Capitol Hill Blue Forums Capitol Hill Blue Opinions CHB Columnists So many felons, enablers and traitors in need of indictment and punishment

Trump is not the only felon: So are members of his GOP gang

Let's call them what they are: Co-conspirators, enablers and traitors to America.


GOP House Speaker Kevin McCarthy: Just one of the enablers and traitors in Congress

By DOUG THOMPSON
April 3, 2023

I don’t know which is more damning and worse: The sad, pathetic fact that the disgraced criminal Donald Trump is running, again, for president or the cabal of co-conspirators in the rabid right-wing of the Republican Party that is abandoning any pretense of morality, love of country or patriotism to support his continued criminal actions.

The facts say any Republicans who continue to claim Trump lost the 2020 election because it was stolen through fraud are committing treason against the nation they swore an oath to support and protect.

The list of these traitors is long: the corrupt Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, is valueless co-conspirator Marjorie Taylor Greene, unqualified committee chairmen like Jim Jordan, and too many others.

Some who claim knowledge of what is happening within the several other grand juries that have not yet finished their investigations of the Trump cult say he will not be the only one indicted. Let’s hope and pray they are right.

In more than a half-century of work either covering our failing government or working within it as a political operative — a failure of judgment on my part — I have seen too many actions with Congress and the White House that seriously threatens our democracy.

In so many ways, the assassination of president John F Kennedy in 1963, started the wave of threats that threatened democracy and America: The attempts during the Watergate scandal that brought the resignation of disgraced president Richard Nixon. the just below-the-surface racism that bubbled up from the surface after the election of Barack Obama, the 9/11 attacks by terrorists who brought down the ‘World Trade Center and damaged the Pentagon head a growing list of events that threatened our way of life

Georga W. Bush lied outright with claims of non-existent weapons of mass destruction to fortify his invasion of that country in what we later learned was his desire to “punish” a claimed plan to kill his father during his presidency.

The rise of rabid right-wing extremism injected outright idiots like Sarah Palen into our presidential races when GOP strategic consultant Steve Schmidt felt she would be a “needed celebrity candidate” for the vice president to help John McCain in the race he lost, primarily because of her stupidity.

As we have reported here before, the Republicans took a hard-right turn towards extremism after gaining control of Congress in 1994 and electing self-righteous demagogue Newt Gingrich as speaker. Gingrich used affairs with mistresses to dump two wives, let another man’s wife give him a blowjob while waiting for his kids to finish a softball game, and talked Trump, during his one-term presidential disaster, into appointing her ambassador to the Vatican.

Gingrich was forced from the speaker’s office and resigned his Congressional seat after the House ethics committee found him profiting from a book deal in violations of the rules, the same kind of felonious crap that defined the failed term of Trump.

Former prosecutor and now political pundit, Glenn Kirshner runs a podcast called “Justice Matters” and his topics of late, focus on Trump’s many criminal actions.

“Keeping track of Trump’s many criminal investigations and prosecutions are doing to keep us working overtime,” he said in a recent podcast, shown below. “I for one, do not have any problem putting in the extra hours.”




Neither do we, Glenn.

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"The facts say any Republicans who continue to claim Trump lost the 2020 election because it was stolen through fraud are committing treason against the nation they swore an oath to support and protect.

The list of these traitors is long: the corrupt Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, is valueless co-conspirator Marjorie Taylor Greene, unqualified committee chairmen like Jim Jordan, and too many others."

I couldn't agree more.

I have watched with growing alarm the devolution of the "Grand Old Party" into a party of scofflaws and ne'er-do-wells. I was one who cheered on Gerald Ford's pardon of Nixon, at the time believing that it was "right thing to do" to heal the country. I now believe I was so very wrong.

Because Nixon never faced prosecution - or even impeachment - he set the pattern of impunity that grew within the GOP and metastasized into Donald Trump and MAGA. That feeling of impunity animated the Iran-Contra scandal less than a decade later, and justified Bush Sr.'s pardon of the co-conspirators (and witnesses) at the behest of then-Attorney General, Bill Barr.

