Debasing Democracy in order to Save It (quoth)

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Self-righteous Dumbfucks. There is no other way to describe the Democrats who have misunderstood and mismanaged the impeachment process.

As I have explained before, impeachment is the constitutional analog to the de-throning of James II who, for imprecise but generally understood reasons was thought to be undermining the state under color of law. The key word here is generally. The understanding had to transcend partisanship and had to involve something more than the usual chicanery kings and politicians are wont to engage in. If you do not have the votes to convict, you should not bring forth articles of impeachment because you do not have the general understanding that is essential to the matter. If anything was foreseeable on January 8th it was that the votes to convict were not there. That should have ended the project.

If that were not enough, Pelosicrats might have hearkened to the principle of judicial restraint. It is a salutary maxim that restrains a court from reaching an issue that is not "ripe" (see above) or that is "moot". The purpose of impeachment is to remove a president from office. Once Trump was no longer in office, removing him was no longer on the table. Instead of adhering to this cautious principle, the Democrats resorted to a stretched constitutional interpretation that attempted to squeeze out from the language of Article I, section 2 the notion that a president could be impeached merely and solely to disqualify him from holding office. As I have argued elsewhere, this reading does not flow either from the grammar or the history of the Impeachment Clause.

I might add that if the person impeached is in office then disqualifying him from holding office is what removing him from office entails. On the other hand, if the so-called "Disqualification Clause" does not require the accused to be in office then it could be brought against any citizen to preemptively disqualify him from running for office. On what basis does the Senate have personal jurisdiction over Mr. Trump who is now a private citizen? Under Article III, the trial of all crimes is vested entirely with the judicial branch. Apart from removing a person from office, Congress does not have a judicial power to try citizens at large for unspecified "high crimes and misdemeanors." The exasperated cry will go up, that such absurdities were not contemplated. Indeed they were not, but that is the absurdity the flows from maintaining that "disqualification" is a ground of impeachment separate and independent from removal for office. Evidently Chief Justice Roberts agrees; for, absent from all the breathless reporting was the absence of the Chief Justice from the proceedings. Why? Because "When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside." Trump was no longer president; there was no one to impeach.

Having misunderstood the nature of impeachment, the Pelosicrats then proceeded to utterly mismanage their prosecution, turning the entire affair into a dismal spectacle of partisan revenge and personal animus.

To begin with, they began by drafting articles of impeachment which were as imprecise as they were rhetorically inflated. Was there not a lawyer in the House? and if there were what damn law school did she (or he) go to? All action has an intended purpose which, in this case, was said to be "insurrection." But "insurrection" is a vague and amorphous term. It merely means a rising up against. It has been used to cover the planned overthrow of the existing government or any diffuse striking out against the authority of government. Instead of defining Trump's alleged purpose, the Articles resorted to equally vague phrases to the effect that Trump "threatened the integrity of the democratic system," "imperiled a coequal branch of Government," and "endangered the security of the United States" to which was gratuitously added that he "betrayed his trust" to the "manifest injury" of the People.

Huffing and inflated as this kind of language may be it added nothing specific to the already vague charge. Words like "peril," "danger," and "threat," all refer to undefined potential harms not actual and specific ones such as "he blew up a bridge" or "disrupted proceedings." Legal puff talk may sound impressive but absent concrete facts it is empty. The strategy seems to have been to paint the target as large as possible so as to be able to proceed by scatter shot. And scattershot it was.

There were three overall ways a prosecutor could have proceeded on the publicly known facts. She (or he) could have chosen to charge Trump with incitement and/or conspiracy and/or dereliction of duty. Although they might all stem from the same general set of facts, each one of these offences has its own legal requirements and limitations.

The worst charge (from a prosecutorial point of view) was incitement because this crime runs smack into the wall of the First Amendment. Criminal incitement requires both intent and imminent causality, as I have discussed elsewhere. It is not enough to blabber about reckless "incitement" that "could foreseeably and likely" result in some kind of danger or damage. "Could" refers to nothing more specific than open-ended and arguable possibilities. Incitement requires words that will infrangibly result in inevitable and specifically intended harm. More than a "trigger," the words must be the hammer that strikes the pin. Why is the bar set so high? Because, as Justice Holmes famously remarked, "all speech is incitement." We do not want people dragged into court on stretched and inflammatory allegations because someone in power took offence at what was said and then argues with great emphasis and moral certitude that because an event happened it was "entirely foreseeable!" and because the effect could not but have been known to any reasonable and honest person, the result must have been intended... beyond a reasonable doubt! Such a recklessness standard can be used to punish any speech, as Holmes plainly understood. Had the House Clowns not read the Supreme's Court jurisprudence on seditious incitement? If they have, one can only conclude that what they were really interested in was dragging Trump into the well of the Senate in order to harangue him with epithets and insults decked out in a very thin tissue of "evidence."

