January 6 Hearings Live

[lpetrich]

Linda Sarsour on Twitter: "Conservatives crying censorship now when they spent the last few years trying to cancel and silence progressives.

This image is from a rally they organized against me they titled “Cancel Sarsour.” One example of their hypocrisy & cognitive dissonance. * Yep, that’s Milo. (img link)" / Twitter
Milo Yiannopoulos


The New York Times on Twitter: "Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez suggested that more House Democrats were considering invoking the 14th Amendment to expel Republican lawmakers who had participated in efforts to subvert the results of the election. https://t.co/VzzHyFdoPz" / Twitter
noting
Presidential Transition Highlights: House Says It Will Move Swiftly With Impeachment if Pence Won’t Act - The New York Times

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is the latest House Democrat to suggest invoking Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which disqualifies elected officials who “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States.

The clause was originally enacted to limit the influence of former Confederates in the Reconstruction era. It has been used occasionally since.

Then Rep. Bill Pascrell last December and Rep. Cori Bush recently.
Bill Pascrell, Jr. on Twitter: "Section 3 of the 14th Amendment was written after the Civil War to bar from government any traitors who would seek to destroy the Union.

My letter to House leadership today demands that 126 Republicans (and counting) are violating the Constitution. (pix link)" / Twitter

 

[Worldtraveller]

CNN has a (almost continuously) updated list of people losing their jobs over this. Presumably, their information is being turned over the FBI as well.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/07/us/capitol-riots-people-fired-jobs-trnd/index.html

 

[lpetrich]

Nancy Pelosi on the riot at the Capitol, Congress's mandate under Joe Biden and the youth in the Democratic party - 60 Minutes - CBS News - "Days after her own office was ransacked by Trump supporters, the speaker of the House talks to Lesley Stahl about what she experienced that day and more."

Nancy Pelosi: Well, the-- when the protesters were making the assault on the Capitol-- before they even got to these doors, the Capitol Police pulled me from the podium and I was concerned because I said, "No, I want to be here." And they said, "Well, no, you have to leave." I said, "No, I'm not leaving." They said, "No, you must leave."

Police – guns drawn - held the invaders off the House floor, but over in the Senate, the Trump supporters were able to break into the chamber. The scenes were shocking to watch.

They smashed through the door of the Speaker's office suite, and broke into her office there, smashing a mirror and one of the invaders putting his feet on her desk. Her staffers cowered under a table in another room for 2 1/2 hours behind a door that they had barricaded with furniture.

After the invaders were driven out, the Congresspeople returned to the Capitol, and they returned to certifying the electoral votes.

Vice President Pence, who had been taken to a secure location in the Capitol, concurred with the decision to resume the count, amid reports that he was livid at the president.

Work dragged on until almost 4 a.m. as Republicans challenged certified election results.

Lesley Stahl: And they did that after the violence?

Nancy Pelosi: After the violence. Shame on them. And shame on-- two-thirds of the Republican caucus in the House supporting the-- so these people are enablers of the president's behavior. I remember when Republicans in the Senate went to see Richard Nixon and said, "It's over." That's what has to happen now.

 

[lpetrich]

Has her full appearance:
Trump should resign or be removed by 25th Amendment: Illinois Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger - ABC News - Rep. Ocasio-Cortez: Trump was a "clear and present danger," should be impeached.

Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Sunday that impeachment should "absolutely" be scheduled, while Republican Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger said he would "vote the right way" if it's presented, but that he doesn't think impeachment is "the smart move" right now.

"I think it victimizes Donald Trump again and I think there's a moment that we're in right now where Donald Trump, he's looking really, really bad," he told ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos. "I'll vote the right way, you know, if I'm presented with that. I just think it's probably not the smartest move right now, but I think that's going to be out of my hands."

Ocasio-Cortez said she backs impeachment.

"Our main priority is to ensure the removal of Donald Trump as president of the United States," she said in an earlier interview on "This Week" Sunday. "Every minute and every hour that he is in office represents a clear and present danger, not just to the United States Congress but frankly to the country."

"We're also talking about complete barring of the president -- or rather of Donald Trump -- from running for office ever again," she added. "And in addition to that the potential ability to prevent pardoning himself from those charges that he was impeached for."

