Are we under-reacting to Trump's crimes? And, a rant for the ages about Democrats and power.
There have been bombshell revelations this week about Trump’s effort to seize power by overturning the 2020 election. The New York Times has become required reading for this week’s articles, with more surely to come.
“Trump Had Role in Weighing Proposals to Seize Voting Machines” by Alan Feuer, Maggie Haberman, Michael S. Schmidt and Luke Broadwater
“Trump’s Words, and Deeds, Reveal Depths of His Drive to Retain Power” by Shane Goldmacher. Donald Trump said he wanted Mike Pence to overturn the election, dangled pardons for Jan. 6 rioters and called for protests against prosecutors. Now, it turns out, he had discussed having national security agencies seize voting machines.
As concerned I have been about the 2020 election and January 6, 2021, it appears that David Cay Johnston’s book title was correct: It’s Even Worse Than You Think.
I think we still need to let the magnitude of the monstrosity of Trump’s crimes sink in. It is a lot to process, and it goes against what we think about our country, which means that we need to overcome our own cognitive dissonance. Trump made repeated overt efforts to turn our government against us citizens, to seize power by overturning an election that his own experts said was free and fair.
Trump called on his cabinet to commit corruption by seizing voting machines: the Department of Justice, the Department of Defense and the military, the Department of Homeland Security, Intelligence Agencies. State legislators with the help of local law enforcement. Declaring a national emergency on false premises and calling for martial law. Pressuring his Vice President to reject the valid Electors on January 6th. This is so beyond the beyond the beyond. In my model of “Perceive, Believe, Act” we need to take a few more beats to Perceive and understand (Believe) what was really going on during the Interregnum between Election Day 2020 and Inauguration Day 2021.
From “Trump’s Recklessness is a Ticking Time Bomb” by Michael D’Antonio:
“All of this is in keeping with authoritarian tradition," noted Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor at New York University and an expert on authoritarian leaders. In The New York Times, Jeffrey Engel, the director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University, echoed the alarm. "I actually think the American public is dramatically underplaying how significant and dangerous this is, because we cannot process the basic truth of what we are learning about President Trump's efforts -- which is we've never had a president before who fundamentally placed his own personal interests above the nation's.”
Trump’s corrupt activities make the Watergate break-ins look like a meaningless prank in comparison.
In other news: A rant for the ages from former GOP chairman Michael Steele
Deadline White House has reached new heights this week. It feels like all the commentators are finally getting on the page that the most worried ones have been on for a long time. They are not totally numb; they still seem open to new information.
Michael Steele had a rant for the ages talking about how Republican Senators are reacting to President Biden appointing a Black woman as our next Supreme Court Justice. “Why do we give a damn what the Republicans think? This is when the vote is. Show up and vote, or shut up.”
Democrats, it is time to wield the power that you have—President Biden should make his choice based on who he really wants, and we should not do back flips in search of elusive bipartisanship, and we should not be distracted by their frankly racist antics.
This is 7 minutes you definitely want to watch:
Michael Steele, February 2 Deadline White House
Let’s follow Steele’s advice to “Move the country off stupid.”