In terms of legal theory, the easiest charge to prove would have been conspiracy to obstruct government business. To show a conspiracy it is not necessary to produce a signed agreement beforehand or audio tapes of thieves compacting in the night. All that is required is to show that the participants of the alleged conspiracy acted in a coordinated fashion toward a singular (unlawful) end. If they acted as if they had agreed to do so, it can be inferred that they in actual fact did agree to do so, if only by wink and by nod. In today's age of texting and tweets, proving conspiracy is a piece of cake. We do have the equivalent of a neighbor listening at the keyhole of the door. The beauty of a conspiracy charge, is that it re-opens the door to an incitement charge; for, all that would be needed is one tweet carelessly urging actual violence without Trump's cagey caveat to be "peaceful". The only drawback, from Pelosi's perspective, is that raising a conspiracy charge required interviews and investigation and this, in turn, would be met with claims of executive privilege and confidentiality. So she discarded a charge that required time consuming footwork and opted for something quick and dirty.

Proving dereliction of duty stands somewhere in the middle. It is not a sexy charge but if the facts are present it is a solid one. Despite all the huffing and puffing from the Pelosicrats, Trump is not directly responsible for the safety of the Capitol or any other building in Washington. The safety of the Capitol itself is entrusted to the Capitol Police which are under the authority not of the Executive but of the Legislative Branch... a detail I did not see reported anywhere on the pages of the Slime.  However, because Washington D.C. is a federal enclave, the President is responsible for activating the National Guard in and for the District of Columbia. This authority has been delegated to the Department of Defence. Reports from January 6th show that when a request to activate the Guard was made, the Secretary of Defence dillied and dallied for over an hour before responding. Trump might always claim that he didn't know the Pentagon was dragging its feet and that he was assuming they would do what was "appropriate," but this kind of self- serving excuse-making ducks the more primary issue; namely, that any president worth his salt would have called out the Guard on his own initiative upon first learning that a violent breaking and entering followed by rampaging had taken place. He certainly would not have waited two hours before telling the rioters to cease and desist. Arguably, laissez aller incompetence is not grounds for impeachment; but his inaction was the one culpable fact that was capable of plain and simple proof.

So, to summarize, there were three avenues of prosecution available to the House. They chose the worst one. Why? They did so because what is known as "bad character evidence" is dirty, cheap and easy. Just paint the accused as a thoroughly rotten apple and, without any further footwork or evidence, the case is proved. As I have explained previously, the whole case against Trump was based on the proposition that (1) nefarious, reprobate that he is, he was (gasp!) contesting an election that he clearly lost and (2) that he had for months roused his rabble with inflamed and "violent" rhetoric and therefore "in context" -- that is, in the context of his demagoguery and low-lifedness -- his call to march on the Capitol really meant and was understood as a call to violently disrupt an official proceeding and (hopefully) to lynch Pelosi in the process. There were several problems with this approach.

The first is that dastardly, low-handed and Tricky Dicky as it might be, it is not crime to contest an election, by whatever legal means might be available. And in our free and open democratic Republic "legal means" includes bringing political pressure to bear on members of Congress. No one seems to have had any problem with advocacy groups bringing "the pressure of public opinion" (as represented by those assembled) against the Supreme Court. The Pelosicrats tried to circumvent this minor legality by casting Trump's contesting as "prevent[ing] the peaceful transfer of power." Now the transfer of power in this country is presumed to be peaceful. The Constitution does not provide for violent successions; so why insert the word "peaceful"? It was a rhetorical trick to insinuate that Trump's contesting the certification was somehow a violent act. Without more, it was not.  If Demorats meant that on January 6th Trump instigated a riot in order to disrupt, with force and violence, the certification proceedings then that is exactly what they should have said. Broad brushing two full months of obnoxious political gambits and protests as "preventing the peaceful transfer of power" was just bullshit.

Of course, the decent and sporting thing to do has been to concede at midnight Tuesday even though one might suspect that some people voted early and often. Are all these swift and gentlemanly concessions really just attributable to mainstream Protestant Decorum? Bunk. Let us be brutally frank. More connects Gore with Bush, and Hillary to Donald than connects either of them to me or to the average anonymous and unimportant anyman. They could give a rats ass about you or me (provided you are a nobody like me) but they do care deeply about preserving the aura of legitimacy around the system that cozies them in privilege and power. They are terrified that the people might see through the utter farce and sham that the whole system, and especially elections, are. People might stop paying taxes, might start revolting and then they would have to call out the goons of a professional army to restore order and everything would get very messy. So it is a far, far better thing to pretend that the elections are, on the whole and with a few minor and unimportant irregularities here and there, free and fair! And after all, the worst that can possibly happen is that for four or eight years one will have to get a cushy corporate job with percs instead of slumping into a cushy government job with percs.

