Like his buddy Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump is a thug willing to use violence to achieve what he cannot achieve by legitimate means. He has shown a willingness to do so in the past, and because he himself has paid no price, he is threatening to do so in the future.

Eleven months after the election, and nine months after the Jan. 6 insurrection attempt, we are only now beginning to understand how organized, intentional and dangerous the Trump coup attempt had been, and how dangerous it remains. Take, for example, the events of Dec. 14 at the Georgia State Capitol.

It was a mob hit, pure and simple.  An angry mob boss, Donald Trump, ordered the hit; two of his henchmen, Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, carried it out. Without warning, without cause and without apparent guilt, the two U.S. senators stabbed Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in the back this week and left their fellow Republican to bleed, pretty much ending his political career.

Donald J. Trump used the power of his office to blackmail a foreign ally into undermining a political foe here at home. Nothing in U.S history approaches that abuse of presidential power, yet the gravity of the charges apparently does not matter. The overwhelming evidence proving those charges – the sworn testimony, the emails and direct messages, the de facto public confessions by President Trump, his personal attorney and his acting chief of staff, explaining that yes, they did pressure Ukraine to produce political dirt – that too does not matter.