Unlike most of America, I have been following with great interest, the hearings being televised about the events that led up to the violent insurrection on January 6, 2021. Like I did when I was a much younger man with the Watergate hearings, I am interested in finding out what really happened and who was involved.
There seems to be three different camps in this country regarding this whole event. First, there are the die hard Trumper's who keep insisting that there is nothing to see here and that this is another in a long list of witch hunts to smear the wonderful reign of the 45th President.
Even though video clearly shows Trump supporters, white supremacists, and other ne 'r do wells beating Capitol police, breaking into the Capitol, and roaming the halls looking for politicians that they can hang, they insist it was all just like a third grade class field trip.
The second group is the polar opposite. These are staunch Trump haters who believe that not only did he have a major role in the attempted overthrow of democracy, but it is more likely than not that he is the Zodiac killer, the real Unabomber, and Satan.
If he cured cancer they would be shouting about how he did this for his own personal gain and that we should all be very, very, suspect. They don't need to see any testimony from this committee because they have already tried and convicted Trump.
Finally, the third group of Americans are too busy trying to figure out how they are going to get to work, drop off and pay for day care for Bobbie and Susie, feed them dinner, and pay their mortgage with the $7.38 they have left over after buying gas for that SUV they needed to buy two years ago.
The $200 a month they had budgeted for fun money has now turned into almost -$300 a month they are short paying their bills because of inflation. In addition, they have to get their children into therapy since they are afraid to go to school because they are certain they will be shot there. Mom and dad are worried too and that has increased their liquor bill substantially.
Polls show that this split is real as each group represents about 30% of the American public when asked where they stand. Obviously the first two groups will never be swayed, no matter what the actual facts show. The third group might be swayed, but they have too many other things on their hands to worry about all this noise.
So who is the target audience for these televised hearings then?
One man. Merrick Garland the Attorney General. Congress is hoping that he can be persuaded by an avalanche of information to open an investigation into the former President and once and for all end this clowns political career. The Democrats want this for obvious reasons. The Republicans also want this because they are too spineless to stand up to this bully and tell him to just go away.
Nowhere is anyone trying to defend democracy in all this. Sure they give it lip service but where are the actual facts to show that destroying our country was the actual goal here? There is tons of talk around it but so far there has been nothing shown to indicate that other than an egomaniac trying to hang onto power was anything subversive involved.
Proving that the former idiot in chief was nuts is a pretty low bar. Only the Kool-ade sippers think he was sane. Proving that he did everything he could think of and then some to stay in office is another low threshold to overcome. That is pretty obvious to everyone.
What we need is to find out how they, whomever they ultimately turn out to be, were able to get so close to destroying everything we hold dear as a country. Free and fair elections and the simple and sane transfer of power after those elections. They almost made their dream come true. We need to make sure nobody ever again has that chance of success.