Trump understands this as well as anyone else. The only difference between him and the average political whore is that he is willing to va banc. This is what so infuriated the Democrats. But they are hypocrites. Did not Democratic congressperons themselves attempt to contest certification back in 2001? And if one is concerned about preserving an aura of legitimacy, who was it exactly, that spent three years delegitimizing the previous election as the result of "foreign meddling" and interference? History is largely a matter of progressions and in the progression from bad to worse, Hillary-the-Cheated and her elves at the NY Slime had already taken things farther than they had been taken before. Trump's rabble rousing -- geared to people who are tone deaf to Buttigiegian Burbble or the gentrified sophisms of the Times -- was a logical degression.

For all that, the question was (and remains) whether Trump intended to resort to violence in order to play his hand. A resort to violence, by the president himself, would have gone beyond all political convention. I do not for a second minimize the charge if true. But its very seriousness demanded that it be proved with something more than "what else" and "innuendo." My own suspicion is that Trump was hoping for violence while stopping just short of calling for it. I feel in my bones that evidence is out there to be found. But the Demorats didn't produce it. In fact they did not present evidence at all but only their opinions about whatever it was that was shown on Youtube and television. For shame! They succeeded only in "proving" to those who agreed that Trump was one of the scummiest, if not the scummiest, politician in a country that has had no shortage of scummy politicians. But dragging out his dirty bad character onto the floor of Senate for all the world to see, did not prove the case for illegal incitement to unlawful action. To be as charitable as possible, the Democrats resorted to a case of "circumstantial impressionism."

My suspicion also is that Trump was tickled pink upon learning that Pence and Pelosi were being scurried to safety. If there are eyewitnesses to this then that would nail Trump's illegal intent; for, it would be simply too much to claim that one was not angling for violence when one is caught jumping up and down with glee when violence occurs. But again, the Democrats did not bring these witnesses into the chamber. They will have all sorts of excuses as to why they could not but none of them are relevant. If you don't have the proof, you don't have a case and shouldn't bring it.

It is far more than a suspicion to say that Trump did nothing when the rioting inside the Capitol became known. Any other president I can think of, except perhaps Willard Fillmore, would have been on the horn to the Secretary of the Army demanding the deployment of the guard. I can all but hear St Jack on the phone. But of course St. Jack would never have called upon his supporters to rally in front of the Capitol in the first place. Had he been so politically crass to have done so, he would have called them off the instant the first pane of glass was broken. In my mind dereliction of duty was the strongest case given what was known. The Democrats didn't bring it because they were too busy rushing to make a solemn and pompous march "to the other House" in the manner of country bumpkins imitating Black Rod.

This whole fiasco -- and when you loose it is a fiasco -- was the misbegotten spawn of Pelosi's pique. There is much to loathe in Donald Trump and the ghouls he surrounds himself with. He represents a next step in the ongoing degeneration of American politics. But, aside from all the pompous and self-righteous posturing, what really fires the ire of the Democrats is that he has bested them at their own game -- and worse yet, tweaks their noses while he is at it. They seethe, not with real concern for the shabby state of our so-called democracy, but with personal resentment. They were incredulous and outraged when Hillary was scorned and they spent the next three years trying to delegitimize the result.

Had the Demorat establishment and the New York Slime been capable of the least objectivity they would have stepped back from announcing to the world that this "miracle" of America (Raskin), this "temple of democracy" (Pelosi), was in fact controlled from abroad, the mere glove of Putin's hand shoved up its ass. Even real satraps don't announce to the world that they are puppets. But no. The Demorats spent three years trying to prove it.

I have been amazed at how intelligent people have fallen for the bullshit of Russiagate. I think it flows from America's Original Derangement -- its profound need for bugbears. Without enemies we are lost! For then we have only ourselves to contemplate and that is truly scary. Supposing the allegations were true, does the national interest require you to broadcast it? No, the national honor requires that the truth be denied in order to maintain the country's credit and authority on the world stage. Governments not run by hysterics and petulant egomaniacs understand this.

