Paul Revere by Cyrus Dallin, North End, Boston

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Sunday, February 14, 2021

Conservative David Frum




"Thanks to their integrity, a clear majority of the Senate voted to condemn the former president as an insurrectionist against the United States. The 57–43 margin wasn’t enough to convict under the Constitution. It wasn’t enough to formally disqualify Trump from ever again seeking office in the United States. But practically? It will do as a solemn and eternal public repudiation of Trump’s betrayal of his oath of office."

34 comments:

Jerry said...

As Trump goes around ramping his supporters up for 2022 and 2024 elections, I suspect most will forget about his criminal activity. Hopefully other criminal court proceedings over the next few years against him will remind everybody. We are now stuck with this slime ball in our national elections, probably, until he dies. We need to work to make sure Democrats hold majority for at least the next four years.

Mike said...

Hopefully, we'll see more of the moderate conservatives going back to their moderate roots because of the orange idiot.

Dave Miller said...

The Senate, on a majority vote, can apply the 14th amendment, Sec 3 on insurrection to Trump and forever bar him from seeking Federal office. It was used against office of the Confederacy.

That would be fitting and would force McConnell into even more pretzelish behavior.

Les Carpenter said...

Yeah. but it won't. As Jerry noted, we're likely stuck with him until ge dies. With aby luck that'll be next week.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Jerry, Mike, Dave, and RN

Some of the more stupid Trump cultists are looking at Trump's SECOND impeachment as being a "champion." LOL! They're proud of their cult leader's criminal acts and, because of a technicality, the Senate's acquittal. Mind you, those nincompoops didn't bother to understand that this was THE MOST BI-PARTISAN vote against a former president for his crimes in American history.

To Trump's more ignorant cultists, they see his defeat and his humiliation in front of America and the world as a "win."

What's coming next for this corrupt loser ex-president will make his cultists think (something that's foreign to them) of another word that's not attached to "champions." LOL!

When you read those Trump blogs and news sites, you understand that his cultists REALLY, REALLY believe Americans agree with them.

IN FACT: 70% of Americans believe Trump is responsible for what happened on January 6th.

That means those bloggers and the people who get their news from the far right news sites are 30 percenters. A MINORITY.

What happened in the Senate on Saturday doesn't wipe any guilt from EX-president trump, it just showed America and the world the cowardice of the Republicans who are left in the Trumpublican Party.

Meanwhile, trumpy is in Mar-a-Largo and Joe Biden is in the White House!!!!

Dave Miller said...

We can cut it any way you can imagine, but the reality is we have upwards of 50 million people who believe Trump, warts and all, won the election and should rightfully be president. And they will survive Trumpism.

America once again is at a cross roads and I am not bullish on which road we will choose.

skudrunner said...

Maybe we can now move on to important issues that affect the country going forward. It is amazing that trump still dominates the media with the exception of bozo cuomo and his circus.

Does it seem right to you that we allow thousands of illegals cross the border without a covid test but citizens are required to have a test to fly.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Well this thread isn't about border crossings but I let it stand:

Health screenings by border officials
CBP told PolitiFact that it does initial inspections for symptoms or risk factors associated with COVID-19, and "pursuant to longstanding infectious disease protocols," refers immigrants who might have an infectious disease to local clinics or hospitals "for appropriate medical evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment."

Les Carpenter said...

We are right now, in the early years of the 21st century where we were in the mid to late 19th century. Father and mother, brother and sister, families standing against one another. For what? Pride? Stupdity? Ignorance? Biblical predictions? Good -vs- Evil?

It is no doubt interesting, maybe even frightening, when individuals honestly confront their biases and fears. It can be, I imaginge, uplifting and liberating. Whether rational humanity or irrational fear and terror will prevail remains to be seen. Like Dave I'm not bullish Americans will ultimately choose the better road. If world history is to be our road map bet on the worst of outcomes.

Shaw Kenawe said...

