What did loser Trump know, and when did he know it?

Dana Bash, near the end of the CNN clip below, notes with emphasis that loser Trump's second impeachment trial is by no means over (as of February 12, 2021).

I disagree with the CNN reporters/pundits who characterized the upcoming moment of truth (when the final vote comes, possibly on Saturday) as being primarily about who those 100 senators are as people, about power or principle. Or more specifically, the 50 Republican senators. The overarching reality is the vote being about so much more. It's about whether we can remain a republic. Res publica. For the good of the public. "When the citizens at large govern for the public good..."

We faced a moment of truth on January 6. But we're going to face similar moments until Trump and trumpism is quashed.

In her February 11, 2021 Letter to an American, historian Heather Cox Richardson closes with this paragraph,

Lead impeachment manager Jamie Raskin (D-MD), who was a constitutional law professor before he went to Congress, seems to understand their dilemma. “Tyranny, like Hell, is not easily conquered,” he told the senators today, quoting political theorist Thomas Paine, “but we have this saving consolation: The more difficult the struggle, the more glorious ... our victory.”

Professor Richardson's Paine quote is from the third sentence in the opening of The American Crisis.

Many of my friends have been, to some degree, despondent over the fact that broadcast and print media (amplified by social media) have convinced the country that there will not be 17 Republican senators willing to vote to convict the former president. 

I simply will echo that tyranny, like Hell, is not easily conquered, but we [DO] have this consolation: the harder the conflict, the more glorious will be the triumph. Whether it comes with the final vote of the impeachment trial, or if the struggle will have to continue. There will be triumph.