Comments

1

Actually, 1b was altered (now called B1) to include K-12 teachers and staff, but it really should include daycare and college/university as well.

Main problem is the age brackets differ by states. My dad is getting his shots now.

2

Mo Brooks is a piece of shit and should be immediately booted from Congress. He is a racist psychopath doubling down on all the conspiracy theories by blaming "illegal aliens" and non-citizens who registered to vote. This was just after the Capitol invasion, and he used his time to go on a rant about how the election was stolen by a bunch of apocryphal nonsense based on conjecture meant to rile up the base, constantly spouting "illegal votes." I wouldn't be surprised if he would pull a John Wilkes Booth if given the chance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RiZbWtnoqU

3

Goddamn.. the prophecy finally came true.. He is the best President ever. The President so great he got impeached twice. Fuck you: Bill Clinton, Richard Nixon and Andrew Jonson.. Donald J. Trump the greatest pussy ever

4

I hope someone has a BOLO for FBI Director Christopher Wray. He should’ve been sacked immediately for allowing the worst attack on our national Capitol in two centuries because the terrorists were screaming far-white Tr666p trash.

Srsly—where the fuck is he??? Has he fled to Brazil already?

It's a tragic day for America that this cruel, sociopathic, sleazeball con artist ever got installed in office, and that RepubliKKKans have redefined and perverted this nation's failures on every level to be their successes. Can't wait to read the Bullshitico hawt take on how this is good news for Tr666p and that the Dems are playing right into his puny, tiny, baby hands.

5

Great work from Chase as usual.

I'm reading: "Gyms and fitness centers reopened this week in Washington state: They've been closed for eight weeks and are reopening under new restrictions, like appointment-only workouts and letting one customer per room or per 500 square feet for larger facilities." Those restrictions are just so draconian, it's like, why bother opening back up at all? It's like a gym can barely function as anything more than a glorified personal trainer.

This is not to say the restrictions are unjustified. It's just an impossible situation for businesses like this, and this is where my only thought is that PPP has obviously fallen short.

The passing of Jessica Campbell is just so sad. I saw one story that raised a possible COVID-19 link, but the story Chase links to says nothing of the sort.

On a happier note, I want to give a thumbs up to the photo on the Seattle Times home page of Jamie Herrera Beutler and Adam Kinzinger wearing their masks and high-fiving each other after defying their party and voting to impeach Trump. Good to see a few Republicans doing the right thing for once—and, considering that pic, looking good in the process.

6

Correction @5. "Jaime Herrera Beutler." I was so focused on getting "Beutler" right I messed up her first name.

7

a) I totally support an investigation---thorough and uncompromising---into whether Congressmen Biggs, Gosar, and Brooks (and others?) assisted protesters bent on violence and vandalism. Go after it, bloodhounds: nothing short of the total truth is acceptable. And b) unconfirmed reports suggest President Trump has ordered his staff to stop paying Rudy Giuliani. Knowing Rudy's propensity for boasting and blabbing, he might, just might, turn on Trump. This story hasn't gotten too much press yet, but it could if it's true and if Rudy starts yakking. And c) investigations must also determine if and whether law enforcement deliberately let some protesters inside the Capitol. I remember the years of Watergate: week after week after week of fresh revelations. This is starting to feel like that era: there seems to be far more to this than appeared at first. Then, perhaps, maybe... we can start to get at the deepest secrets of Mr. Trump's career: the rumors about money laundering for organized crime, for example, or what and how much Trump owes Putin. We're beginning to see just how small the tip of the iceberg is and how huge the part we cannot see is. Let the whole truth emerge, no matter how sordid, ugly, and dispiriting. "Healing"? Only honesty heals. Everything else is a Band-Aid over a cancer.

8

FBI arrested two current police officers from Virginia and a Florida firefighter for their role in the insurrection. Houston Chief Art Acevedo says he fully expects the FBI to arrest one of his officers soon. Inspector General of Capitol Police opens a "wide-ranging" investigation into role of their personnel, and GAO is investigating role of Congresspeople involved.

9

Perhaps we are finally hearing the death rattle of the 1980s.

11

@8: Yes, the 2 police officers from Virgina took selfies of themselves inside the Capital building and posted it on social media. They were just arraigned.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/police-officers-us-capitol-charged-trump_n_5fff57d9c5b6c77d85ec8162
"Magistrate Judge Robert S. Ballou, citing the defendants’ military and law enforcement service, said that he would not put the defendants on GPS monitors as the government requested, but said they could not have firearms in their home, restricted their travel to within the Western District of Virginia, required the forfeiture of their passports, and ordered them to stay away from public demonstrations."

Looks like the magistrate felt wearing ankle bracelets was far too extreme, so simply asked them nicely to stay in the Western part of Virginia. It doesn't say in the story whether the magistrate said pretty please to them or not.

I wonder how many day of probation and community service they will get for this before they return to work.

On the surface of it taking pictures and posting them online seemed like a bad idea, but apparently they knew better than we did there would be no repercussions for their behavior.

