Corruption of the GOP on show ... After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

[Crepitus]

Hitler hated socialists.

View attachment 303009

Nope. Hitler hated socialists. He used them to get a leg-up, but t dumped them asap.

 

[MAGAman]

[
The pamphlet containing the quote you falsely attribute to Hitler goes on to say:

The spirit of our National Socialist idea has to overpower the spirit of liberalism and false democracy if there is to be a third Reich at all! Deeply rooted in organic life, we have realized that the false belief in the equality of man is the deadly threat with which liberalism destroys people and nation, culture and morals. violating the deepest levels of our being!

Lap it up, pinhead. 'Nazis were leftists' is total bullshit.

You're such a tard.

You really expect anyone to believe NAZIs were some band of Libertarian Capitolists?

No... They were Big Government Leftists, just like Democrats. Only more successful.

You really are desperate.

 

[Denizen]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans
Accepting the president’s corruption is one thing. Enabling the erosion of democracy is another.

By Francis Wilkinson
January 26, 2020, 8:00 PM GMT+7

The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trump’s guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit — which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus — have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: “The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

It’s a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isn’t what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trump’s acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the president’s venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe it’s OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trump’s gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trump’s political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to “the chosen one.” But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trump’s videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or his quotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiff’s repeated use of the word “cheat” to describe Trump’s posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. “No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,” Schiff told the Senate last week. “He’ll do it now. He’s done it before. He’ll do it for the next several months. He’ll do it in the election if he’s allowed to.”

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trump’s presidency could yield an even larger return — destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationally if not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. It’s the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy what’s left of the Republican Party’s claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

no one cares about your hissy fit.

Correction: Correll does, otherwise it would not have stimulated and aroused itself.

 

[MAGAman]

Nope. Hitler hated socialists. He used them to get a leg-up, but t dumped them asap.

You mean like Progressive Socialists used Traditional Liberal Democrats?

 

[joaquinmiller]

[
The pamphlet containing the quote you falsely attribute to Hitler goes on to say:

The spirit of our National Socialist idea has to overpower the spirit of liberalism and false democracy if there is to be a third Reich at all! Deeply rooted in organic life, we have realized that the false belief in the equality of man is the deadly threat with which liberalism destroys people and nation, culture and morals. violating the deepest levels of our being!

Lap it up, pinhead. 'Nazis were leftists' is total bullshit.

You're such a tard.

You really expect anyone to believe NAZIs were some band of Libertarian Capitolists?

No... They were Big Government Leftists, just like Democrats. Only more successful.

You really are desperate.

You're the dummy who posted the fake Hitler quote. Own your ignorance. You've been driven crazy by Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and FOX News - who looked at every bad man in history and told you that person was a liberal, leftist, socialist, communist, or whatever their crackpot-designation of the day happened to be.

 

[Correll]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans
Accepting the president’s corruption is one thing. Enabling the erosion of democracy is another.

By Francis Wilkinson
January 26, 2020, 8:00 PM GMT+7

The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trump’s guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit — which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus — have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: “The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

It’s a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isn’t what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trump’s acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the president’s venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe it’s OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trump’s gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trump’s political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to “the chosen one.” But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trump’s videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or his quotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiff’s repeated use of the word “cheat” to describe Trump’s posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. “No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,” Schiff told the Senate last week. “He’ll do it now. He’s done it before. He’ll do it for the next several months. He’ll do it in the election if he’s allowed to.”

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trump’s presidency could yield an even larger return — destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationally if not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. It’s the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy what’s left of the Republican Party’s claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

no one cares about your hissy fit.

Correction: Correll does, otherwise it would not have stimulated and aroused itself.

I care about the damage you are doing. I dont' care about your reasons, or your excuses, or the details of your delusions or what have you.

 

[MAGAman]

[
The pamphlet containing the quote you falsely attribute to Hitler goes on to say:

The spirit of our National Socialist idea has to overpower the spirit of liberalism and false democracy if there is to be a third Reich at all! Deeply rooted in organic life, we have realized that the false belief in the equality of man is the deadly threat with which liberalism destroys people and nation, culture and morals. violating the deepest levels of our being!

Lap it up, pinhead. 'Nazis were leftists' is total bullshit.

You're such a tard.

You really expect anyone to believe NAZIs were some band of Libertarian Capitolists?

No... They were Big Government Leftists, just like Democrats. Only more successful.

You really are desperate.

You're the dummy who posted the fake Hitler quote. Own your ignorance. You've been driven crazy by Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and FOX News - who looked at every bad man in history and told you that person was a liberal, leftist, socialist, communist, or whatever their crackpot-designation of the day happened to be.

You're desperate and Butthurt because you know Hitler was just like the Democrat party strives to be.

 

[joaquinmiller]

[
The pamphlet containing the quote you falsely attribute to Hitler goes on to say:

The spirit of our National Socialist idea has to overpower the spirit of liberalism and false democracy if there is to be a third Reich at all! Deeply rooted in organic life, we have realized that the false belief in the equality of man is the deadly threat with which liberalism destroys people and nation, culture and morals. violating the deepest levels of our being!

Lap it up, pinhead. 'Nazis were leftists' is total bullshit.

