Conviction! The George Floyd murder trial has concluded with a conviction on all counts. The police officer who murdered Floyd while on video will go to prison. People are happy. People are overjoyed. But, should we be surprised?
A murder conviction of a murderer shouldn’t be a reason to celebrate, it should be normal. But, apparently it’s not. So far, the public has responded with gratitude, but we still have a long way to go.
There could have been riots. There could be speeches of ingratitude—complaining about the glass being half-empty, so to speak. But, thankfully, that’s not happening. Gratitude is good. But, we need to restore trust in law enforcement to a point where there is no need for a murder trial for police because police shouldn’t be killing people.
Meanwhile, the Court sits in charge and rules in favor of itself as always. It is attracting the spotlight. With noises of 2024, so is Trump.
Republican leaders continue to lecture a public which no longer trusts them. They want the American people to “move on”, apparently without knowing that would mean moving on “from them”. But, people can’t move on when they are convinced of election fraud anymore than we can move on with unaddressed police killing.
The solution is to restore confidence in what has well-earned doubt. Government doesn’t want to do that, but only “solve” problems by making more problems that will gain more distrust. The public has a breaking point. We are getting very close to that point. And, both parties are both stepping on the gas when they should both be stepping on the breaks.
Trump plans to present more election fraud in defense at his Senate trial. Chief Justice Roberts has made it clear he doesn’t want to hear any evidence of election fraud—he shares that view with several other judges. Remember, the Court always votes in favor of the Court. It is not impossible for Roberts to walk into the Senate, sit down, declare, “The plaintiff is not the incumbent; dismissed,” swing his gavel, and walk out. With Trump’s intended defense, Robert’s only other option would be to shut down presentation of evidence while the nation watches. That is, unless he has changed his mind on hearing evidence.
No less than 45 Republican Senators voted that the trial itself is unconstitutional. If any of them vote to remove Trump from an office he no longer holds, they would have declared themselves unconstitutional in their own opinions and thus hasten the growing distrust of the RNC. So you see, Roberts and the Republicans are in a tight spot.
After hearing from the house managers and then the Trump defense team, it sounds more like the one who may have committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” would be Joe Biden. Maxim Waters claimed that impeachment is not governed by law, only whatever whim Congress decides—a statement that simply isn’t true.
This level of lawlessness expected of the government suggests a nation doomed. A growing portion of the electorate actually believe that government should take whatever drastic action it wants—because they feel comfortable with the current action proposed. But, they so quickly forget that the tables were only recently reversed, and being lawful in the very way they hold in contempt now was the only thing protecting them from the government doing likewise to them just a few years ago.
The biggest danger Trump always posed was that he would do too good of a job, that he would be too successful, and that the Republicans would thus earn great power that they neither deserved nor understood. These past few months, Republicans have announced that they would back a president they abhorred just a few years ago. They do this because they enjoy the success they didn’t expect him to create because they had failed to create that success at anytime in their careers. Hateful yesterday, grateful today, what will tomorrow hold for Republicans?
Last week, as expected, Republicans turned down Democrats’ call for more witnesses—after House Democrats could have called the same witnesses, but didn’t. Though having Biden on record would have played well in Republican politics, the disgruntled, disenfranchised, dejected, and shamed former National Security Advisor John Bolton was never going to be given a soapbox. He is a war monger and a neo-Conservative, still angry that Trump pulled out of Syria and Afghanistan. Democrats wanted him as a witness, but Republicans knew he would only yield opinion and tainted facts at best, understandably contrary to the president who fired him. That was never going to happen and Democrats knew it; that’s why Democrats asked for it. Getting rejected often rallies the voter base.
As Democrats push their case for impeachment because of “feelings rather than law”, Republican voters are rallying around their president. Trump will likely win by an even greater margin in 2020 than he did in 2016, all thanks to the support for impeachment. This is not only because of Democrats on Capitol Hill. In coffee shops, offices, and homes, Republican voters are listening to Democrat voters give their reasons to support impeachment and that scares them just as much, if not more, than what Democrats in Washington say. Thus, in 2020, the Senate stands to gain even more seats, inching ever closer to a supermajority in the Senate. Once that happens, our liberties will be at the greatest risk since the founding because nothing is as dangerous as a party not held in check. Republicans in Washington pose a supermajority danger to all voters, and it was Democratic voters who helped it all happen—because their parents never taught them why government must not be lawless.
