Axios sent out an email yesterday headlined “Biden’s Stubborn Loyalty.” I went back to it this afternoon and realized I’d remembered it having a more negative spin than it really did. That headline above is followed by “1 Big Thing: Biden’s Teflon Cabinet.” The gist is that Biden sticks by his people. Got a criticism of one of his people? Who cares? Biden doesn’t want to hear it. What spurred this write-up is the controversy about Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. Will Biden fire Austin? Will he resign? No, says the White House. Indeed, Biden won’t let him resign. Done and done.

Axios writes this: “Politico reports Biden would not accept a resignation from Austin even if he offered, and chatter from the pundit class is likely to reflexively harden the president’s view.”

I like this attitude.

Nicole Lafond has stolen a bit of my thunder here. But I feel obliged to let you know that Christian Ziegler, threesomer and erstwhile chairman of the Florida Republican Party, was finally given the boot today by the state party. The state party executive committee named Evan Power as his successor. No word was available as we went to press on whether Power and his wife will be inviting anyone else to play. I had explained in one of my earlier posts that the state party was in a jam because the state party bylaws provided no mechanism for firing a state party chairman. What happened? As near as I can tell the state party committee decided that that didn’t matter. They all wanted him to go. So they fired him. Bada bing bada boom.

Let me flag this piece to your attention. I’m not sure what to make of it yet. The gist is that one of Donald Trump’s codefendants in the state coup prosecution in Georgia has filed a motion to remove Fani Willis as prosecutor. Michael Roman claims that Willis hired a romantic partner (he alleges), Nathan Wade, to serve as special prosecutor in the case. In essence, she hired him as an outside lawyer since it’s a big case and something bigger than the office might normally handle. Roman then goes on to claim that since Willis and Wade vacationed together (he alleges) and since Wade paid for some of those vacations (he alleges), Willis illegally profited from Wade’s work for the DA’s office. He further argues that Willis had no authority to hire Wade in the first place; so basically the whole prosecution falls apart.

It’s become fashionable for some to say that we shouldn’t be hung up on January 6th, that it is, after all, time to move on. And it’s not just the Trump supporters who led the insurrection. The thinking is that it is a bit lazy somehow, holding on to the familiar. You’re stuck in some relevance-affirming cocoon. And it’s time to get outside. It’s an attitude that most especially prevalent among those who judge their seriousness about politics and the validity of their perspectives precisely in inverse proportion to their personal engagement and investment in the big questions of political life. Let’s call them the supercilious center. The attitude is pervasive among elite political reporters and editorialists.

In fact, January 6th remains at the center of our politics. It’s as important as it’s ever been. We often say that it’s not just what happened on January 6th but the criminal conduct leading up to it. That’s true, as far as it grows. But what’s more true is this: It’s not so much what happened on January 6th or even in the weeks leading up to it. What’s truly important is what came after January 6th.

I wanted to respond to a few questions and comments about my disqualification post. It’s a complicated issue that a number of you have raised. In so many words, I said that in the very unlikely case that the Court found that Trump had participated in an insurrection and allowed the Colorado decision to stand, it would still be up to individual states to remove him from the ballot. Clearly no red state is going to do that. And it seems unlikely that any purple states would do it.

TPM Reader BS writes: “I think you’re underestimating the impact of the (admittedly slight) possibility of SCOTUS affirming the removal of Trump from the Colorado ballot. However the majority phrases it, this will be seen and interpreted as the GOP-dominated SCOTUS, the highest court in the land, finding Trump GUILTY of insurrection.” (Don’t hold BS‘s initials against him.)

As BS goes on to argue, this would unleash a tidal wave of recriminations within the GOP and open the door to swing states removing Trump from the ballot.

I just saw that there’s a new ARG poll out this afternoon showing Donald Trump at 37% and Nikki Haley at 33% in New Hampshire. Christie is at 10% and Dead Bounce Ron is at 5%, if you’re a completist. This spurs me to share with you an editorial conversation we were just having about how we’re going to cover, how much of our editorial resources we’re going to put toward, the primaries in the next couple months. Can Haley beat Trump in New Hampshire? Do we care or does it matter if she does?