“This is not a difference on positions – it is a difference between truth and lies”

This morning I spoke with a aide for a Republican Congressman to share my concerns over what a shame it is Representative Liz Cheney is being ousted from her position in House leadership in the Republican Party citing my arguments. After he listened to me, he noted I had a right to share my difference on positions.

I said, this is not a difference on positions – it is a difference between truth and lies. I said I do not agree with many of the positions of Liz Cheney, but in this instance she is calling out the former president for his lying and sedition. There is no widespread election fraud and the president invited and incited an insurrection on members of Congress, endangering your boss. That is unforgiveable.

Then, I shared that this is not just my opinion, David Brooks, a conservative pundit said on PBS News Hour just this Friday that “to be a leader in the Republican party, you have to lie.” I did ask him, as an independent and former Republican, what am I supposed to think about all of this? He could not offer me his opinion, which I knew. beforehand, but I wanted to pose the question. It should be noted that Senator Mitt Romney noted that Republicans are not going to gain one vote from this and will lose many.

I closed with sharing we need a viable Republican Party, but right now the party is adrift. In fact, GOP Representative Adam Kinzinger equated the party with a slow-sinking Titanic. I told him I agree with that statement.

“It is like the Titanic”

In an article called “GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger Compares Trump-Mesmerized Republican Party To The Titanic” by Mary Papenfuss of HuffPost, the title says pretty much what one needs to know about the opinions of this Republican who continually calls the former president on the carpet. Kinzinger is one of ten House Republicans to vote to impeach Trump for inciting an insurrection on the Capitol building on January 6.

Per Kinzinger and other truth telling Republicans, he sees what is happening to his party as a death knell. He is particulary amazed how a consistent conservative Republican like Liz Cheney is could be ousted from her #3 Republican position in the House because she had the temerity to call the former president what he is – untruthful and a seditionist.. There was no widespread election fraud and the former president did have a hand in inviting, revving up and siccing rioters on the Capitol endangering members of Congress and the Vice President and his family.

Per the article, which has the subtitle “And Donald Trump is hunting for ‘women’s clothing’ so he can ‘get on the first lifeboat,’ the Illinois lawmaker said,” note the following few paragraphs:

“Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said Sunday that the sharply divided Republican Party is in a “slow sink,” like the Titanic, doomed by leaders’ stubborn fascination with reelection loser Donald Trump.

‘Right now it’s basically the Titanic. We’re … in the middle of this slow sink,’ he explained on ‘Face the Nation’ on CBS. “We have a band playing on the deck telling everybody it’s fine. And, meanwhile, Donald Trump’s running around trying to find women’s clothing and get on the first lifeboat.

Kinzinger pulled out the Titanic metaphor as he criticized party leaders’ attacks on Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) for blasting Trump for his ‘big lie’ that the presidential election was rigged and for inciting the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.

‘It’s incredible. Liz Cheney is saying exactly what [House Minority Leader] Kevin McCarthy said the day of the insurrection,’ holding Trump accountable for urging the violence, Kinzinger said. ‘A few weeks later, Kevin McCarthy changed to attacking other people.‘

McCarthy was reportedly rebuffed by the former president on Jan. 6 when he implored Trump to call off the Capitol rioters. McCarthy said later on the House floor that Trump ‘bears responsibility for the attack on Congress by mob rioters.’ Trump ‘should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding,’ he added. McCarthy called then for ‘justice’ and for a ‘censure resolution’ against Trump.

Kinzinger said the Republican Party still needs to have ‘an internal look and a full accounting as to what led to Jan. 6.’ It’s been only four months since the ‘insurrection — something that was unthinkable in this country,’ he noted.“

Like Cheney, Senator Mitt Romney and others who voted to impeach or convict the former president, they are on the side of the Angels on this issue. Yet, they are being vilified and threatened for it. That is inexcusable. But, so is what the former president and his partners in crime did on January 6.

GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger Compares Trump-Mesmerized Republican Party To The Titanic | HuffPost

Purging Liz Cheney will purge some GOP voters along as well

It has long been observed by Thomas Wells, an attorney who worked with the former president before he was elected, if you are on Donald Trump’s good side, do not get used to it, as you won’t be there for long. You will not jump high enough or genuflect lowly enough to remain in favor. Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney long sided with the former president in supporting his actions. Yet, she has the temerity to challenge his lies with respect to the election and call him out for inciting an insurrection against the Capitol.

