What Trump has wrought

If you haven't seen it, you do have to watch it. All 13 minutes of it. Sorry about that.

I was surprised at how distressing I found it. I'm so old, I've been in crowds that occupied buildings to make a political point (Vietnam-era protests, among others). I know that surge of amazement and slight consternation when suddenly you find yourself inside what you've experienced as the impenetrable center of an evil power. I'm sure many in the Capitol were in that state of mind.

But I didn't enter to kill and maim. I didn't want to kill the police standing in my way; I wanted them to stand aside. When we took what we thought of as the authority's fortress, we wanted to be heard. (And subsequent historical judgements largely agree we were right about the evil of that war.)

The leaders of Trump's crowd invaded the Capitol with a purpose: to overthrow the democratic verdict of the people for their leader by any means necessary. And their followers? They were there because Mr. Trump told them to go ... that's what they tell us.

Sure, Trump's on trial in the Senate. But really, the Republican Senators are on trial. Will they agree that it's okay to try to overturn the results of a legitimate election by inciting a mob? That's what an acquittal will mean. 

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A couple of days ago I shared a film about how the prosecutors at Nuremberg used video during the trial of the Nazi war criminals. They wanted the world to see the trial itself and the filmed evidence of their crimes. And they wanted the defendants to have to look at that evidence. Many were visibly horrified. The perpetrators had tried to preserve their innocence of what their regime had done.

Heather Cox Richardson reports that Republican senators did their best to avoid taking in the enormity of what their guy has done. 

Republican senators who have been defended Trump know it. During the video of the insurrection, Trump supporters Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) looked at papers on their desks, Rick Scott (R-FL) looked at papers on his lap, and Rand Paul (R-KY) doodled.

They are being asked to throw down, to reveal how much more complicit with the choice to overthrow the will of the people they wish to show themselves. There is as yet no indication they will rise to that challenge.