Dear Commons Community,

I have just finished reading The Hare with Amber Eyes:  A Hidden Inheritance by Edmund de Waal. Published in 2010, it is the true story of de Waal’s family starting in the 1800s to the present.  de Waal is a world famous ceramicist, who inherited an elegantly-crafted collection of 264 tiny Japanese wood and ivory carvings called netsuke (pronounced net – SOO – kay) and sets out tracing their history.  It is part family memoir and part detective story as he uncovers both the history of the netsuke and his family, the Ephrussis, who were as rich and as respected as the Rothschilds, but had lost everything except this collection during World War II.  My wife Elaine recommended this book to me after visiting The Jewish Museum here in New York where the netsuke collection is currently on display.  If you are interested in 19th/ 20th century European history especially in Paris and Vienna, de Waal will not disappoint.

Below is a review that appear in BookBrowse.

Tony

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BookBrowse Summary

The Ephrussis were a grand banking family, as rich and respected as the Rothschilds, who “burned like a comet” in nineteenth-century Paris and Vienna society. Yet by the end of World War II, almost the only thing remaining of their vast empire was a collection of 264 wood and ivory carvings, none of them larger than a matchbox.

The renowned ceramicist Edmund de Waal became the fifth generation to inherit this small and exquisite collection of netsuke. Entranced by their beauty and mystery, he determined to trace the story of his family through the story of the collection.

The netsuke—drunken monks, almost-ripe plums, snarling tigers—were gathered by Charles Ephrussi at the height of the Parisian rage for all things Japanese. Charles had shunned the place set aside for him in the family business to make a study of art, and of beautiful living. An early supporter of the Impressionists, he appears, oddly formal in a top hat, in Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party. Marcel Proust studied Charles closely enough to use him as a model for the aesthete and lover Swann in Remembrance of Things Past.

Charles gave the carvings as a wedding gift to his cousin Viktor in Vienna; his children were allowed to play with one netsuke each while they watched their mother, the Baroness Emmy, dress for ball after ball. Her older daughter grew up to disdain fashionable society. Longing to write, she struck up a correspondence with Rilke, who encouraged her in her poetry.

The Anschluss changed their world beyond recognition. Ephrussi and his cosmopolitan family were imprisoned or scattered, and Hitler’s theorist on the “Jewish question” appropriated their magnificent palace on the Ringstrasse. A library of priceless books and a collection of Old Master paintings were confiscated by the Nazis. But the netsuke were smuggled away by a loyal maid, Anna, and hidden in her straw mattress. Years after the war, she would find a way to return them to the family she’d served even in their exile.

In The Hare with Amber Eyes, Edmund de Waal unfolds the story of a remarkable family and a tumultuous century. Sweeping yet intimate, it is a highly original meditation on art, history, and family, as elegant and precise as the netsuke themselves.

Dear Commons Community,

More than 800,000 noncitizens and “Dreamers” in New York City will be allowed to vote in municipal elections as early as next year — after new elected Mayor Eric Adams allowed legislation to automatically become law yesterday.

Opponents have vowed to challenge the new law, which the City Council approved a month ago. Unless a judge halts its implementation, New York City is the first major U.S. city to grant widespread municipal voting rights to noncitizens.

More than a dozen communities across the U.S. already allow noncitizens to cast ballots in local elections, including 11 towns in Maryland and two in Vermont.

Noncitizens still wouldn’t be able to vote for president or members of Congress in federal races, or in the state elections that pick the governor, judges and legislators.

The Board of Elections must now begin drawing an implementation plan by July, including voter registration rules and provisions that would create separate ballots for municipal races to prevent noncitizens from casting ballots in federal and state contests.  As reported by the Associated Press.

It’s a watershed moment for the nation’s most populous city, where legally documented, voting-age noncitizens comprise nearly one in nine of the city’s 7 million voting-age inhabitants. The movement to win voting rights for noncitizens prevailed after numerous setbacks.

The measure would allow noncitizens who have been lawful permanent residents of the city for at least 30 days, as well as those authorized to work in the U.S., including “Dreamers,” to help select the city’s mayor, city council members, borough presidents, comptroller and public advocate.

