2nd Senate impeachment trial Archives - Owl Medicine: Shamanic Healing

That’s That

Well, that’s that.

So much for believing in people to act in a way that serves a higher purpose than their own self-serving interests.

Yeah, I know; I’m idealistic. I was a dreamer back in 2020, thinking that truth and justice would be served in the stone age of the first Senate impeachment trial involving DT. I learned my lesson, of course. And in spite of the admonition of then House Impeachment Manager Adam Schiff, the Senate voted to acquit with only one courageous Republican willing to join all Senate Democrats in standing up for our principles.

What admonition? The warning that if he were acquitted, DT would turn right around and behave even more egregiously.

Here We Are

And so, to no one’s surprise (if you were paying attention), after months and months of stoking The Big Lie and cultivating an atmosphere of victimhood and grievance, our country endured an assault on our country, on our lawmakers, on our Capitol, and on our entire system of government. Worse? It was perpetrated by our own fellow citizens.

But beyond the pale was the fact that it was stoked, incited, and celebrated by the person who was at that moment our President, our Commander in Chief. And he orchestrated the entire deadly and disgusting desecration because he refused to honor the will of the people and acquiesce to one of our country’s proudest hallmarks of democracy: the peaceful transition of power.

Dare We Ask?

The rapidity with which Representative Schiff’s dire warning of the consequences of Trump’s first acquittal came to fruition begs the question: Where will it end?

What monstrous wave of disrespect and brutal violence will this unleash on us?

Who will be safe?

Anyone?

If you think it won’t touch you, what makes you think you’re so special?

I bet I can guess. And in the end, I bet you’ll be wrong.

Because without the rule of law, without justice, truth, and integrity, no one’s going to come out of this intact.

(T-286)

Sirius & Orion – Photo: L. Weikel

Some Nights

Some nights it’s really hard for me to come up with anything to write about that doesn’t bludgeon our sensibilities with thoughts and emotions that are unrequited. That’s especially true when two circumstances collide and rob me of my inspiration: (1) when I’m constrained by my sense of civic responsibility and passion for our system of law and government to avidly watch the Senate impeachment trial; and (2) when I fail to get myself outside to take a walk.

Yes, I’ll admit it. I become consumed by the writhing gyrations our country is going through. I feel helpless as I watch it struggle to either give birth to a new, more diverse, passionate, and unified version of itself or die as it reverts to its fearful, racist, hateful, and disrespectful roots.

Indeed, those roots are the undercurrent that streams throughout our perceptions of the Senate trial we’re witnessing this week. Those roots are the source of the trauma we’ve endured and seen perpetrated in our name, the violence we’ve seen stoked since the very first rallies took place, the desecration and madness that was unleashed on our elected representatives and sacred symbols of democracy on January 6^th.

Not Light and Airy

Believe me, I’d love to write about something whimsical or fanciful this evening. My usual go-to sources of a higher perspective, Mother Earth and her myriad creations, don’t feel as readily available to me when I fail to take make the effort to get outside my cocoon.

And perhaps, if I’d managed to wedge in a walk this evening, I might have received the gift of a distraction. But I didn’t. So I’m relegated to musing over the unsettling way my heart feels like it’s taken up residence in the pit of my stomach.

I don’t know if any of you heard it, but at least twice in the arguments that took place today on behalf of the House Managers, the word resilience or resilient was used to refer to our democratic ideals. For obvious reasons, if you’ve been hanging with me this week, you’ll understand that the word jumped out of the television at me.

Crumbling Institution

We’re going to find out over the next few days just where we stand. If there is a conviction, there will be fallout. At least, I imagine there will be disappointment and at least some outrage felt by those who have fallen for The Big Lie. Hopefully, the backlash will be muffled and subdued, because deep down, hatred is unsustainable.

But if there is an acquittal…ah yes. That’s the situation that will test our resilience probably more than it’s ever been tested in our history. Even more than the Civil War? Yeah, probably. Because an acquittal will give legitimacy to the very same factions that incited the Civil War and were allowed to flourish under a veneer of invisibility and distorted respectability.

But that veneer has been ripped off by the actions stoked by DT and perpetrated on our nation. An acquittal will force an eruption, because the ideology of those who desecrated our capitol is unsustainable.

Some nights, like tonight, I hang on to the idea of our resilience by a thread.