Neither did anyone explain why requesting an investigation of a “debunked” conspiracy theory is an impeachable misdemeanor.

Such a the request isn’t impeachable, but the extortion of it with the lives of Ukrainian soldiers is. There is one offense: withholding authorized, necessary aid from an ally in order to get bogus investigations of a political opponent by a foreign government. The charge cannot be made to go away by misstating it.

Is the presentation boring? Of course it is. So the fuck what? The case is as compelling as Trump’s obstruction permits it to be. Shitheads like Sen. Borasso say they heard nothing new. Again, so the fuck what? It isn’t the House Managers’ job to present facts not in evidence. What possibly “new” could there have been? Witnesses could have added something new, but the GOP Senators who are saying they heard nothing new, as if that mattered, are not exactly clamoring for, well, something new.

The most remarkable thing about this trial is how dishonest/stupid Trump’s defenders must be to make/believe the arguments they are making. But there is a valuable history lesson here. We are learning exactly what the Federalists were afraid of. The number of voters who actually act on their populist impulses is far too high to allow such people actually to have their way. The best Trump supporters in 2016 were good people who were duped. The best Trump supporters in 2020 are fool-me-twice blockheads.