This is what the post is about:



WSJ Tries to End Trump’s Political Career: Brutal Op-Ed Says Capitol Siege ‘Will Mar His Legacy for All Time’


WSJ Tries to End Trump’s Political Career: Brutal Op-Ed Says Capitol Siege ‘Will Mar His Legacy for All Time’


"Yesterday, we wrote that Trump’s power was “diminishing,” not as an overnight collapse, but as a daily drip, by drip, by drip. Trump’s hold on the GOP weakens by the day.

Today is a BIG day in that leak.

The Wall Street Journal operates as the parish bulletin for that block of Trump voters with the money to donate to campaigns and GOP causes. It is owned by Rupert Murdoch. When the editors of the Wall Street Journal demand that the GOP cut its association with Trump altogether, it is a massive problem for Trump and powerfully indicative of the fact that Trump’s short fingers are slipping from their grip on the GOP and especially from the segment with money.


The Senate failed Saturday to convict Donald Trump on the single House impeachment article of inciting an insurrection, but the 57-43 vote was no vindication. The statements by Senators who voted to acquit make clear that he escaped conviction mainly—perhaps only—because he is no longer President.

Moreover, the Journal echoed McConnell’s stunning beat-down of Trump:

Former President Trump’s actions that preceded the riot were a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty. There’s no question—none—that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.”

“He lost re-election before the events of Jan. 6, and as President his job approval never rose above 50%. He may go on a revenge campaign tour, or run as a third-party candidate, but all he will accomplish is to divide the center-right and elect Democrats. The GOP’s defeats in the two Jan. 5 Georgia Senate races proved that the country is moving past the Trump Presidency, and the GOP will remain in the wilderness until it does too.“


skudrunner said...

Ms. Shaw, That is about the most non policy I have read in a long time, we look them and if they look OK we let them in but if you fly you have to have a covid test (WOW). I am through discussing the for president because he doesn't matter anymore but I would like your take on eliminating 30K jobs and how they are going to be replaced. After all you and your readers are informed democrats and I would like their take.

Infidel753 said...

Skudrunner: Maybe we can now move on to important issues that affect the country

Yes, Congress need to get back to work on passing Biden's covid-19 relief package which 83% of Americans support and which will really help the country.

WSJ: Trump’s hold on the GOP weakens by the day

They're full of it. Trump's hold on the Republican party gets stronger every day. Republican politicians who voted for Trumpeachment or for conviction afterwards are being censured and purged everywhere. The Trumpist forces have near-total control of the party and are stamping out the last pockets of resistance.

Hopefully, as the Republican party becomes entirely the Party of Trump, he'll be the millstone that finally carries them down to well-deserved oblivion with the broader electorate.

skudrunner said...

I read today that the administration is in contact with Amazon about assisting with distribution of the vaccine. This is an excellent move because Amazon can get the job done where no government, local, state, federal, has the ability to accomplish because after all they are skilled at bureaucracy not at getting things done. This action is totally out of the range from the previous administration because it would admit they have no clue how to do anything.

Infidel, I do agree with you that the GOP is finished and hopefully we can form another party that represents the will of the people not the will of the politicians. Both sides have become so entrenched in their own self interests that they have forgotten they are in place to serve the people. I know you may differ because you believe in the competence of government while I believe in the corruption of government. They are for the few by the few and if you look at the last four decades you will see little good our federal government has accomplished for the people.

Les Carpenter said...

Right Infidel, the GOP and Trumpism will hopefully go the way of the Whigs. Only from this day on a damn sight faster would be nice indeed!

Shaw Kenawe said...

skud: "...no government, local, state, federal, has the ability to accomplish because after all they are skilled at bureaucracy not at getting things done..."

That's an interesting comment from an American. Apparently skudrunner never heard that the United States military (G.I.s -- do you even know what that stands for?) won TWO world wars. That's quite an accomplishment in anyone's book. But if you hate anything the government is involved in, I can understand why you would not be proud of its military.

Also, the Biden administration is on track with its promise to get 100 million Americans vaccinated within 100 days.

You have no faith in government because when the Republicans are running it, they run it into the ground and the Democrats have to clean up after them (see 2008 and the Great Recession, and Trump's debacle with the pandemic. It's not government that messes up everything, it's the political party in charge of it that does. Someday you'll learn this.

