The only appropriate response to the Senate.
The only appropriate response to the Senate. Sarah Silbiger / Stringer

Well, it happened: The President was acquited of two impeachment charges this afternoon, after a vote fell along party lines. Notably, Mitt Romney crossed over and found Trump guilty of one impeachment charge, abuse of power. While Romney's break with his party means the impeachment process cannot be called a purely partisan event, it's still a largely/mostly entirely/basically partisan event. But the impeachment process, which has lasted five months and included countless hearings, is now over. Trump did not immediately make a statement, but promised this for tomorrow:

Republicans and the White House sprinted to vindication: The White House claimed "full vindication and exoneration of President Donald J. Trump." Republican senators rushed to request Hunter Biden's travel records. And Trump reshared that terrifying meme "joking" that he'll be in power forever...


And what's going on over in Iowa? The Iowa Democratic Party released 85% of the caucus results but then had to issue a correction today when an error caused incorrect delegate equivalents to be reported. It looks like Buttigieg will win Iowa, unless there's a radical shift. The New York Times estimates Buttigieg will win with 95% certainty. The Associated Press, however, still says the race is too race to call, as of this afternoon. UPDATE: Looks like the AP was right. "Pete Buttigieg’s slim lead in the Iowa caucus results evaporated overnight," writes the New York Times late tonight. "The Iowa Democratic Party released another batch of results late Wednesday night, and with 97 percent of precincts reported, Mr. Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders were in a near tie." Their tracker currently gives Bernie a 54% chance of winning and Buttigieg 46%. Flip a coin!

The New York Times made a great recap video, below:

How is the rest of the week looking? There are two CNN Town Hall events with eight Democratic presidential candidates in New Hampshire this week. One is tonight, with Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Andrew Yang and Tom Steyer; and another tomorrow, with Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, and Deval Patrick. They're four hours long, one hour for each candidate. Another Democratic debate will be held on Friday night. It's all for you New Hampshire, don't fuck this up like Iowa.

So far tonight, Biden has said he "expected to do better" in Iowa. Biden then minimized the importance of Iowa, saying it was only a small cut of the delegate share. Biden also accused Bernie Sanders' supporters of misrepresenting his stances on social security. "Whether he did it or not, his supporters put out a clip that took out of context what I said," Biden said.

Kirk Douglas is dead?!?!? Well, he was 103.

We're in the middle of another atmospheric river, Seattle: I like to look up and pretend I'm the soil in a riverbed... Up to four inches of rain are possible on Friday. There's a flood watch in effect through Friday, which has brought about concerns of landslides...

But don't worry, it's about to get much drier: Spring is around the corner.

Are you ready for "Korean Chipotle"? That's what the owners of Seoul Bowl say they're bringing to 12th Avenue. Seoul Bowl is a successful food-truck business around Seattle, offering Korean BBQ bowls. This will mark their first brick-and-mortar store, and the owners say they'll also feature soju and Korean liquor. They soft open this week. Notably, the K-Pop band Seventeen had Seoul Bowl do its catering when they came through last month, reports Capitol Hill Seattle Blog.

Welcome to Hell, also known as the Diamond Princess: 3,700 people are stuck on board the Diamond Princess cruise ship outside of Tokyo. They're quarantined for two weeks, after some of the passengers were found to be ill with the novel coronavirus. They are stuck in their rooms. Some of those rooms have windows, some don't. Meals have been coming slowly, delivered by staff members in goggles and masks. “Most of my day will be spent writing and researching and so on,” one trapped cruiser said to the New York Times, then added, “What my bar bill is going to be, goodness only knows.” Now's not the time to take an international cruise! Not with this almost-pandemic on the loose!
The number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus have risen to over 24,000, reports The Guardian. Nearly all of those cases are in China, where the outbreak has grown exponentially and totals around 24,384. Across other countries, the total hovers near 213, as of yesterday. The death count is at 493.

The Gates Foundation has pledged up to $100 million to fight the novel coronavirus: That was nice. "The money will go toward the detection, isolation, and treatment of the virus," writes Monica Nickelsburg for Geekwire. "The Gates Foundation will also fund the development of coronavirus vaccines. The $100 million commitment includes $10 million the foundation already pledged in January."

It's been a hectic day, let's end it with some soothing trailers: There's a new Saw movie, but it's called Spiral (its tagline is "From the Book of Saw") and stars Chris Rock and Samuel L. Jackson. It released a trailer today.

And did you see the new A Quiet Place Part II trailer? It released during the Super Bowl. I'll drop that and another Super Bowl-dropped trailer, for Jordan Peele’s new series, Hunter, about Nazi hunters. Oh, and a Sonic the Hedgehog trailer, for funsies.