Barr's behavior as AG under Trump was no different and he actively obstructed justice in numerous ways. (Yes, I think he is a duplicitous traitor who should be prosecuted.)

"On June 16, 1992, Weinberger was indicted on two counts of perjury and one count of obstruction of justice. Bush pardoned him before his trial. Robert McFarlane, Reagan’s national security adviser, was convicted of withholding evidence, but after a plea bargain he faced two years of probation before Bush’s pardon came though.

Bush also pardoned Elliott Abrams, the assistant secretary of state, who was convicted of withholding evidence and received two years’ probation; Duane Clarridge, a former CIA senior official, who had been indicted on seven counts of perjury and false statements; Clair George, chief of CIA covert operations, who had been convicted on two charges of perjury and had yet to be sentenced; and Alan Fiers, chief of the CIA’s Central American Task Force, who had been convicted of withholding evidence and sentenced to one year’s probation.

During Bush’s 1988 presidential campaign, he denied any knowledge of the Iran–Contra affair, asserting that as Reagan’s vice president he was “out of the loop.” Although in his diaries Bush wrote he was “one of the few people that knew fully the details,” he refused to discuss it." Bush Pardons Iran-Contra Felons, Dec. 24, 1992 (Politico) As Thom Hartmann opined, Bill Barr Is The Master Of Covering Up Political Scandals

Trump expects similar treatment, and his sycophants, in Congress and elsewhere, are willing to lobby for it.

Justice needs to be served.

They never should have been sworn in.

Besides the 14th Amendment, there is a federal statute that says pretty much the same thing: Anybody who takes an oath to defend the constitution and then takes part in an insurrection, or even just "gives aid or comfort" to insurrectionists" is disqualified from holding any elected office for life. All those congressmen pictured above certainly gave aid or comfort, or actually took part in the insurrection.

So it's not like it just can be ignored. Trump claiming he would pardon all the insurrectionists if elected IS giving aid or comfort. Congressmen claiming insurrectionists should be freed IS giving aid or comfort. They claim it is political persecution, but "criminal" trumps "political", as many convicted politicians have discovered.

Sadly, I don't think that the majority of the American public cares that 147 Republicans violated their oath of office and the 14th Amendment. I am not among those in the majority. I think all 147 should be prosecuted.

I don't think it matters that many people don't care. Crime is still crime, and prosecutors are obligated to prosecute if they think they can get a conviction.

I think all but a handful of these people have moved on to the Navarro claim that there was not ballot fraud with the tabulators but voting regulation irregularities i.e. non-legislative bodies were writing and implementing regulations without legislative approval. I have to laugh at this claim because in the one case where it made it to court, the opinion of the court was litigants had over a year to bring suit before the election and only waited until they lost the election to mention it. Case was thrown out. The reality is, most if not all, legislatures have given local entities the right to make new voting regulations without their consent and they have done so for many years.

Who these 147 represent are the beliefs of THE BASE. They are acutely aware in order to remain in power they will have to reflect those beliefs. It is a sad state of affairs when a unique voting block has so much power they can extort the will of politicians to do what the delusional block believes.

I think there is a difference between simply objecting to certification for legitimate reason versus what was done on J6, which was to actively overthrow an election. I don't think all 147 were implicated in the conspiracy. I do believe some of these folks are simply extremely delusional. Think Rep's Boebert, Greene, or Gohmert. People like Rep Scott and Gaetz are nefarious and not necessarily delusional. I think the delusional folks would have voted not to certify regardless of state of a conspiracy. Without a conspiracy to obfuscate their motivation, I don't know if Rep like Scott or Gaetz would vote against certification.

Historically, the "I'm a moron" defense has not done very well in court. Juries are perfectly happy to send the morons off to prison along with the smart criminals.

Yes ... ignorance of the law and just plain ignorance are not justifications for committing crimes.

However .... delusional folks suffer a mental disorder ... it does not exonerate them and they can assist in their defense but they would never (as long as they remained in a state of delusion) understand why they are guilty vis a vis an ignorant person who can be educated to the facts and with a modicum of intelligence figure out why they committed a crime.

political paranoia is real and presents as political delusions