Bannon Guilty! Trump Roasted!

First off — Bannon found guilty on both counts! Really fast! The jury took about long enough to eat lunch and vote. He could get up to a year on each count!

I’m still digesting the J6 finale. But here’s one of the lighter moments:

It’s probably too soon to say that Hawley’s political career is over, but whoever runs against him in 2024 can just run that YouTube video as their television ads. Here you can watch the run with different soundtracks. We can say Josh was Hawl-ing ass. See also Philip Bump, WaPo, Hawley’s effort to reap political rewards from Jan. 6 scampers off.

It’s especially amusing to recall how last year Hawley was making speeches about the virtues of manliness that liberals allegedly oppose. These virtues include courage, as I recall.

But on to the main point, which is Trump.

After the committee documented (once again) that Trump took absolutely no steps to stop the violence until he finally told the mob to “go home” in a video released at 4:17 p.m. — and he only did that because everyone else in the White House pressured him to do it — Trump is still not taking responsibility. All along he has blamed Nancy Pelosi for turning down some alleged offer of 20,000 troops to protect the Capitol. I understand he repeated that claim on Truth Social after last night’s hearing. But there is no evidence this offer was ever made, and in any case the Speaker of the House has no authority whatsoever over troop movements. Pelosi can neither green light sending troops to the Capitol nor turn them away. That’s the Commander in Chief’s job, and he wasn’t doing it.

Last night’s hearing emphasized that Trump really wanted to march to the Capitol with the mob. Really, truly. After the encounter with the driver of his car he got back to the White House and sulked in his overcoat for a bit. What did he imagine he would do? Did he envision leading the mob into the House chamber to stop the counting? That really would have been a coup attempt, plain and simple.

Liz Cheney and the crew made the point that no responsible human being would support Trump for another term in the White House. That’s going to be lost on many of them, of course.