Must Read Piece from NBC News: Republicans Predicted This in 2016, Then Got On Board Anyway

Liberals & progressives & general lefties have been screaming for years that Trump is unfit for office and that he has openly said and done things for years that should have disqualified him from serious consideration in 2016, much less the presidency over the last 4 years. Sometimes we feel like Cassandras, doomed to be disbelieved even as we tell the truth about our country’s inevitable fate.

But Republicans, too, warned the country. Nearly unanimously when Trump first entered the race the people in power in the GOP denounced him. They even compared Trump and his base to the No-Nothings of the 1850s who rioted in the capital and destroyed marble meant to finish the Washington Monument. Lindsey Graham famously declared that the GOP “will be destroyed” if they nominated Trump. “And we will deserve it,” he concluded.

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More quick thoughts on 1/6/2021 (Updated 9pm PST)

Please don’t miss today’s earlier posts on race & policing, the risks of leaving Trump in office, and some Q&A about the 25th Amendment, including whether the votes of “acting” Cabinet secretaries count.

On to the NEW THOUGHTS!

Thought 1: (12:40 PST, 1/7/2021) 

The House Sergeant at Arms Paul D. Irving has been fire-quitted. (The opposite of quit-fired: they were told to resign or they would be fired. Irving chose to quit.)

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Acting Cabinet Secretaries and the 25th Amendment

Everyone seems to be asking this, so let’s just tee it up, okay? Then I don’t have to answer it in the comments of a million different threads on a million different posts on a thousand different blogs.

The 25th amendment doesn’t mention Cabinet Secretaries. It mentions “principal officers”. These are people who report directly to the President and also do not report directly to anyone else. Let’s look at some examples:

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Terrified: A little knowledge is a dangerous thing

First, let’s get this out of the way: I don’t want you to miss this post I just put up a few minutes ago, but the separate topic of this post is also something that needs to be addressed now, not later,. I can’t have both posts top my stories for the day, but I can at least berate both my readers into making sure they read both posts. So go read that other thing, okay? Okay. On to this post.

As you know, I’m US-law curious, with a side of comparative constitutional law & constitutional construction, but I’m not a US lawyer & didn’t go to a US law school. That puts me firmly in the position described by the aphorism

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

That said, I am terrified that Trump is going to do further damage to the US government. Some people have been saying, and I’m sure that many have been thinking, that removing Trump when he only has 13 days left in his term of office is more dangerous than leaving him in as a lame duck.

Personally? I think he’s too dangerous to be left in office for 13 minutes. When I went to bed last night, it was my hope that by the time I woke up, Trump would have been 25th and Biden would be the 47th president two weeks from now instead of the 46th. Make no mistake, I’m not happy about a Pence presidency, even one as short as this would be, but the combination of Trump’s dangerous instability with the circumstances of yesterday’s assault on the Capitol Building creates some unique dangers.

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Let’s examine race and policing in Portland & DC

I and others have mentioned, of course, the vastly different treatment given to BLM protesters when it was thought they might inflict property damage and yesterday’s insurrectionists. There are numerous reports, including from Newsweek, about how law enforcement had plenty of information leading them to predict that the publicly-planned January 6th event would become violent. They even had good reason to fear there would be violence against people, not just property. For a variety of reasons, they did not take seriously the need for event security or even security on Capitol Hill. One reason is particularly interesting: they feared it would be even worse if they acted to prepare defenses against violence. Why? Here’s Newsweek’s take:

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A coup is underway: First thoughts

Thought 1:

I’m not saying that I like the use of tear gas, but after being tear gassed with no warning because someone 50 yards away from me threw a firecracker over a fence I literally am confused as to how the masses of people occupying the steps outside were not tear gassed before the could force their way in.

And then they used tear gas inside the rotunda because they wouldn’t use it on people who were charging the Capitol Building but not yet inside… but once the rubicon was crossed, why wasn’t gas used on the people outside the building? Why only inside?

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You know what you did…

So what is it?

it’s been a weird and difficult year, but before we hit January 1st & everyone starts talking about what you’re certainly going to do this next year, let’s take a minute to contemplate what we did this past year.

Did you beat cancer into remission? Introduce your kids to your favorite hiking trail? Read an excellent book? Finish a degree? Reorganize that closet so you can actually find the things you need when you need them? Actually get a picture of that rare bird you see two or three times per year, but only when you don’t have your camera?

We’ve all complained about 2020, but a year is a long time. I know everyone has done things that they are proud or happy to have accomplished. I know that I’m happy to have been a part of the protests in Portland. I have deep roots there and what happens in Oregon generally and Portland specifically matters to me. Barriers related to disability can get in the way of getting a lot of things done, and when the new wave of protests began in the aftermath of the murders of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, I wished I could do more. But I wasn’t really doing much.

Then things continued to get worse, and suddenly I found it in me: I did do more, for three hard weeks. It required help from a number of people (thank you all!) but I was able to maintain a presence there for a crucial period of time. And that mattered. Whatever else I did or didn’t do, I can say that I am both proud and happy that in 2020 I did that.

So, what did you do this year?

BFF’s mom has died

You might have read the other day that my BFF had to take off in an emergency kind of way to rush back east because her mom who had been ill and was probably going to be moved to hospice soon suddenly came down with an infectious respiratory disease and the docs weren’t sure if she would last the 10 days until BFF’s scheduled trip, or even 24 hours.

BFF’sM lasted almost a whole week, long enough for BFF to get back home and visit with her. At her most alert she only opened a single eye for just a short time, and gave BFF a hand squeeze, but she was made comfortable and she had her family about her. It was wonderful for BFF that she was able to change her flight plans & make it home with 36 hours to spare before that last time her mother opened an eye and was able to look at her.

It’s sad, of course. But there were so many things about her that I loved. There are, of course, too many to list here, but the one that makes me smile most is that she became an outspoken advocate for women her age sexually objectifying the asses of the hot, lycra-clad Tour de France riders every June. She also would attend MLS games & ogle the players.

There was something delightful about a white-haired New England church lady and school marm (she was a teacher for over 40 years) waxing enthusiastic about how TV was showing off hot man ass for a month a year now. So if you feel touched by anything I’ve written about her, past or present, you could do something nice for your library as she often did, or you could just go look at the hot man asses of professional cyclists for a few minutes & know that she would approve.