In That Case

Today were the closing arguments in the Rittenhouse case, where a 17-year-old boy shot three people in self-defense in late summer 2020 during riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Defense Attorney Mark Richards during closing arguments, November 15, 2021
(Defense Attorney Binger seated in the background)
screenshot from the Rekieta Law livestream

There are so many people who can talk about guns with more authority than I can. But I understand enough to know that this case has broader implications, because it puts self-defense on trial.

In the closing argument rebuttal today, the prosecution said some truly crazy things. Like, we all know what it’s like to get beat up sometimes. You should expect that. It’s not something you should kill somebody over. So, getting hit in the head with a rock and a skateboard and being attacked by somebody with a Glock in hand (a “small” gun, not a big scary one like an AR-15) is not enough; any reasonable person would wait until bodily harm was inflicted before using a firearm that could actually kill someone.

There’s plenty to say about the couple of weeks that have been shown to the jury. But it’s in their hands now, and we’re likely to hear a result by tomorrow.

If the result is a guilty verdict (unlikely), we could expect an appeal based on a mistrial, because there were enough causes for that before it went to jury.

This may be the most clear-cut case of self-defense in history. It should not have been brought to trial. But this case isn’t about law or justice; it is about political posturing.

I’ve been mostly following daily reports from Robert Gruler and Viva & Barnes. Today I watched large portions of the closing arguments—on Nick Rekieta’s livestream. He has been doing those daily. Today there were over 700,000 people watching his livestream when I tuned in, which shared the PBS livestream (because some other stream was more technologically unreliable) while he and a panel of law vloggers commented as they watched. When I checked that video again tonight, over 900,000 had watched. That in itself is kind of a phenomenon. Here are the 9+ hours of video from today.

·       “Kyle Rittenhouse Trial Monday LIVE - CLOSING ARGUMENTS” Rekieta Law livestream, November 15, 2021. 

screenshot of the panel of law vloggers following the closing arguments
on Nick Rekieta's livestream, November 15, 2021

Something to keep in mind is that the mainstream story has very little resemblance to what actually happened that night, or probably to what the prosecution claimed happened. Video and testimony, even of prosecution witnesses, shows that Kyle Rittenhouse retreated, avoided firing until the final moments, with more composure and bravery than many older people with much more experience. He did not provoke. He was attacked. He had reason to fear for his life. And a reasonable person would see that he is innocent. One of those he shot, who sustained a serious arm injury, testified that Rittenhouse didn’t shoot him until he drew his gun on Rittenhouse. The trial should have ended right there.

One of the many observers of the trial, billionaire Bill Ackman, a lifelong Democrat, watched the trial and realized the media story had been false. He said so in a series of tweets, and the response he got was, “Did someone hack your account?” In a fair world, the natural response would be, “Hmm. Maybe I should watch for myself.” Here’s that story:

·       “Billionaire Bill Ackman shows that 'the truth shall make you free'” by Andrea Widburg for American Thinker, November 15, 2021. 

You can watch (or rewatch) the daily coverage from Nick Rekieta at Rekieta Law on YouTube. But for the daily briefings, I recommend Robert Gruler and Viva Frei or Viva & Barnes—all of whom popped in on Rekieta’s panel today. Robert Barnes had been volunteering to help with the defense. He was set to help with jury selectionas were the guys from the Behavior Panel, world-renowned body-language experts. But the defense team at the last minute rejected all help. Not good. And there were times during the trial it looked like they should have paid better attention. But the closing argument today was quite good. Anyway, here are a few highlights from the past week or so:

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 11 Recap: Closing Arguments Review” November 15, 2021. 

·       Viva & Barnes “Rittenhouse Closing Arguments RECAP” November 15, 2021. 

·       Viva & Barnes “Ep. 87: Rittenhouse; Arbery; Bannon; O'Keefe; Baldwin; Astroworld & MORE!” November 14, 2021. 

