This cannot possibly be a surprise

Shocking testimony! Surprise witness! A surefire distraction from the fact that Congress has yet to take any of the plentiful actions available to them to rein in the Supreme Court-!

The first two of those read like headlines from your average supermarket scandal rag; the last one, not so much. That's because the last one is actually true and the other two are trying to create something out of nothing. Today's "shocking witness", Cassidy Hutchinson, former top aide to former Trump chief of staff, Mark Meadows, sat in front of the January 6th committee to tell everyone precisely nothing of interest outside of a soap opera script and nothing that could in any way be a surprise to anyone who has actually been paying attention. Of course, that latter category tends to include less than 10% of humanity, so perhaps I can't really find this unusual, either. Everyone knew on January 6th, 2021, that Trump had organized a mob to attack the Capitol. We knew this. It was right there in front of us and there's been a mountain of evidence piled on top of that accusation since that day. That Hutchinson, an insider to the Trump cabal, albeit one of minimal importance, was actually willing to talk about it in detail is the only mildly extraordinary event that took place.

I'm honestly baffled by the number of people reacting to this as if it's any more shocking than anything Trump has done before and what he's done for the vast majority of his life. Anyone that has paid attention to this man-child's behavior can't possibly be surprised that he would be throwing a tantrum because his attorney general followed the law; because not enough people could get through the metal detectors for his pity party at the Ellipse; that he attacked his driver who wasn't willing to let him bask in the glow of his devoted followers by leading them to sack the Capitol. This is who he is. This is who he's always been. The last six years have been daily reminders of that very fact and, yet, people are still somehow shocked that he's not only not "presidential" or anything even vaguely close to it, but is an outright criminal, as he has been for most of his life. There was a steady stream of commentary about his criminal behavior while in office and the last two years have been a constant parade of a host of other actions and events that only reinforce that perspective.

Most are assuming that nothing will come of this and they're absolutely right. Nothing will come of this because the people controlling the institutions of power are interested in only one thing: preserving those institutions of power and their place within them. That means preserving the dignity of the office of President by not prosecuting a blatant criminal who once held that office and attempted to retain it by overthrowing those very same institutions. It's why the New York Times refused to call Trump a liar when that's what he clearly is. It's why the current AG, Merrick Garland, chosen for his status as a legal non-entity that the GOP might actually go along with on the Court until McConnell decided to refuse to do even that, isn't standing outside Mar-a-Lago right now with a battalion of FBI agents. It's why Biden and Congress aren't taking the blizzard of actions they can, quite legally, take against both Trump and the corrupted Court. All these people care about is preserving the façade that is the American version of "democracy" and that means not bringing those institutions into question. Again, anyone who's been paying attention should have begun to question them decades ago. But most people don't pay attention and, thus, here we are in the Weimarican Republic with our far more threatening version of the Beer Hall Putsch resulting in prison terms for precisely no one who actually matters. And it's because, in the grand scheme of things, those people matter and we don't. To quote one of the greatest stand-up comedians of all time: "It's a big club and you ain't in it!" And all they care about is the club.