“Dreamers” are young immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children who would benefit from the never-passed DREAM Act or the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which allows them to remain in the country if they meet certain criteria.

The first elections in which noncitizens would be allowed to vote are in 2023.

“We build a stronger democracy when we include the voices of immigrants,” said former City Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez, who led the charge to win approval for the legislation.

Rodriguez, who Adams appointed as his transportation commissioner, thanked the mayor for his support and expects a vigorous defense against any legal challenges.

Adams recently cast uncertainty over the legislation when he raised concern about the monthlong residency standard, but later said those concerns did not mean he would veto the bill.

While there was some question whether Adams could stop the bill from becoming law, the 30-day time limit for the mayor to take action expired at the stroke of midnight.

Adams said he looked forward to the law bringing millions more into the democratic process.

“I believe that New Yorkers should have a say in their government, which is why I have and will continue to support this important legislation,” Adams said in a statement released Saturday night. He added that his earlier concerns were put at ease after what he called productive dialogue with colleagues.

Former Mayor Bill de Blasio had similar concerns but did not move to veto the measure before vacating City Hall at the end of the year.

Opponents say the council lacks the authority on its own to grant voting rights to noncitizens and should have first sought action by state lawmakers.

Some states, including Alabama, Arizona, Colorado and Florida, have adopted rules that would preempt any attempts to pass laws like the one in New York City.

This is a good move forward for New York City even though it will surely be challenged in the courts.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The dedication below to Sidney Poitier who died on January 6^th, was published in Vanity Fair.  It reflects well the depth and greatness of Mr. Poitier, the man and the actor.

May he rest in peace!

Tony

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Vanity Fair

To Sidney, With Love

Sidney Poitier wasn’t just an actor—but he was a really great actor.

By Chris Murphy

January 7, 2022

Just one week into 2022, another titan of cinema has fallen. On Thursday, January 6, Sidney Poitier—the first Black man to ever win the Oscar for best actor—died at 94. The timing of Poitier’s loss poetically and painfully echoes that of another Black icon of cinema, Cicely Tyson, who died in January of last year. Like Tyson, Poitier projected superhuman levels of grace both on and off camera. They both became civil rights activists, not necessarily by choice but because their era demanded it, and used their influence as movie stars to advocate for tangible change for Black people across the nation. Both Tyson and Poitier were synonymous with Black excellence—a testament not only to all that we could achieve, but all that we could do for others in the process.

In the ’50s and ’60s, Poitier knew that as Hollywood’s sole Black leading man, everyone was constantly watching him—looking for him to set an example. Poitier was “the only one,” he has been quoted as saying. “I felt very much as if I were representing 15, 18 million people with every move I made,” he once wrote. While this responsibility may sound crushing, Poitier rose to the occasion, imbuing all of his roles with a dignity that stretched beyond whatever character he happened to be playing, whether doctor or prisoner.

And while he’ll certainly be remembered for his poise, it would be a shame to forget what a versatile, nuanced, and engaging actor Poitier was as well. To Sir, With Love; In the Heat of the Night; and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner—three vastly different movies—were all released in 1967, making him Hollywood’s top box-office star at the time. In the first, Poitier played Mark Thackeray, an immigrant to Britain and unwitting high school teacher tasked with getting a classroom of unruly students on his side. With Mark, Poitier utilized his soft charm, his stoic patience, and his commanding presence to effectively create the “inspiring teacher” archetype that films like Dead Poets Society and Mona Lisa Smile have been emulating ever since.

And then there’s In the Heat of the Night, where Poitier played Virgil Tibbs, the stone-cold, tough-as-nails Philadelphia detective who finds himself investigating a murder in Mississippi. Looking stark Southern racism square in the eye, Poitier never loses his cool, whether he’s slapping plantation owner Endicott across the jaw, or, after being called a slur, delivering the film’s most iconic line: “They call me Mr. Tibbs.” That incredible composure resonated with audiences Black and white, winning In the Heat of the Night the Oscar for best picture.