·       Viva Frei Vlawg “Rittenhouse Trial Final Day —, Rejection & Projection” November 12, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 9 Recap: Defense Rests, Use of Force Dr. Black, Drew H Live, Video Evidence” November 11, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 8 Recap: KYLE TESTIFIES!” November 10, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 6 Recap: Gaige Grosskreutz Direct & Cross Exam, Crime Lab, Kenosha PD” November 8, 2021. 

Viva Frei (left) and Robert Barnes during their recap
after closing arguments, November 15, 2021
screenshot from here

The most interesting testimonies, to me, were Gaige Grosskreutz, with the mic-drop moment when he admitted under oath that Rittenhouse didn’t shoot until Grosskreutz aimed his gun at him; and Kyle’s testimony. He didn’t have to testify. The evidence was all in his favor. It was risky. But he handled it pretty well. He did break down near the beginning—evidence of PTSD, which Barnes later verified he is being treated for. After recomposing, he held up very well. Not flawlessly, but good enough.

There were times during closing arguments when the prosecution was creating the story of what Kyle was thinking—at each of which the defense should have said, “Objection: mind-reading”—but that Kyle’s own testimony had explained. His testimony always coincided with video and other witnesses. So, for those of us watching, and maybe for the jury, it was somewhat satisfying to hear from him. But it shouldn’t have been necessary.

We’ll have more answers on the Rittenhouse case tomorrow. It has been a painful trial for everyone who believes we have a God-given right to self-defense. The panel today, after the end of closing arguments, was guessing what would happen tomorrow. About half guessed it would be a hung jury—not because the evidence didn’t show that Rittenhouse clearly acted in self-defense, but because the jury will be afraid of reprisal if their identity becomes known. Or they don't want to be blamed for the outbreak of more riots. Or possibly because there will be a holdout jury member who already had prejudice against Rittenhouse and is disregarding all the evidence.

If that happens, I think it will not be retried; it will be dismissed, maybe on some Friday afternoon news dump. I don’t know. Maybe the judge could call it a mistrial, which he could have done, based on prosecutorial misbehavior. I can’t see it proceeding forward with us all going through this again. But maybe I’m naïve.

I’m encouraged that there were so many people paying attention. It is a certain kind of person who listens to Rekieta and the other law vloggers: people interested in law and order. Other sorts might tune in directly to the PBS livestream or other sources. But it was nearly a quarter of a million people today. Viva Frei has been commenting frequently on how the number of watchers has been growing daily during the trial. It’s a phenomenon. And it is a metric that means something good for our country.

I hope things go well for Rittenhouse tomorrow, because that is something good for him personally, and also good for justice. Eventually I believe things will be made right for him, whatever happens. And enough of us care about law and order that we won’t lose our rights to apathy.

So, long live the rule of law!

Some Are More Equal Than Others

Newly released footage of the surveillance cameras in the Capitol building on January 6^th were recently released. Law vlogger Robert Gruler’s video from October 18 talks about  it.

Gruler shows several clips of the 40 minutes released, of the same doorway; he shows on top the view looking out and on the bottom the view looking in, simultaneously. He shows several consecutive segments. These start around 2:30 PM on January 6, 2021. In the first, the hallway between an exterior door and an interior door is mostly empty, although some people, who look like they could have concluded or walked away from a tour, go from the interior door, through the hallway, and exit the building. And other people calmly enter the building. People are coming and going at will, with police present but not in any way hindering them.

Robert Gruler shows clips of surveillance footage
from the Upper West Terrace of the Capitol, exterior and interior doors.
At this point, people are allowed to come and go through this hallway.
screenshot from here

In the next segment, about ten minutes later on the time stamp than on the empty hallway video, you see police move toward the exterior door and stop people from continuing to come inside. So more people wait at the exterior door. A few police officers stand in the entrance and talk with some of the people at the front of the crowd. The people are standing and waiting, and the crowd builds but remains calm. You see one man, not an officer, walk from the interior and pass through the police and exit the building. The police do not seem at all alarmed by him. He simply exits. Another couple of times a person will begin to enter the hallway from the interior, see the police, and turn around and go back through the interior door. Police do not seem bothered about the people already inside the Capitol.

