A) We did read it in the news. And then it got swamped by all the other "news" coming out of the advance copies of Peril.* Blame the media, if you must.“A Trump lawyer wrote an instruction manual for a coup. Why haven’t you seen it on the news?” @Sulliview on the Eastman memo, which is detailed in PERIL.
— Robert Costa (@costareports) September 30, 2021
Key thing our reporting shows: it was not just a memo. Eastman, Trump in Oval Jan. 4 w/ VP. https://t.co/QkhwLgtGTg
B) Almost every legal expert who read it agreed the Eastman memo had the same credibility as Sidney Powell's claim that Justice Alito was just waiting to give the election to Trump, and would have done it, too! If not for Pelosi and those meddling kids...er, Representatives and Senators who returned to the joint session after the attack on the Capitol.
Yeah, that wasn't going to happen, either. For one thing, Alito could have enjoined the proceedings whether they were active or suspended. For another, that was simply never going to happen. Alito referred the suit to the full court; they all agreed it was a nothingburger. Pretty much like Eastman's memo. The risk of the Supremes intervening? Zero.
Once again: while I'm not arguing we can just relax because the courts are here to protect us, I am arguing that the Chicken Littles who insist the sky is falling always leave out how no effort to stop, overturn, reverse, "decertify," or otherwise overturn the results of the Presidential election of 2020, ever got any traction in the legal system, where such efforts would have to turn. The Eastman memo even presumed a concordance with Congressional Republicans that never so much as made an appearance (voting against certification of electoral votes you know is an empty gesture of a vote is a far cry from actually provoking a Constitutional crisis with all the authority at your command). Had the GOP even tried to implement the "strategy," Pelosi could have simply cancelled the joint session, and refused to reconvene until 12:01 on January 20th, when Trump was no longer President as a matter of law. The Congress then could have certified Biden, and the whole matter would be no more than a footnote in American Presidential history.
We have a three-part system, and while one part was under the ostensible control of a toddler with a shotgun with, fortunately, no idea even after 4 years of how government works, the other part, Congress, was never going to go along with his insanity, and the third-part, the courts, tossed everything he tried into their shredders.
Frankly, we were in greater constitutional peril when Lincoln suspended habeas corpus.
*Which everybody and his dog "obtained a copy" of because the publisher supplied them, not because the journalists are such good buddies with bookstore buyers. Can't buy free publicity unless you at least send the book around to people who will write/talk about it in the media.
No comments:
Post a Comment