It would be fun to be a fly on the wall when the next guy who is not with law enforcement walks on the room. You know, detention without bail because of the heinous crime and the decades of prison time they will serve.

12

Well I stand corrected. It appears they were dealt with far more severely than I predicted:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/2-virginia-police-officers-were-arrested-after-taking-a-selfie-inside-the-capitol-during-the-insurrection/ar-BB1cKrtO?ocid=uxbndlbing
"Jacob Fracker, 29, and Thomas Robertson, 49, were arrested on the misdemeanor counts of knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority, and one count of violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, according to a criminal complaint unsealed on Wednesday."

I wonder if they can push back against this draconian sentence of multiple misdeameanors in an Appeal under the 8th amendments restriction against cruel and unusual punishment?

Or maybe qualified immunity? You know, they had no reasonable way of knowing in advance that trying to overturn an election was illegal. That and there was no previous example of a police officer storming the capital to set precedent. In fact, perhaps we will find there's a specific law on the books that involves no actually punishment when it's a police officer that storms the capital the same way those police officers with the NYPD had a special law that allowed them to have sex with an 18 year old under arrest while they were on duty in the back of their police cruiser.

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/rape-charges-dropped-against-nypd-cops-arrested-for-sex-with-teen-woman-in-police-van/38990/

They are currently on administrative leave, or paid vacation as civilians call it. Will they be paid their police officer hourly rate while they are doing their upcoming community service?

I don't see anything about "the importance of setting an example" or "the law is the law" from the prosecutor. Looks like he didn't even get it a good "we're doing it for the children" before marching them out of the room and into their waiting car.

Well, I suppose that's all being saved for the next guy who is not a police officer.

13

Some may claim I hated the president from the start and that I never gave him a chance. That simply is not true. I used facts and logic to determine that he would do a terrible job. Here we are, national debt, unemployment and basically everything is worse than when he started. Anyone who thinks he has done a good job has an irrational emotional attachment.

14

@ 9

That rattle you're hearing is the boomers finally busting.

15

13 "Some may claim I hated the president from the start and that I never gave him a chance."

There's nothing wrong with that stance though. Anyone with a properly functioning prefrontal cortex could see that Donald Trump has been a sleazy criminal since his slumlord days. The family has never hidden their financial ties to Russia and there are plenty of pre-2016 soundbites straight from his own mouth betraying how horrible of a person he is.

17

Don't forget that a lot of Americans thought Trump's vulgarity was an act would pivot after being elected. I entertained that thought to some extent, but voted for Mrs. Clinton.

Maya Angelou was proven correct.

18

@16:

I guess you didn't get the first, oh, six thousand memos on this subject when they were issued last year, but impeachment is not - repeat, IS NOT - a criminal proceeding, it's a constitutional one. Legal arguments may or may not be presented, but regardless, they are immaterial to the process. And as we saw with Impeachment #1, Senators are under no obligation to vote for or against conviction based on either the law, evidence or sworn testimony.

19

@ 6,

The correct spelling is Jaime Hellacious Buttkisser.

20

@ 11/12,

Our law enforcement and legal systems are just as abusive, toxic, destructive, and incompetent as our government overall.

There's no doubt that if any one of us participated in the worst terrorist attack on the nation's Capitol in two centuries in an attempt to violently overthrow the government, the FBI would kick the door down and shoot us to death in an extrajudicial execution.

As it is, they can't stop kissing the asses of the far-white trash Tr666p traitors. Let's just release them--would they like more tea and organic dinners??? Jeezus Ker-rist. They most frightening aspect of this whole traumatic ordeal is that law enforcement doesn't even care how weak, incompetent and complicit they are.

21

@2 I actually knew Brooks personally for many years. I had no idea he was BAT SHIT CRAZY at the time. He either hid it really well, or he got PTSD and lost his mind after being shot at a few years ago in DC.

23

@20: Not only are they complicit, but many of them are still in full on denial on their fascist right wing police social media sites. Many of them are actually claiming this was all a red flag antifa attack.

We are not talking about a chat room with 1 or 2 people either. We are talking about sites like Facebook group “Law Enforcement Family,” with 69,000-members “developed by law enforcement officers for the law enforcement community, family members, friends and those who support law enforcement. If you read some of the conspiracy theories about the attack on the Capital here it will blow your mind.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/police-capitol-riot-antifa-conspiracy-theories_n_5ffe14abc5b63642b6ffeb0c

Now we know where Mike Solan from the Seattle Police Union got his “far right and far left are responsible for that sad day.” That was not some weird one of. That appears to be pretty name stream thinking on all this.

They are so delusional that even when one of their own is tragically bludgeoned to death, it doesn't cause a moment of self reflection. These are the same people who testify in court and sign warrants. Tell me how some implicit bias training is going to fix all that?