 

[lpetrich]

Trying to delete the evidence:
ken olin on Twitter: "Hi Charlie. Why’d you delete this? https://t.co/x73KrzzPap" / Twitter

Charlie Kirk
@charliekirk11

This historic event will likely be one of the largest and most consequential in American history

The team at @TrumpStudents & Turning Point Action are honored to help make this happen, sending 80+ buses full of patriots to DC to fight for this president

Moni1440 on Twitter: "@kenolin1 Ginni Thomas the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas is on Turning Points advisory council. She was an inciter who funded the buses. WTF https://t.co/pfKmVwVXd6" / Twitter

Lois Beckett on Twitter: "“If you’ve ever stayed up way too late trying to find your ex’s wedding pictures on Instagram, you can dox a Nazi. It’s the same skill set.” https://t.co/dY7iJithHv" / Twitter
noting
Left-wing sleuths seek out and publish the identities of the violent far-right - The Washington Post

For a nationwide network of left-wing activists who seek out and publish the identities of those they believe to be violent “fascists,” some investigations can take months, years even.

Or it can take 10 minutes.

That’s how much time Molly Conger spent on her laptop last month searching for the man who used the right-wing social media site Parler to share that he was a police officer and pledge support to a member of the Proud Boys extremist group, advocating violence against Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr..

 

[lpetrich]

These right-wing militias evoke similar militias in the early 20th cy. with favorite shirt colors:  Blackshirts (the Italian Fascists),  Sturmabteilung (SA, the brown-shirted "Storm Detachments" of the early Nazis), and lots of others.

Their colors: gray, black, red, brown, yellow, green, blue

Paul Gosar on Twitter: "Biden should concede. I want his concession on my desk tomorrow morning. Don’t make me come over there. #StopTheSteaI2021 @ali (pic link)" / Twitter
Showing that huge Trump-rally gathering in the Mall

Mike Siegel on Twitter: "WHERE WERE YOUR POLICE ON JANUARY 6?

Cops from around the country backed the attempted coup.

Now’s the time for a national reckoning with “Blue Lives Matter” and its authoritarian, anti-democratic underpinnings.

A thread of officers ID'd so far (let me know if you find more):" / Twitter


Sam Sanders: 'This Isn't America'? The Lie We Have To Confront To Get To Truth : NPR

There is a lie some Americans tell themselves when America is on its worst behavior: "This isn't America!" or "This isn't who we are!" or "We're better than this!"

You heard versions of this lie again this past week after armed insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol on urging from President Trump, attempting to undo the results of last November's election.

Even in the halls of Congress, after the broken glass was cleared and U.S. senators and representatives were allowed back into their chambers from undisclosed locations, Republican Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska came back to this refrain: "Our kids need to know that this isn't what America is."

 

[lpetrich]

Ronald Brownstein on Twitter: ""In the days before the attack that appalled the world and resulted in five deaths, @marcorubio made no public effort to counter what he now calls a lie pushed by politicians he didn’t name." https://t.co/KlrisxEw9v" / Twitter
noting
Rubio was silent on Pence’s election role until after riot | Miami Herald

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said Friday in a video that the people who stormed the U.S. Capitol were “lied to by politicians who were telling them that the vice president had the power to change the election results.”

But in the days before the attack that appalled the world and resulted in five deaths, Rubio made no public effort to counter what he now calls a lie pushed by politicians he didn’t name. Nor would he talk when asked this week about a last-ditch attempt by his fellow Senate Republicans to overturn the election by blocking President-elect Joe Biden’s formal certification, though he later voted against it.

And he said nothing when, hours before the riot, President Donald Trump tweeted as riled-up caravans of his supporters headed to Washington that “if Vice President Mike Pence comes through for us, we will win the presidency.”

How sleazy and dishonest.

 

[lpetrich]

Randi Mayem Singer on Twitter: "Do people not realize how lucky we are that *more* officers weren't killed? That no Congress members, Senators or staff were killed? We were seconds away from it being ten times worse. This. Cannot. Stand." / Twitter
noting
Jared Pushner on Twitter: "TRIGGER WARNING: This video shows Donald Trump supporters dragging a police officer down the steps and beating him to death. Dozens of people appear to be involved. Horrifying. https://t.co/upyM0o5Ee3" / Twitter


Michael Tracey on Twitter: "It absolutely is absurd melodrama to claim, as AOC did, that half of Congress barely avoided being executed en masse" / Twitter
then
Jordan on Twitter: "Right on cue @mtracey minimizing domestic terrorists trying to overturn an election by force with bullshit semantics. https://t.co/txiZYgiS3R" / Twitter

 

[lpetrich]

Susan Simpson on Twitter: "@hudeatsbugs @igorbobic The officer initially scopes out the door, sees it's not guarded, and tries to block the way. More rioters pour up the stairs after them, and the officer seems to go with a new strategy – he shoves the first rioter, pissing him off, and then leads the whole mob the other way. (pix link)" / Twitter
then
Pamela Colloff on Twitter: "I did not fully grasp what was happening in this footage when I first saw it. Now it seems clear that this officer tricked the mob away from the unguarded door to the Senate, using himself—a Black man—as the bait. He is a national hero. And lucky to be alive." / Twitter


Marco Rubio on Twitter: "Biden has a historic opportunity to unify America behind the sentiment that our political divisions have gone too far

But instead he decided to promote the left’s efforts to use this terrible national tragedy to try and crush conservatives or anyone not anti-Trump enough" / Twitter
So he likes being called "Little Marco"?