In the interracial marriage drama Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, Poitier plays Dr. John Wade Prentice—a heretofore model minority who upsets his family by marrying a white woman—and shows his fiery passion, the gravitas that made him a force to be reckoned with. In a rousing monologue, Poitier gets to speak for an entire generation—really, every generation battling against the antiquated and close-minded ways of the past. He lets loose; he rips; he roars at his father, played by Roy E. Glenn Sr., fighting for his right to love whomever he wants. “You don’t own me,” Poitier spits out. “You and your whole lousy generation believes the way it was for you is the way it’s got to be. And not until your whole generation has laid down and died will the dead weight of you be off our backs.”

Whether quiet and restrained or bursting with emotions, Poitier touched audiences with his power and skill. From his Oscar-winning performance as Homer Smith in Lilies of the Field to my personal favorite, his heart-wrenching turn as Walter Lee Younger in Lorraine Hansberry’s classic A Raisin in the Sun, Poitier brought an overwhelming, piercing humanity to all of his roles—changing preconceptions of what a Black man could not only do, but be, at a pivotal time. The trails he blazed and the legacy he built would never have been, if not for the talent and profound dignity with which he infused every performance. He earned that legacy “brick by brick,” role by role.

Dear Commons Community,

Maureen Down in her column this morning looks at the past week and compares Dick Cheney and Donald Trump.  Here is an excerpt:

“Cheney was there (January 6^th Memorial) with his daughter Liz, a congresswoman from Wyoming who is persona non grata in her own party and persona grata with the Democrats for speaking truth about Trump.

This time, Dick Cheney was not Darth Vader, employing his Death Star to blow up Democrats. This time he was Darling Dick, one of the only Republicans willing to defy Trump and say the obvious: The G.O.P. is embarrassing.

His erstwhile critic Nancy Pelosi warmly shook hands with “Vice,” and a cluster of Democrats waited to kiss his ring.

Trump is such an egomaniacal thug that Dick Cheney, christened “a self-aggrandizing criminal” by The Atlantic in 2011, seems saintly by comparison.

No matter, as The Atlantic pointed out, that as vice president, Cheney “advanced a theory of the executive that is at odds with the intentions of the founders, successfully encouraged the federal government to illegally spy on innocent Americans, passed on to the public false information about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and became directly complicit in a regime of torture for which he should be in jail.”

Cheney, who had subverted the Constitution at every turn, was greeted as a defender of the Constitution. From Vice to Nice. This is the world we’re in now.”

Whoever thought that Cheney could look good but compared to Donald Trump, he is a hero!

Dowd’s entire column is below.

Tony

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The New York Times

Maureen Dowd

Trump’s Coup, Part Deux

Jan. 8, 2022

WASHINGTON — When pigs fly.

That’s the kind of surreal day Thursday was at the Capitol. Donald Trump has so malignantly scrambled his party and this country that we keep seeing tableaus that defy belief and flout history.

The last time we took note of Dick Cheney and Patrick Leahy at the Capitol was in 2004 when the then vice president hurled a vulgarity — one not usually heard on the august Senate floor — at the Democratic senator from Vermont. Democrats had accused Cheney of using his government position to help win contracts for his former firm, Halliburton.

Now, 17 years later, the two men were back. Senator Leahy was snapping photos at the memorial on the first anniversary of the desecration of the Capitol. And Cheney was there with his daughter Liz, a congresswoman from Wyoming who is persona non grata in her own party and persona grata with the Democrats for speaking truth about Trump.

This time, Dick Cheney was not Darth Vader, employing his Death Star to blow up Democrats. This time he was Darling Dick, one of the only Republicans willing to defy Trump and say the obvious: The G.O.P. is embarrassing.

His erstwhile critic Nancy Pelosi warmly shook hands with “Vice,” and a cluster of Democrats waited to kiss his ring.

Trump is such an egomaniacal thug that Dick Cheney, christened “a self-aggrandizing criminal” by The Atlantic in 2011, seems saintly by comparison.

