At 6:01 p.m., after the Capitol Police had finally cleared the U.S. Capitol of hundreds of armed insurrectionists, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, Proud Boy fascists, extremist militia gangs and fellow-rioters donning MAGA hats, shouldering Confederate battle flags, and sporting outerwear emblazoned with the words Camp Auschwitz and the acronym for “Six Million Jews Were Not Enough,” the sitting President of the United States tapped his last tweet of the day.

Today the U.S. Senate will open the impeachment trial of Donald Trump.  It will start with a bang of the Senate President’s gavel and the evidence presented will focus on the bang of gunfire in the United States Capitol slightly more than one month ago. In other countries during that short time:  The military leaders of Myanmar, the former Burma, staged a coup against their democratically elected government because they favor a military dictatorship.

I wrote here recently that there was not enough evidence to impeach President Trump. That the effort to do so was driven by vindictiveness and hatred of everything about him. Since I wrote that, those that disagreed with me based their arguments exclusively on the last four years, what a jerk he has been, and all the bad things he has said and done, etc.

Regarding energy needs, the long view is the right view. I was encouraged to read that Gov. Ned Lamont has gone on record opposing the building of the Killingly Energy Center.

The coming months may be the most trying time of all for small businesses hard-hit financially by the pandemic and lawmakers must deeply consider the economic consequences if they fail. From January to December last year, there was a 36% decrease in the number of open small businesses in Connecticut, according to a Harvard website tracking that data.

I along with millions of Americans watched the Capitol siege unfold in real time, a barrage of video feeds appearing on all major news networks, across all platforms. After dozens of viewings of the wreckage and death, I found myself either looking away, turning down the volume or putting my hand over half of the split screen, unable to continue watching the horror.