Prosecutors: Convict Trump or face dire damage to democracy
Mountain Pointe’s “Tru” Washington explodes for 41 points,handles Cibola
WASHINGTON – Dire harm from Donald Trump’s false and violent incitements will vex American democracy long into the future unless the Senate convicts him of impeachment and bars him from future office, House prosecutors insisted Thursday as they concluded two days of emotional arguments in his historic trial.
Making their case, they presented piles of new videos of last month’s deadly Capitol attack, with invaders proudly declaring they were merely obeying “the president’s orders” to fight to overturn the election results as Congress was certifying his defeat to Democrat Joe Biden. Trump is accused of inciting the invasion, which prosecutors said was a predictable culmination of the many public and explicit instructions he gave supporters long before his White House rally that unleashed the Jan. 6 attack.
“If we pretend this didn’t happen, or worse, if we let it go unanswered, who’s to say it won’t happen again?” argued prosecutor Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo. Even out of office, Democrats warned, Trump could whip up a mob of followers for similar damage.
Trump’s defense will take the Senate floor on Friday, arguing that as terrible as the attack was, it clearly was not the president’s doing. The proceedings could finish with a vote this weekend by the senators who are sitting as impeachment jurors.
The Democrats, with little hope of conviction by two-thirds of the evenly divided Senate, are also making their most graphic case to the American public, while Trump’s lawyers and the Republicans are focused on legal rather than emotional or historic questions, hoping to get it all behind as quickly as possible. Five people died in the Capitol chaos and its aftermath, a domestic attack unparalleled in U.S. history.
Trump’s second impeachment trial, on a charge of incitement of insurrection, has echoes of last year’s impeachment and acquittal over the Ukraine matter, as prosecutors warn senators that Trump has shown no bounds and will pose a continuing danger to the civic order unless he is convicted. Even out of the White House, the former president holds influence over large swaths of voters.
The Democratic House members acting as prosecutors drew a direct line Thursday from Trump’s repeated comments condoning and even celebrating violence – praising “both sides” after the 2017 outbreak at the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia – and urging his rally crowd last month to go to the Capitol and fight for his presidency. He spread false claims about election fraud and urged his supporters to “stop the steal” of the presidency.
Prosecutors used the rioters’ own videos from that day to pin responsibility on Trump. “We were invited here,” said one. “Trump sent us,” said another. “He’ll be happy. We’re fighting for Trump.”
“They truly believed that the whole intrusion was at the president’s orders,” said Rep. Diana DeGette of Colorado. “The president told them to be there.”
At the White House, President Biden said he believed “some minds may be changed” after senators saw chilling security video Wednesday of the deadly insurrection at the Capitol, including of rioters searching menacingly for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Mike Pence.
Biden said he didn’t watch any of the previous day’s proceedings live but later saw news coverage.
Though most of the Senate jurors seem to have made up their minds, making Trump’s acquittal likely, the never-before-seen audio and video released Wednesday became a key exhibit.
Senators sat riveted as the jarring video played in the chamber. The footage showed the mob smashing into the building and rioters engaging in hand-tohand combat with police, with audio of officers pleading for backup. Rioters roamed the halls chanting, “Hang Mike Pence,” and eerily singing out, “Where are you, Nancy?” in search of Pelosi.
Videos of the siege have been circulating since the day of the riot, but the graphic compilation offered a moment-by-moment retelling of one of the nation’s most alarming days. And it underscored how dangerously close the rioters came to the nation’s leaders, shifting the focus of the trial from an academic debate about the Constitution to a raw retelling of the assault.
Trump attorney David Schoen took issue, saying that the presentation was “offensive” and that the Democrats “haven’t tied it in any way to Trump.”
He told reporters Thursday at the Capitol that he believed Democrats were making the public relive the tragedy in a way that “tears at the American people” and impedes efforts at unity in the country.
And by Thursday, senators sitting through a second full day of arguments appeared somewhat fatigued, slouching in their chairs, crossing their arms and walking around to stretch.
One Republican, Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, said during a break: “To me, they’re losing credibility the longer they talk.”
The goal of the two-day presentation by prosecutors from the House, which impeached the outgoing president last month a week after the siege, was to cast Trump not as an innocent bystander but rather as the “inciter in chief” who spent months spreading falsehoods and revving up supporters to challenge the election.
“This attack never would have happened but for Donald Trump,” Rep. Madeleine Dean, one of the impeachment managers, said as she choked back emotion. “And so they came, draped in Trump’s flag, and used our flag, the American flag, to batter and to bludgeon.”
The first president to face an impeachment trial after leaving office, Trump is also the first to be twice impeached.
His lawyers say he cannot be convicted because he is already gone from the White House. Even though the Senate rejected that argument in Tuesday’s vote to proceed to trial, the issue could resonate with Senate Republicans eager to acquit Trump without being seen as condoning his behavior.
While six Republicans joined with Democrats to vote to proceed with the trial on Tuesday, the 56-44 vote was far from the two-thirds threshold of 67 votes needed for conviction.
NEW YORK – Chick Corea, a towering jazz pianist with a staggering 23 Grammy Awards who pushed the boundaries of the genre and worked alongside Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock, has died. He was 79.
Corea died Tuesday of a rare form of cancer, his team posted on his website.
On his Facebook page, Corea left a message to his fans: “I want to thank all of those along my journey who have helped keep the music fires burning bright. It is my hope that those who have an inkling to play, write, perform or otherwise, do so. If not for yourself then for the rest of us. It’s not only that the world needs more artists, it’s also just a lot of fun.”