No matter, as The Atlantic pointed out, that as vice president, Cheney “advanced a theory of the executive that is at odds with the intentions of the founders, successfully encouraged the federal government to illegally spy on innocent Americans, passed on to the public false information about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and became directly complicit in a regime of torture for which he should be in jail.”

Cheney, who had subverted the Constitution at every turn, was greeted as a defender of the Constitution. From Vice to Nice. This is the world we’re in now.

There were other topsy-turvy moments. Republicans, once the outspoken defenders of law enforcement, deserted the Capitol en masse on a day of appreciation for the bravery of the police, dead and alive, who risked their lives holding back the horde, hellbent on shredding democracy, as well as lawmakers, if they could get their hands on them.

It’s disgusting that Republicans could not honor the institution they took an oath to protect, or even show up for the cops and other staffers they see every day who were traumatized by Jan. 6.

We also saw Tucker Carlson, once a bow-tied preppy struggling to cha-cha-cha on “Dancing With the Stars,” cracking the whip as the Fox High Sparrow, making Ted Cruz grovel and apologize for slipping and accurately using the phrase “terrorist” to describe the Jan. 6 attack.

At least Joe Biden finally seemed to recognize that the old days are gone and that the Republicans are not going to be working with him. He came in wanting to knit the country together, but part of the country is not going to be knitted.

It’s as if Trump has projected his id into a national psychosis. His father divided the world into killers and losers. So rather than admit that he lost re-election, Trump was willing to egg on a seditious cult to overturn the election. You can just picture him sitting there in the White House, surrounded by McDonald’s wrappers, thrilled at the TV scenes of MAGA hooligans attacking the police.

In his speech in Statuary Hall, President Biden pierced the haze of his first year and called out Trump: “He lost.” Without using his name, Biden charged Trump with a profound sin: turning Americans against their own democracy.

“Those who stormed this Capitol and those who instigated and incited and those who called on them to do so held a dagger at the throat of America, at American democracy,” he said.

Besides his dagger at the throat of democracy, Trump has his party in a chokehold. Republicans may have held back Trump from giving a news conference Thursday, because they know that Nov. 3 and Jan. 6 are dates that make them look awful, but they are still in his vile grip, as evidenced by their shameful flight from the Capitol. (And they didn’t even know “Dear Theodosia” was coming.)

Trump’s coup attempt is in its second stage. As NPR reported, the MAGA crowd is working hard in states like Georgia and Arizona, which defied Trump in 2020, to institutionalize Trump’s big lie, with election-deniers running for offices that control the voting process. The Washington Post revealed that “at least 163 Republicans who have embraced Trump’s false claims are running for statewide positions that would give them authority over the administration of elections” and “at least five candidates for the U.S. House were at the Capitol during the Jan. 6 riots.”

Biden must make good on his speech and make sure the Vandals who sacked the Capitol are not able to do it again. He must find a way to enact new voting rights laws to head off the Republican efforts to control election certification. If the Dems keep flailing, they could be looking at a wipeout in the House and maybe the Senate and years of kangaroo trials. Hopefully, Merrick Garland is not another Robert Mueller.

This is not a moment for punch-pulling.

Alyssa Farah Griffin

Dear Commons Community,

Mike Pence’s former press secretary Alyssa Farah Griffin blasted the moral “disrepair” of the Republican Party yesterday after she’s received hate messages for reportedly cooperating with the House select committee investigating the U.S. Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.

“Getting a lot of hate for thinking 1/6 was a big deal,” Griffin tweeted. “There’s nothing less conservative [than] trying to overturn democratic process,” she snapped.

“I watched a violent mob call for my boss and mentor, Mike Pence, to be hanged on the steps of the US Capitol,” she added.

Axios reported on Thursday that Griffin is cooperating with congressional investigators. Pence’s former chief of staff Marc Short is also among those in Pence’s circle talking to the House select committee.

Short wrote a scathing draft article intended for The Washington Post in which he attacked the pressure put on the then-vice president on Jan. 6 to hold up certification of Electoral College votes, which would have violated both the Constitution and Pence’s oath of office.