The same doorway, ten minutes later, police stop allowing
entry, and the crowd obeys, waiting outside.
screenshot from here

In a segment about four minutes later, one of the police officers speaks in the ear of another (we do not have audio), then taps another officer on the shoulder. Then the officers—it looks like a total of six, when we see them in lower frame—back up and enter through the interior door, allowing the crowd to follow them and enter the building, which they do, calmly, without any restraint from or conflict with the officers. It looks as if the police got orders to allow the people in now.

Gruler has drawn red arrows indicating the three visible officers;
the one in the center speaks to the one at his left, then taps the
one on the right, and then they allow the crowd to enter.
screenshot from here

So, what are we seeing? An orderly crowd allowed into the Capitol building by police officers. In this particular doorway—and we've seen both people in the interior and exterior of the building—we do not see rioting. We do not see shouting or agitation in the crowd. We see calm and restraint, and obedience to the officers. And then these restrained members of the crowd enter the building with permission.

Does that mean that no violence happened elsewhere? No. But we were told this was—Biden’s words in April—the worst assault on our democracy since the Civil War. Something supposedly started around 1:30, before President Trump finished his speech, before the crowd listening to him could have moved to the Capitol. But by 2:30 people are peacefully entering and existing the building with the permission of the Capitol police.

If it was worse than Pearl Harbor or 9/11, there must have been massive death, right? No. One woman, an unarmed veteran, was shot at close range by a Capitol police officer when clearly there was no need of deadly force. (By the way, she was denied a veteran’s military funeral.) That was the only gunshot at the Capitol that day. Not a single gun was found or confiscated from any protestor at the January 6 event. The only other deaths were deemed to be natural causes, including the death off Officer Brian Sicknick, who it was falsely reported had been bludgeoned by a fire extinguisher. Not only did that not happen to him, but there doesn’t appear to be evidence of anyone using a fire extinguisher as a weapon.

No insurrection charges have been made against those arrested and detained—many of them still await being charged. Most charges have been for trespassing, a minor offense. Some have been charged with “disrupting an official proceeding,” which is a law intended for acts such as shredding documents needed in a Congressional inquiry, not for a ceremonial proceeding such as was happening on January 6^th, and which continued unheeded after a few hours’ delay.

Despite the 6^th Amendment right to a speedy trial, some are still being held, unable to talk with family or counsel, kept in solitary confinement until eventually being brought to trial. The video surveillance released this week is part of the evidence. It is only now, in part, being provided, even though defense counsel is entitled to all of it from the moment it is to be used in the case—and it was available on or immediately after January 6^th. That’s ten months ago. Prosecutors claimed they had to go through the 14,000 hours of footage to get it in the right format for the defense. But that convenience service is not what is required of the prosecution; providing the raw footage is. That is what they should have done immediately. So it appears they have held off to avoid showing the benign nature of the vast majority of attendees at the Capitol. It appears they were afraid we would see footage such as Robert Gruler shared.

Roger Kimball
image from Imprimis

This month’s Imprimis newsletter is a piece by Roger Kimball, adapted from a speech he gave at Hillsdale College September 20^th. He lays out the case that the “hoax,” the hype surrounding the mostly banal event at the Capitol, is part of a larger picture, beginning with the Russian collusion hoax, in order to paint their opponent as the dangerous enemy. He says,

Of course, it is absolutely critical to the Democratic Party narrative that the January 6 incident be made to seem as violent and crazed as possible. Hence the comparisons to 9/11, pearl Harbor, and the Civil War. Only thus can pro-Trump Americans be excluded from “our democracy” by being branded as “domestic extremists” if not, indeed, “domestic terrorists.”

Kimball says that when Biden and others have referred to Trump and the 74 million people who voted for him as a threat to “our democracy,” what they mean is a threat to “their oligarchy.” He takes us back a bit further, to 2015,  

when the resources of the federal government were first mobilized to spy on the Trump campaign, to frame various people close to Trump, and eventually to launch a full-throated criminal investigation of the Trump administration.