But none of this matters to Pelosi, the Demorats and the Slime. They viscerally hate Trump only because he has upset their complacency and sense of entitlement. Aided by the true cunning of McConnell, Trump consistently left them to stew in impotent rage. Had the Demorats acknowledged the alienation and dispossession that fuels Trump's base they would have got behind Bernie. But no. They ran a campaign whose aim and slogan was to return to the "normalcy" of the days when we were in power.

Well fine. They got what they wanted. So what did Nancy do? Enraged that the Temple of Her Office got polluted by riff-raff, she went off half cocked on a third attempt at revenge. Revanche! Revanche! Toujours Revanche. But to paraphrase St. Jack, you can't get even when you are mad.

Impeachment is a legalized form or regicide or revolution. It is very serious business because it annuls an election and thus shakes the very governmental order it seeks to save. It should not be used for tactical partisan advantage or revenge, far less for personal pique. The Republoscum started the abuse when they impeached Clinton over nonsense. There was no reason for the Democrats to turn the abuse into a habit.

I have said from the start of this fiasco that impeachment was not the way to go. The case should have been investigated with calm and care. Once the evidence of the three crimes I have mentioned was marshalled, the former president should have been haled into District Court to face the music. Instead, energized by his acquittal, Trump will claim vindication and carry on as before to the delight of his half of the country and to the general nausea of everyone else.

I have often alluded to Ridicule, the French movie about the sly, snide and sordid games played against one another by the aristocratic ruling class within the confines of Versailles. The movie ends with the distinct implication that this world of powdered and periwigged vipers will not last. Pelosi, who last year, while hundreds of thousands lined up at failing food banks, cheerfully told an interviewer that she found consolation in designer chocolates, symptomizes the despicable uselessness of this intramural class on a hill.

The Demorats can play their stupid games with the Republoscum, but the broader picture is (1) that the people in the country are close to hopelessly divided against themselves and (2) the system is economically, educationally, medically and socially failing close to 80% of the populace, with 40% subsisting in a state of no-escape destitution. In light of this socio-economic debacle, Trump is the least of this country's problems. He is a manifestation and not a cause. The rabble he roused will still be there when he is gone only to be roused by someone else. No amount of smug, self-righteous hectoring and finger wagging from the gentrified liberals and the woke "left" will change that. What will change things is not lectures, not social media control, not tearing down statutes and doxing people but putting in place social conditions which prevent the despair and degeneration of the individual.

If, instead of obsessing over Trump, the Demorats rolled up their sleeves and used their thin majorities to make America a worthwhile and happy place to live in, the alienation, resentment and hate demagogues like Trump feed on, would recede away. I will not hold my breath. At the end of the day, politics is a game of entre nous and nobodies don't count except as ballot fodder to keep the illusion alive.


Post Script. As this was being readied for publication, the Demorats disclosed, at the 13th hour, that they had just discoverd (Neguse on Face the Nation) a memo from Congresswoman Jaimie Herrera Beutler about a overhearing a conversation between Congressman McCarthy and Trump which supposedly showed that Trump knew rioters were breaking into the Capitol. The letter is at least double hearsay and is still loose ended as to exactly what and when. But the letter proves my point. As I have said, I have always felt that there was evidence (real evidence and not personal conclusions) that could nail Trump. My point is that the Pelosicrats were so obsessed with viscerally going after their Hate Object that they did not properly investigate and marshall their case which ought to have been taken into a court of law.

House Lynch Mob puts on Senate Show Trial

Yesterday commenting on an editorial in the Fem Woke Guardian, I wrote:

"What we are witnessing is a show-trial satisfying the political blood lust of the Democrats. It will solve nothing; it will only drag the country into deeper irredentism.

"Impeachment was designed to remove a president from office. Trump is out of office; the issue is moot. The way to go after Trump is by criminal prosecution with the evidentiary precision and due process safeguards such a trial entails."

Instead the Democrats are pursuing a lynching decked out in the trappings of a "procedure." But don't take my word for it, hearken to the New York Slime

Impeachment Managers Focus on Lack of Remorse

"If Convicting Trump Is Out of Reach, Managers Seek a Verdict From the Public and History

“The Democrats and House managers are playing to a different jury in this case than in any previous impeachment trial of an American president."

THAT IS PRECISELY WHAT A SHOW TRIAL IS -- a performance for the public as jury, with guilt proved by lack of remorse.

And performance it is. The difference between drama and history, says Aristotle, is that history deals with particulars that have taken place whereas drama deals with more abstract concepts that could be. Both contain the same elements and both resort to "spectacle" to suspend judgement and produce a cathartic effect in the audience. And there has been plenty of spectacle. Hearken again to the Slime

Never-Before-Seen Footage Shows Trump Supporters on Rampage

Impeachment Video Reveals a True American Horror Story

"Using never-before-seen footage from Jan. 6, impeachment managers wove video from the Capitol into a narrative of terror, our television critic writes"

Our television critic? Yes, why not? There is certainly no need for any legal commentary.

