The insurrection at the Capitol on January 6 was incited by the many unfounded election fraud lies spread by former President Trump, his supporters and right-wing media.  The eight senators and 139 House Republicans who, shortly thereafter, objected to President-elect Joe Biden’s electoral votes from Arizona and Pennsylvania were apparently motivated by the same false narritive.  Incredibly, this meant that two-thirds of GOP House members believed that keeping Trump in office was more important than upholding our democracy. 

After the Democratic-controlled House voted to impeach Trump for inciting the attack on the Capitol and delivered the articles to the Senate, 45 of 50 GOP Senators voted to challenge the constitutionality of impeaching a former president.  In doing so, they signaled that they will likely vote to acquit Trump of these charges, no matter how much damning evidence of his guilt is presented during the upcoming Senate trial. 

Numerous congressional Republicans are claiming that an impeachment trial will further divide the nation and that Congress should just, “move on” and forget about the five people who died during the insurrection and the desecration of our most sacred government building.   What flaming hypocrites!  They didn’t move on from the deadly 2012 attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, did they?  Oh no, House Republicans and Fox News anchors spent the next four years trying to put the blame for that tragedy on former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton.

Problems with the Republican Party, however, go much deeper than hypocrisy in Washington.  It’s mind boggling what’s happening in states where Trump loyalists are in control of the GOP organization. 

Party officials in Arizona actually adopted a resolution censuring their very conservative Republican Governor Doug Ducey, former Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake and Cindy McCain, the widow of Arizona hero and former Senator, John McCain.  McCain and Flake sinned by endorsing Biden.  Ducey was rebuked because his coronavirus restrictions allegedly limited personal liberties.  This stunning move was the work of radical state party chairwoman Kelli Ward, who Trump recently endorsed for reelection. 

The Republican Party of Texas issued a statement thanking Trump for “putting America first,” and falsely stated that his defeat was due to massive fraud.  Comments from local GOP officials in Oklahoma, Nevada, Virginia and Washington state, among others, published more lies in strongly supporting the former president and totally opposing Republican politicians who challenge him. 

The Oregon GOP approved a resolution that went even further into an absurd, alternative reality.  It accused the ten Republican House members who voted to impeach Trump of “conspiring to surrender our nation to Leftist forces seeking to establish a dictatorship void of all cherished freedoms and liberties.”  It also falsely claimed there was growing evidence that the attack on the Capitol was a “false flag” operation – i.e., one perpetrated by the left to blame the right – “designed to discredit President Trump, his supporters, and all conservative Republicans.”  These Oregon party officials compared the Capitol insurrection to the February 1933 burning of the German Reichstag, which led to a Nazi dictatorship. 

Back in Washington, a staffer working for a Trump-supporting GOP congressman told a Politico reporter that “their office has received multiple calls from constituents who say the rioters didn’t inflict enough damage and that there should’ve been more people storming the Capitol.”

The big news in D.C. for Republicans, however, is newly-elected Rep. Margorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who Trump called a rising star in the party.  She’s a believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory that Democratic leaders are part of a global pedophile ring that engages in unspeakable acts against children.  One of the totally sick conspiracy theories that Greene has promoted claims that Hillary Clinton has mutilated and murdered children.  It is simply too gruesome to describe. 

In 2018 and 2019 Greene supported Facebook comments that advocated putting a bullet in Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s head and executing FBI agents who were accused of being part of the nonexistent, Trump-hating “deep state.”  And she has mocked the killing of little children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut and the murder of teenagers at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.

No problem, says House Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.  He gave Greene a seat on the House Education Committee and most House Republicans have been silent about her ultra-radical behavior.  

On the other hand, conservative Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wy.), the third most powerful Republican in the House, is being pilloried by many of her colleagues because she voted to impeach Trump. 

Recent polls indicate that 70% of Republicans believe that Biden “was not legitimately elected,” that 80% supported Trump as he left office and that 60% believe the GOP should follow Trump’s leadership going forward.  Democrats, of course, have a totally opposite opinion.

A January New York Times Article by Thomas B. Edsall entitled, Is America Ungovernable Now? presented opinions on this subject by several noted educators, including Julie Wronski, a political scientist at the University of Mississippi.  She contended that “when Americans are divided on simple facts, and live in two different realities, we are not a governable people.”

Well, I believe Wronski precisely described where Americans are today, thanks to GOP and right-wing media lies.  Still, I’m not ready to accept that America is ungovernable.  The problems President Biden inherited from Trump’s incompetent administration require bold government solutions and I’m reasonably confident that “we the people” will demand that they be legislated.

Note: Thanks to the follower(s) who posted my January 14 blog on Facebook.  It resulted in significant activity on my fromthecenter.net blog site.  I greatly appreciate followers who post my blog on Facebook or send links or copies to their email list.