vying to lead the party want to differentiate themselves from the pack.

On Wednesday, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) announced he would join the efforts of his House colleagues to challenge Biden electors from Pennsylvania and perhaps other states. This will not affect the outcome of the election, but it will force senators to go on record for or against Trump. In a statement, Hawley listed Trump talking points: the influence of “mega corporations” on behalf of Biden and “voter fraud.” Hawley seems pretty clearly to be angling for a leg up in 2024.

On Wednesday night, Senator Ben Sasse (R-NE) made his own play for the future of the Republican Party. He refuted point by point the idea that Trump won. He scolded his colleagues who are signing on to Trump’s attempt to steal the election, calling them “institutional arsonists.”

“When we talk in private, I haven’t heard a single Congressional Republican allege that the election results were fraudulent – not one,” he wrote on Facebook. “Instead, I hear them talk about their worries about how they will “look” to President Trump’s most ardent supporters.” They think they can “tap into the president’s populist base without doing any real, long-term damage,” he wrote, but they’re wrong. “Adults don’t point a loaded gun at the heart of legitimate self-government.”

Today, Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT), the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, launched his own bid to redefine the Republican Party with an attack on Trump’s apparent botching of the coronavirus vaccine rollout. In a press release, Romney noted “[t]hat comprehensive vaccination plans have not been developed at the federal level and sent to the states as models is as incomprehensible as it is inexcusable.”

But he didn’t stop there. Romney went on to say that he was no expert on vaccine distribution, “[b]ut I know that when something isn’t working, you need to acknowledge reality and develop a plan—particularly when hundreds of thousands of lives are at stake.” He offered ideas of his own, offering them “not as the answer but as an example of the kind of options that ought to be brainstormed in Washington and in every state.” After listing his ideas, he concluded: “Public health professionals will easily point out the errors in this plan—so they should develop better alternatives based on experience, modeling and trial.”

Romney’s statement was about more than vaccine distribution. With its emphasis on listening to experts and experimenting, it was an attack on the rigid ideology that has taken over the Republican Party. Romney has said he comes to his position from his own experience, not his reading, but he is reaching back to the origins of conservative thought, when Irish statesman Edmund Burke critiqued the French Revolution as a dangerous attempt to build a government according to an ideology, rather than reality. Burke predicted that such an attempt would inevitably result in politicians trying to force society to conform to their ideology. When it did not, they would turn to tyranny and violence.

Sasse’s point-by-point refutation of Trump’s arguments– complete with citations—and Romney’s call to govern according to reality rather than ideology are suggestive. They seem to show an attempt to recall the Republican Party to the true conservatism it abandoned a generation ago.

********************

Get today’s “full Letter” and all th others here: https://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxtkE1uhDAMhU8zWSLnB8gssuhmFr0ECokHokJCE9MpPX0zw6pSJcuWbD89fc9Zwinlw2ypEHu2gY4NTcRHWZAIM9sL5iF403INoCXzRnmuW81CGe4ZcbVhMZR3ZNs-LsFZCik-BQJaKdls9KgtR9dKjnDXnVMd3r0CUFLzdhz709buPmB0aPAL85EissXMRFu5yLeLuNWa0dKM2aXvHNxssy8pNmUfC1n30bi01h8Wqq3gwEFAL5SEhjcPyQ-e1efPelGwTuKPhmXzjjGGOBUu6t2m5bWuLEOd6x4DHQNGOy7oT0w6w3qBDxNGzDVEP1gyvINr2wvRg9L8xKo5SOiE6K6SVV-fqiqa_1B-AX8mhyo

Much as the idea appeals to me, and much as I admire Professor Richardson, it seems like an noble, yet unrealistic, hope rather than a slice of reality. As noted by Professor Richardson, the current GOP abandoned any real values at least a decade ago. They now rely on the “anti-democracy right” to keep them in business as a party that wields political strength out of proportion to the minority of voters it represents.

I find it perversely amusing, yet fundamentally disturbing, to have heard a Trump voter on TV recently claim to have “voted for the GOP platform” not the man in the last election. She was woefully ignorant of the fact that the GOP had no platform in 2020 other than “whatever Trump says.”

