Truly defensive. Amateur. Video montages conveniently taken out of context. Talking louder and angrier as a way to compensate for a lack of substance. All Trump’s defense lawyers proved is that, given enough time and creativity, people are capable of offering a rebuttal to just about any argument.

Many of us know what we saw—a POTUS who groomed a mob over a period of years to do what it did on January 6. We all saw it, even as we’ve interpreted it in different ways. A mob of angry, misguided, and gullible people broke into the Capitol because they loved their President and believed everything he told them, including the oft-repeated big lie about a stolen election.

The extent to which members of Congress were actually threatened will probably never be known, though the human tendency is toward a flair for the dramatic and overstatement. Do we know for sure what the mob would have done if they had found Mike Pence or Nancy Pelosi? Would they have indeed followed through on their mob-induced, crazed threats? Who knows? That’s not what this impeachment trial is about.

It’s about what the President of the United States said and did—and didn’t say and do—that day and the days leading up to it. The fact that most Republican Senators will not be moved to convict says less about Trump’s innocence or guilt than it does about these Senators’ desire to save their own skins. And to hell with the rule of law, the Constitution, and the Republic.

Legitimate concern dismissed as partisan bickering, as much ado about nothing.

Some Senators doodling while others are trying to present evidence and appeal to the gravity of the situation.

Are Paul, Hawley, and the rest simply blowing it off as over-reaction and political theater, or can they not stand to face a certain reality?

The picture that ends up being created is one of minds made up, blind allegiance, fear of the mob, er Base, and a classic case of CYA and looking out for #1. As seemingly forceful and substantive as the Democratic argument has been, what we end up seeing are too many Republican Senators dismissing it out of hand, as if none of it matters, as if it’s just a vendetta born of long-held animosity– which in part it probably is.

Still, what is it going to take for them to see it as more than that? We’re likely never to know.

On the Impeachment front, the prosecution has had a couple days to make their case. They’ve been pretty convincing, though it’s not like there isn’t any evidence to support their case. The defense has tomorrow and Saturday, in which they will reveal their own video footage and harp on a phrase Trump used in his speech at the Ellipse on 1/6. They have a flimsy case but will do their best to convince they have an ironclad one.

When all is said and done, there most likely won’t be enough votes to convict, so we will have spent all this time and energy on a futile pursuit, and more than half the country will go on feeling like justice once again has not been served, the rat once again has gotten away with something gravely serious, and many will once again settle for bitterness, anger, and frustration.

Last night, there was not one second of primetime programming dedicated to anything else going on in the nation and world— at least on the station I was watching. It was all focused on the Impeachment trial. Nothing about Covid or vaccination efforts, nothing about other legislation or anything else newsworthy. It was like Trump was still in office. Trump front and center, the whole night.

It is maddening beyond words that we are still having to pay so much attention to such a mole hill of a man. This in itself should somehow be an impeachable offense.

The impassioned speech by Jamie Raskin, the video footage of the events of January 6, the ham-handed, bumbling nonsense from Trump’s lawyers. Still, many Republican Senators averted their eyes– a visible, intentional dissing of everything, because they believe the whole impeachment effort is just political theater and a waste of time.

But do they really believe that? How can they? It would be a heavenly turn of events if enough Senators see the light and vote to impeach. The bottom line is that no one gets away with inciting insurrection. There’s nothing more to parse. No more hiding behind legal smoke screens. No more defense of the indefensible. No more avoidance of consequences for Donald Trump.

How can anyone think that the Democrats prefer to invest precious time and resources on this when there are so many other pressing issues to tend to?

The 44 Republicans who thought this endeavor unconstitutional are plugging their ears and singing, “la, la, la,” hoping it all just goes away- again! Their continued defense of a brazen pretender who sat in the Oval Office for four years is absolutely stunning. Talk about partisanship, talk about political theater– it’s the Republicans who have had a corner on that market for quite a while now.

The impeachment effort will probably fall short– again! But this time it’s going to leave a lasting mark on the Constitution and the rule of law. And it will leave the door open for Trump to slither in and finish off The Dream.

There was much talk about how we as a country really needed the Super Bowl this year, what with everything that has been going on. It was time for some worship at the altar of the NFL, who apparently deserved reverence for its perseverance amid such a tumultuous, challenging season. And got all its games in. For the benefit of us all.

But did we really need this year’s version of what has long been a glitzy, ostentatious, gluttonous commercial venture that highlights everything about America that’s outsized and mythologized and over the top and excessive? Is this who we really are—just a nation in a trance, mesmerized by spectacle and shallowness, living vicariously through someone else’s dreams?

Balm for our weary souls, I guess.

So much for my 1/25 take on Super Bowl 55 results.

TB12 and Tampa Bay pretty much manhandled the Chiefs, though the refs seemed to be keyed in on the KC defensive backs and safeties. They must have had at least 3 damaging penalties in a short amount of time in the first half.

So Tom Brady has 7 rings. Impressive. They made Patrick Mahomes look like a raw rookie, despite his flashes of brilliance. He couldn’t keep them in this one, couldn’t lead them back. It must be nice to win the big game at home. First time that’s ever happened. It figures Brady would be involved.

A scintillating career. You’d think he might want to call it a day, go out on a high note, but we’ve thought that before. I want to know what it’s like to sustain such passion for your work when it would seem natural to start losing interest, start thinking about moving on to something else.

It seems foolhardy and naïve to believe Marjorie Taylor Greene and her mea culpa. What are the chances that such a change of heart could happen so quickly? There’s a big difference between moral conviction and denial born of a fear of consequences.

Accordingly, the House voted her off her committee assignments, along largely partisan lines. But she’s still there, publicly apologetic but whiney and vindictive, probably seething and desiring revenge. A cornered rat, like others of her ilk. An angry conspiracy junkie feigning gullibility so she can “serve” her equally angry and genuinely gullible constituents in northwest Georgia…

Her misguided and nutty views landed her a seat in Congress! Elsewhere, there are others like her.

The longer this pandemic drags on, the less likely it seems we will ever return to anything approaching the way things used to be. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. There are probably takeaways we’ve needed to heed that only a pandemic could place before us.

The news outlets present differing emphases, treating everything from vaccine roll-out to the spread of variants that threaten to throw a wrench in the works of whatever progress is being made. We hear of a drop in cases and the promise of another vaccine soon added to the arsenal, and at the same time we are being warned of a South African strain, a U.K strain, and some other mutation, all of which exhibit heightened transmissibility and virulence, along with the potential for slowing any momentum and blunting any optimism we may have been feeling.

Lately, cases and hospitalizations are dropping, though deaths are still north of 3000. It seems like things are quieting a bit, though tomorrow is Super Bowl Sunday, which provides yet one more opportunity for people to ignore sound advice and contribute to another spike.

There really is no cure for stupid, so we’ll continue in fits and starts until who knows when.

The NBA is a gathering of gigantic little boys with fragile egos and way too much money and influence.

Their quirks and flare for the dramatic don’t make them as interesting as some make them out to be. Instead, these things make them seem more pathetic and spoiled.

Please be quiet and do your job. Otherwise, take your “disrespect” and your toys and just go home.

Donald Trump still gets too much press coverage. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that right now he’s still getting the lion’s share, more than the Biden administration and all that they are doing or trying to do.

Lately I have felt an acute need to turn off the noise or find a station that’s broadcasting a quiet brook meandering through a mountain meadow. The amount of verbiage being released on any given station is testing our limits of endurance.

People like Trump and MT Greene, the My Pillow guy… a collection of low-lifes and misfits is still getting paid way too much attention. What is the attraction? Somehow it seems we are still playing into the former President’s hands.