Yet, the impetus to remove Cheney from her number three position in the Republican caucus, may cause the loss of Republican voters. These voters see Cheney as something the former president and his sycophants are not – a truth teller.

In a Newsweek opinion article called “If Republicans Purge Liz Cheney, They’re Purging Many of Us Voters Along With Her” by Jonathan Frank, he predicts the firing of Cheney will be harmful to the party. Here a re few paragraphs:

Republican House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy said “‘I’ve had it… I’ve lost confidence.’ …McCarthy saved these words for Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), a dutiful, third-term Congresswoman and mother of five who, as Chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, is the lone female in House Republican leadership.

Cheney is a stalwart conservative who voted with President Trump 93 percent of the time, earns an A+ rating from the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, and is ranked by GovTrack as “most politically right” compared to other members of House Republican leadership. But McCarthy and a chorus of House Republican cannot be bothered with such facts.

Cheney committed the cardinal sin of holding President Trump accountable for the violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, a position that McCarthy briefly held himself, before changing course in fearful obedience to the former President.

In January, Cheney joined nine other House Republicans in voting to impeach Trump for his role in the January 6th attack, a move she called a ‘vote of conscience.’ Lest voters think this move reveals Cheney as some sort of secret moderate, her record shows she has continued to vote with House Republicans 95 percent of the time this year.

Still, some House Republicans remain set on purging the lawmaker from her leadership post in the middle of the year, even as they rail against ‘the extreme left’s cancel culture’ and stress ‘party unity’ without the slightest hint of self-awareness. Punchbowl News rightly describes it as ‘unlike anything in modern House GOP internal politics.’

Their preferred pick to succeed Cheney: Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), a Congresswoman whose recent unyielding devotion to Trump belies a spotty conservative record.

Stefanik earns a failing 43 percent lifetime rating from the American Conservative Union and a similarly lackluster 48 percent lifetime score from Heritage Action for America, compared to Cheney’s scores of 78 and 80 percent respectively. Stefanik also voted against the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Trump’s signature legislative accomplishment, while Cheney helped secure its passage.

But Stefanik redeemed herself with Trump in late 2019 when she helped lead the former President’s defense in his first impeachment trial. Trump tweeted approvingly that ‘a new Republican star is born.’ With that, the Harvard grad and former George W. Bush administration aide’s transition from pragmatic Republican institutionalist to populist MAGA adherent was complete.

A Republican Party that does not have room for a principled conservative like Liz Cheney does not have room for many of us. In scheming to overthrow her, House Republicans are sending a clear message that support for the former President’s policies is not enough. Meeting the new and ever-changing definition of a true Republican requires one to accept and parrot Trump’s every claim, the truth and the rule of law notwithstanding.”

Or, as conservative pundit David Brooks said on PBS Newshour Friday night, “To be a Republican leader means you have to lie.”

If Republicans Purge Liz Cheney, They’re Purging Many of Us Voters Along With Her | Opinion (msn.com)

Loneliness defines the fight against disinformation in one’s tribe

In an article by Jeremy Peters of The New York Times called “One Republican’s Lonely Fight Against a Flood of Disinformation,” it is very lonely in the world of truth seekers in the GOP. Former Republican Congressman Denver Riggleman openly condemned the conspiracy parrots that had taken over his party led by the deceitful former president and it cost him is job. He was one of the seventeen Republicans who voted to impeach or convict the former president on his seditious incitement of an insurrection.

And, almost all of those Republicans have been censured by the so-called state leadership of the Republican party. That is a sad statement in and of itself. The folks who risk much to call out those who risk so little are the ones being called on the carpet. As two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Nicholas Kristof noted in defining the contrast in the retirement of Senator Rob Portman and the rise of Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, “When a party loses a statesman and gains a kook, that’s a bad omen.”

Here is the opening paragraph from the attached article:

“It was Oct. 2, on the floor of the House of Representatives, and he rose as one of only two Republicans in the chamber to speak in favor of a resolution denouncing QAnon. Mr. Riggleman, a freshman congressman from Virginia, had his own personal experiences with fringe ideas, both as a target of them and as a curious observer of the power they hold over true believers. He saw a dangerous movement becoming more intertwined with his party, and worried that it was only growing thanks to words of encouragement from President Donald J. Trump.”

There is not more that needs to be said. The fact the former president was not only parroting, but promoting these lies from conspiracy sites is telling as he is not known for being very truthful. Frankly, I expect this kind of behavior from the former president. What bothers me most is his sycophants who push these lies forward.