The "managers" of the prosecution, the Slime tells us, want to use the "national spotlight to make the searing images of havoc the inexpungible legacy of the Trump presidency."

Lest anyone get lax about this, the Slime would have us know that:

Sometimes the horror was in seeing how much worse it could have been.

Say what? If this isn't horror enough for you, the true horror lay in the horror that didn't occur but could have?

What the Slime is telling you, in pure Orwellian fashion, is that you will be horrified whether the images sear you or not.

Let us step back for just a moment to comprehend the broader picture. While the Corporate Masters of Public Discourse are dropping accounts into a memory hole in the name of sanitizing content, the Corporate Liberal Media are telling you that you should be feel dismay and horror at the horrible things that did or did not occur, whether you saw the searing horror or not.

It is really choice when one considers that social media control is done in the name of protecting your mind from unsettling, disturbing or offensive content while at the same time we are being told that our hearts should be filled with fear and loathing. Now if they will only add anal dildos the manipulation will be complete. But I digress...

At least the Slime leaves no doubt that what this senatorial trial really amounts to is a spectacle of horror, havoc and images intended to leave a scar on your brain. So much for judicious.

Let us return to the beginning. In an incredibly imprecise indictment that only Nancy Pelosi could have managed Trump was charged with "inciting an insurrection." I will forgo a detailed parsing of the Articles of Impeachment. Suffice to say that these two words make up the two elements and two factual issues of the charge.

The ordinary meaning of incite means to "stir up" or to "encourage;" in other words, to emotively cause a particular course of action, process or situation. Okay. But as Justice Holmes said, "all speech is incitement." Most Americans get incited every sunday from the pulpit. So, the primary question is: incitement to what? and this brings us to ask what is the meaning of insurrection, since that is what Trump supposedly sought to trigger.

Did Trump seek to incite the overthrow of the government? Did he seek to instigate a coup d'etat? No. After blabbering about Trump's "false" claims to have won the election ( and it is just blabber ) the indictment finally specifies that Trump "willfully made statements that, in context, encouraged—and forseeably resulted in—lawless action at the Capitol."

So, in answer to our first question, the Articles charged Trump with inciting a riot. That is several notches down from what is normally thought of as an "insurrection," "coup," "overthrow," or "revolution".

It is at this point, that we can see what a shabby piece of work the Articles were. A riot is lawless no doubt but it is also aimless. It is a composite of individual actions that have no consistent or organizing principle, other than being a public disturbance. That a riot took place at the Capitol is indisputable. That the riot had the effect of disrupting proceedings in Congress is also indisputable. That this disruption "threatened the integrity of the democratic system" and that it "interfered with the peaceful transition of power" are exagerated ways of saying the same thing twice over. In legal practice this is known as a parade of horribles; in this case, a parade of repetitive horribles. What the matter boils down to is simply that Trump is alleged to have instigated a riot which had the effect of disrupting a proceeding in Congress.

Even to say as much gives the Article too much credit. Every entry-grade prosecutor knows (or ought to know) how to charge inciting a riot or, instigating the disruption of an official act in violation of 18 U.S. Code § 2384. Why not just say it in plain English? Because, as they say in the trade, if you don't have the facts dazzle em with bullshit... the more inflammatory and morally lofty the better.

But the shabbiness of the indictment does not end there. Let us read into the Articles what ought to have been plainly stated; namely, that a specified act was the cause of certain specified effects. Trump made statements which caused a riot at the Capital which riot had certain effects. The effects, rhetorically exagerated as they may be are, as I have said, indisputable. The spectacle of the cause (i.e. the riot) is, as I have also said, a matter of deep impression. That Trump told the crowd to "fight like hell" is also a matter of record. But what gets buried in all of this is the small issue of specific intent.

It is not enough to simply say that the "disruption" of the certification process was "foreseeable" (a disputable fact). In law, ignoring something that is "reasonably foreseeable" implicates the mental state of "recklessness." However, to prove criminal incitement the disruption must also have been specificically intended. As stated by the Supreme Court in Yates v. United States, the words uttered must be "reasonably and ordinarily calculated to incite persons to ...action" and must be aimed at "overthrowing or destroying the Government of the United States by force and violence, ... with the intent to cause the overthrow." (354 U.S. 298, at p. 326 [construing the Smith Act] .) In other words, in addition to action, cause and effect, guilt requires knowledge and intent. This is a maxim of jurisprudence that dates back to Roman law.