While Short was hunkered down with Pence amid the melee that day, he was receiving emails from Donald Trump ally and right-wing attorney John Eastman, who authored so-called coup memos on how the then-president could overturn his 2020 election loss.

Eastman blamed Pence for the violence and told Short there was still time for Pence to hold up the pro forma electoral vote certification, according to Short’s intended op-ed piece.

“The ‘siege’ is because YOU and your boss did not do what was necessary,” Eastman reportedly messaged Short.

We are going to see a lot more reporting of Ms. Griffin and Mr. Short in the weeks ahead!

Tony

Marc Short

Travis McMichael, Greg McMichael, and Roddie Bryan

Dear Commons Community,

The three white men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery were sentenced yesterday to life in prison, with a judge denying any chance of parole for the father and son who armed themselves and initiated the deadly pursuit of the 25-year-old Black man.

Murder carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison under Georgia law unless prosecutors seek the death penalty, which they opted against for Arbery’s killing.  For Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley, the main decision was whether to grant Travis and Greg  McMichael and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, an eventual chance to earn parole.

The judge ordered both McMichaels to serve life without parole. Bryan was granted a chance of parole, but must first serve at least 30 years in prison.  As reported by the Associated Press.

During the sentencing hearing, Arbery’s sister recalled her brother’s humor, describing him as a positive thinker with a big personality. She told the judge her brother had dark skin “that glistened in the sunlight,” thick, curly hair and an athletic build, factors that made him a target to the men who pursued him.

“These are the qualities that made these men assume that Ahmaud was a dangerous criminal and chase them with guns drawn. To me, those qualities reflect a young man full of life and energy who looked like me and the people I loved,” Jasmine Arbery said.

Arbery’s mother asked for the maximum sentence, saying she suffered a personal, intense loss made worse by a trial where the men’s defense was that Arbery made bad choices that led to his death.

“This wasn’t a case of mistaken identity or mistaken fact. They chose to target my son because they didn’t want him in their community. They chose to treat him differently than other people who frequently visited their community,” Wanda Cooper-Jones said. “And when they couldn’t sufficiently scare or intimidate him, they killed him.”

Prosecutor Linda Dunikoski asked the judge for life without parole for Travis and Greg McMichael and the possibility of parole for Bryan. But she said all deserved that mandatory life sentence for showing “no empathy for the trapped and terrified Ahmaud Arbery.”

Contending the McMichaels still believed they didn’t do anything wrong, Dunikoski disclosed  that Greg McMichael gave Bryan’s cellphone video of the shooting to an attorney, who leaked it.

“He believed it was going to exonerate him,” the prosecutor said.

For Travis McMichael, who is 35, the possibility for parole could mean hope for release from prison in his 60s, said Robert Rubin, one of his defense attorneys. He argued that Travis McMichael opened fire only after “Mr. Arbery came at him and grabbed the gun.” But Rubin also acknowledged his client’s decisions to arm himself and chase Arbery were ”reckless” and “thoughtless.”

“They are not evidence of a soul so blackened as to deserve to spend the rest of his life in prison,” Rubin said. “This was not a planned murder. This was a fight over a gun that led to Mr. Arbery’s death.”

Greg McMichael recently turned 66, and Bryan is 52, raising the chances that they would spend the remainder of their lives in prison even if granted a chance of parole.

Greg McMichael’s lawyer, Laura Hogue, said her client has health problems and acknowledged he likely won’t ever get out of prison. But he said granting him a chance at parole would show he didn’t intend Arbery to die, never pulling his gun until his son fired his shotgun.

“Greg McMichael did not leave his home that day hoping to kill,” Hogue told the judge. “He did not view his son firing that shotgun with anything other than fear and sadness. What this jury found was this was an unintentional act.”

Bryan’s lawyer said he should get a chance at parole because he showed remorse and cooperated with police, turning over the cellphone video of the shooting to help them get to the truth.

“Mr. Bryan isn’t the one who brought a gun,” Kevin Gough said. “He was unarmed. And I think that reflects his intentions.”