What we know is that the Steele dossier, which was the sole pretext for the FISA warrants to spy on Carter Page and other American citizens, was false, known to be false, and was paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC—its source kept unknown from the judges signing off on the warrants. We know, then, that the DNC knew, the Clinton campaign knew, and James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and Rep. Adam Schiff knew, along with other Democrat House Intelligence Committee members and the upper levels of the FBI. Whatever they claimed in public, under oath, behind closed doors, they admitted they knew there was no evidence to merit spying on a presidential candidate.

They attempted to impeach President Trump beginning mere minutes after his inauguration; riots followed, with damage to property and injury to multiple police officers. As Kimball points out, “You will search in vain for media or other ruling class denunciations of the violent riots in Washington, DC, following President Trump’s inauguration.” Those rioters got off. The rioters who began in May 2020, following the death of George Floyd were praised and supported—our current VP actually funded some of their legal fees. As one commentator quipped, in a reference to Animal Farm, “some riots are more equal than others.”

When they did finally impeach Trump (but of course failed to remove him from office), it was on false charges that were not even an impeachable offense, and which they simply couldn’t support with any evidence beyond their over-puffed indignation. Then they impeached him a second time—after he left office—without any charges, because of January 6^th, even though he had clearly called for people to “peacefully and patriotically” walk to the Capitol and let their voices be heard—something that sounds an awful lot more like a 1^st Amendment right than an incitement to insurrection.

Kimball expresses something true about this whole thing:

Another lesson was perfectly expressed by Donald Trump when he reflected on the unremitting tsunami of hostility that he faced as President. “They’re after you,” he more than once told his supporters. “I’m just in the way.”

There’s a part of Kimball’s piece where he contests a quote from philosopher David Hume: “It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.” Kimball points out just how very quickly we have been losing our liberty. Maybe it's like the saying about bankruptcy: it happens slowly, slowly, and then suddenly. Of the sudden loss of freedom, Kimball uses as an example, one Joseph Hackett:

[Hackett] is a 51-year-old Trump supporter and member of an organization called the Oath Keepers, a group whose members have pledged to “defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.” The FBI does not like the Oath Keepers—agents arrested its leader in January and have picked up many other members in the months since. Hackett traveled to Washington from his home in Florida to join the January 6 rally. According to court documents, he entered the Capitol at 2:45 that afternoon and left some nine minutes later, at 2:54. [According to the video mentioned above, police were allowing entrance at this time.] The next day, he went home. On May 28, he was apprehended by the FBI and indicted on a long list of charges, including conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding, destruction of government property, and illegally entering a restricted building.

As far as I have been able to determine, no evidence of Hackett destroying property has come to light. According to his wife, it is not even clear that he entered the Capitol. But he certainly was in the environs. He was a member of the Oath Keepers. He was a supporter of Donald Trump. Therefore, he must be neutralized.

Joseph Hackett is only one of hundreds of citizens who have been branded as “domestic terrorists” trying to “overthrow the government” and who are now languishing, in appalling conditions, jailed as political prisoners of an angry state apparat.

The clearly biased congressional committee looking into the January 6 event—set up because it didn’t like the findings of the official investigation, which found there was no collusion—is on a fishing expedition, requesting every communication Trump or his advisors may have had. That means, ten months after the event, they don’t have a single statement or copy of a communication—like a tweet—that shows Trump or anyone surrounding him was involved in planning any sort of insurrection, violence, or illegal action of any kind. And note, they ought to have had that evidence before they impeached him (after his term). The former President is rightly taking them to court over their overbroad subpoenas into his private communications protected by executive privilege. Meanwhile, the current occupant of the White House, Biden, says he is waiving the former President’s right to executive privilege. It doesn’t work that way. (Robert Gruler discusses this in another video, here, at about 45 minutes in.) 

The Biden crowd seems rather disappointed that there wasn’t more violence on January 6^th. (Maybe they had paid for there to be more, and feel swindled.) They acted then, and continue to act, as if it were something much worse than it was. As Kimball says,

Turning Washington into an armed camp was mostly theater. There was no threat that the Washington police could not have handled. But it was also a show of force and an act of intimidation. The message was: “We’re in charge now, rubes, and don’t you forget it.” In truth, there is little threat of domestic terror in this country. But there is plenty of domestic conservatism. And that conservatism is the real focus of the establishment’s ire.