One Republican’s Lonely Fight Against a Flood of Disinformation (msn.com)

Being caught lying used to be embarrassing

Few people outside of Arizona may know the name of Republican Senator Jon Kyl. He uttered one of my favorite lines when he was caught in a lie that reveals so much. After wrongfully saying that 90% of Planned Parenthood’s activities were abortions (it is actually 3%), he said the following when questioned.

Per the HuffPost, “so why did Kyl say 90 percent? CNN got a hold of him and relayed his response: apparently it was ‘not intended to be a factual statement‘ and was supposed to merely illustrate that Planned Parenthood subsidizes abortions.” In essence, he is saying it is your fault for believing what he said.

This emboldened quote from the Senator is his legacy with me. When I think of Kyl, I think of his being untruthful. Yet, it did not bother him to lie. It was just modus operandi. I expect politicians to embellish and even lie, but I want them to at least be chagrin when they are confronted with proof they are lying. And, it is not just one party.

When I think of the seditious former president, it is hard to only think of his untruthfulness, but that is at the heart of who he is. He also bullies and denigrates people and throws them under the bus if they dare criticize him. But, he is a notorious and well-documented untruthful person. But, it does not seem to matter, as he has convinced his followers that everyone else is lying or just doesn’t like him, which is a toddler’s argument.

Because we live in a post-truth society, people who are untruthful can get away with an awful lot. That has been the seditious former president’s one great talent – muddy up all waters to make everyone look bad, so he is OK by comparison. And, his sycophants cover for him. They are being Kyl-like in their support and lack of shame.

His followers do not want to hear the truth. Then, they would have to consider if it is possibly true. If a MAGA follower was a good friend, you could ask if I knew you husband routinely lied to you, had cheated on you twice, once over eight months, who grabbed women by their private parts and then bragged on it, who had a person go around to people he affronted and pay them for their silence, and then berated and bullied anyone who dared criticize him, would you stay married to such a man? The person I just described is the former president.

Lies do matter. The former president’s legacy long before he was ever president would include the words bully, egomaniacal, and sexual misconduct, but make no mistake, the first word would be untruthful. Taking the former president at his word is a fool’s errand.

Republican Party ‘engulfed in lies and fear’ per another former Republican legislator

In an article this weekend called “Former GOP lawmaker: Republican Party ‘engulfed in lies and fear'” by Jonathan Easley of The Hill, yet another former lawmaker is sharing his concerns about how far his party has fallen. Here are a few paragraphs from the article, plus a link below.

“Former Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.) argued in a pre-taped interview that ran Friday that the Republican Party has lost its way and become ‘engulfed in lies in fear.‘

Curbelo and former Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) teamed up as part of the nonpartisan debate series IntelligenceSquared U.S. to argue that many within the GOP are knowingly pushing a lie that the election was stolen out of fear of retaliation from former President Trump.

In his opening remarks, Curbelo said that by embracing former President Trump’s election claims, which preceded the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the GOP had lost its credibility and damaged democracy.

‘Here we only have two [political parties] and in order for one to be able to hold the other accountable, it has to be viable. It has to have credibility. With a majority of the voters in the country, it has to be a reasonable choice for most people,’ Curbelo said. ‘And the problem we have today in our democracy is that the Republican Party is losing that position. Why? Because it has lost its way. Because it’s a party engulfed in lies and in fear.’

Curbelo, a moderate conservative, lost his South Florida swing district in 2018 by only about 4,000 votes in what was a big year for Democrats. He has emerged as a vocal critic of Trump and the direction of the GOP.

In the Intelligence Squared debate, he argued that many members of Congress know Trump’s election claims are false but that they lack the courage to stand up to him, knowing that it could cost them their seats.”

Let’s be clear. Fear has long been a tool of the untruthful and bullying former president. He even bragged to NBC’s Lestor Holt in an interview that is his modus operandi. That even led two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Bob Woodward to entitle his book on the Trump White House “Fear,” based on 750 hours of interviews. But, lying is also a tool of the former president as he is well-documented from multiple sources and data points as routinely untruthful.

So, the fact the former president lied about rampant election fraud is not a surprise. If he is talking or tweeting, he is most likely lying. Or, as Thomas Wells, an attorney said about him in 2016, “Donald Trump lies every day even about things of no consequence.

