Marcy Wheeler/emptywheel:
FINALLY, EVERYONE IS TALKING ABOUT TRUMP’S OBSTRUCTION ON JANUARY 6
Twice within the final 24 hours, Liz Cheney has learn from texts that Mark Meadows already turned over to the January 6 Committee, exhibiting that everybody from Sean Hannity to Don Jr have been desperately contacting Meadows begging him to get Trump to do one thing to halt the assault on the Capitol…
Along with her forceful feedback Cheney was, as TV legal professionals have lastly found, invoking the clause of the obstruction statute that DOJ has used to cost a whole bunch of essentially the most severe January 6 rioters. Liz Cheney was stating that Trump’s actions on January 6 could show that he, together with a whole bunch of individuals he incited, had intentionally tried to stop the vote rely.
At the same time as she was doing {that a} second time at this time, the choose presiding over a lot of the Proud Boys instances, Tim Kelly joined his colleague Dabney Friedrich in rejecting the problem that Ethan Nordean had taken to that very same software.*
Jennifer Rubin/WaPo:
A brand new survey supplies little consolation about democracy’s future
Probably the most fundamental disconnect from actuality (and democratic values) stays the 2020 presidential winner. The survey stories, “94% of Democrats say [President] Biden is the rightful winner in comparison with simply 26% of Republicans — a cut up that has additionally remained remarkably secure since Biden took workplace.” Because of this, solely 42 p.c of Republicans trust within the final result of elections in comparison with 80 p.c of Democrats. That raises a query that was so distinguished all through the Senate runoffs in Georgia: Why vote if you happen to suppose the entire thing is rigged?
The excellent news is that extra detailed information reveals not many People favor political violence as some earlier surveys instructed. When the pollsters screened out “inattentive respondents” and offered definitions of assorted undemocratic habits, they discovered “help is 9% for threats, 8% for harassment, 6% for non-violent felonies, 4% for violent felonies, 4% for violence if the opposite celebration wins the 2024 election, 4% for violence on January 6, and 5% for violence to revive Trump to the presidency.” The dangerous information is that also represents tens of millions of individuals.
Eric Topol/LA Occasions:
Pandemic fatigue has People glossing over Omicron. However we will’t quit
For indoor gatherings, every individual must be totally vaccinated with a booster shot, or, for somebody with a confirmed prior COVID an infection, no less than one vaccine dose. All of them ought to have frequent fast antigen assessments for the times previous to and time of gathering. These assessments display for whether or not an individual is infectious, which is way extra vital than whether or not they have been contaminated however not able to transmitting the virus. Ideally, all gatherings can be outdoor, but when that’s not attainable, maximizing air flow with home windows open or HEPA air filtration with CO2 monitoring supplies good air high quality.
Sadly, most individuals received’t be prepared or in a position to take these precautions for varied causes.
Jonah Goldberg/The Dispatch:
Donald Trump’s Megaphone
Fox Information information hosts knew that Trump’s lies have been lies—they usually amplified them anyhow.
I’ve proven a great deal of restraint since information broke that I left Fox Information.
I haven’t performed any TV about it, and I’ve let a variety of nonsense go by and not using a response.
A significant cause I selected to depart with greater than a yr left on my contract was that I felt conflicted about talking freely. Fox understandably doesn’t prefer to pay individuals who criticize Fox or its expertise, and there’s something unseemly about it.
In order that was one cause why I left.
One other was that I didn’t need to be complicit in so many lies.
That’s the factor. I know that a large share of the folks you noticed on TV praising Trump have been being dishonest. I don’t merely suspect it, I know it, as a result of they might say one factor to my face or in my presence and one other factor when the cameras and microphones have been flipped on. And even once I didn’t hear it straight, I used to be typically one diploma of separation from it. (“Guess what so-and-so mentioned throughout the business break?”) Punditry and politics is a really small world—particularly on the fitting—and if you happen to add-up all of the congressmen, senators, columnists, producers, editors, and so on. you’ll most likely find yourself with fewer folks than the coed inhabitants of a decent-sized liberal arts school.
