Sunday, June 19, 2022
The January 6th Committee has now held three public hearings and it’s time to review what they have revealed. Much of it is stuff that was known or thought to be known, but now it’s on the record. There was a Facebook meme that pointed out that the people who said the former president knew he lost are under oath as saying so; the ones who say he didn’t lose have refused to testify under oath.
What has been established, not beyond a reasonable doubt, but as fact is that ex-president Trump was told repeatedly by his inner circle and everyone else that he lost the election. There were two people: Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman who were pushing the idea that he hadn’t lost and that he could overturn the results of the election. Eastman is particularly interesting because he was acting as the ex-president’s lawyer. He admitted to Mike Pence’s legal advisor that his case for overturning the election would lose in the Supreme Court 9-0. He also asked for a pardon, which he did not get.
Why he didn’t get a pardon is interesting because it goes to the heart of the problem for Trump. According to a 1915 Supreme Court decision asking for a pardon is an admission of guilt and if what he is guilty of is conspiracy to do something like say overthrow the government with whom is he guilty? There is only one person because he was working for only one person – the president of the United States. To pardon Eastman it would require laying out the crime, to do so would implicate Trump, therefore no pardon.
In his deposition for the January 6th Committee he took the 5th over one hundred times. He knows he’s guilty, and therefore so is Trump.
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Late in the week The New York Times issued a video that showed The Proud Boys who were on the Capital grounds and where they were during the attack. They did not dress in clothing that would make them identifiable. Rather, to use their wording, they dressed as “normals.” They spread out across the front of the crowd at various points of attack. There were at least three on any front shown in the videos of them inciting the crowd, harassing the police, and removing – literally – the police barriers. The removal of the barriers allowed the crowd to surge forward unimpeded. The NYT video team identified five points of attack where the Proud Boys were instrumental in breaking through resistance and leading the crowd forward.
Also, a document called the 1776 document was filed in court by the Proud Boys lawyers. I’m not sure why they filed it, but it outlines a plan for occupying key buildings on the capital grounds, mainly the Senate and Congressional office buildings. It is alleged that The Proud Boys did not create the document but rather it was given to them by the girl friend of the leader of the group. Where she got it is not known to me at this time.
Also, the Jan 6th Committee showed footage of a tour being led the day before Jan 6th by a Congressman from Georgia. It shows someone photographing a stairwell. The one that leads to Nancy Pelosi’s office. Also, he photographed a security point and the tunnel connecting to the Capital. Curiously, the Capital Police have said they see no evidence of anything unusual in this. (Really? It has been said that these are not normal tourist photo spots. Like this has to be pointed out.) The Congressman at first denied leading any tour that day. He attacked the Congresswoman from New Jersey who as a helicopter pilot in combat had been trained to spot unusual situations and she had pointed out that she had seen tours on January 5th and thought it suspicious. What did the Congressman from Georgia do at the time of the assertion? He called for the Congresswoman to be investigated for an ethics violation.
Now, said Congressman has done some amazing backpedaling. First, he denied leading a tour on that day. Then it was, well, yeah he did lead a tour but so what? Then it was he didn’t really know the people in the tour. Okay, how unusual is it for a member of Congress to personally lead a tour? Real unusual. Maybe, they did it for their immediate family. Usually, a staff member might do it. However, the Capital was not allowing visitors or tours because of Covid. So why was a member of Congress leading a tour the day before a violent insurrection on the Capital and why was he showing them places that most visitors would not care about? That were security check points and access to key officials’ offices? (The best excuse so far is that the tunnel has kids’ drawings in it and they were photographing them. Yeah, right.)
And lastly, let’s look at Bill Stepien. His testimony to the Jan 6th Committee is interesting because he not only verified that everyone on Trump’s team knew he had lost the election, including Trump, but he said that an intoxicated Rudy was saying they should declare victory even before all the ballots were counted. Stepien went on to divide the election crew into two groups: Team Rudy and Team Normal. He went on to say how he didn’t want his reputation to be sullied by this fiasco. Let me be clear about Mr Stepien – there is nothing normal about this guy and his reputation. He was in the thick of the icky stuff Chris Christie was doing during Bridgegate. He is currently leading the campaign of the person trying to oust Liz Cheney. He has been at the center of some sleazy lying Republican campaigns, and continues to be. This is not normal stuff. Well, I guess you can argue that lots of Republicans are doing it so therefore it is the new normal, but really?
Lastly, I think it is worth noting that the people the Jan 6th Committee had shown as testifying were not Democrats but Republicans. These were inner circle Trump supporters and family members.
The most stunning thing to me was how Bill Barr and others were willing to say under oath that what Trump was doing was BS, but didn’t have the guts to do it before. Take Mike Pence, he waited until the last second to say no to Trump. Imagine if he had done it earlier and publicly? Would the insurrection have happened? Would thousands of people come to the Capital to back up The Proud Boys? What if the Republicans in the Senate had actually done their job and impeached the President? We wouldn’t have this mess.
Now? Now we move on to the Senators who were in on the plot to overthrow the government of the United States. Two names stand out: Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley. Sedition is a hard thing to prove and to get a conviction in court. Yet, there are now five instances where the Justice Department has brought those charges.
We are in a race against time. Trump and his henchmen have moved to elect people willing to overturn elections if they don’t win. Trump has raised 250 million dollars since January 6th all for an organization that doesn’t exist. Is that fraud? You betcha. Will he get away with it? Maybe. He’s gotten away with fraud time and again. Now his lawyers are asking for delays because there are currently seven cases against Trump and they can’t be in seven places at once. Too bad. So sad. Get more lawyers. I saw a billboard advertising some. You know the kind, “Have You Been Injured?” Yeah. Donnie get more lawyers and whine about how you’ve been injured.
PS Photo of one of three altar legs from Piedras Negras, Mexico. This one in the Philadelphia Museum. (It’s Mayan. I was on an Egyptian tour but snuck away for a moment.)
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