• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Split Thread A second impeachment

Once again, 45 Republican senators show they are spineless cowards and care more about their own ambitions and party than their country. Shame on them. This is why I hold the GOP in nothing but utter contempt.

They impeach Clinton for lying about a blow job, but refuse to hold Trump responsible for lying about "mail in ballot fraud", for trying to overturn a legitimate election because he cannot accept losing, for trying to force a governor and state AG to "find" enough votes to overturn that state's election, for lying about a "rigged election" and inciting a crowd to walk "with him" to the Capitol to "fight like hell" and not let the "steal" the election.
No, that is ok with them.

That part right there. There's a lot of fulminating from the right about how this whole show is a political game on the part of Democrats, they don't really care about accountability, etc. It seems pretty obvious to me, though, that the party making this about politics instead of accountability is the GOP- they're so scared of Trump taking his base into a new party of his creation, and costing them primaries in 2022 and the Presidency (again) in 2024, that they're avoiding holding him accountable for a course of conduct that they would absolutely crucify a Democratic President for.

The Republicans don't care about the country being divided- they only care about their party being divided. And if it takes kissing Trump's ass to save theirs, by god, that's what they'll do.
 
Marco Rubio tweeted

@marcorubio
Waste of time impeachment isn’t about accountability

It’s about demands from vengeance from the radical left

And a new “show” for the “Political Entertainment Industry”

And once again a prominent Republican uses his heel to grind the face of logic into the grounds.

Also, how many times did President Chucklehead tweet “Law and Order”?
 
I'm a tad sorry that I'm biased but I simply cannot take Senator Baby Face seriously.


Right now I think he's simply stumping to get in front of the cameras. Not saying he doesn't plan to run for POTUS. clearly he does.
 
Last edited:
Of the five Republicans who voted to proceed with the impeachment process, I'm really only inclined to give Sasse and Romney credit for voting their consciences instead of strictly for their party's interest (or their own). I only exclude Toomey because I don't know much about him- he may indeed deserve some credit here.

Susan Collins, though, really had no other choice consistent with her previous "I hope Trump has learned his lesson" from the first impeachment, when she voted to acquit, in the face of demonstrable evidence that he damned well didn't learn any lesson except that he could get away with pretty much anything. And, after all, she just won re-election, so she has six years to convince moderate Maine voters that her second vote today was the one for them to remember, the first one doesn't count; and, for the Trump faithful in Maine, just the reverse, that the first vote was the one that deserves their attention. Six years is a long time with a voting public that has an attention span of about five minutes.

As for Murkowski- yes, she said she wanted Trump out, she was considering leaving the GOP over his antics, etc. But how badly can that really hurt her? Alaska now has a ranked-choice voting system (USA Today):

A year ago, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, stated that President Donald Trump was “shameful and wrong” but still voted to acquit in his first impeachment trial. Last week, she bluntly stated that he should go, with barely a week left in office.

True, the attack on the Capitol was far worse than the offenses that led to Trump’s first impeachment, but Alaska’s electoral reforms also give Murkowski less fear of being “primaried” out of office in her 2022 re-election.

The fear of Trump’s base has kept most Republicans in Congress in line. Off the record, many mock Trump or express fears about his actions, but in public, they’ve been remarkably loyal.

The few who have spoken out have sometimes paid for it with their political careers. The fear of a Trump-backed primary opponent helped drive 138 House Republicans to support Trump’s lies about the election.
...
Instead of separate, party-only primary elections, future Alaska primaries will have all candidates on a single ballot. The four candidates who receive the most votes advance to the general election. This makes it much harder for partisan extremists to beat a moderate in the primary. Appealing to moderates and even disaffected Democrats will be a viable strategy.

General election voters will then list those top four candidates in ranked order of preference. All voters are initially counted for their first choice.

If any of the four have more than 50% of the vote, that candidate wins the election. If no candidate has a majority, the last place candidate is eliminated. But votes for the last place candidate are not thrown away; their votes are shifted to support their second ranked choice on voters' ballots.

Vote counts are immediately recalculated, and if any of the three remaining candidates has a majority, the election is done. If not, the third place candidate wins, votes are reassigned and whoever gets more votes in the final count wins.

...

Alaska’s reforms mean that Murkowski has helped her reelection chances in 2022, unlike other Republicans who are still afraid they will be punished for disloyalty to Trump.

How much courage or conscience do you need to take a position that probably won't cost you anything? It's possible she is, indeed, voting her conscience here, but assuming that a politician is doing so is, to say the least, a pretty generous reading. I have no way of knowing how much of Murkowski's vote today was conscience and how much was political calculation, but no politician gets very far without a large share of the latter in play. (Yes, any politician, so spare me the whatabouts)
 
Last edited:
I'm not too surprised that the Republicans are backing out, but a little surprised it's coming so soon. I thought there was a compromise on their part to try to keep the filibuster in place, but if they are going to show their bad faith this early, I wonder how they expect that to happen.
 
The vote of 45 senator's against the Impeachment of Trump on the grounds it is, "Unconstitutional", convinces me that convicting Trump at the trial no matter what the evidence is will be very hard, next to impossible. So sadly Trump will continue to be a major political force in the USA for the next few years at least.
 
The vote of 45 senator's against the Impeachment of Trump on the grounds it is, "Unconstitutional", convinces me that convicting Trump at the trial no matter what the evidence is will be very hard, next to impossible.