Michael Brendan Dougherty/NRO:
Gone Too Far
The Capitol riot occurred as a result of President Donald Trump merely lied, and lied, and lied.
Listening to the texts learn aloud at this late date within the yr does present a way of readability. Lots of Trump’s lies earlier than this appeared to have little price in any respect. Lots of them had been brazened out till they produced a sort of success. The lies that Trump advised that day to that crowd had produced this particular, televised catastrophe. Sadly, it was a predicted catastrophe. However nearly everybody knew it was incorrect whereas it was taking place. It took effort to overlook.
Within the months after January 6, the politically right transfer for Trump’s cable-news apologists has been to disregard the truth that the individuals who set about “investigating” the supposed vote fraud have turned up nothing of consequence or benefit. Or, it has been to focus obsessively on the potential involvement of the FBI or different intel companies within the riots, to invest about who could have been planted as agent provocateurs within the crowd. That is value inquiring about, particularly after the FBI’s cack-handed work attempting to instigate a kidnapping plot in opposition to Governor Whitmer went south.
However the riot on the Capitol occurred as a result of President Donald Trump merely lied, and lied, and lied. On that very day he lied about what the vice chairman’s powers have been. “All Vice President Pence has to do is ship it again to the states to recertify, and we turn into president, and you’re the happiest folks,” he advised the group.
NY Occasions:
Meadows and the Band of Loyalists: How They Fought to Hold Trump in Energy
A small circle of Republican lawmakers, working carefully with President Donald J. Trump’s chief of employees, took on an outsize function in pressuring the Justice Division, amplifying conspiracy theories and flooding the courts in an try and overturn the 2020 election.
Mr. Donoghue [DOJ] had spent weeks fielding calls, emails and in-person requests from President Donald J. Trump and his allies, all of whom requested the Justice Division to declare, falsely, that the election was corrupt. The lame-duck president had surrounded himself with a crew of unscrupulous legal professionals, conspiracy theorists, even the chief govt of MyPillow — they usually have been stoking his election lies.
Mr. Trump had been handing out Mr. Donoghue’s cellphone quantity so that folks may go on rumors of election fraud. Who may very well be calling him now?
It turned out to be a member of Congress: Consultant Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, who started urgent the president’s case. Mr. Perry mentioned he had compiled a file of voter fraud allegations that the division wanted to vet. Jeffrey Clark, a Justice Division lawyer who had discovered favor with Mr. Trump, may “do one thing” in regards to the president’s claims, Mr. Perry mentioned, even when others within the division wouldn’t.
WaPo:
Position as Trump’s gatekeeper places Meadows in authorized jeopardy — and at odds with Trump
From his time as chief of employees for Donald Trump, Mark Meadows has offered a gold mine of knowledge to the Home committee investigating the lethal Jan. 6 rebellion: pressing texts from the president’s son, pleas from GOP lawmakers and exhortations from Fox Information hosts calling on him to get Trump to cease the assault.
However now his proximity as Trump’s former gatekeeper and high aide has thrust Meadows into authorized jeopardy — even because the revelations within the texts and his new e-book additionally threaten his standing with Trump.
Meadows in current weeks has veered between steps geared toward bolstering his former boss and actions that, deliberately or not, have undermined him. His new e-book treats the previous president as a hero but additionally angered Trump by revealing that he was a lot sicker from covid-19 than beforehand recognized and that his first optimistic coronavirus take a look at was stored hidden. And Meadows has now stopped cooperating with the Jan. 6 committee after first supplying hundreds of pages of damning materials, resulting in a Home vote this week holding him in contempt of Congress.
The panel’s months-long investigation has revealed the myriad methods wherein Meadows is inextricably certain to the Jan. 6 assault, serving much less as chief of employees than chief enabler to a president who was determined to carry onto energy.
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