Now, in this situation, a strong inference of intent is usually derived from the words spoken. "Go burn down that den of iniquity" (pointing to the Capitol) very strong implies that the speaker thereof wanted his audience to do precisely that. Oh but alas! Trump told his rabble to march on the Capitol "peacefully." Trump is no fool, and that put the House prosectors in the position of proving intent from something other than the allegedly inciteful words themselves. But instead of producing evidence from which an inference of intent might be drawn, the managers resorted to the shabby trick prosecutors always use to establish their case: the conduct had the effect, therefore the effect must have been intended. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.

During the proceedings, representative Neguse correctly noted that Trump cultivated a culture of aggresive resentments and hate. But Neguse's argument that violence was therefore "foreseeable" shifted legal standards and ducked the issue of intent. In so doing, Neguse fell back on the old --and discarded-- hobby horse of all sedition statutes; namely, the criminalization of speech that has an alleged tendency to provoke violence or sedition. This is not the rule that the Supreme Court follows. Seditious speech is not a question of "atmospherics" or "cultures" or "likelihoods" but of words that are immediately and imminently brigaded to unlawful conduct (Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) 395 U.S. 444.)

The now recognized defect in the tendency rule is that it criminalizes anything that can arguably be said to have created a "risk" or "danger" or "likelihood" of some violence or some unlawful occurrence. The tendency rule (which is still followed in England) is the darling of all moralists and sociologists precisely because it is open ended. Anything can "tend" anywhere and on the morning after it is always "obvious" that it was going to land where it did. But in Brandenburg the Supreme Court made clear that words cannot be criminalized based on the argument that they may have a tendency to lead to some undesirable end or that that they could in the vast realm of possibilities promote some undesirable consequence. In addition to being intended to promote an unlawful end they must be imminently connected to conduct which is itself unlawful.

Trump spoke. A riot happened. Proceedings were temporarily disrupted. That is all these "managers" have. They have even less, once it is taken into account that Trump told his "fighters" to be "peaceful." To make up for the thin tissue of their case, the managers of this prosecution and the pontiffs at the Slime want to suspend your judgement with the spectacle of the horror that could have been!!

But it gets worse still. In addition to the issues of act, knowledge, cause, intent, and effect there is the small matter of free speech. The Supreme Court has made it difficult to prove criminal incitement not simply because "free speech is important" but because speech itself is emotive and fluid. If we were constrained to using words only in their precise and literal meaning, speech would be as dead as the High Priestesses of Poltical Correctness want it to be. As stated in Yates "[v]ague referemces to 'revolutionary' or "militant' action of an unspecified character" are not sufficient. So too statements like: "hang the bastards!" "fight like hell for what you believe" and "Johnson ought to be shot!" Two rules emerge: (1) mere "advocacy" of violence does not suffice; and (2), figurative expressions, metaphorical language and even violent language or "fighting words" are constitutionally protected, Nancy Pelosi notwithstanding.

Do the "managers" of this senatorial lynching really not understand that Trump's exhortation to "fight" for the government they wanted was protected speech? Do they really not understand that for words to amount to criminal incitement they must be so "brigaded" with the unlawful conduct as to be inseverable from the conduct? The Supreme Court has set an extremely high bar for prosecutors, managers and the pontiffs at the Slime to jump over; and, in making a case against Trump in accordance with these principles they have utterly failed.

As I have said, Trump knows how to push the envelope. He told people to "fight" to "save" the country. When Neguse argued that such speech "was not a metaphor" he was tacitly admitting that this kind of speech is constitutionally protected, precisely because it is presumed to be a metaphor. What did Neguse offer to show that "fight" was meant literally? What did he offer to show that "peacefully" was not meant to be taken seriously? Nothing other than that Trump had laughed off violence before and often resorted to aggressive and hateful language. "Just look at all the stuff he said before..." But this was to go around in a circle -- circumstantial evidence being used to buttress an inference from circumstantial evidence. It is in this manner that the matter is brought back to the issue of specific intent. It is only separate proof of intent that can break out of the self perpetuating loop.

It is at this point the House prosecutors actually did manage to come up with what might have been relevant evidence. Although criminal intent must exist at the time of the criminal conduct in question, it is an accepted maxim that it can be proved by conduct after the event. Typically this conduct consists in some form of consciousness of guilt. But it can also consist in consciousness of success! When a person cheers the success of something, there is a strong and logical inference that he intended for that "success" to happen.