A prolific artist with dozens of albums, Corea in 1968 replaced Herbie Hancock in Miles Davis’ group, playing on the landmark albums “In a Silent Way” and “Bitches Brew.” He formed his own avant-garde group, Circle, and then founded Return to Forever. He worked on many other projects, including duos with Hancock and vibraphonist Gary Burton. He recorded and performed classical music, standards, solo originals, Latin jazz and tributes to great jazz pianists.
DEAR SAVVY SENIOR – I am interested in getting my mom, who lives alone, a medical alert system with a wearable pendant button that will let her call for help if she falls or has a medical emergency. What can you tell me to help me choose one? – Too Many Choices
DEAR TOO MANY – A good medical alert system is an effective and affordable tool that can help keep your mom safe and living in her own home longer. But with all the different products and features available today, choosing one can be challenging. Here are some tips that can help.
Three Key Questions
Medical alert systems, which have been around since the 1980s, provide a wearable help button – usually in the form of a neck pendant or wristband – that would put your mom in touch with a dispatcher who could summon emergency help or contact a friend or family member as needed.
To help you narrow down your options and choose a system that best fits your mom’s needs, here are three key questions you’ll need to ask, along with some top-rated companies that offer these products.
Does your mom want a home-based or mobile
system?
Medical alert systems were originally designed to work inside the home with a landline telephone, which is still an option. But since fewer and fewer households have landlines these days, most companies today also offer home-based systems that work over a cellular network. With these systems, pressing the wearable help button allows you to speak to a dispatcher through a base unit located in your home.
In addition, many companies offer mobile medical alert options, too. You can use these systems at home, but they’ll also allow you to call for help while you’re out and about.
Mobile alerts operate over cellular networks and incorporate GPS technology. They allow you to talk and listen to the operator directly through the pendant button, and because of the GPS, your location would be known in order for help to be sent.
If your mom doesn’t leave the house very often, she may not need a mobile system, but if she is still active, she may want added protection outside the home.
Should her system be monitored or not?
The best medical alert systems are monitored, meaning that the help button connects you with a trained operator at a 24/7 dispatching center.
But you also have the option to choose a system that isn’t monitored. With these, when you press the help button, the device automatically dials a friend or family member on your programmed emergency call list.
These products can often be set up to call multiple people and to contact emergency services if you don’t get an answer from someone on your list.
Should you add a fall-detection feature?
Most medical alert companies today now offer the option of an automatic fall detection pendant for an additional fee of $10 to $15 per month. These pendants sense falls when they occur and automatically contact the dispatch center, just as they would if you had pressed the call button.
But be aware that this technology isn’t full proof. In some cases, this feature may register something as a fall that isn’t. The alarm might go off if you drop it or momentarily lose your balance but don’t actually land on the ground.
Top Rated Systems
Here are four top companies, rated by Consumer Reports, that offer home and mobile monitored medical alert systems:
• Bay Alarm Medical: Fees range between $20 and $40 per month; BayAlarmMedical.com; 877-5229633.
• GreatCall’s Lively Mobile Plus: The device costs $50 plus a $25 to $40 monthly service fee; GreatCall. com; 800-650-5921.
• MobileHelp: Monthly fees run $20 to $45; MobileHelp.com; 800-809-9664.
• Phillips Lifeline: $30 to $50/month, plus a onetime device/activation fee of $50 to $100; Lifeline.Philips. com; 855-681-5351.
Send your senior questions to: Savvy Senior, P.O. Box 5443, Norman, OK 73070, or visit SavvySenior.org. Jim Miller is a contributor to the NBC Today show and author of “The Savvy Senior” book.
Before a full minute vanished off the game clock, Cibola quickly found themselves in a 10-0 hole.
And it wasn’t much longer before the contest between No. 11 Mountain Pointe and No. 15 Cibola was all but over as the Pride handled the Raiders 101-55 Thursday night.
“(Their athleticism) was something that was tough to deal with,” Cibola head coach Ron Bratton said. “We couldn’t stay in front of them. They were able to get to the basketball whenever they wanted to...Unfortunate because we were playing well. They played harder than we did.”
Creating most of the damage Thursday for the Pride (6-1 AIA) was sophomore sensation Roosevelt “Tru” Washington.
The 6-foot-4 guard has already received scholarship offers from the likes of Arizona State and Nevada.
And he dazzled Thursday against Cibola (5-3).
Washington scored eight of Mountain Pointe’s first 10 points before rattling off 27 first half points on over 80% shooting.
On his way to a career-high 41 points, Washington certainly lived up to the billing. He’s smooth as the primary ball-handler, attacks the rim at a high-level and can stroke the outsider jumper.
And if a team becomes too centralized around defending Washington, he can make the extra pass to an open teammate as he did Thursday, finishing with five assists.
“They’re a good team and he’s able to get to the basket easily and can knock down the outside shot,” Bratton said.
Despite digging themselves in a quick hole, Cibola had scoring opportunities in the opening quarter, but missed shot after missed shot ultimately doomed the home team.
“We had some open looks early that didn’t drop and it would have helped us no question about it,” Bratton said. “Some of the shots we took, for me, I wanted to see us attack more and get to the line. You can’t live on jumpshots alone.”
Cibola’s best aggressor driving to the hoop, Eric