The history of those in the GOP who have been openly critical of Trump and his cult supporters is that they generally either 1) fall into line behind Moscow Mitch and Trump on most issues (e.g., Romney, Collins, et al.) or 2) head for the hills (e.g., Flake, Corker). Unlike the Dems, where spirited opposition is always threatening to rock the boat, true opposition and public dialogue are nearly non-existent in today’s GOP.

Nor does the lack of GOP soul searching and public recognition of Trump’s toxic, highly dishonest, and fundamentally anti-American “non-leadership” and responsibility for his own defeat, as well as the disastrous course his “maliciously incompetent non-leadership” has set for America, lead me to believe that the GOP will head in a “new direction” any time in the foreseeable future.

For example, as I’m writing this Cruz and ten other corrupt GOP “Senators” (or “Senators-elect”) are openly spreading lies and preaching sedition 🏴‍☠️ in the U.S. Senate.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/01/02/cruz-johnson-9-other-gop-senators-say-they-will-not-vote-certify-electors-unless-audit-is-conducted/

That shows where the anti-American “Party of Putin and White Nationalist Extremists” ☠️🤮🤥 is headed these days. They might be the minority in their party, but you can bet that they won’t suffer any censure, much criticism, or real consequences from the rest of the GOP for essentially fomenting treason and seeking to undermine the credibility of an election fairly and overwhelmingly won by Biden and Harris.

The real hope for America’s survival is that under Biden and Harris, the Dems can finally figure our how to turn their numerical advantage in the general elections into actual political power to govern. Remains to be seen. Certainly hasn’t happened to date! That’s why we’re in this position, with Dems having won the popular vote in seven of the last eight elections, but held the Presidency after only five of those seven elections.

While I agree with some of what Romney says these days, he is somewhat unique in the GOP. He is one of the few GOP Senators with sufficient independent standing in his home state to be largely immune to criticism and attacks by Trump and his cronies.

Based on their overwhelming refusal over the past four years to put our national interests above Trump’s personal agenda, I (unfortunately) think that a “loyal opposition” springing from today’s GOP is more of a “Dem pipe dream” than a realistic possibility.

PWS

01-02-20

“I’M HENRY VIII, I AM, HENRY VIII, I AM, I AM” – Unhinged Trump Confuses Himself With The State, Threatens “Whistleblower” Sources With Treason – Will “Drawing & Quartering” Be Next? — Audience “Stunned” By Latest Evidence Of Unfitness for Office!

I’m Henry VIII

Herman’s Hermits

I’m Henry the eighth I am
Henry the eighth I am, I am
I got married to the widow next door
She’s been married seven times before

And every one was an Henry (Henry)
She wouldn’t have a Willy or a Sam (no Sam)
I’m her eighth old man, I’m Henry
Henry the eighth I am

Second verse same as the first

I’m Henry the eighth I am
Henry the eighth I am, I am
I got married to the widow next door
She’s been married seven times before

And every one was an Henry (Henry)
She wouldn’t have a Willy or a Sam (no Sam)
I’m her eighth old man, I’m Henry
Henry the eighth I am

I’m Henry the eighth I am
Henry the eighth I am, I am
I got…

Source: LyricFind

Maggie Haberman
White House Correspondent
NY Times

Henry VIII
Former King, England
Executed Those Who Wouldn’t Swear Personal Allegiance

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/us/politics/trump-whistle-blower-spy.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share

Maggie Haberman reports for the NY Times:

By Maggie Haberman

President Trump told a crowd of staff from the United States Mission to the United Nations on Thursday morning that he wants to know who provided information to a whistle-blowerabout his phone call with the president of Ukraine, saying that whoever did so was “close to a spy” and that “in the old days,” spies were dealt with differently.

The remark stunned people in the audience, according to a person briefed on what took place, who had notes of what the president said. Mr. Trump made the statement several minutes into his remarks before the group of about 50 mission employees and their families at the event intended to honor the mission. At the outset, he condemned the former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s role in Ukraine at a time when his son Hunter Biden was on the board of a Ukrainian energy company.

Mr. Trump repeatedly referred to the whistle-blower and condemned the news media reporting on the complaint as “crooked.” He then said the whistle-blower never heard the call in question.