According to Representative Ceciline, Senator Sasse was said to have said that Trump was "delighted" and "borderline enthusiastic" "as events unfolded on January 6." But like the proverbial carrot being dangled before the jury, what this double hearsay evidence left unclear was precisely what Trump was delighted at. "As events unfolded" is a very broad and vague timeline. Was Trump "delighted" at the sight of Antler Man howling in the Senate Chamber? At the sight of rioters smashing windows? Or was his delight at the sight of a swelling mob outside the Capitol?

Again, Ceciline, cited an article from the Washington Post according to which Senatory McCarthy pleaded with Trump to "to issue a statement for his supporters to leave the Capitol." To leave the Capitol grounds or to leave the building? It makes a difference.

Instead of pursuing and nailing down this potentially very damning evidence the prosecutors left double and triple hearsay statements dangling in the wind while they chased after what amounted to bad character evidence. That is the favorite tactic of all prosecutors because it makes their case as easy as it is illusory. So-and-so is a bad apple -- indeed a bad, worm eaten and rotten -- apple, ergo he must have done the bad thing. We know that Trump is a very bad and rotten apple that any decent worm would disdain, but that does not prove the case. As the matter was left the "proof" was simply a species of ad hom coupled to a vague proffer of what might have been evidence.

In this regard, it might be worth noting that this was not the first time the Certification Process has been called into question. Democrats tried to do it on the floor of the chamber back in 2001. It is a somewhat dodgy manouever but it is not illegal. Just as the Senate's prerogative to "consent" implies a prerogative not to consent; so too, the power to certify implies a power to not certify. And if that is the case, then Trump was within his envelope to bring peaceful, political, protest pressure to bear on the proceedings inside. The House prosecutors waxed indignant that Trump had dared to question the legitimacy of the vote. Whoa.... Had not the Democrats done precisely that for three years on behalf of Hillary-the-Scorned?

Was it shabby? Unquestionably. Everything Trump does is shabby and this was the shabbiest of all. Compare his conduct with Al Gore's when, presiding over the certification of Bush's win, he ruled challenges to the certification to be out of order. But shabby is not illegal. Politically pornographic as it may have been, so long as he did not incite violence, Trump was within bounds in seeking to bring peaceful pressure to bear on the process.

But just as shabby was a trial at which the evidence consisted of nothing more than accusatory closing arguments. Not a single witness has been called and, consequently, not a single assertion of fact has been cross-examined. The managers' argument was that there was no need to call witness because we all were witnesses who tuned into CNN and Youtube and saw what there was to be seen. When the evidence is "what every good German knows it to be" (thank you Roland Freisler) we are in deep show.

I realize that an impeachment trial is not a judicial proceeding in the strictest sense. But I don't know of a case where the basic rules of evidence -- direct and cross examination -- were so completely and high-handedly disregarded. The "evidence" in this case was about as real as a Trump reality show. Shabby. Shabby. Shabby.

To be clear. The Demorats might have had a case had they pursued the right issue instead of embarking on a self righteous crusade of character assassination. They might have a case had they properly formed the indictment so as to charge a separate count of dereliction of duty for failing to to protect the duly elected officials of government if and once Trump knew of the danger they were in. It is for this reason that I have always stated, that the way to proceed is by criminal prosecution...not by what amounts to a partisan political lynching.

In my view there is a strong, potential case that Trump and his cronies conspired to disrupt the proceedings in Congress, and such a conspiracy would be illegal. But that is a charge that would require much more investigation and precision in charging than what is taking place in the Senate Chamber now.

None of this is relevant to the Vengeocrats in the pits of Congrease or in the caves of the Slime. Instead, knowing beforehand that they did not have the votes to convict, they want to carry their case to the public on waves of contrived horror.

Even here, we are led to wonder what kind of nation of ninnies we have become that a largely comic riot should be accounted as and equated with History's Greatest Horrors! Per the hysteria emanating from the offices of the Slime, one would think it was a Second Albigensian Crusade. Caedite eos omnes!!

Let me be clear, again. Violence is ugly. Two men pummeling one another on a street corner is a shocking spectacle of raw animal rage. A bar room brawl, which might be the scene of slapstick comedy, is, in actual fact, a brutal event. It is very injurious and at times fatally so to be blindsided by a chair or hit over the head with a bottle. Protests turned riot -- whether of the left or the right, by blacks or by whites -- are harmful precisely because people have lost their better judgement and are utterly unpredictable in what they will do. Those faced with a tsunami of rioters running amok are justifiably scarred shitless. No one can fault AOC or Pelosi or Pence for being fearful for their own safety. Nor do I make light of the fact that one protestor was shot by a federal agent or that one cop died from as yet unkown causes.