This current administration, more than past administrations, has proved that they cannot be trusted. They are lying about what happened on January 6^th entirely. They are holding political prisoners—in the way Cuba would, or the old Soviet Union, or North Korea—but totally anathema to the laws of the United States of America. They are separating and dividing us, weakening us on the international scene, causing a border crisis, and an economic crisis that’s beginning to show in supply chain problems—what we might one day view as a modern famine, where there’s plenty of food grown, but it can’t get into the hands of the hungry. They continue to foment fear of a treatable illness, censoring and mandating at every turn. It’s hard to believe this administration has our health in mind, when it’s obvious that control over us, and our compliance in thought and deed, is what they demand.

Kimball says a sad lesson learned from the January 6^th hoax is:

that America is fast mutating from a republic, in which individual liberty is paramount, into an oligarchy, in which conformity is increasingly demanded and enforced.

Miracle Max and wife Valerie, from The Princess Bride
image found here

In a reference to Benjamin Franklin, after the drafting of the Constitution and announcing it as a republic, can we keep it? We haven’t been fully keeping it for a very long time. But previously it always seemed to be just a matter of getting a little more power in Washington, and then we could straighten things out. What we need now, though, is a wholesale upending of the tyranny and a return to our constitutional republic. That’s a tall order.

I’m not without hope. But, to quote Miracle Max (The Princess Bride) after telling the heroes to “Have fun storming the castle!” he whispers to his wife, “It’ll take a miracle.” I hope a miracle rescue of our Constitution—and freedom for other good people in the world—has been in God’s plans all along, and we’re about to witness it.

Time for the Annual Pointless Impeachment Trial

A year ago, the pointless impeachment trial was meant to say, “Even though we can’t find a single crime, even a misdemeanor, that this President has committed, we think he’s awful and should be removed from office.” That was the essence of the prosecution, which of course went nowhere once they sent it to the Republican-led Senate. So it was posturing, nothing more.

This year, the pointless impeachment trial has actually included a crime—just not one the former President committed. And they’re saying the action, which he didn’t commit, was done a mere two weeks before inauguration. They held the trial just days before the President was leaving office. And they failed to deliver the Article of Impeachment to the Senate until well after inauguration.

I’m not a lawyer, but I can play one as well as the next blog writer. So here’s my analysis.

The founders didn’t want elected officials to have to spend their time in office defending themselves against lawsuits and various accusations. It is the nature of politics that there are things they will do in office that opposing factions will find just wrong, even though not technically unlawful. For policy issues that may actually violate the law, lawsuits can be brought against the government, rather than personally against the official.

But when it is the official who personally does wrongdoing, rather than a typical court trial, the remedy is an impeachment trial. In our Constitution, the limit of such a trial is to remove the person from office. The founders wanted to prevent the uncivilized practice of executing or imprisoning political enemies. If there was a criminal act, that could then be handled in a criminal trial—for example, say a president murdered his secretary of state in a fit of anger. The House would bring charges in an impeachment trial, and if the House found the president guilty, they would pass the articles of impeachment (the charges and the prosecution’s case) to the Senate, where the actual trial would be held. If the Senate found him guilty, he would be removed from office. That’s the limit of an impeachment. But the president—or a justice or other officeholder subject to impeachment—would thereafter be a private citizen, subject to criminal proceedings, and murder, as you know, has no statute of limitations.

A year ago, when we were talking about this, I explained, 

While an impeachment is not exactly a court trial, it is analogous to think of the impeachment articles, and all that was done in the House, as the prosecution’s case. When they pass along the articles of impeachment, that is akin to the prosecutors saying, “The prosecution rests its case.”

When the Senate takes up the case, they have a couple of options beyond holding a further trial. One is to look at the evidence and say, “No, the evidence does not show beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant [the president] is guilty of these charges,” and they could rule not guilty.

