Washington, February 5 (RHC)-- U.S. President Donald Trump has been acquitted of both charges in the Senate impeachment trial.  Senator Mitt Romney of Utah was the only Republican who voted to convict Trump.

Political observers said that Trump was acquitted Wednesday on a largely party-line vote not because the Senate believes he didn’t conspire to withhold aid to Ukraine in exchange for political favors, but because the Republicans have now explicitly decided they don’t care that he did this. 

Having decided to block the testimony of any witnesses who might make it too politically uncomfortable for such a cavalier attitude to stand in the court of public opinion, Mitch McConnell’s senators decided to speedily wrap up the trial and vote to acquit in the face of overwhelming evidence of Trump’s wrong-doings. 

Observers in Washington said that as a result of the vote, the “So what?” defense has won, and Trump has shed one of the last restraints on his tyrannical presidency.  The consequences will ricochet through the body politic for years, perhaps generations, to come.