FEBRUARY 11, 2021 – If on Tuesday House impeachment managers laid down the law, yesterday they presented an open-and-shut evidentiary case. As top-gun trial lawyers, managers connected the dots to prove irrefutably the direct link between Trump’s mouth and the mob attack on the capitol.
As the evidence unfolded, I realized how close democracy’s death came—not by nuclear weapons of a foreign foe; not by suicidal Islamic extremists from overseas; not by migrants crashing our border gates, but by homegrown bullies wrapped in our flag and directed by our tyrant with absolutely no care or concern for any human being except himself.
Yet there sat 44 Republicans impervious to truth. Behind their contempt for American democracy? American democracy itself—millions of constituents under the spell of the quintessential anti-democrat, Dumb Junk Tyrant, and millions more yawning and shrugging.
When newly elected Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy bucked his party and voted affirmatively on the question of constitutionality, his state party leadership condemned him and stated, “We feel that an impeachment trial of a private citizen is not only an unconstitutional act, but also an attack on the very foundation of American democracy, which will have far reaching and unforeseen consequences for our republic.”
Holding to account a president who would launch a full, frontal attack on the Constitution is . . . “unconstitutional”?! And the horrific mob attack on the entire legislative branch of government is not “an attack on the very foundation of American democracy”?! How does such thinking take hold inside any American mind?
I’m more worried than ever before.
We’ve now been shown in its totality, tightly stitched proof of Trump’s big lie; of his illegal, strong-arm attempts to demolish democracy’s electoral foundation; of his fanning the fires of domestic extremism; of his provocation of the mob and the mob’s pre-meditated attempt to murder democracy. Until I witnessed the full fabric of proof, I hadn’t appreciated how close the dagger had fallen. Yet still, all too many Americans—Americans—continue to text, twitter, email, call, bark, post, rant, and rave for Trump’s acquittal. These people—powered not by legitimate policy disagreements but by falsehoods spewed by GoebbelsNews, Newsmax Qanon, 4-chan, 8-chan and the tyrant himself—and their 44 Republican senators pose a serious ongoing threat to our democracy.
I don’t know what causes the greater “shock and awe”—the attempted murder or the prospect of acquittal despite open and shut proof of the attempted murder.
During yesterday’s jaw-dropping proceedings, I thought about Watergate. By contrast, Nixon’s wrongdoing seems almost quaint and attenuated. Nevertheless, he was forced to resign because the public and Republicans rightly and overwhelmingly abandoned him. Once Marine One carried The Crook away, America sighed with collective relief.
The absence of universal fright and outrage over Trump’s heinous crime is convincing evidence that American democracy remains in mortal danger. The worst of it is that Americans themselves are the enemy. There can be no sigh of relief this time around.
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© 2021 by Eric Nilsson
