Excerpts from Heather Cox Richardson (Monday, February 15, 2021)

According to a new Quinnipiac poll, 75% of Republicans want Trump to continue to lead the party. But 21% don’t, and between 24% and 28% blame him for the January 6 riot.

The Senate trial gave powerful proof of just how undemocratic the Senate has become. Voting rights journalist Ari Berman noted that the “57 senators who voted to convict Trump represent 76.7 MILLION more Americans than 43 senators who voted to acquit.” *

Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne noted that the adherence of all but seven senators to Trump “should end the absurd talk that there is a burden on President Biden to achieve a bipartisan nirvana in Washington. If most Republicans can’t even admit that what Trump did is worthy of impeachment, how can anyone imagine that they would be willing and trustworthy governing partners?”

Dionne added that the acquittal made an overwhelming case for getting rid of the filibuster, which in its current incarnation effectively means that no legislation can pass without support from 60 senators. Thanks to the 50-50 split in the Senate, getting to 60 means getting 10 Republican votes. This is impossible, Dionne says, because clearly “There are not 10 Republican Senate votes to be had on anything that really matters.”

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• For example:
  California has a larger population than the following twenty-one states COMBINED:

Iowa, Utah, Mississippi, Arkansas, Kansas, Nevada, New Mexico, Nebraska, West Virginia, Idaho, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, Montana, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alaska, Vermont, Wyoming.

The people in that group of 21 states have 42 senators representing them.

California has 2 senators representing a larger population than those 42 senators do.