You're such a tard.

You really expect anyone to believe NAZIs were some band of Libertarian Capitolists?

No... They were Big Government Leftists, just like Democrats. Only more successful.

You really are desperate.

You're the dummy who posted the fake Hitler quote. Own your ignorance. You've been driven crazy by Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and FOX News - who looked at every bad man in history and told you that person was a liberal, leftist, socialist, communist, or whatever their crackpot-designation of the day happened to be.

You're desperate and Butthurt because you know Hitler was just like the Democrat party strives to be.

Only one of us is desperate to lie about what Hitler said. That's you.

 

[Denizen]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans
Accepting the president’s corruption is one thing. Enabling the erosion of democracy is another.

By Francis Wilkinson
January 26, 2020, 8:00 PM GMT+7

The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trump’s guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit — which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus — have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: “The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

It’s a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isn’t what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trump’s acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the president’s venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe it’s OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trump’s gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trump’s political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to “the chosen one.” But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trump’s videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or his quotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiff’s repeated use of the word “cheat” to describe Trump’s posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. “No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,” Schiff told the Senate last week. “He’ll do it now. He’s done it before. He’ll do it for the next several months. He’ll do it in the election if he’s allowed to.”

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trump’s presidency could yield an even larger return — destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationally if not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. It’s the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy what’s left of the Republican Party’s claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

no one cares about your hissy fit.

Correction: Correll does, otherwise it would not have stimulated and aroused itself.

I care about the damage you are doing. I dont' care about your reasons, or your excuses, or the details of your delusions or what have you.

Are you one of the persons with a soft cranium that Trump abhors. Toughen up. Suck it up.

 

[Correll]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans
Accepting the president’s corruption is one thing. Enabling the erosion of democracy is another.

By Francis Wilkinson
January 26, 2020, 8:00 PM GMT+7

The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trump’s guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit — which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus — have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: “The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

It’s a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isn’t what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trump’s acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the president’s venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe it’s OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trump’s gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trump’s political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to “the chosen one.” But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trump’s videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or his quotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiff’s repeated use of the word “cheat” to describe Trump’s posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. “No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,” Schiff told the Senate last week. “He’ll do it now. He’s done it before. He’ll do it for the next several months. He’ll do it in the election if he’s allowed to.”

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trump’s presidency could yield an even larger return — destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationally if not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. It’s the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy what’s left of the Republican Party’s claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

no one cares about your hissy fit.

Correction: Correll does, otherwise it would not have stimulated and aroused itself.

I care about the damage you are doing. I dont' care about your reasons, or your excuses, or the details of your delusions or what have you.

Are you one of the persons with a soft cranium that Trump abhors. Toughen up. Suck it up.

Make me. Until then, my words stands. NO one cares about your hissy fit.

 

[Harry Dresden]

The GOP will cease to exist
hopefully your party will cease at the same time....

It pretty much already has.

It's the tRump party now.

so the democrats went from obama to the shit it is now.....so you may have a point.....

They scored more votes than the First Shit Donald Trump in the 2016 POTUS election and the 2018 Congress elections.

Flush Donald Trump and send him down the sewer he came from.

Trump just may be doing the flushing.....just saying....

Trump has stymied flushing his cabinet. He has appointed obese clowns who will need a hydraulic press to get them through the crapper's s-bend.

Bill Barr is more gross than he has ever been. Fat Mike Pompeo will need to be carried if he gets any bigger.

like the people you like are just so much better....you would have to be kinda stupid to fall for their shit....

 

[Thinker101]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans
Accepting the president’s corruption is one thing. Enabling the erosion of democracy is another.

By Francis Wilkinson
January 26, 2020, 8:00 PM GMT+7

The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trump’s guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit — which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus — have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: “The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

It’s a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isn’t what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trump’s acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the president’s venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe it’s OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trump’s gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trump’s political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to “the chosen one.” But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trump’s videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or his quotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiff’s repeated use of the word “cheat” to describe Trump’s posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. “No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,” Schiff told the Senate last week. “He’ll do it now. He’s done it before. He’ll do it for the next several months. He’ll do it in the election if he’s allowed to.”

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trump’s presidency could yield an even larger return — destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationally if not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. It’s the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy what’s left of the Republican Party’s claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

No kidding, finally you fricken loons are admitting the Dems have nothing and Trump will be acquitted.

 

[AZrailwhale]

The GOP will cease to exist after they refuse witnesses and refuse to convict and remove Donald Trump despite compelling evidence that has emerged since the impeachment opened. They will be absorbed into Trumpworld of personal vassals of Donald Trump.

There is no doubt that the only power that holds the GOP lawmakers to Donald Trump is fear of retribution from the Trump base and having their head publicly displayed on a pike.

Acquittal of Trump will forever destroy the oversight power of Congress because a precedent will have been set that will allow any POTUS to refuse to cooperate with investigations by Congress.

The GOP is greasing the slippery slope.

“The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Party’s institutional culpability in Trump’s contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.”

“No one is really making the argument, ‘Donald Trump would never do such a thing,’ because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did,”

After Trump’s Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans

That certainly didn't age well with the republicans set to gain control of both the House and Senate in a week or so.