But for all that, history is (in Gibbon's inimitable words) the sorry chronicle of the "crimes, vices and follies" of mankind. We have seen far, far worse before than the riot at the Capital on January 6th. When we are called upon to make an objective judgement as to the legal or political harm involved, a certain callousness is required. Increasingly, public discourse is being reduced to using words as emotional flash-bangs. If we are to fall to pieces in fits of quivering fear and hysteria at the mere thought of any injury or violence, then we are not fit to make dispassionate judgements.

That is precisely the fear and trembling the Slime wants to substitute for judgement. And not even judgement in the Senate, because the Slime has already conceded that the votes for conviction are not there. No... the Slime is talking about judgement by the public and by history. By history reduced to a spectacle of horrors and a public induced into states of hysteria.

As much as I think Trump is a despicable creature; as much as I am glad he is out of office, I refuse to be jerked around in this fashion. The Slime and the Pelosicrats can go to hell.

Fetische Korrecktheit

Morgan Wallen...

Who?

... was dropped from his record labels and radio stations across the country on account of using a RACIAL SLUR.

According to the Aunt Britannia Broadcasting Company the incident was filmed.   "In the footage, reportedly filmed by a neighbour last weekend, the 27-year-old is seen saying goodbye to some friends and calling one of them the N-word."

That's TERRIBLE. 

Not only that its TERRIBLY INTOLERABLE.  If I had any I would immediately have thrown out all my Morgan Wallen records... after of course, smashing them to bits and sweeping up all the debris to make sure no VERBAL POLLUTION remained in my house.

Morgan Wallen is a DISGUTING HUMAN BEING, if he even qualifies as that. ...

In fact...

....uh but wait... what was that about "saying goodbye to friends"? 

Surely a hideous RACIST like Wallen can't have an RACIALLY SLURABLE friend!

Confused... we googled to see what it was, exactly, that Wallen had said to whom, seeing as Aunt Britannia Broadcasting Company was protecting us from HORRIBLE WORDS  by not printing them, for our own safety and good.

Thanks to Variety Mag, we learned that a drunk Wallen was carrying on loudly with friends outside his house.  "As Morgan appears to stumble toward his house, he tells someone to watch over a guy in his group. He says ... "take care of this "p****-ass mother******" -- and then goes on to say, "take care of this p****-ass n*****" ... before finally heading in."

pushy-ass  mother nucker?

puppy-ass figger

What could the horrible word have been?  

* ****** ***'* figger ** ***

Oh well it must have been WRONG and BAD, but not as wrong as bad as the terrorizing of uncivil society by fetishizing Torquemadists.  Make no mistake, political correctness is tyranny and when it is coupled with unthinking fetischized irredentism it is nothing less than a form of terrorism

Let start with the fact that all meaning is contextual.  Words like nigger, bitch, fag, spic, jarhead and just about any epithet or insult you can think of can be used in either a hostile and denigrating way or as sign of affection or appreciation.

One can hear the instant and uncomprimising rejoinder of the Korrectheit Fascist:  "THAT'S NO EXCUSE!"  "THERE'S NO EXCUSE -- EVER -- FOR USING WORDS THAT ARE OBJECTIFYING and OPPRESSIVE, DEMEANING and DIVISIVE, ASSAULTIVE and INJURIOUS, Blah, Blah, Blah, and still more very uncompromising blah.

Well yes, swee' pea there is.  Adopting a denigrating epithet is a way of asserting control over it.  Using it as a term of cameraderie or affection is a way of neutralizing its poisonous impact.

Black gang members refer to themselves as "nigga's" all the time.  Depending on context, it can mean just another black man or it can refer to our nigga bro.  Sometimes it is left ambiguous as in: he's a sorry-ass nigga which  can signify either sympathy or contempt.

The same is true of just about every  perjorative epithet and every other human group.

The High Shrieks of Correctness, Heiko-the-Idiot, Saint Jacinda-the-Mournful, any wool-for-brains British judge and the entire gaggle of of limped dicked, never fucked academics, sociologists and activists are intent on killing civil society and turning it into pretty and harmless snow globe... as dead and as stupid as they are.

Have they ever heard of "chilling effect" ?  Yes, in fact they have and it is exactly what they wish to bring about.  Soon we will be left to ask not what is prohibited but what is allowed --the legal hallmark of LL totalitarian law   And because we will never know for sure, we will always be looking over our shoulder, always checking our tongue and always wondering if perhaps we ought not to say what once we said so spontaneously and lively. 

This is what the tyrants of correctness want.  That we
only think what is approved
only speak what is approved
only want what is approved
and most importantly of all
only buy what is approved.
Don't turn around; the algorithm's in town