Columnists

A month into the Biden-Harris administration, we've reached an inflection point: the conclusion of Donald Trump's second impeachment trial. While there were not enough Senate votes for conviction, public sentiment turned against Trump. The outcome has consequences for Biden-Harris, Trump, and the 2022 election.

The latest ABC News/Ipsos Poll (https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/abcnews-impeachment-poll ) indicated that 58 percent of respondents felt Trump should have been convicted at the trial (84 percent of Democrats, 65 percent of Independents, and 14 percent of Republicans.) 57 Senators voted for conviction, including 7 Republicans. After the trial, Republican Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell said: "Former President Trump's actions preceding the riot were a disgraceful dereliction of duty... There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their President. And their having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories, and reckless hyperbole which the defeated President kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth."

Going forward, what can we expect? -more-

The instincts that cause human beings to survive are numerous, multifaceted, and intertwined. In my life, the survival instinct that evolution gave most people, has worked both for and against me. It has also sometimes worsened my symptoms of mental illness, and yet at other times has been grounding. -more-

Resuming a project begun under the Obama administration, following a review process, President Joe Biden will seek to close the Guantánamo Bay Detention facility, opened in January 2002 to hold people suspected of ties to al-Qaida and the Taliban.

A total of 780 prisoners have passed through Guantánamo, and the 40 remaining include alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four co-defendants. About a quarter of the remaining prisoners are facing criminal charges in various terrorism cases, but most of the others have never been charged and are being held indefinitely. Guantánamo has cost U.S. taxpayers more than $6 billion despite finalizing only one conviction in nearly two decades.

Biden’s options are limited without help from Congress. In 2015, Congress passed, and Obama signed, with objections a National Defense Authorization Act—the annual bill that sets the budget for the Pentagon—that included provisions barring the transfer of detainees from Guantánamo to the U.S. This transfer restriction has continued in subsequent NDAAs. -more-

The Times Mocks Trump's Demise

One couldn't hope for a more fitting news item to mark the end of Donald Trump's Reign of Error than the ballyhooed demolition of his failed Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City. The New York Times aimed a few more parting darts at Trump's sagging ego when they wrote off the explosive destruction of this monument to debt and mismanagement with a lede sentence that basically translated to "Meh."

Typically, the demolition of a major high-rise would draw spectacle-hungry press attention and huge crowds. Not so much this time. As Times reporter Tracey Tully wrote: "It was not the biggest or the best implosion ever. An auction for the right to detonate the dynamite. . . fizzled."

As Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small put it: "Today is truly a great day in the great city of Atlantic City."

Hopefully, the final collapse of this 39-story eyesore will serve as a metaphor for Trump's failed ambitions. In the aftermath of his attempted anti-democratic rebellion, may the all the remaining monoliths bearing his name eventually be reduced to piles of smoking rubble. -more-