“You guys may not be following the Internet the way I do.” - DJT on his 'Sources' for Election Fraud Claims
“You guys may not be following the Internet the way I do.” - DJT on his 'Sources' for Election Fraud Claims
Autocratic Plot at DoJ Stopped Due to Counter Threat of Mass Resignation -- Congressmen Sought Blanket Pardons for Roles in Promoting DJT Election Fraud Claims
Happy belated Solstice Everyone! Returned from a trip today, so posting a little later than usual today.
In this Issue:
Five January 6th Committee Hearings Deep
Poem
Out-and-About Photo
Five January 6th Committee Hearings Deep
The top-line quote from DJT came to my attention from the 5th, and at the time of this posting, most recent, January 6th Committee hearing. It was sourced from meeting notes taken by then Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue in December of 2020, and was DJT’s retort to being told that his election fraud claims lacked a factual basis. This phantom evidentiary quality is the primary reason officials in various Executive Departments discontinued investigatory wild goose chases. I want to get to that statement more, but first, catching up on the January 6th Committee Hearings since last post.
The plot by the time January 6th rolled around was that Pence would ‘discover’ newfound Vice Presidential powers during the electoral count process, and either dismiss the electoral ballots entirely or kick some of them back to “disputed” states, at which point the State’s certified electors would be swapped for non-State certified (meaning fraudulent) Trump friendly electors. There was even fake elector documentation sent to the national archives in D.C., which was a good evidentiary display during the hearing. Pence, and apparently most everyone else with a legal degree, thought this novel legal theory was nuts when they heard it weeks prior, and they were apparently quite frank about it to DJT and company. DJT clings to John Eastman (a Chapman University law professor) to be his voice in the wilderness in running legal cover for his plot to overturn the election.
By January 6th, the Department of Justice (and Defense, and Homeland Security, etc.) investigating the President’s claims found no evidentiary basis for them (and told him so, repeatedly). There were a lot of coercive efforts personally used by DJT to try and get people across various levels of government (Federal, State, Local, etc) to provide cover to the plot. An amazing amount of people with an R next to their name stood firm during this time and rebuked DJT. The final act of DJT’s preferred plan was to have Vice President Pence channel Steve Carell’s character from the Office on January 6th and go, “I DECLARE A RE-DO!” Except worse because in addition it’s a re-do “Just for these select States! Also, we went ahead and found some certified *wink* *wink* alternate State electors.” Had the Capitol stormers gotten hold of the ballots and torched them, or killed Pence, that would have also functionally assisted in the plan to delay and re-run till getting the plot’s preferred result.
Professor Eastman appears deeply involved in cooking up the autocratic Vice President theory, as well as the phony (as in none of the State’s certified these people to be electors, while these people were fraudulently claiming otherwise) state elector plot. A particularly damning collection of testimony includes Eastman acknowledging that the plot was illegal and contrary to the Electoral Count Act of 1887. Eastman’s rationale for breaking the law was that the Electoral Count Act of 1887 is actually unconstitutional (in his mind, newly discovered, after all this time…). When Eastman was pressed by other attorneys whether he thought his arguments had any hope facing a Supreme Court challenge, conceded that his arguments would lose 9-0 (after first claiming it would only lose 7-2). Eastman then told people not to worry about potential SCOTUS interference to the plot because the Court would sit this one out due to its deference on “political” questions (meaning defer to the two elected branches — Congress, Presidency).
Eastman, may forever be known for his super legal theory of do illegal shit and accuse the laws in your way of being unconstitutional while wishful think away that likelihood, would go on to seek a pardon after January 6th. Regarding the pardon requests, included among them were several Congress people, and yes, they were exactly who you might suspect.
The Tuesday hearings this week covered the pressure campaign conducted by DJT, and certain DJT loyalists, against election officials in various states. A pattern repeated throughout all the “theories” being espoused by DJT and Rudy Giulliani, when they engage these officials, which went, “Ok, Rudy, you say there are hundreds of thousands of illegal votes, do you have their names?” Such was the case for Rusty Bowers, state legislator from Arizona. The request for evidence from the people claiming illegality, was to say, “oh yeah, we got names, we’ll get them to you.” Yet, despite claiming they had the goods, never delivered. This pattern repeated, and like Bowers, an apparent majority of officials did not go along with the plot to overturn the election. Their testimony made it clear that it was not the case that these officials would have been opposed to doing something, it is just that there simply was no factual basis for doing so. Trump leaned hardest on “fellow” Republicans. The officials being pressured often responded with “I do not have the legal authority or power to just start declaring things absent real evidence.” DJT’s response to this resistance included the top-line quote, as well as to at one point say, in a roomful of people, “But wouldn’t it be cool if you did.” Eventually, this even got to a point with the Department of Justice where a frustrated Trump says, “Just say that the election was corrupt, and leave the rest to me and the Republican Congressmen.”
