His pathetic whining now is just CYA, a sop to "moderates" who might disapprove of what Moscow Mitch did this past week. 

He's the most hateful politician of modern times.

Exactly.  Funny how an elected official can question constitutionality as a basis for acquittal when that same elected official had his hands on the lever of when that issue could be brought before a tribunal and decided not to pull said lever until after the president was out of power.  

Mitch is all kinds of awful.  The depths of his depravity have been, sadly, yet to be mined.  

[T.S. Eliot, "The Hollow Men"]

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Paul,

It has A LOT to do with Trump crimes on January 6th. 

A Law Enforcement Officer (LEO) was killed that day. 2 others committed suicide. 

This would have never happened that day if Trump did not incite his asshole supporters to riot. That's black and white.

And this is coming from the so-called  "Law & Order" president. The guy who backs the blue. I'm sure you remember the rallies he had for the police officers telling how much he loves the "boys in blue"?

Well, Trump show them much love Jan 6th.

43 senators turned into cowards yesterday. A few less than a year ago but they are still cowards.

Those 43 and Trump have blood on their hands.

So point 1: The House voted to impeach Trump for incitement.

The question then: was he guilty or not of incitement?

The question was not whether they had the right to try him or not. The Senate has no power to decide whether he is tried only to try him.

Point 3: McConnell explicitly states he think Trump is guilty. "There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day."

and 

"74 million Americans did not engineer the campaign of disinformation and rage that provoked it.

“One person did."

Point 4: McConnell also says "We are not free to work backward from whether the accused party might personally deserve some kind of punishment"

Correct. The senate is required to try whether he was guilty or not of insurrection, as directed by the House which has sole power of impeachment. Not work back from punishment .

Point 5: Considering whether he is in office or not and deciding that a conviction is moot because the punishment of removal of office would have no effect is expressly doing what McConnell says he is not free to do in point 4. That is, working backward from the punishment in order disregard his responsibility as the sole body charged with trying the impeachment charge.