History Lessons

Every supposedly "moderate" Republican—including Cassidy, Collins, Moran, Murkowski, Portman, and Young—voted to censure Warren for reading Coretta Scott King's letter, but none of them will do anything about unapologetic insurrectionists in the Senate like Cruz and Hawley. https://t.co/MYjldgYoZr

— Max Kennerly (@MaxKennerly) February 7, 2021

To refresh your memory:

When Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) read from[the 1986 letter of Coretta Scott King criticizing the civil rights record of Sen. Jeff Sessions] ate Tuesday night, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) found her in violation of Senate Rule 19 — an obscure and rarely enforced restriction barring senators from using “any form of words [to] impute” the motives of another senator during floor debate. The Republican Senate then voted to prevent Warren from speaking for the rest of the debate over Sessions’s confirmation.

Ah, but it didn't end there:

But around 10 the next morning, Sens. Tom Udall (D-NM) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) went to the floor and read King’s letter, including portions of it that directly attacked Sessions. This time, McConnell decided against using Rule 19 to cut off Udall or Brown — even though both of the Democratic senators were certainly also “imputing” Sessions’s record.

What changed since Warren’s speech was about 12 hours of relentlessly negative press and social media coverage about the decision to censure her. “It backfired badly," said Sarah Binder, a congressional scholar at the Brookings Institution. "McConnell has every incentive to get these nominees into office as quickly and quietly as possible. By trying to do it more quietly, he in fact ginned up much more attention."

It seems Professor Senator Warren made good use of...social media:

When Warren spoke on the floor of the Senate Tuesday night, only a few hundred people were tuned in to C-SPAN. There was almost nobody in the Senate chamber watching what was a non-event, as each member of the Senate Democratic caucus delivered his or her stump speech opposing Sessions. Warren herself appeared caught off guard as McConnell and Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) told her she would not be allowed to speak for the rest of the debate over Sessions’s nomination.

The ensuing backlash against McConnell’s decision turned a routine and otherwise unremarkable floor speech into a national media controversy.

After she was cut off, Warren recorded a Facebook Live video on the steps of the Capitol decrying McConnell’s decision; it got more than 3 million views. Democratic senators beat the drum of outrage, rallying to Warren’s defense....

Warren’s Facebook page gained nearly 3 million followers essentially overnight. Encouraged by celebrities, activists on social media reported calling McConnell’s office and reading King’s letter out loud. 

And that was just a letter and opposition to Sen. Sessions' nomination to be Trump's first AG.  We all remember how that tenure ended; few remember how it started.

I think I see a lesson here, on how to make sure Trump's impeachment is both remembered, and noticed immediately.  You know, McConnell's repuatation as a political genius is built on some very thin reeds, and some very unstable mud.