Fred Guttenberg on Twitter: "Shut the fuck up @marcorubio. Not this time. You are responsible. You want unity? Acknowledge the big lie, demand Trump and your colleagues who enabled him resign, you included. Until then, YOU SPEAK FOR NOBODY!!!" / Twitter


John Scott-Railton on Twitter: "NEW FOOTAGE: a long, disciplined line of men in body armor moves as a unit up the #CapitolBuilding steps.

We need to identify this group.

Grateful to @lehudgins for the find. Source: (Instagram, pic links)" / Twitter
That's serious. There were some quasi-professionals among that mob, a lot more than the two zip-tie military-clothed men. I estimated about 8 or so men in that line.


Jennifer Moore on Twitter: "One of Parler’s founders, Rebecca Mercer, is daughter of a hedge-fund manager who @JaneMayerNYer wrote about nearly 4 years ago. It was quite a read at the time to learn how much $ and influence Mercer had over 45’s successful run for office. (link to New Yorker article)" / Twitter

So he was in the pay of a right-wing oligarch. Some "populist". This despite arguments like Trump advisor: The wealthy can't be corrupt because they're wealthy - presumably because they have all the wealth that they could want.

 

[lpetrich]

CNN Politics on Twitter: "January 6 will go down as the day America realized how dangerous President Trump really is | Analysis (links)" / Twitter
then
Ilhan Omar on Twitter: "Raise your hand if you realized before January 6th." / Twitter

Joshua Holland on Twitter: "
In ‘16, when Trump lost the IA Caucus, he accused Ted Cruz of stealing it.
When he won the election but lost the pop vote, he claimed fraud.
He started to claim that 2020 was rigged a year before the vote.
There’s no excuse for hiding behind that ‘just asking questions’ BS.
" / Twitter

David Atkins on Twitter: "The most innocent possible explanation for the lack of National Guard presence is that they terrified of being accused of being big government authoritarians by the Trumpist seditious militia.

Stop caring what fake-populist fascists say about you and protect democracy. (pic link)" / Twitter


Manu Raju on Twitter: "Roy Blunt calls Trump’s actions “clearly reckless.” But he says on CBS he won’t call on Trump to resign. “My view is what the president should do is finish the last 10 days of his presidency ... The president touched the hot stone on Wednesday and is unlikely to touch it again.”" / Twitter
noting
John Neffinger on Twitter: "Blunt joins Susan Collins in the "He's definitely learned his lesson THIS time so we don't have to do our jobs" caucus." / Twitter
Making excuses for him yet again.


Andrew Krystal on Twitter: "Need to ask @Scaramucci Was the #Capitol riot a Kristallnacht or a Munich Putsch ? #Scaramucci #CapitolRiot #RemoveTrump #TrumpTwitterBan #ImpeachTrumpAgain" / Twitter
then
Anthony Scaramucci on Twitter: "I see it more like Munich 1924. Failed coup with the fight just getting started. I pray that business leaders will take this as seriously as Amazon Google and Stripe. Political leader don’t seem to have the courage here. Trump needs to be jailed with his accomplices. Immediately." / Twitter

 

[lpetrich]

Republicans for Joe Biden on Twitter: "Former Republican Governor of NJ ,Chris Christie, is calling for the impeachment of Donald Trump. (video link)" / Twitter

Shimon Prokupecz on Twitter: "This is a pretty big fact that would show extensive coordination: outgoing Capitol police Sund said he now suspects that the pipe bombs were an intentional effort to draw officers away from the Capitol perimeter. (link)" / Twitter
noting
Outgoing Capitol Police chief: House, Senate security officials hamstrung efforts to call in National Guard - The Washington Post

As Trump leaves office weakened, Republicans wonder if his wounds are fatal - The Washington Post - his political wounds

 

[lpetrich]

Rep. Maxine Waters Speaks Amid Today's Attack on the U.S. Capitol

Well, let me tell you, I suspected that something like this would take place, and I talked with the chief of police here at the Capitol about what the security plans were. And the chief of police assured me that they would not even get on the plaza, let alone get in the Capitol. And I must have asked him 30 or 40 questions about how he was going to secure the Capitol and how would he know which of these organizations would be here. I mentioned to him that the Proud Boys were in town and the Oath Keepers were in town and white supremacists were in town, and he assured me that not only did they have it under control they were working in cooperation with the Metropolitan police of DC. And all of that has turned out to be untrue that they really had it taken care of.