Or they could look at the evidence and say, “He may have done these things he’s charged with but still not be guilty of something requiring his removal from office,” and they could rule not guilty.

Beyond that, of course, if they were to find him guilty, they could remove him from office, which, of course, they didn't do.

But this year, the trial is against a private citizen already out of office. The Congress doesn’t have the authority to legally pursue a private citizen, even a former officeholder. The Democrats don’t care, however. But that explains why Justice Roberts will not be overseeing the impeachment trial as constitutionally required; this is not a legal impeachment trial.

If the Senate trial were to find the former President guilty, they can’t even remove him from office. Obviously. The assertion is that they can at least attach the additional impeachment punishment of preventing him from ever running again. Now, seriously, in four years Donald Trump will be 78, practically as old as Joe Biden is now. While his health and energy are far better than Biden’s right now, handling a presidency between ages 78 and 82 might not be what he wants to do—or what the American people want him to do at that time. Democrats seem to assume others are as power hungry as they are, and as incapable of retiring from their power mongering. But if you look at someone who hasn’t lived his life accruing political power, you might find other life purposes altogether. Who knows?

However, if Donald Trump wants to run in 2024, he can run, regardless of what the House proclaims in a nonofficial “impeachment” trial. If he does, the House can take him to court, to see whether they had any legal authority to punish him by removing permission to run. But their saying “You can never run for anything again,” when they had no authority to do so is nothing more than slamming the door after someone leaves, and then saying, “And take that!” If they could, they would simply hold an “impeachment” trial of any political foe they never wanted to face and put up that roadblock. In a legal court of law, such a punishment couldn’t stand.

They also want to claim he shouldn’t be allowed to have a presidential library. A good question would be, why do they care? It’s a private thing, built with money from private donors. Not taxpayer dollars. And no one is forced to go to it. Just as Congress has no power to prevent other private citizens from building libraries, or other buildings of whatever purpose, they do not have the power to declare that a former president cannot build a library related to his life and his time in office.

This impeachment isn’t going anywhere for one large additional reason: the Democrats do not hold a 2/3 majority in the Senate, where they need to convince all Democrats plus around 17 Republicans that the President committed the crime they are accusing him of.

As with last time, it’s hard to know whether the Senate will even bother to try the case. With a split Senate, and possibly a few Republican defectors, they will likely look at the charges, and spend some time posturing. But they cannot convict. So it is a waste of taxpayer time and money.

There are some other legal issues related to this impeachment we ought to mention. Like we said, the House brought the single article of impeachment. That is the prosecution’s case. Done. They took only a few hours to discuss and even fewer pages to write up their case. They voted on that in a frenzied hurry.

And then they changed the article of impeachment, added to it, after the vote. This week they offered up what they’re calling a “memorandum” on the impeachment. And it isn’t what the House voted on.

Law vlogger and defense attorney Robert Gruler compared the original article of impeachment to this new memorandum. He reviewed what he said a couple of weeks ago, where he had shown the pertinent charges: that President Trump incited violence at the capitol with his speech, and they cited certain words from that speech. Here’s a screenshot of what was included:

Robert Gruler shows the main points of the Article of Impeachment
screenshot from here

You might note that, speaking untruths about election fraud is something the former President could defend himself on by showing that there was a whole lot of election fraud. They’re claiming that saying that basic fact, which they call untrue, incited violence at the capitol. The other things they’re saying incited violence are two quotes from his January 6^th speech. Plus, not shown on that page is also the Raffensberger phonecall, which Gruler says was simply a settlement discussion in a litigation suit, perfectly legal, even if the President’s words were not precisely elegant or helpful. It was certainly not something they could impeach him on, nor did they consider doing so prior to the events of January 6^th. In other words, that was just thrown in but wasn’t an impeachable charge.

Gruler draws the scope looking like this, inside the blue circle. Plenty of things exist outside the circle, but they are all outside the scope of the case.