The guilty verdicts against the men handed down the day before Thanksgiving prompted a victory celebration outside the Glynn County courthouse for those who saw Arbery’s death as part of a larger national reckoning on racial injustice.

All three men were also convicted of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit false imprisonment. Maximum prison terms for those counts range from five to 20 years. The judge was likely to allow those additional penalties to be served simultaneously with the life sentences for murder.

The McMichaels grabbed guns and jumped in a pickup truck to chase the 25-year-old Arbery after spotting him running in their neighborhood outside the Georgia port city of Brunswick on Feb. 23, 2020. Bryan joined the pursuit in his own truck and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael firing close-range shotgun blasts into Arbery as he threw punches and grabbed for the weapon.

The killing went largely unnoticed until two months later, when the graphic video was leaked online and touched off a national outcry. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over the case from local police and soon arrested all three men.

Defense attorneys have said they plan to appeal the convictions. They have 30 days after sentencing to file them.

These are stiff sentences but well-deserved!

Tony

Representative Liz Cheney, right, and her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, were the only Republicans in the House chamber for a moment of silence acknowledging the toll of the attack on the Capitol. Credit…Al Drago for The New York Times

Dear Commons Community,

Former Vice President Dick Cheney yesterday marked the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by attending a moment of silence in the House of Representatives, where he once served as a member.

Cheney, along with his daughter, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), were the only Republicans present for the ceremony in the House chamber. A number of Democratic lawmakers walked over afterward to shake his hand, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Asked later if he was disappointed in how GOP leadership has responded to Jan. 6, the former vice president told reporters: “It’s not a leadership that resembles any of the folks I knew when I was here for 10 years.”

Cheney served as a Wyoming representative from 1979-1989 before going on to become George W. Bush’s vice president in 2001. He has been outspoken in denouncing the Jan. 6 siege of the Capitol and the attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election by President Donald Trump and his supporters.

Liz Cheney has been a leading member of the House select committee probing the attack. The House GOP conference stripped her of her position as conference chair for speaking out against Trump and his efforts to deny the 2020 election.

“My daughter can take care of herself,” Dick Cheney told reporters yesterday when asked what he made of the treatment of his daughter.

Good gesture on Dick Cheney’s part in supporting the country and his daughter!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of the insurrection on January 6^th  on the United States Capital by followers of Donald Trump.  President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamal Harris started the anniversary’s events with pointed comments about what occurred. President Biden did not hold back (see video above) in laying blame for the insurrection on Donald Trump and his enablers in the Republican Party, who continue to preach the “big lie” about how the 2020 presidential election was stolen. The New York Times has an article this morning identifying four major takeaways from yesterday’s events as follows:

• Biden takes a new, confrontational approach to Trump.
• Biden rejects working with Republicans who support ‘the rule of a single man.’
• Trump — and Trumpism — are not going away.
• Republicans mostly tried to stay out of the spotlight.

The entire article is below.  It is an excellent analysis.

Tony

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The New York Times

At the Capitol on Jan. 6, a Day of Remembrance and Division

Jan. 6, 2022

By Katie Rogers

WASHINGTON — This anniversary of Jan. 6 marked a turning point for President Biden, who for much of his first year in office avoided direct confrontation with his predecessor, Donald J. Trump.

On Thursday, Mr. Biden took deliberate aim at Mr. Trump, assailing him for watching television as the attacks unfolded, spreading a lie that the 2020 election was rigged, and holding “a dagger at the throat of America” when he encouraged his supporters to attack the United States Capitol.

But Mr. Biden held on to one vestige from the past year: He still refused to call Mr. Trump by name.

Biden takes a new, confrontational approach to Trump.

As president-elect in November 2020, Mr. Biden and his staff proceeded with the transition process by treating Mr. Trump’s attempts to reverse the election as little more than histrionics.

The calculation made back then by Mr. Biden and his advisers was that America was simply ready to move on, but on Thursday, the president was more willing than usual to address Mr. Trump’s claims, calling him a loser in the process.

