GOP Hype For A Bipartisan Acquittal Backfires | Talking Points Memo

Democrats fell short on their biggest goal going into President Trump’s impeachment trial: getting witnesses. But when it ended, they were able to achieve the second best thing they could have hoped for, given an acquittal was always guaranteed.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1289553
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Cory Gardner is finished.

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I honestly thought Jones and Manchin were going to vote for acquittal. Glad to see that outside of the Trump subservience zone, even moderate/conservative politicians know what Trump did was wrong and worthy of impeachment.

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Not just Gardner, but McNasty, Collins, Tillis. And Earnst and the two GA hacks (Purdue and whomever comes out of the cat fight for the R nomination for Isikson’s seat) will have tough races, as will Cornyn.

And oh, Toomey (R-PA) cost himself his seat when he has to run again in 2022, and Rubio (R-FL) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) probably did themselves in as well.

Romney did us all a big favor by doing the right thing and explaining it. i expected him to abstain, but he had a good cogent explanation for why what Trump did cut so deep into the center of our democracy. I urge everyone to watch his speech. https://wapo.st/36YqyIj

Some really good stuff there to run in 1 minute TV adds attacking those who stood with evil and violated their oaths. Lots of republicans who sold out the US for a few pieces of silver.

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I’m impressed that the Democrats stood together. Nancy must have done a mass order at Rent-A-Spine™.

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Big fuckin’ whoop. Even knowing we wouldn’t get to 67, we should have had more than 50 for witnesses.

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I just did a quick calculation that underscores how meaningless Trump’s acquittal was in terms of representing the peoples’ will. Most of the senators who voted today were elected in 2014, 2016 or 2018, with the rest either winning special elections or being appointed to the office on an interim basis. Putting aside these others, just under 100 million Americans voted over these three elections for the 53 GOP senators (or for their predecessors) who voted today. Whereas just under 125 million Americans voted for the 47 Dem senators (or their predecessors) who voted today.

So, 25 million more voters voted for these 47 Dems than for these 53 Repubs. Assuming that most voters would agree with the way the senators they voted for voted today, way more voters wanted Trump convicted than acquitted. 52% of senators might have voted to acquit, but only 44.4% of voters did so, via their voting preferences. Unsurprisingly, that 44.4% figure aligns with Trump’s approval numbers. In case it wasn’t clear, we don’t live in a democracy, and really haven’t ever, because of inherently undemocratic institutions like the senate, or states, really. Trump just made it more so.

We need to either abolish the senate or make the number of senators proportionate to state size. But since neither is likely to happen any time soon, our best bet is demographics, which are gradually taking away this traditional GOP advantage. It’s just a matter of time before states like Texas, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida and Arizona go blue, and other traditionally red states go purple. At which point, if it doesn’t adapt, the GOP will cease to exist at the national level. And that would be good. “Traditional”, white, inbred, bigoted, stuck in the past America is about to get a very rude awakening. It’s inevitable.

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Unfortunately I don’t know many people willing to pack up and leave their good jobs, schools, and homes to move to those dumpsters of deplorables just to change the electoral color. Winning California by 65% means nothing when we always lose Florida by 3%.

We need to enshrine the right to vote in the Constitution, then get rid of the electoral college.

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My emotions regularly swing from hope to despair with regard to the future of our Republic. Today is one little snippet of hope.

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No need for Dems to move to red states to even things out. It’s happening naturally, as lower costs of living, better jobs, higher quality of life, etc., are making that happen anyway. Plus, naturalized Latinos overwhelmingly tend to vote Dem. As well as the young, educated non-Latino immigrants, etc. Demographics are killing the GOP slowly, which is why it’s had to resort to ever more desperate moves, like making this POS its leader. Everything they do, is our of sheer terror, of becoming obsolete.

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We went into this knowing that he’d be acquitted. That was, after all, the biggest argument the naysayers were making - why bother? the Senate will acquit. There’s no pathway to 67 votes. So, the news that he’s been acquitted isn’t news. The news is he’s been impeached on strong evidence that the Senate was too chickenshit to hear and that Blue Dogs and Romney grew a spine and robbed the Republicans of a talking point.

Just because he was acquitted in the Senate of these things, doesn’t mean he’s protected from future crimes. Keep digging. Keep threatening. Keep calling the things these evil-doers are doing into question.

And vote.

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I was proud that the Democrats hung together. I was impressed that Mitt Romney displayed courage,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) told reporters after the vote.

Mitt still voted to acquit on Article 2, so no roses.

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I’m sorry but I am not going back to Florida. No way, no how. It took me a lonnnnnng time to get out of there and finally get to California, and now that I’m here, I’m staying put. :slight_smile:

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My mother-in-law - a staunch and faithful NC Baptist, decorous and ladylike - just emailed Thom Tillis’s and told him he didn’t have the balls to stand up for our country. Literally.

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My Colorado friends are determined to make that a true statement.

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Trumpies think this is the end of serious Dem attempts to hold him accountable. It isn’t. In some ways it’s just the start. I believe that there will be more investigations to come. They’re certainly merited, but they’d also be politically smart. Their real-world aim will be less to remove via impeachment then to remove electorally, and perhaps make it more likely that there are legal consequences for him post-presidency. But Dems can’t stop going after him, even if some claim that it would be a mistake.

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Join in the existential fight for our country, USC and democracy!

Defeat these 9 RepubliCONS:
AZ - Mc Sally
CO - Gardner
GA - Perdue
IA - Ernst
KY - MoscowMitch
ME - Disappointed Susan
NC - Tillis
SC - Leningrad Lindsey
TX - Cronyn
These greedy and corrupt senators betrayed our country, USC and their Oath of Office by voting to cover up the Impeachment Trial of DJT!

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“Every single vote — even a single vote, by a single member — can change the course of history,” Schiff said last week from the Senate floor. “Is there one among you who will say: ‘Enough’?”

Romney did say, enough, with a floor speech on Wednesday afternoon that dissected the President’s defense, brushed off calls that he vote with team, and called Trump’s abuse of power the “most abusive and destructive violation of one’s oath of office that I can imagine.”

Profiles in courage. Both of them.

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Yes, and that is why things are getting so ugly - and will likely get worse from a GOP in its death throes. Sort of like a president who knows his days in office are numbered. But the problem is how much damage those voters and the corrupt system they are supporting can do before they are finally gone. The same parallel holds: just as the GOP will dive into voter suppression and gerrymandering to hold on to power, Trump will embrace foreign intervention in our elections and complaints that any race he loses was “rigged” in order to stay in office as long as he can.

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I am looking forward to voting Cory ‘Cowardly’ Gardner out of office this fall.

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