Dung Jury

Few public servants in the post-WWII era carried the gravitas of George Shultz. A marine who fought in the Pacific, an economist, academic, business titan, one of only two people to hold four separate Cabinet positions in the US government, and most notably Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State for 6 1/2 years, present at the creation of the post-Soviet world order, Shultz lived and served plenty in his 100 years above ground. His passing several days ago was predictably met with universal sadness, his many accomplishments lauded in fully bipartisan fashion across the political spectrum.

Anyone who lives for a full century is going to possess some wisdom; Shultz had more than his fair share. Perhaps his most sage and prescient observation was the lesson he “learned over and over” that “trust is the coin of the realm.” When “trust was in the room,” maintained Shultz, “good things happened.” When it was missing “good things did not happen. Everything else is details.” As common sense as it is insightful; who could argue otherwise?

Sadly, by this barometer America is going nowhere fast. Trust is exactly the commodity we lack most at the moment, primarily because it has to be earned and one half of the body politic feels a far greater obligation to abetting criminality than any moral capital it might accrue. For four years our highest office shamelessly trafficked in more than 30,000 publicly uttered falsehoods. That 74 million were ready to validate such shockingly unprecedented dishonesty with another term speaks as much to a disdain for truth as a trust in lies, or even worse, that neither really matters in our governance. Voting with a belief that everyone lies so the liar you know is better than the one you haven’t yet experienced abdicates all civic responsibility. It’s also an essential element of MAGA election strategy, the false equivalence ascendant fascism requires. The current class of Trump toadies certainly didn’t rise based on their bold vision.

In fact, Trump most often labeled any effort to reach consensus not fully toeing the line of his own personal benefit – near always aligned with one deceit or another – a betrayal, more than enough reason for public repudiation. As Donald Jr. made clear just before the wretched core attacked the Capitol, “Trump’s Republican Party” will “come to get” those insufficiently dedicated to the war effort the big boss demanded they fight in pursuit of criminal aims encompassed by the bald-faced lie he conjured. Now, from his Mar-A-Lago exile, he continues to call for nothing less, plotting revenge on any who “let him down.” Incredibly, most of the GOP Senate Caucus still feels obligated to deliver for their Scut Farkas, unwilling to stand up for either themselves or the country that so foolishly entrusted them to protect its national interest.

Like almost exactly one year ago, House floor managers have an easy job: to prove Donald Trump is guilty of impeachable conduct. And just like one year ago, they have a better chance scaling Mount Everest in bathing suits and flip flops than securing a conviction. Faced again with half a jury who view facts as little more than inconvenient clarification of their collective disdain for the oath of office most all are intent to disregard, Trump’s prosecutors will have to settle once more for the pyrrhic victory of shaming the shameless, disgracing the disgraced, laying bare who this nation can no longer afford to trust in any measure.

Anybody who wasn’t riveted and revolted by the Raskin team’s airtight presentation of how bad things could have gotten on 1/6 lacks concern for country. Not surprisingly, the usual suspects were unimpressed. “I think the trial is a waste of time,” hissed Ted Cruz, who urged on the seditionists from the start, giving Trump’s lie credibility at every opportunity. Rand Paul apparently was more interested in what he was doodling than what was on the screen. Lindsey Graham sniveled to Sean Hannity that the presentation was “offensive.” No doubt the GOP Presidential primary class of 2024, when not kissing Trump’s ring and unctuously urging him to run again, will define this impeachment exactly as they did the last, as Cruz called it Wednesday, “the result of seething partisan anger on the part of congressional Democrats.” Some juror.

Yet and still, it’s hard to believe hour upon hour of the clearest and most damning timeline imaginable won’t force most to at least consider where a vote to acquit places them within US history’s calculus. They have to know how posterity will frown on their abject servility to a loathsome figure time will only render more depraved with every now unreported detail it uncovers. That Marco Rubio will again be voting to absolve the tormenter who mockingly dubbed him “liddle Marco” and whose daughter now plans to primary him herself in 2022 can only make one wonder if blackmail is involved. Honestly, no human can be that self-abasing, can they?

Fact is, House Democrats did the Senate GOP a huge favor teeing up Trump for a lifetime ban from office and the ticket to palookaville it would punch. All they have to do is summon up the will to send him packing, and only a handful of them have to do it. Seventeen is all they need, less if some don’t show up for the vote (the Constitution only requires 2/3 of “those present”.) The rest can enjoy the cowardice that comes so naturally to them. Draw straws, compare polls, rock, scissors and paper… whatever works. Just get it done. In any fight for a viable GOP future, this has to be the first volley, right?

Holding Trump to account for sedition he forced on those who spent four years eating every shit sandwich he served would not only provide the just desserts he has earned in spades, it would serve notice to future imitators that dead-ender populism will ultimately not be kind to them either. He’s there for the dispatching; all they need to do is grow a pair. Yea, sure! Might as well expect me to sprout a mane of lush handfuls of hair.

It did happen here. Giving the stochastic terrorist Trump a pass for the 1/6 mayhem he is solely responsible for inspiring, inciting and inflicting means it’s still happening here. The idea Americans committed to our democratic system could possibly ever trust a party depraved enough to pursue such injustice a mere month after they themselves were hightailing it through obscure Capitol passages and stairwells in search of sanctuary from murderous hordes their cowardice abetted is a laughable proposition.

For weeks after Joe Biden was projected the winner of Decision/2020 virtually every GOP Senator muttered not a word as Trump incessantly spewed his big lie. Many still have yet to actually say Biden won fair and square! Now, despite a flawless prosecution case that connects every dot, they will again shrug and acquit. It’s a party that deserves to die, maybe must die if we are to continue as a going concern. George Shultz is already turning in his casket.