Will Mitch ditch Trump?
Outgoing Senate Majority Leader McConnell said to be happy about impeachment
“Tough guy to read. My wife would say, ‘How’d you do with Mitch?’ and I’d say… ehhh… I don’t know!” - Donald Trump 2/6/2020
Trump addressed the GOP in February of 2020.
In hindsight, this might the happiest he will ever be.
Impeachment foes dispatched, roaring economy and an exuberant Republican party ready to turn their focus on the election.
If they could only fast forward eleven months. Trump bested by Biden. The Senate in the hands of Schumer. Trump facing yet another impeachment and this time… it might be supported by Mitch McConnell.
The trial balloon went up yesterday afternoon. Mitch believes Trump is dead weight and impeachment might the way he can cut him loose. We have already seen more than enough GOP members in the House support the second impeachment of Trump but a removal? And more specifically one that could happen before Biden’s first 100 days? That takes Mitch’s cooperation.
It would mark a bitter end for two unlikely partners.
Mitch bet on Trump to win in his blocking of (now incoming Attorney General) Merrick Garland and won. Trump bet on Mitch to rule the Senate with an iron fist to quash impeachment and ram through judges to appease the conservative base.
And now, between Trump freelancing with the COVID relief bill and his handling of the 2020 results ending with the disgraceful mob in the capitol, it looks to be over.
Talk about a tough guy to read…
Calculating the incalculable fall of Donald Trump
He could have been an ex-president. Now the only way he can communicate on the internet is his YouTube channel.
He could have had infinite influence and power. Now he scrambles to build a knock-off social network.
He could have been Jimmy Carter. Now he’s Steven Crowder.
THE REST OF THE NEWS…
House lines up impeachment votes for today
POLITICO
Casino mogul, GOP megadonor Sheldon Adelson dead at 87
CNBC
Congress briefed on threats against Biden inauguration
THE HILL
FBI seeking felony cases against capitol rioters
AXIOS
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I don’t want conservatives de-platformed. I want assholes, firebrands, and people who profit from incitement de-platformed. Trump may have been the symptom of a larger problem, but he was uniquely qualified to make it much worse. People need moderation. Hell, the only reasons this newsletter exists as a soap bubble of bipartisan participation are:
1. You can’t reply to people right away. There’s a 24 hour cool down period built in.
2. Justin blocks the more incendiary messages. This is a good example of moderating tone instead of content, and that’s what we need more of on both sides.
To the person who compared the current Big Ban to abusing and silencing your spouse, to me it feels more like finally telling your uncle who constantly gets too drunk at family thanksgiving and loudly reminisces about the chicks he could have boned in college to shut up, and now he’s complaining about being persecuted after subjecting us to his self centered tirades for far too long. - JOHN
To be fair, Justin only blocks the laziest messages. If you have an incendiary message that original and thought provoking it often goes to the top. But if you are trying to recycle a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of a Tucker/Maddow line… you get the boot.
The missing piece of our moderation conversation is what we consider a “shared space.” Is Twitter a shared space since there are no borders to communities? How about Facebook, which has groups but is designed for all content to be sharable? Reddit is SPECIFICALLY Balkanized with only one page designed as a gathering point and yet some communities there still fall afoul of the spirit of the site and get banned. Going wider… is the internet itself a shared space. As users (not citizens to a government or culture) do we all have a say as to what can live here?
We understand that IRL moderation of our private life (personal habits, family, kids) is different than what is expected in public or in business. Until we understand what is inside or outside on the internet we’re going to keep crossing our wires on the conversations about what’s allowed.
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Glad someone else is entertaining the idea that we're going to get people who'll be bored of Q and float to something else. If it'll be more or less dangerous who knows! But the herd mentality behind it fascinates me even if I find it... a bit weird.
- A CRAFTING/COOKING CHICK WHO HAS ACCEPTED THAT MEDIA INFLUENCED HER TO BECOME A PARODY OF A MIDDLE CLASS WHITE WOMAN IN HER 30s
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My favorite thing currently is conservatives that are so far into their bubble they don’t realize that liberals get banned on Facebook and Twitter every day. They act like “Big Tech” is only out to get “conservative thought” when there’s a hacker still banned from Twitter for saying “I’m killing Parler and it’s great” in November. I know women who got 48 hour Facebook bans for saying “all men suck.” Anyone trying to start the slippery slope fascism argument for banning people who invaded the Capitol wearing T-shirts about killing Jews is showing just which fascists they’re okay with. - RICHARD
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Yes, yes, let’s ban all the people/things that we disagree with/makes us uncomfortable.
*Golf claps*
Bravo. Marvellous. Top stuff.
I see we’ve all learned so much from the last 12 years.
I’m sure that won’t have any unforeseen consequences at all. - SCALE
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After the loss of life, the most troubling thing (to me) about the Capitol incident is that it gives the government an excuse to further limit public access to their buildings. The White House is alteady pretty locked down. Aside from seasonal garden tours, or tours that have to be scheduled months in advance through the office of a member of Congress, all you can do is stare at it through several layers of fencing. The Capitol was already heading that way, but now it looks as though they will put barriers in place, nominally to keep the legislators safe, but effectively to keep the American people out of THEIR Capitol. I don't know why this bothers me so much. Maybe it's because I'm old enough to remember when you could just walk in, and tours would leave, periodically, from the rotunda, without needing a prior reservation. I guess it's also that people already feel like the legislature is insulated from them, and this will add another layer.
I understand the concerns for the safety of members of Congress, but all the words calling the Capitol a "temple of democracy" are meaningless if people are not allowed to enter it. At some point we have to say the interest of the people to observe the function of their government outweighs the risk of someone trying to harm legislators, or move legislative business to a non-descript office building, and convert the Capitol to a museum that is only used by Congress for special occasions. - J. D.
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Political discourse right now…
We get it, you read a history book. It sounds so much smarter by saying it in German too, not like basic ol' me calling it "the night of busty glass that happened that one time." - KEN