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Probably because they do not want the way they live to have to change even a little. They’re conservatives.

Last night, one of my softball teammates, who occupies some mythical “well-informed middle” on the whole thing (as though anyone well-informed would form no opinion on any of this), said he was unimpressed by the first hearing because he said we didn’t learn anything new. I mentioned how we learned that the violence was all pre-planned, and how Trump pushed the fraud claim even after he knew he had lost, and my teammate said well, we already knew this, didn’t we? What’s new about that? He had me for a minute because, yes, this had all been talked about for the last year and a half, ever since the Capitol attack happened, and it really does seem like old news—until I came to realize that the big difference now is that all this was just Twitter speculation before, whereas now, we have actual sworn testimony to all of this, which carries the imprimatur of legal truth. That’s the big difference. Once I shared this thought with him, he had an “aha” moment about it.

I think if they lay out all this evidence and then fail to indict Trump, basically making this whole thing a political stunt, he will become more popular with the red hats than ever, since it will show that he is indeed the most powerful person in the world, bulletproof and unable to be taken down by the woke radical left mob, and that he is the true North Star of the future of the world. It might even radicalize a few current moderate right-of-center conservatives who might look at all this pomp and circumstance, see how nothing actually happened, and conclude that we really do live in a Deep State Democrat tyranny that uses its power to punish their opponents politically. If Trump comes out of this unscathed, it’s not just that democracy would die. It’s also that the very idea of democracy will be completely discredited.

It looks for all the world that Ginsburg is hedging his bets that Trump might come out of this a winner, and he wants to reduce his sentence for treason when Trump does win.

This is not unlike the same psychology that leads to poor people playing the numbers, or scratch-offs, or convenience store slot machines, or those machines that look like they’re gonna slide a whole bunch of quarters to you if you put in just one more. Just risk a little money and you could hit it big.

Ginsburg just basically said on CNN that we have to hold Trump and his campaign accountable, not for the fraud, apparently, but basically for not accepting the decision of the courts and for trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. But Ginsburg also believes that the consequence should be, not an indictment and a conviction in any court of law, but some realization about “their role in history” and how they’re absolutely “torched” about it, and then Congress should “take a look” at legislation to “ensure nothing like this happens again”. So, basically, according to Ginsburg, any penalty for Trump should not happen now, but in some undefined future, and not anything in real terms, but something in ethereal terms, and presumably only after he’s dead and won’t be around to give a shit about any of this anymore. For the good of the country, I presume?

Trump raised almost $250 million, $150 million in the first week after the election, on claims of election fraud that they knew to be false. That sounds like fraud itself to me!

Now we’re getting to the money fraud part …

Benjamin Ginsburg, Republican Elections Attorney. Very direct, confident, and adamant that all Trump claims were baseless. Clearly he must be a globalist agent of the deep state. 😏

Richard Donoghue’s testimony includes a whole lot of conspiracy stories that I had never even heard of.

Because he was the key to any power or influence they might have. Without Trump, they are all fringe nobodies. All of them to a one.

Good thing we’re not doing a Bill Barr Bullshit drinking game. We’d all be three sheets to Giuliani by now.

This looks like something that might come up again and again over the next three or so years.

Be that as it may in this case, I’m keeping my eye on this possibility. It does seem like it would be a pretty convenient out For people just minutes before showtime.

I wonder whether this is a jiu-jitsu move of some sort—pretending that 10am is preferable to prime time to try to convince the American people that is the actual case, when obviously the impact may be muted by running them outside of prime time. After all, come on, she knows the upcoming schedule as well as anyone.

Does anyone else here get the feeling that a lot of “family emergencies” are going to pop up?

It may depend on their calculation of whether they believe the norms of behavior by themselves will strong enough to hold the country together and preserve democracy. If they calculate they those behavioral norms cannot do so, they’ll indict. If they believe that the norms are strong enough to defeat the fascists, they probably won’t.

The thing that concerns me about this is basically what you say: the more against the wall you push someone, the harder they come back at you. The thing that gives me hope about that is that the harder they came back at us, the more people reject the messaging. The key is whether the people have the power to strip these fascists of any ability to remake America in their image. I think we still do as of this moment.

The fire hose of projection is becoming so common, so obvious, and so brazen that even once it registers with people, they’ll eventually be just amused by it rather than horrified, leading to mere resigned acceptance rather than action-inducing outrage. I assume this is an actual strategy used by authoritarian regimes that pattern themselves on Soviet-style tactics.

So, in other words, it was a not political circus.

Behold, America—your Republican future … er, present.

The Tigers finished the day with two base hits. This is the sixth time the Tigers have gotten two or fewer hits in a game this season. Out of 2,542 teams since 1901, 169 teams, or just 6.6% of total teams, had two or fewer hits at least six games in an entire season. With just 59 games played this season so far, the 2022 Tigers are already on this list. The 2022 Tigers are on track to finish the season with 16 or 17 games with two or fewer hits. The major league record is 11, by four teams: the 1910 White Sox, the 1911 Browns, the 1965 Mets, and the 1968 Cubs. At this rate, the 2022 Tigers will break this record on August 15, our 118th game. The prop bet is: Scott Coolbaugh will still be the hitting coach when the Tigers break this record.

At least we have the best play-by-play guy in the game on the radio.

There’s the right adjective for it: embarrassing. The TV broadcast is in a perpetual rebuild itself.