Texas is experiencing colder weather than we are here in the Northeast. Their electrical grid system is independent from the Federal government's. How's that working out for them?

"About 2 million homes statewide were without power Monday as the Texas electric grid grappled with a diminished supply of energy in the face of the lowest temperatures the state has seen in three decades.

After midnight Sunday, the grid enacted Level 1 of the protocol, drawing from an emergency energy supply. But the rapid succession of failing energy generators, which are privately owned, accelerated the emergency alerts to Level 3, which requires local electric providers to enact rotating blackouts and is treated as a last resort.

“This even was well beyond the design parameters for a typical or even an extreme Texas winter, which is what you would normally plan for,"


A combination of climate change denial (not believing in science) and distrust of government (thanks to decades of Republican presidents hawking that to their eager followers) came together in a perfect storm of unpreparedness and consequent misery for millions and millions of Texans.

However, unlike the former president who didn't care about blue-state disasters and who tried to overthrow his own government and encouraged murderous mobs to assassinate his vice president, the current President Joe Biden has immediately given emergency aid to Red Texas.

Shaw Kenawe said...

skudrunner "...if you look at the last four decades you will see little good our federal government has accomplished for the people."

Of the past 40 years, 24 of them were under Republican presidents:

Reagan 8
Bush, Sr. 4
Bush, Jr. 8
Trump 4

16 years under Democratic presidents;

Clinton 8
Obama 8

When skud talks about the last 40 years one can see which party was in power longer and why skud has such a poor opinion of the government.

Republicans don't know how to govern. BTW, under Ronald Reagan, more people in his administration were indicted and went to jail than any of the other GOP presidents.

So, yes. Republicans are very, very bad at governing, therefore, they make folks like skud distrust and disfavor the government.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Infidel753 maybe all the coming law suits and the Congressional investigation into January 6 will lessen the Trumpublican Party's infatuation with Trump.

I've read in several publications that already 140,000 Republicans have left the party. Trump will be left with dead-enders and whackos, and he'll be responsible for splitting the party in two, which will be a gift to the Democrats.

We have to wait and see how it all plays out.

Jerry said...

Trump came out today slamming McConnell. We will see how much power Trump has left. As I wrote on your blog before, I hope the Republican party will split and if Trump still has enough power within the Republican party, he wants to split the Republican party. The Wigs turned in to the Republican party and Lincoln was the new Republican party's first candidate for president. There is no Lincoln hanging around waiting to be a new parties candidate for president. Hopefully this is the end of the Republican party.

Anonymous said...

Trumpers complaining about "cancel culture" because some actress got fired for being a bigot? So all liberals believe in "cancel culture?" Bullshit!

Republican Party BREAKS in Two: Trump Responds to McConnell with BLISTERING Shot, Calls on GOP to Cancel McConnell

Do the Trumpers ever do any self-examination? Almost all the GOP senators who voted for impeachment have had their state RNCs censure them! Talk about cancel culture.

I'm sick of reading those asshole whine about the Dems when their own party does much worse!

Les Carpenter said...

It ain't going to be over till it's over. Whatever it may bring.

I find it problematic that the GOP with a Q is moving rapidly to censure and otherwise punish republicans who fail to properly praise tRump on bended knee and pay proper fealty to him.

Sure they are a minority. But I'm going to bet in 2022 the house flips republican as well as the senate.i will not make a prediction on the 2024 because America is, in a nutshell fickle. So who knows?

One think is certain... we live in strange and irrational times. And it is beginning to appear that this nation may very well be the most irrational. On almost EVERY level.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Jerry, it looks like the GOP IS splitting in two.

There's the Marjorie Taylor Green whacko half and the Mitt Romney half. It remains to be seen which half will prevail. Either one will only have half of their followers after you take away the thousands and thousands who've left completely.

Remember what Lindsey Graham said when he was not fawning over Trump in 2016?

"If we nominate Donald Trump we'll get destroyed, and we will deserve it."

The GOP certainly does deserve to be destroyed, and who better to do it than Donald J. Trump!

