Democrats should show riot footage on the floor of the House

It is incredible that Republicans are standing there defending Trump in the chamber that was trashed in his name.

The scene of the crowd breaking into the door at the front of the Capitol is Trump’s personal “Nixon tapes.”  All that he incited is right there in the footage over and over again.  You can see the Trump terrorists dragging one of the Capitol policemen out of the door and down the steps.  You can see one guy beating on him with a flagstaff holding an American flag.  There is footage from a few moments later where they are beating on the inner door protected by helmeted Capitol tactical cops.  You can see the head of one of the policemen grabbed and dragged through a narrow opening.  You can see them press on the door, crushing his neck.  His face is showing great pain, and there is sound of him screaming.

It’s all there.  Chris Hayes on MSNBC went through about 30 minutes of footage the other night showing many of the violent clashes.  You can see how organized Trump’s terrorist insurgents are.  You can see there was a plan to violently take the Capitol building, and that plan was carried out.  “It will be wild” Trump assured his 88 million Twitter followers on December 19, urging them to come to the Capitol on January 6 and help stop the certification of electoral ballots.

It was wild all right, and it was the crime of sedition.  It was the crime of interfering with the lawful functioning of the government.  It was the crime of invading a government building and destroying government property.  All of these crimes are caught on tape, and Trump’s incitement to riot amounts to an impeachable offense.

In the end with Richard Nixon, one of his impeachable offenses was proven on a White House tape (which he recorded) saying “We can do that” when someone mentioned paying off the Watergate burglars.  That was the so-called “smoking gun.”  A single sentence conspiring to commit the crime of obstruction of justice.

The FBI now has hours of digital images of the crimes committed by Trump’s co-conspirators as they assaulted and looted the United States Capitol.  These digital images are Trump’s “tapes.”

Swalwell and Pelosi and Nadler should be putting these images in front of the American people – not to mention in front of their Republican counterparts – right there on the floor of the House of Representatives.  One of them should leave the podium and walk up to the doors that were broken through by Trump’s terrorists and point out the damage.  They should point to the galleries where some of them cowered wearing gas masks when the attack was underway.  They should be physically proving their case of impeachment against Trump. 

One of the Democrats should step forward and point to the Speaker’s platform that was defiled by one of Trump’s terrorists who sat in Nancy Pelosi’s chair in the chamber of the House with a Trump flag around his shoulders.

The name of the man Republicans are defending, Donald Trump, was right there on the flag the terrorist worn in the chamber of the House of Representatives.  Show that photograph on the floor of the House.  Shove Jordan’s and Gohmert’s faces in it.  Make them watch on a great big flat screen as one of their almighty “blue lives” is dragged from the door of the Capitol and beaten with the American flag.  Make them watch it over and over and over.  Make them acknowledge the damage done to the House chamber in which they are holding their debate today. 

Make them answer a question on the floor of the Congress:  you are standing there and defending the man who incited this?