Wednesday, February 10, 2021

A quick programming note before we begin. A forever-more fierce ice storm is apparently on its way to the Memphis area, so bundle up. We’ve had gorgeous weather for the last couple of days here in Enon Holler and while we’re not supposed to get the worst of it, it is about to get unpleasant around here. From what I’m told the whole East Coast is looking at a hard freeze so, again, bundle up and stay warm.

Okay, then. The second day of the second impeachment trial for former President Donald Trump carried on today. Since we really didn’t touch on it even over at the Gibberish, let’s make sure we’re all caught up. Tuesday the Democrats laid out just why they impeached Trump this time around. It all connects back to the events of January 6, when a bunch of chowderheads stormed the Capitol building hoping to disrupt the count of electoral votes. What they thought this would do, I have no idea, because by that point Joe Biden was the 46th POTUS and things were just a formality.

But storm they did, trashing the Capitol, scaring the shit out of the assembled Congress critters, and live-streamed all the fun like a bunch of complete morons. It also lead to the death of four of the rioters and one member of the Capitol police, a couple more have committed suicide since. The Democrats contend Trump incited the violence with his nonstop whining about the election being “stolen” from here and impeached him on January 13 on one count of “incitement of insurrection.”

Trump’s legal team argues the entire to-do is unconstitutional, but one of the first things decided yesterday was that, yes indeed, it was constitutional. It should be noted that Trump’s current legal team was a last-minute choice after the previous five-man team quit on him early last week. As an aside, one thing I’ve learned about lawyers is they rarely quit on a case they think they can win. Not a risk-taking bunch, is what I’m saying.

Anyhow, once the Democrats laid out their intentions, Trump’s lawyers got up to give their opening statements and proceeded to embarrass the entire legal system. Their opening statements were barely coherent, much less well-argued, and it all started when Bruce Castor opened by saying how powerful he thought the prosecution’s opening arguments were.

Indeed, he said it was so good that they had to change their whole strategy. I’m sure we’ve all watched enough Perry Mason to know that’s not exactly a winning opening. It was so bad it drew criticism from Republican Senators and even caused Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy to swap sides. He was one of six GOP law dogs that joined with the Democrats in saying the trial was a go.

Now that we’re all together, today saw testimony from most Democratic Congress critters about their experiences during the riot of dumbasses. There was also more footage from security cameras recording the day’s events. One particularly striking one was Officer Eugene Goodman – already considered something of a hero among certain folks for leading the mob away from the congressional assembly – catching Utah’s Mitt Romney before he walked right into the mob. For his part, Romney didn’t realize just how close he got to getting the shit stomped out of him and was quite taken back.

And let’s be real, y’all. The only reason no Congress critter was hurt was because the Capitol cops managed to keep the bunch of dickwads away from them. They were out for blood and there are recordings of them saying how much, for example, they’d love to put a bullet in Nancy Pelosi’s head. A “RINO” like Romney wouldn’t have fared well under the self-declared patriots’ boots and it terrifies me to think what they would’ve done to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had they found her. You may think I’m being an alarmist but I say you either ain’t been paying attention or just don’t want to admit it.

Anyhow. The prosecution showed video evidence of Trump encouraging the rioters and produced a transcript of the speech he gave that day, where he basically accused Vice-President Mike Pence of stabbing him in the back. For his part, Trump’s still down in Florida playing “President of Mar-A-Lago” in an attempt to keep from getting kicked out by the town. Word has it he was mad as an old wet hen at how bad his lawyers started off his case. I don’t blame him but you get what you pay for.

Okay for all that. The trial goes on but no one realistically thinks it will end in anything but an acquittal. The sad, sorry fact is in the numbers. There are simply not enough GOP Senators who might jump shit to get the two-thirds majority needed for conviction. They’d need 17 and that would take a miracle. Fact is, despite the popularity of Trump’s impeachment among most of the country, the rabid loonies who worship their blind, idiot god still make up the bulk of the GOP base. Along with electoral concerns, they’re probably scared those nuts will come for them and who can blame them.

Moving on, the state Republicans down in Jackson are showing once again how awful they can be if you give them a chance. Hours after voting down two attempts to expand Medicaid coverage for the state – down party lines, natch – Southaven’s Kevin Blackwell introduced Senate bill 2765. This is another attempt to scuttle the medical marijuana initiative that voters overwhelmingly supported back in November. It passed with two-thirds of the state putting it in the state constitution.

However, this state hates its citizens. In short, the bill would limit the number of growers in the state to just five. For comparison, Arizona – which has had medical marijuana since 2010 and recently moved to make it legal for recreational purposes – has over 130 growers in the state. They’ve recently put in motion plans to let individual growers get a second permit.

Even worse, the bill would require a one-time, non-refundable application fee of $200,000 and would require all applicants to have at least one million dollars in liquid assets. This would essentially shut out all but the largest growers and some say it would give preference to out-of-state money. We’re supposed to have everything in order – cards, dispensaries, the whole nine yards – by August 15, but legislators have monkeyed around so much the date might be missed. The State Board of Health has been against it from the get-go, so them dragging their feet on this is no shock.

But it’s in the state constitution and there’s no going back. It’s just a matter of how badly the state legislature screws it up. This state’s long proven the government really doesn’t care all that much about its citizens, and this is no different. Believe you me, though, we definitely need to collectively take a big hit so we can step back and take stock of things.