Shaw Kenawe said...

Anonymous, That's typical of the current GOP and Trump cultists. They love to point fingers at others but ignore what their own people are doing.

It's called hypocrisy. They're champions at it.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Remember when Republicans blamed California’s rolling black outs on poor electrical grids and solar power? They sure are quiet now about Texas.

skudrunner said...

There are wackos on both sides as there are extremes on both sides. The far right support trump but overall they are a small minority as are are the radical ANTIFA left, small minority.

As to politicians being worthless you point out wars we "won". Look at NKO and Vietnam both of which we entered into because of politicians and both of which we lost/pulled out because of politicians.

The power outages in the South primarily Texas you are correct and that points out that when government controls people lose. Now we have Politicians diminishing the need for coal and natural gas in favor of wind turbines which freeze up and solar which doesn't produce if there is cloud cover.

The GOP will survive as will the DNC but now we have an opportunity to form a party who actually represents the populace.

Shaw Kenawe said...

skudrunner: "Now we have Politicians diminishing the need for coal and natural gas in favor of wind turbines which freeze up and solar which doesn't produce if there is cloud cover."

Um, No. Operators of wind turbines in Alaska, Canada, Maine, Norway and Siberia provide power during deep freezes all the time. You, skud, just parroted what you heard dumb people say who don't know anything about this energy source.

Turbines in colder places are typically equipped with de-icing and other tools, such as built-in heating. In Texas, where the weather is almost never this cold, they usually are not. “Cold weather kits can keep [wind turbines] operating when temperatures plunge. Texas didn't plan for this "worst case" weather because Texas pols don't believe in climate change.

Solar and cloudy days? Jeebus. Ever hear of the concept of batteries?

Solar batteries work by storing energy produced by solar panels for later use. In some cases, solar batteries have their own inverter and offer integrated energy conversion. The higher your battery's capacity, the more solar energy it can store

Despite being among the countries with the least sunshine hours, Germany is one of the largest solar power producers in the world. In 2019, they produced about eight percent of the country's net power consumption, out of a total renewables share of 43 percent.

Antifa=Antifascists. I don't know about your family, skud, but all the males in my family during WWII were antifascists fighting for America. And so were millions of other patriotic Americans, including General Eisenhower. Antifa is not like the marauders, anti-democracy, assassins who followed Trump's orders and desecrated, defecated, and trashed our US Capitol.

There is absolutely NO bothsiderism in what happened on Jan. 6.



Shaw Kenawe said...

David Pakman
@dpakman
·

The disinformation about Texas is nuts. While some wind farms froze, the bigger problem is frozen instruments at coal, gas, and nuclear plants. The problem isn't believing in climate change, it's ignoring it and not proofing the systems against increasingly erratic weather events.

Ray Cranston said...

I'm adding to Shaw's comment about the Texas disaster:

If gas/nuke/nuclear/wind had been winterized - as they are everywhere else in the country - this would have largely been prevented. But it would have cost companies money, and that would cut into profits. If the gas lines has been buried deeper, as was recommended to avoid freezing (plus if they had used the larger diameter pipelines - the freeze of the pipelines which has prevented the flow of gas wouldn’t have happened.

But better gas pipelines buried deeper would have cost the gas industry more money, so they
thought about it and said, “Screw it. Let’s gamble with Texans lives.

That’ll mean the gas industry will make more money and give us more contributions, and who cares about people without their own $20,000 generators outside their homes.

The grid itself is a GOP privatization of electric utility, non-coupling with Federal grid, lack of planning for climate change extreme cold and heat, and choosing profits over reliability and backup over capacity led to current power shortage suffering and death in Texas.

Profits over people! The old GOP mantra!

skudrunner said...

Good thing you are not in the south because you would hear a different set of facts. I do realize that us "southerners" have limited intellect and only care about our bibles and guns but the local news, ABC, has stated wind turbines are frozen leading to a restriction of electricity.

We need to cancel pipelines because then we can transport oil by trucks and trains which are much safer ad much less polluting. All power companies are state controlled and fall under the watchful eye of corrupt and bumbling bureaucrats.