“He’s not just a former president. He’s a defeated former president — defeated by a margin of over 7 million of your votes in a full and free and fair election,” Mr. Biden said. “There is simply zero proof the election results were inaccurate.”

His remarks set him down a more confrontational path with Mr. Trump, who holds a firm grip on his party and shows no sign of backing down from continuing to perpetrate a false narrative about the 2020 election. It is a development Mr. Biden spent his first year in office avoiding, but one that he seemed to embrace as a matter of necessity on Thursday.

Biden rejects working with Republicans who support ‘the rule of a single man.’

On his Inauguration Day just under a year ago, Mr. Biden promised to be “a president for all Americans. I will fight as hard for those who did not support me as for those who did.” On Thursday, he appeared not as the peacemaker president but as a leader who had a warning for Americans who attacked the Capitol in service of Mr. Trump.

“I did not seek this fight brought to this Capitol one year ago today, but I will not shrink from it either,” Mr. Biden said. “I will stand in this breach. I will defend this nation. And I will allow no one to place a dagger at the throat of our democracy.”

Mr. Biden also reserved some of his ire for elected officials. For a leader who came into office speaking poetically about the art of bipartisanship — “politics is the art of the possible,” he said early on — and about the need to heal a fractured nation, Mr. Biden suggested that he was only interested in working with Republicans who have not tied their political fortunes to the falsehoods spread by Mr. Trump.

“While some courageous men and women in the Republican Party are standing against it, trying to uphold the principles of that party, too many others are transforming that party into something else,” Mr. Biden said. “But whatever my other disagreements are with Republicans who support the rule of law and not the rule of a single man, I will always seek to work together with them to find shared solutions where possible.”

Trump — and Trumpism — is not going away.

The president’s remarks presented a stark choice: “Are we going to be a nation that lives not by the light of the truth but in the shadow of lies?” In corners of the internet governed by Mr. Trump and his supporters, the answer seemed clear.

On a podcast hosted by Stephen K. Bannon, a former Trump aide who was indicted in November for failing to comply with congressional investigators, Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia deflected blame for the attack and suggested it was part of a government conspiracy.

In his own cascade of statements, Mr. Trump showed no sign that he was going to shrink from a fight. He assailed Mr. Biden for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, the troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, and even the way he delivered his Thursday remarks.

“He acts like he’s aggrieved,” Mr. Trump said in one of several statements, “but we’re the ones who were aggrieved, and America is suffering because of it.”

The Republican Party remains very much Mr. Trump’s, his lies about a stolen election a litmus test that he is seeking to impose on the 2022 primaries with the candidates he backs. He is the party’s most coveted endorser, its leading fund-raiser and the early front-runner in polling for the 2024 presidential nomination.

Mr. Trump has a rally scheduled in Arizona next week.

Republicans mostly tried to stay out of the spotlight.

Mr. Biden’s forceful condemnation of Mr. Trump was echoed by Democrats across the Capitol. Republicans were mostly absent.

Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, accompanied by her father, appeared to be the only elected Republican among dozens of lawmakers who gathered on the House floor on Thursday afternoon. Many Senate Republicans were out of town for the funeral of a former colleague.

Republicans were not totally silent. While calling last Jan. 6 “a dark day,” Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, said in a statement that it has “been stunning to see some Washington Democrats try to exploit this anniversary to advance partisan policy goals that long predated” the chaos at the capitol, a likely reference to a Democrat-led push for voting rights legislation.

Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who condemned the events of the day when they happened only to reverse course soon after, accused Democrats of politicizing the anniversary: “Their brazen attempts to use Jan. 6 to support radical election reform and changing the rules of the Senate to accomplish this goal will not succeed,” Mr. Graham said.

But there were some voices among unelected Republicans calling for something of a reckoning over the party’s support for Mr. Trump.

Karl Rove, the strategist who helped George W. Bush win the presidency twice, used his Wall Street Journal opinion column to rebuke “those Republicans who for a year have excused the actions of the rioters who stormed the Capitol, disrupted Congress as it received the Electoral College’s results and violently attempted to overturn the election.”