The scope of the case includes only what is in the blue circle.
screenshot from here

 

What does he mean by scope? An example he gave was, if you were arrested for stealing a candy bar, and you face your day in court on that charge, referring to what you did on a certain day, a certain place, doing a particular thing—and then suddenly on the day you get to defend yourself in court, they say, “Oh, by the way, we’re also charging you with the theft of that TV.” What? That has nothing to do with what you were charged with. That’s not what your attorney prepared to defend you on. Not only that, it’s not what they presented evidence to prove. We have due process to prevent that sort of thing.

Here he shows what additional “outside the scope of the case” stuff they are suddenly putting in that memorandum. 

Gruler shows how the memorandum stuffs all kinds of things
into the scope of the case that are not in the Article of Impeachment.
screenshot from here

He lays it out this way:

My high-level take on all of this is, the old narrative, the old theme of this case was, “Trump’s irresponsible rhetoric on January 6th was the direct cause of (incitement of) the Capitol Hill Insurrection.” That narrative is now changing. It’s now, “Trump’s irresponsible rhetoric before, during, and after January 6th was the direct cause of (incitement) of the Capitol Hill Insurrection and is a continuing threat to America.”

It’s even worse than that; he didn’t just cause what happened on Capitol Hill, but he’s also now a continuing threat to America. So you see how the scope sort of changes a little bit. And I read through most of the 80 pages. I read through Donald Trump’s response. And that’s just sort of how I synthesize it into the Democrats’ argument, that they’re expanding the scope, and they’re now saying that a lot of Trump’s behavior, before, after, during, his response after the Capitol Hill riots, was all inappropriate, and it’s all impeachable now as a result. So the scope—it gets much bigger, as we’re going to see.

He goes on to say why they couldn't leave it at "Trump's speech incited a riot." You see it spilled by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez earlier this week. She claimed that she was getting text messages about a threat on January 6^th as early as a week before. Add to that some things we’ve known for a while. There was a letter put out by Pelosi herself, I believe, refusing any additional help from the feds. Chief of the Capitol Hill Police Steven Sund brought concerns to the attention of the Sgt. of Arms of both chambers of Congress, but they flatly refused to use any additional help. Gruler says,

So, if they knew this was going to be a problem, and they undersecured the facilities, is the government negligent? Are they contributory? Is their negligence contributing to this entire debacle? Or was this all just Donald Trump? Because that’s what the original allegation has been.

At least it was that for a while. Then Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said, no, Ted Cruz tried to murder her. So it’s not just Donald Trump; it’s Donald Trump and Ted Cruz who tried to murder her, literally; she said that on Twitter. We covered that.

So, you’re seeing how the narrative is just unraveling just a little bit.

You can’t have it both ways: Trump incited violence on January 6^th, or there was pre-planning that didn’t involve Trump, but he’s somehow responsible for that too.

Evidence keeps coming out about the pre-planning. Much of it appears to be done by non-Trump supporters. It’s looking more like a setup. They hoped there would be a problem they could blame Trump for. Maybe Democrats even colluded to make that happen; if I were the investigator, that’s what I’d be looking into. But of course Democrats won't be investigating themselves.

But now we’re supposed to believe Donald Trump is guilty of insurrection for questioning a voting process with more evidence of fraud than we have ever seen in a US election. And we’re supposed to believe saying so—which I have done and continue to do on this platform—is inciting insurrection. And it was all put over the top by a speech, in which the President called for peacefully cheering on those who challenged the electors, and never called for violence—and never has before or since either. And the words they claim incited violence weren’t even spoken before the violence began miles from where he was speaking.

Incitement has a legal definition as well, which they’re ignoring. It has to be actually calling for violence to happen imminently. It can’t be hinted at, or words construed to mean that. And you certainly can’t incite violence by calling for peace, as the President did, before, during, and after.

So this is all a sham. It seems designed to label everyone who believes there was election fraud as an insurrectionist. And beyond that, anyone who voted for Trump is, by association, an insurrectionist.

It’s hard to believe this is America. A question for a future post is, is the current dictatorship more like a banana republic or a communist regime?

In other words, don’t worry about President Trump’s impeachment trial. He’ll be fine. But the country, if left in the hands of these lawless power mongers, will not.