All the while, easily persuaded paranoid people were breaking into homes and engaging in threatening behavior towards election workers, elected officials, and their families, because they were apparently so convinced of the fraud narrative being espoused by Trump and company.
Thursday’s focus was on how the plot impacted the Department of Justice, which culminated in a plan a few days prior to January 6th to remove Acting Attorney General Rosen who replaced Attorney General Barr after Barr’s resignation only a couple weeks earlier. The replacement was going to be an environmental law stooge named Jeffrey Clark. Apparently, Clark was so stoogey that it served as the basis for another great quote from highlight machine Eric Herschmann saying to Clark, “Congratulations. You just admitted your first act as Attorney General would be committing a felony.” This plan was thwarted shortly after the White House call logs had already changed to calling Clark the Acting Attorney General, because Assistant Attorney Generals from around the country threatened to resign en masse. This made DJT back off Rosen, apparently out of fear of optics that it would be a bigger story than what he might gain by installing an Attorney General that would play pretend with his election fraud claims. DJT wanting Jeffrey Clark to put out a vague statement supportive of the plot’s fraud narrative and saying that the DoJ would be probing around about it.
Even after all this insane dangling the country off the edge of a cliff, Bill Barr and Rusty Bowers claim they would likely still vote for Trump if he was the Republican nominee. The reason being as stated by Barr:
“Because I believe that the greatest threat to the country is the progressive agenda being pushed by the Democratic Party, it’s inconceivable to me that I wouldn’t vote for the Republican nominee.”
There is a bit of paranoid nightmare fantasy that motivates this man in life, and that is something to explore in another essay. I will point out that for as bad as Eastman is, he probably felt sincerely that he had to push for the overturn of the election because the alternative would be too unbearable. In a way there are differences of degrees, and differences in line drawing, between these guys. It is not clear to what extent Eastman sincerely believed the fraud claims, but what appears to have eventually pushed Barr and many others away from allying with Trump, is fatigue from his post-election psychosis. Back to that top-line quote from DJT, “You guys may not be following the Internet the way I do.” This actively seeking out all sorts of manner of denials of reality is wholly consistent with DJT tracking as someone with a prominent narcissistic personality disorder. Meaning, for him to admit the truth would wound his ego too much. As a means of a narcissist’s sense of self preservation he is likely not able in the way most other people would be, to agree with his staff, attorneys, and others around him, that he lost the election. Hence the public displays of attachment to increasingly outlandish constructs. These can be viewed as efforts to create a new shared reality where his egoistic needs can still be satiated by his followers and US citizens more broadly.
The break from reality relative to multiple other qualified and expert observers is a consistent theme throughout all the testimony and evidence presented. The Internet quote underscores that no theory could be too incoherent, or extremely dramatic — ex. one had Italian satellites changing votes, which Trump made the Secretary of Defense contact the Italian attache to investigate (nothing came of it). The more elaborate and far reaching the election fraud claim also highlights the narcissism — as if — all these people from around the world, and all-walks of life in the USA, are secretly and criminally focused on depriving the narcissist of the supply from being re-elected. Everyone out there just risking their lives, liberty, careers, focusing on the narcissist. Somehow these election fraud claims get pulled off without any credible evidence of anything happening at all. The only one that can ‘see it’ are those like Trump apparently, because everyone else is just stupid.
Overall my takeaway from the January 6th Committee is that it was all far more crazy, orchestrated, and stupid, than I had been aware of up to this point. A frightening will to power appears to have been there throughout. DJT seems to compliment his personality disorder by being brought up with the Power of Positive Thinking a “great book,” he says. Back in 2009 Barbara Ehrenreich released the book Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America, which studies this phenomena more in depth, and I found to be worth reading if only for its insights to understanding personalities like DJT.
Understanding the interplay of these perspectives with a person like DJT, makes it seem like some subtle yet terrible thing has come home to roost in America. I think there is a certain denial in the United States regarding what happened here, and the hearings are good for preserving this record. None of this bodes well short or long term either considering debunked election fraud claims are still impacting elections, such as in New Mexico. In New Mexico, there was no real reason given by officials for impeding certifying election results other than some vague insinuations towards Dominion tabulation machines. It was not that they had any particular evidence they could point to it was a “feeling” in the “heart.”
Justification reads like a description of partisan brain death. I hope the United States is an organ donor so that at least some beneficial aspects of the experiment might survive.
Poem for 2022.06.24
Heron croaks in flight
Green pillars of Douglas fir
Silver clouds roll in
Out-and-About Photo for 2022.06.24
[Can you smell this picture!? Mmmm lovely sunny briny stench!]
[2022.09.19 Headline Style and Formatting Updates (Link-ablity and Site Consistency)]