“I want to know who’s the person who gave the whistle-blower the information because that’s close to a spy,” Mr. Trump said. “You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart with spies and treason, right? We used to handle it a little differently than we do now.”

The complaint, which was made public on Thursday morning, said the whistle-blower obtained information about the call from multiple United States officials.

“Over the past four months, more than half a dozen U.S. officials have informed me of various facts related to this effort,” the complaint stated. It described concerns that the president was using his phone call with the Ukrainian president for personal gain to fulfill a political vendetta.

Full Document: The Whistle-Blower Complaint

The complaint filed by an intelligence officer about President Trump’s interactions with the leader of Ukraine.

Some in the crowd laughed, the person briefed on what took place said. The event was closed to reporters, and during his remarks, the president called the news media “scum” in addition to labeling them crooked.

The ambassador to the United Nations, Kelly Knight Craft, was in the room.

A White House spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

An intelligence whistle-blower law protects intelligence officials from reprisal — like losing their security clearance or being demoted or fired — as long as they follow a certain process for bringing allegations of wrongdoing to the attention of oversight authorities.

The whistle-blower followed that process — filing a complaint with the inspector general for the intelligence community. The Trump Justice Department later proclaimed that the information the whistle-blower put forward did not qualify under the intelligence whistle-blower law, raising the question of whether the official was still protected from reprisal. The acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, has said he would not permit the official to suffer retaliation, but the inspector general has pointed out that this personal assurance is not a legal shield.

Moreover, whistle-blower laws are aimed at channeling complaints to certain officials with oversight responsibilities — Congress, supervisors or inspectors general — and do not protect officials who provide information to other people without authorization. For that reason, these laws almost certainly do not protect the officials who told the whistle-blower about the call in the first place.

Mr. Trump spoke as the director of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence was testifying before Congress that the president had never asked for the identity of the whistle-blower, whose complaint was initially withheld from Congress by the Trump administration.

At a fund-raiser at Cipriani 42nd Street in Manhattan immediately after the United Nations event, Mr. Trump walked out before the crowd of several hundred donors clutching paper in one of his hands and said, “This is the call.” He then said it was “the greatest thing” to happen to the Republican Party because they had raised so much money off the controversy.

In a Twitter post later in the day, Mr. Trump referred again to the whistle-blower having “second hand information” and called the inquiry “Another Witch Hunt!”

Editors’ Picks

Charlie Savage contributed reporting.

***********************************************************

Those of us who have been saying for some time now that Trump’s conduct makes him a “clear and present danger” to the continued existence of our nation have been proved right again. Not, of course, that it means that Trump, with lots of help from the GOP and complicit courts, won’t succeed in destroying American democracy. Democracy is “on the ropes” while Trump is still in office.

What would Thomas More, former Lord High Chancellor of England, say about Trump’s rhetoric? More was famously executed in 1535 for refusing to recognize Henry VIII as the head of the Church in England.

In a time where Trump, Barr, McAleenan, Mulvaney, Pence, Graham, McConnell, Pompeo, the majority of the Supremes, and many others illustrate the complete absence of integrity and ethics in Government, the “Whistleblower” reminds us that there still are are some persons of integrity left in our Government. Sadly, they appear to be an “endangered species.”

Voters have a chance to save our nation by throwing Trump and his GOP scoundrels out of office, at every level, in 2020. Whether they are “up to the task” or not remains to be seen.

PWS

09-26-19

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

🇺🇸Due Process Forever! Treason & Insurrection, Never! No “Bogus Unity” With Insurrectionists!

Related posts:

🇺🇸🗽⚖️Due Process Forever! The GOP 🥷🏻⚰️☠️Never!

Related posts:

🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Due Process Forever!🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼

Related posts:

🗽⚖️🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Related posts:

⚖️🗽🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Due Process Forever! ⚖️🗽

Related posts:

‘I just want to find 11,780 votes’: In extraordinary hour-long call, Trump pressures Georgia secretary of state to recalculate the vote in his favor

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼Due Process Forever! Traitors never!🏴‍☠️👎🏻

Related posts:

Related posts:

Related posts: