Two years and two days ago, Donald Trump organized a coup to stop Congress from declaring Joe Biden the lawful president of the United States. He knew he’d lost the vote; he just didn’t care. Neither did a lot of the GOP: Trump aide Hope Hicks’ big concern was that as a Trump toady she’d be unemployable.
Ever since then I’ve been reading, off and on, about Republicans have had it with Trump. He’s crossed too many lines. Said too many lies. He really damaged them in the midterms. But as Paul Campos says, they just can’t quit him. A lot of the base still love Trump way more than DeSantis or any of the other aspiring leaders; resisting Trump is still political suicide. And I’m quite certain none of them would have objected if the coup gave Republicans four more years in the White House.
That’s who we’re dealing with (and they’re inspiring other authoritarians).
Marjorie Taylor Greene says that if she’d organized the attemped 1/6 coup, “we’d have been armed.” That’s a lie — they were armed — but it’s a clear statement she’s a pro-dictatorship Republican. Though I frankly doubt she could organize anything effective.Jim Jordan insists the cluster-fudge of a vote for House Speaker was no different than Democrats — Pelosi got a majority, McCarthy got a majority, same thing!
Unfortunately, despite a lot of tough talk from judges about how despicable the coup attempt was, the seditionists have consistently received lighter sentences than prosecutors requested. Despite Greene claiming they’re prisoners of war suffering in inhuman conditions they’re getting better treatment than they deserve (if it’s bad, it’s because most of our prisons are bad). But at least she admits, unintentionally, that they were waging war against our country, Thanks, Marjorie!
As I wrote last week, they’re gutting the House Ethics Committee. Many of them sought presidential pardons. They were complicit, they are complicit, and their outcries of shock and disapproval have no real weight because they’ll never back them up unless Trump is dead or otherwise blocked from running. They’re like the Nazis who tried to kill Hitler; as William Manchester put it in The Arms of Krupp, none of them thought Hitler was a dangerous madman when Germany was winning. The difference is Trump will never lose enough for them to reject him.
Fraser Sherman's Blog 