What bothers me more is Republican legislators – Gaetz, Gohmert, McCarthy, Scalise, Jordan, Nunes, McConnell, Hawley, Cruz, Graham et all lying for this untruthful person. Too many continue to believe what Attorney General William Barr called “bulls**t” about the former president’s toddler-like election fraud claims.

To give the former president’s claims the appropriate reporting, use your best four year old voice and say “I didn’t lose. I won by a lot. It was stolen from me.” That is the veracity of the petulant and seditious former president’s claims. As his niece Mary said, her uncle will burn it all down to avoid losing. It should be noted that seven people are dead because of an insurrection he caused.

Former GOP lawmaker: Republican Party ‘engulfed in lies and fear’ (msn.com)

A disgusting lack of leadership

The following are the views of a former Republican and now Independent voter. I did not vote for the former president either time and remain puzzled why people would vote for such a well-documented untruthful, egomaniacal bully.

On Friday, I read that Senator Mitch McConnell would support the seditious former president if he were the 2024 presidential nominee. Note, this is after McConnell denounced the former president for his role in the insurrection against a branch of government, which of course, put McConnell and his colleagues in danger. And, unsurprisingly, Mr. McConnell chose not to vote to convict the former president before he admitted said person was guilty.

This is a disgusting lack of leadership in a country that needs this party to help offer some form leadership. But, as of this writing, people who voted as leaders to impeach or convict the seditious former president, have been vilified, censured and threatened. Yet, these seventeen folks knew this going in and voted to impeach or convict anyway. That is leadership. What Messers. McConnell, Graham, Hawley, Paul, Cruz, McCarthy, Scalise, Gaetz, Gohmert, et al have done is cowardice and sycophancy to someone who almost caused their deaths.

Reading McConnell’s statement in support of a traitor is seditious in its own right, in my view. This former president planned and staged a big lie about rampant election fraud. And, too many Republican so-called leaders were silent. The former president set the stage for the insurrection through his lies, that even his Attorney General labeled as “bulls**t” before he was fired for so saying. Republican election officials and judges even pushed back on the former president’s lies, yet they also got death threats.

Our country needs two viable political parties or more. Yet, we need the people in leadership positions in these parties to be leaders and not sycophants. The seditious former president is the most corrupt and deceitful president in my lifetime including Richard Nixon. I have been pleading with Republican Senators for three years asking what will it take to hold this former president accountable. Apparently, even traitorism does not qualify.

The former president was right when he said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and it would not matter. What he did not say is he would hand the gun to McConnell and blame him. Our country deserves better than this.

Exodus of Republicans

In an article yesterday by Jason Lange and Andy Sullivan of Reuters called “Analysis: Exodus of Republican voters tired of Trump could push party further right,” the departures away from the now Trump party are growing. Here are a few paragraphs, with a link to the article below.

“A surge of Republicans quitting the party to renounce Donald Trump after the deadly Capitol riot could hurt moderates in next year’s primaries, adding a capstone to Trump’s legacy as president: A potentially lasting rightward push on the party.

More than 68,000 Republicans have left the party in recent weeks in Florida, Pennsylvania and North Carolina, crucial states for Democrats’ hopes of keeping control of Congress in the mid-term elections in 2022, state voter data shows. That’s about three times the roughly 23,000 Democrats who left their party in the same states over the same time period.

Compared to the Republicans who stayed put, those who fled were more concentrated in the left-leaning counties around big cities, which political analysts said suggested moderate Republicans could be leading the defections.

If the exodus is sustained, it will be to the advantage of candidates in the Republican Party’s nomination contests who espouse views that play well with its Trump-supporting base but not with a broader electorate.

That could make it harder for Republican candidates to beat Democrats in November, said Morris Fiorina, a political scientist at Stanford University.

‘If these voters are leaving the party permanently, it’s really bad news for Republicans, Fiorina said.

Most of the defectors switched to having no party affiliation or joined a minor political party, though many registered as Democrats, according to publicly available voter registration data that is regularly updated by states….

Diana Hepner, 76, a retired attorney in Florida’s Nassau County near Jacksonville, described herself as a fiscal conservative who was turned off by Trump’s rhetoric.

‘I hung in there with the Republican Party thinking we could get past the elements Trump brought,’ she said. ‘Jan. 6 was the straw that broke the camel’s back.’

Hepner, who joined the Democratic Party, hopes she can be a centrist influence on its nomination contests.“

The above should be a clarion call to those who now call the Trump party home. Yet, these calls and others made by Republicans pushing back on the seditious former president, have been largely written off by the MAGA base. At some point, there must be reckoning.