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tim-ryan-capitol-police-leadership-not-transparent_n_5fffbc3bc5b63642b701ce43

"Rep. Tim Ryan Says Capitol Police Leadership Not Being Transparent With Lawmakers
The Ohio Democrat, who chairs the subcommittee that oversees the Capitol Police, said he was "having a hell of a time getting information" from them since the riot."

24

In the email the byline says: Chase Burns Wm. Steven Humphrey.
Why did Chase burn Humphrey?

25

@22:

Maybe YOU didn't read them either, because in an impeachment proceeding none of that matters. The Senate, acting as the de-facto "jury" is not required to consider ANY evidence or legal argument in making their decision. They may hear it, but they are not, as would be the case with a jury in a criminal proceeding, instructed by the presiding judge, in this case the Chief Justice of SCOTUS, to base their decision on a preponderance of the evidence, "reasonable doubt" or any other similar legal criteria; they can simply choose to ignore it at their own discretion. Furthermore, being found guilty of impeachment does not entail any criminal penalty or liability; merely removal from office. If such punishment is warranted, then the guilty party would need to be subsequently tried in the appropriate criminal court.

Alexander Hamilton summarized the intent of impeachment in The Federalist Papers No. 65, thusly:

"The subjects of its jurisdiction are those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated political, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.”

I'll leave the final word on the subject to the experts at congress.gov (https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S4-1-1/ALDE_00000282/) with accompanying footnotes:

"While judicial precedents inform the effective substantive meaning of various provisions of the Constitution, impeachment is at bottom a unique political process largely unchecked by the judiciary. While the meaning of treason and bribery is relatively clear, the scope of high crimes and misdemeanors lacks a formal definition and has been fleshed out over time, in a manner perhaps analogous to the common law, through the practice of impeachments in the United States Congress.6 The type of behavior that qualifies as impeachable conduct, and the circumstances in which impeachment is an appropriate remedy for such actions, are thus determined by, among other things, competing political interests, changing institutional relationships among the three branches of government, and legislators' interaction with and accountability to the public.7 The weight of historical practice, rather than judicial precedent, is thus central to understanding the nature of impeachment in the United States."

II Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States § 762 (1833) (Not but that crimes of a strictly legal character fall within the scope of the power, (for, as we shall presently see, treason, bribery, and other high crimes and misdemeanours are expressly within it;) but that it has a more enlarged operation, and reaches, what are aptly termed, political offences, growing out of personal misconduct, or gross neglect, or usurpation, or habitual disregard of the public interests, in the discharge of the duties of political office. These are so various in their character, and so indefinable in their actual involutions, that it is almost impossible to provide systematically for them by positive law.); id. §§ 795–98.
See Michael J. Gerhardt, The Federal Impeachment Process: A Constitutional and Historical Analysis x–xi (2000). See also Story, supra note 6 , at § 762.

26

Re: @25:

Footnote 7 starts with "See Michael J. Gerhardt..."

27

Here's a link to the Senate impeachment rules for reference:
https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/3_1986SenatesImpeachmentRules.pdf

29

@22 misinformed: Dude. Hydroxychloroquine is not a mixer. Seek serious medical attention NOW.

@25 & @26 COMTE and @27 Lissa: Thank you for your informative links and sources regarding impeachment hearings and rules of reference.

30

@14: Okay, Gen-Z.
Actually, Trumpty Dumpty's Great Fall is a relief to this Late Boomer. DJT should NEVER have been admitted to the White House four years ago in the first place.

31

@3 Ignarauns: Unfortunately, I believe that that was Trumpty Dumpty's game plan, all along, through the smoke, snake oil, and hate rallies---to make Tricky Dicky look like a choir boy in comparison. That ~75 million neofascist MAGA dupes are willing to lose everything and end up in prison to violently defend DJT's sorry, corrupt ass is beyond sickening. Trumpty Dumpty and its loyalists should be sent to the guillotine for pushing us so far back into the Dark Ages. Trump tool Joey Gibson ad nauseum have nothing to be Proud of.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin and North Korea's Kim Jong Un are laughing their asses off....

32

@16: "...Trump's action or lack of action with respect to the hoard [sic] of beer-billies who sacked the [C]apitol."

That's actually something federal prosecutors are examining in detail. They're already finding evidence to suggest it wasn't a spontaneous riot, but planned sedition:

'At least one protest organizer said he coordinated with three House Republicans. There are unverified accusations of a "reconnaissance" mission one day before the attack. And more than a dozen US Capitol Police officers are under internal investigation for allegedly helping rioters.

'While President Donald Trump's role in inciting the violence is clear, there are some early indications and accusations that other insiders may have more actively aided the mob.'

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/13/politics/capitol-insurrection-insider-help/index.html

18 U.S. Code § 2384 - Seditious conspiracy

"If two or more persons ... in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire... by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States... they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both."

Trump has a lot more to worry about than the U.S. Senate.

33

10 Actually it was people just like you that first drove me towards Trump

34

@13 Except he was doing an amazing job up until China released the virus onto the world and kept it to themselves until it was too late


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