Shaw Kenawe said...

skud: "...the local news, ABC, has stated wind turbines are frozen leading to a restriction of electricity."

That's not what you wrote in your comment above. You wrote this:

"...we have Politicians diminishing the need for coal and natural gas in favor of wind turbines which freeze up and solar which doesn't produce if there is cloud cover."

The wind turbines in Texas probably DID freeze up, and that's because, as I wrote in my answer to you: "Turbines in colder places are typically equipped with de-icing and other tools, such as built-in heating. In Texas, where the weather is almost never this cold, they usually are not. “Cold weather kits can keep [wind turbines] operating when temperatures plunge. Texas didn't plan for this "worst case" weather because Texas pols don't believe in climate change."

Turbines CAN be built to withstand deep freezes, as I wrote, but I also wrote that Texas pols didn't plan for worst case scenarios because they don't believe in climate change!

I didn't write that the turbines in Texas didn't freeze. I explained that Texas pols brought this terrible situation on themselves and their citizens because they didn't plan for it; they didn't plan for it because they deny climate change. There will be more deep freezes in Texas and other southern states because of climate change. Ignore science and pay the price.

Ray Good information, but science denying Trumpers will ignore it and, as I said, pay the price.


Les Carpenter said...

skud, there may be "different sets of facts", but there can be ONLY one set of actual facts for the same set of circumstances. But for deniers the only "set of facts accepted are the ones that fit their rather flimsy amti science narative.

skudrunner said...

Everything can be built to withstand anything, or almost anything. Saying they should build in systems to wind turbines to withstand 100 year freezes is like saying they should have constructed breakwaters to prevent destruction of the jersey shore from sandy.

For the party who professes to represent the poor they sure so everything they can to raise costs and hurt the poor and middle class. I am waiting for joey to do something to aid the American people and so far his EO have done nothing except raise dependence and cost the American Taxpayer. Now he is being pressured for tuition relief.

Oh BTW, Climate change was supposed to be global warming, why the name change. Now we have democrat governors lying, mayors and the teachers union ignoring science yet I am
the one accused of ignoring science. They must have a "different set of facts"

Shaw Kenawe said...

skud "Everything can be built to withstand anything, or almost anything. Saying they should build in systems to wind turbines to withstand 100 year freezes is like saying they should have constructed breakwaters to prevent destruction of the jersey shore from sandy."

Except there will be other freezes like this in Texas! It's called "climate change." According to the reports I've read, the decision to NOT winterize the coal and gas lines was made because it would cost more money and reduce the profits for the swells.

Your second paragraph is not supported by evidence, so I dismiss it as more talking points from the rabid right wing media.

skud: "Oh BTW, Climate change was supposed to be global warming, why the name change. Now we have democrat governors lying, mayors and the teachers union ignoring science yet I am
the one accused of ignoring science. They must have a "different set of facts"

Why are you hung up on what these phenomena are called? When parts of the US were experiencing record blizzards and freezes, the less educated in our population mocked the "Global Warming" label. And they did so because they don't understand that climate is different from weather. Climate change can cause extreme weather, as we're witnessing right now in Texas. Here in Boston, while Texas was in a deep freeze, we had temps in the middle 40s. I'm glad my family who lived in Plano for 20 years moved six years ago and avoided what the unfortunate Texans are going through.

skudrunner said...

Basic business is based on a cost to benefit ratio. Only the federal government can operate in a deficit for extended periods of time.
Climate change also includes pollution for all countries. I know you support the billions that will go to support the paris accord. I will wait to see if that feel good organization accomplishes anything other than saying how great they are.

Les Carpenter said...

What is important is, wait for it skud, CASH flow. As long as cash flow is at break even or positive the busines remaind viable. When it turns negative for a sustained lomg period businesses fail.

With government that basic economic reality remains true, but, for a nation with an economy the size of our national and the phenomenal wealth of the nation we have no problem securing loans. For now. But the Q-GOP better pay attention to its profligate drunken spending on unnecessary BS. Something NO GOP president or congress has concerned itself with since DDE.