While I firmly believe the former president’s political career is over, his influence will remain. As long as the party base buys into the conspiracy and lies he (and his sycophants) peddles, he will have a voice. As I have noted before, the best thing to do about the former president is to ignore him.

Analysis: Exodus of Republican voters tired of Trump could push party further right (msn.com)

Former ambassador under Trump says the former president has no future in the GOP

Nikki Haley, the former United Nations ambassador appointed by the former president, rebukes her former boss in a very public manner. To me, the number of folks who are realizing it is more than OK to call out the deceitful former president is starting to pick up steam, irrespective of what happens in the impeachment trial.

Here are a few paragraphs from a piece called “Nikki Haley criticizes Trump and says he has no future in the GOP” by Veronica Stracqualursi of CNN. The full article can be linked to below.

“Former US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley directly criticized former President Donald Trump for his involvement stoking the US Capitol riot in a new interview, a notable condemnation from someone who is widely viewed as harboring presidential hopes in a party that is still in thrall to Trump.

‘We need to acknowledge he let us down,’ she told Politico magazine in an interview published Friday. ‘He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again.’

Haley has often attempted to walk a fine line between allying herself with Trump — who remains a hugely popular figure within the party — while distancing herself enough to appeal to his Republican and moderate critics. She notably left his administration in 2018 on good terms with Trump, a contrast to many other officials who have publicly fallen out with their former boss.

In the Politico piece, Haley expressed anger over Trump’s treatment of former Vice President Mike Pence on January 6 and said she hasn’t spoken with Trump since then. Trump attacked Pence on Twitter that day for doing his duty of presiding over Congress’ counting of the Electoral College votes, as the mob of supporters broke into the Capitol hoping to stop the certification, some of whom chanted death threats against Pence.

‘When I tell you I’m angry, it’s an understatement,’ Haley told Politico. ‘Mike has been nothing but loyal to that man. He’s been nothing but a good friend of that man. … I am so disappointed in the fact that [despite] the loyalty and friendship he had with Mike Pence, that he would do that to him. Like, I’m disgusted by it.'”

To me, these words are relevant, but tardy. I feel there has been a calculation weighing the efficacy of finally condemning the former president. I think it follows on the courage of folks like Representatives.Liz Cheney, Adam KInzinger and the other eight Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, as well as Senators like Ben Sasse, Mitt Romney and a few others who voted to hear the impeachment trial.

Nonetheless, what Haley is saying is powerful. It also reveals we are beyond the tipping point on the former president. It is OK to speak the truth and call him on the carpet for his deceit and sedition. Stick a fork in him, he is done.

Nikki Haley criticizes Trump and says he has no future in the GOP (msn.com)

Quite simply the attack on the Capitol building would not have happened if Trump were not president

Sometimes, the simplest comment can say so much. Yesterday, on the talk show “The View,” attorney Sunny Hostin said the above title. The attack on the Capitol building on January 6 would not have happened had the president not been Donald J. Trump. And, now seven people are dead and others might have been, except for the bravery of those to escort legislators out of harm’s way.

Two major comments needs to be stated clearly. First, the argument that Republican Senators are using to prevent a vote from occurring that the trial is unconstitutional does not hold water. In essence, it says a president can commit the most vile crime against the country as long as he does it right before he or she leaves office.

Second, the fact is the former president did commit a vile act two weeks before leaving office, staging and inciting an insurrection on another branch of government. Words matter. Lies matter. The former president’s egomaniacal nature prevents him from accepting he lost the election. He staged this action for many months before the election, so what he did following it was predictable and predicted.

What happened was shameful for our country. What happened could have been even worse. And, what happened was provoked and incited by the enfant terrible acting former president. In your best toddler’s voice, say out loud the words of the president. “I didn’t lose. I won by a lot. It was stolen from me.”

The former president needs to be convicted because he is guilty as charged. This would not have happened if he was not in the equation. This would not have happened if the former president was not a big baby who cannot take losing. Seven people are dead because of Trump. His VP Mike Pence could have been. The Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi could have been. And, anyone in business attire could have been.

A final thought for Republican Senators is a vote to acquit does not serve the former Republican, now Trump party well. It puts those Senators and the Trump party on the wrong side of history. The vote to acquit is not defensible as Senator Rand Paul found out when Fox News host Chris Wallace grilled him on it.

There is a truism I have observed over the years about the former president. If you fly to close to Donald Trump, you will get burned.