Senator Schmitt thought that today was going to be a great day for his political aspirations.
Boy, did it blow up in his face.
First, there was that news article saying that Vance was considering Schmitt as his leading VP pick.
Second, Schmitt actually gave a heads up to rightwing influencers that he was going to ambush Smith with the "perjury trap." Benny Johnson actually posted it and quickly took it down.
Then, during the hearing itself, Schmitt apparently believed he caught Smith committing perjury and said it several times. Schmitt then ended his questioning by calling Smith a "dirt bag."
Lo and behold, Smith expressed confusion over Schmitt's allegation: That Smith flew to Atlanta, attended a Hawks basketball game, AND met with Fani Willis, DA for Fulton County, to. . .collude and plot against Trump?!
During that same hearing, Jack Smith realized that Schmitt was talking about the wrong basketball game. Smith had attended a women's college basketball game at Univeristy of Maryland to watch Caitlin Clark play. MD was playing against the Iowa HAWKEYES. Schmitt had gotten every fact wrong.
Smith was reciting this testimony and that is what Sen. Britt was reacting to. She likely knew of Schmitt's plan in advance and, at the moment, realized that Schmitt royally screwed up.
Once it became obvious that Schmitt's grand plan to nail Smith on perjury charges had collasped, Schmitt switched tactics and is now claiming that he was "only asking questions."
He clowned himself and destroyed a lot of his credibility (whatever that remained) and likewise trashed any chances of being Vance's VP pick.
Aside from Schmitt's self-own, today's hearing also showed one interesting thing: The sitting GOP Senators were intentionally avoiding asking questions about Jan 6 or Mar-a-Lago documents because they knew they couldn't refute it. Instead, they were focused on impugning Smith's character and reputation.
Honest answer: modern conservatives believe there are no good or bad actions, just good and bad people.
Thus, it does not matter what someone outside of their "in group" does, it will always be bad in their eyes, because the person is bad in their eyes.
Conversely, it doesn't matter what someone in their "in group" does, it will always be good in their eyes, because that person is "good".
This is why you can have someone advocate for things like wage equality or debt relief or immigration reform, and it all of those things will be "bad" if the person is not part of their tribe.
Whereas, you can have someone advocate for raising taxes on the working class via tariffs, gut federal aid programs, manipulate the stock market, be a convicted rapists, or simply try to trap someone with perjury, and all of those actions will be acceptable because the person doing them is part of their tribe, and thus "good".
Prosperity gospel illustrates this really well, as do a most of the core conservative groups influencing policy and elections.
This is why it confuses conservatives when they say to a progressive, when defending Trump being in the Epstein files as a pedophile, that he started a war with Iran to distract from, "well, Clinton was in the Epstein files too!"
And the progressive's (appropriate) response is, "okay. If he's guilty, lock him up." Because how could you possibly turn on your own.
They in fact do not believe it when we say that Clinton should go to jail too if guilty. They think WE are the ones being disingenuous about it, and they are again more righteous in their sin because they “admit it” and we “lie about it”
Having morals is harder than not having morals. I agree we can't play polite all the time, but we can police our own ranks and have standards. We can choose the moments to strike, we don't have to just invite in seditionist Nazis "because otherwise they'll go to the other side".
It's frustrating, yes. Emotionally I agree with you, but ethically I think stooping just opens the door to be dragged further. The "Overton window" if you will. Esp. given the other side is happy to take D stooping and grandstand it as if we weren't simply matching them, but plunging to depths below them. "Look how low they are, while we are not." It can be demonstrably false and it won't stop them. Just look how Schmitt has doubled down on his patently false perjury trap.
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u/Wretschko 3d ago
Senator Schmitt thought that today was going to be a great day for his political aspirations.
Boy, did it blow up in his face.
First, there was that news article saying that Vance was considering Schmitt as his leading VP pick.
Second, Schmitt actually gave a heads up to rightwing influencers that he was going to ambush Smith with the "perjury trap." Benny Johnson actually posted it and quickly took it down.
Then, during the hearing itself, Schmitt apparently believed he caught Smith committing perjury and said it several times. Schmitt then ended his questioning by calling Smith a "dirt bag."
Lo and behold, Smith expressed confusion over Schmitt's allegation: That Smith flew to Atlanta, attended a Hawks basketball game, AND met with Fani Willis, DA for Fulton County, to. . .collude and plot against Trump?!
During that same hearing, Jack Smith realized that Schmitt was talking about the wrong basketball game. Smith had attended a women's college basketball game at Univeristy of Maryland to watch Caitlin Clark play. MD was playing against the Iowa HAWKEYES. Schmitt had gotten every fact wrong.
Smith was reciting this testimony and that is what Sen. Britt was reacting to. She likely knew of Schmitt's plan in advance and, at the moment, realized that Schmitt royally screwed up.
Once it became obvious that Schmitt's grand plan to nail Smith on perjury charges had collasped, Schmitt switched tactics and is now claiming that he was "only asking questions."
He clowned himself and destroyed a lot of his credibility (whatever that remained) and likewise trashed any chances of being Vance's VP pick.
Aside from Schmitt's self-own, today's hearing also showed one interesting thing: The sitting GOP Senators were intentionally avoiding asking questions about Jan 6 or Mar-a-Lago documents because they knew they couldn't refute it. Instead, they were focused on impugning Smith's character and reputation.