Agreed. We should resign ourselves to the fact that conviction in the Senate is a lost cause. But then proceed to put on a show trial to end all show trials, for the historical record if nothing else. Subpoena the rioters who have already said that they felt they were, in fact, following the President’s orders when they attacked the Capitol. If they plead the fifth, have them sit on the witness stand and just play videos of them stating such. If nothing else make it VERY clear what voting against conviction in spite of the evidence means. Maybe not to the 25% of voters who call themselves Republicans, but cementing in the minds of Democrats and Independents what the Republican Party stands for today.

Then again, I didn’t think there was any way on God’s green earth the Dems could win both GA Senate seats, so maybe there’s just the slimmest of slim chances enough Republicans might vote to convict. But at this juncture I seriously doubt it.
 
The Oregon Republican Party actually had the gall to state that the Capitol riot was a "false flag" operation:

The Oregon Republican party has falsely claimed in a resolution that there is “growing evidence” that the 6 January attack on the US Capitol by a pro-Trump mob was “a ‘false flag’ operation”.

The resolution, which was published on 19 January and was endorsed by the executive committee of the state Republican party, suggested that the storming of the capitol by Trump supporters was an orchestrated conspiracy “designed to discredit President Trump, his supporters and all conservative Republicans,” and to create a “sham motivation” to impeach the former president.

To back up these false claims, the resolution cited links to rightwing websites, including the Epoch Times, a pro-Trump outlet that has frequently published rightwing misinformation, as well as the Wikipedia entry for “Reichstag Fire.”

In a Facebook video released on 19 January, the Oregon Republican party chairman, Bill Currier, said that Oregon Republicans were working with Republicans in other states to release similar resolutions. “We are encouraging and working with the others through a patriot network of RNC members, the national level elected officials from each state, to coordinate our activities and to coordinate our messaging,” Currier said as part of the video conversation with other members of the Oregon Republican party.

“We’re partway in the door of socialism and Marxism right now … and we have to fight,” Currier said. “It’s a time for choosing. People can decide what they want to believe and what they want to do, but there are people standing up and there are people sitting down.”

Well, there's the problem. People are choosing what they want to believe instead of believing what the facts tell them.
 
Agreed. We should resign ourselves to the fact that conviction in the Senate is a lost cause. But then proceed to put on a show trial to end all show trials, for the historical record if nothing else. Subpoena the rioters who have already said that they felt they were, in fact, following the President’s orders when they attacked the Capitol. If they plead the fifth, have them sit on the witness stand and just play videos of them stating such. If nothing else make it VERY clear what voting against conviction in spite of the evidence means. Maybe not to the 25% of voters who call themselves Republicans, but cementing in the minds of Democrats and Independents what the Republican Party stands for today.

Then again, I didn’t think there was any way on God’s green earth the Dems could win both GA Senate seats, so maybe there’s just the slimmest of slim chances enough Republicans might vote to convict. But at this juncture I seriously doubt it.

Agreed.

CNN played videos of Graham, Rubio, etc stating how the investigation into Benghazi was all about holding the people responsible for it then played their excuses for not holding Trump responsible for his actions. Their hypocrisy seeped out of my TV and stunk up the room. But then again, it always does.
 
I'm not too surprised that the Republicans are backing out, but a little surprised it's coming so soon. I thought there was a compromise on their part to try to keep the filibuster in place, but if they are going to show their bad faith this early, I wonder how they expect that to happen.
There have probably been phone calls made to each of them starting with the words "You know those photographs we have that you would NEVER want to come out...?"
 
I wouldn't read to much into the fact that the GOP Is disinterested in holding an impeachment trial. Their party is not going to look good. They are going to be facing a very different trial. Actual evidence of a very awful event that many of them were complicit in is going to be put in front of the American people. Who can blame them for wanting to sweep it under the rug.
 
The Oregon Republican Party actually had the gall to state that the Capitol riot was a "false flag" operation:



Well, there's the problem. People are choosing what they want to believe instead of believing what the facts tell them.

I fear for our country.

Seriously. People at that level shouldn't be crazy. What's wrong with us that we are electing the crazy?
 
There have probably been phone calls made to each of them starting with the words "You know those photographs we have that you would NEVER want to come out...?"

I see it more as reminding them of their faith in the Holy Scriptures.

Book of Reagan. chapter 1 verse 1. “Verily, I say to you, The eleventh commandment is thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”

I’m not going to speculate what is in the Book of Trump.
 
I see it more as reminding them of their faith in the Holy Scriptures.

Book of Reagan. chapter 1 verse 1. “Verily, I say to you, The eleventh first , last and only commandment is thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”

I’m not going to speculate what is in the Book of Trump.

FTFY
 
....
The few who have spoken out have sometimes paid for it with their political careers.
How much courage or conscience do you need
to take a position that probably won't cost you anything? It's possible she is, indeed, voting her conscience here, but assuming that a politician is doing so is, to say the least, a pretty generous reading. I have no way of knowing how much of Murkowski's vote today was conscience and how much was political calculation, but no politician gets very far without a large share of the latter in play. (Yes, any politician, so spare me the whatabouts)
This is going to separate their belief in their own self-importance over the importance of our democracy.

It's insane this even is an issue.

It appears there are more than a few infiltrators in Congress.

:popcorn1
 
The vote of 45 senator's against the Impeachment of Trump on the grounds it is, "Unconstitutional", convinces me that convicting Trump at the trial no matter what the evidence is will be very hard, next to impossible. So sadly Trump will continue to be a major political force in the USA for the next few years at least.

Because they have a cop-out excuse. That is a little fire that need stomping out.
 
45 of 50 GOP Senators committ fresh Treason, try to dismiss Impeachment

Wtihout even hearing a single minute of evidence.

They are not Americans. They are not loyal. They must be criminally charged and removed by the DoJ.
 

Back
Top Bottom