This is an absolutely incredible occurrence here in the United States Capitol where these anarchists are basically taking over our chamber and our statuary hall and the Senate floor. They’re all over the place, breaking the windows, and I saw one scene where they were trying to bring down the American flag and trying to hoist the Trump flag on top of the Capitol.

...
It is not only about the safety of the Capitol and the workers. As chair of the Financial Services Committee I can tell you the markets cannot take uncertainty, they cannot take this kind of disruption. This is not good for our economy. This is not good for our relationships with other countries. This is not good for the stability of the dollar. Everybody is at risk.

At the very least, there was some terrible miscommunication somewhere. What was going on?

Mary L Trump on Twitter: "People like Donald and Cruz and Hawley and Brooks and McCarthy have no shame or decency or dignity. It is pointless to call on them to resign and they shouldn’t have the option. Impeach/convict, censure/expel. We cannot blow this—everything is at stake." / Twitter

 

[lpetrich]

Ayanna Pressley on Twitter: ".@PramilaJayapal got it right. (video link)" / Twitter
About how some Michigan anti-lockdown protesters showed up with guns and got away with confronting cops.

BrooklynDad_Defiant! on Twitter: "Lauren Boebert needs to be expelled from Congress and prosecuted for her role in inciting sedition and live tweeting Speaker Pelosi's location during the attack.

That is despicable." / Twitter

Cori Bush on Twitter: "Tomorrow, I’m introducing my resolution to expel the members of Congress who tried to overturn the election and incited a white supremacist coup attempt that has left people dead. They have violated the 14th Amendment.

We can’t have unity without accountability." / Twitter

Julia Ioffe on Twitter: "Look, I'm from the former Soviet Union. ..." / Twitter

Look, I'm from the former Soviet Union. One of the reasons Putin, an alumnus of the KGB, the agency that committed some of the worst atrocities of the 20th century, came to power in 2000 and stayed is that people wanted unity rather than accountability. Chew on that.

NB: There were discussions after the fall of the Soviet Union to hold a tribunal, similar to the Nuremberg Trials, to hold members of the NKVD (as the KGB was previously known) to account for their crimes. There were also talk of lustration. In the end, it was decided that, in the face of a massive economic crisis and a country that seemed to be splitting apart, it was better to turn the page and not pick the scabs of the country's historical trauma, not to dwell on the things that pitted Russian against Russian.

By 2000, nine years after the fall of the USSR, a KGB man was elected president. You might know him as Vladimir Putin.

The US made a similar mistake in the late 19th cy., by wimping out on helping Southern blacks and letting white supremacists terrorize them into submission.

 

[lpetrich]

House lawmakers may have been exposed to Covid-19 during Capitol riot | Coronavirus | The Guardian - Pramila Jayapal mentioned this

Some lawmakers and staff were furious after video surfaced of Republicans not wearing their masks in the room during lockdown.

Newly elected Georgia representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a presidential ally aligned with the pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy theory, was among those Republicans not wearing masks.

How a Toronto researcher is helping to identify those who attacked U.S. Capitol | The Star

Since Wednesday’s deadly attack in Washington, D.C., Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs, has been trying to identify members of the mob that briefly paralyzed American government.

To do so he’s scouring images and video taken that day, and using photo enhancement techniques, facial recognition software, and tips crowdsourced through social media. So far his requests for help on Twitter have generated thousands of responses, and as of Sunday had led to two positive identifications. Scott-Railton says he’s closing in on more.

Alex Roarty on Twitter: "“You always think that evil is going to come from movie villain evil, and then you’re like — oh no, evil can just start with bad jokes and nihilistic behavior that is fueled by positive reinforcement on various platforms.” https://t.co/2EvVwPOgwb" / Twitter
noting
We Worked Together on the Internet. Last Week, He Stormed the Capitol. - The New York Times

 

[Patooka]

A very disturbing interview with new elected Republican congressman Peter Meijer. A few key callouts:

"One of the saddest things is I had colleagues who, when it came time to recognize reality and vote to certify Arizona and Pennsylvania in the Electoral College, they knew in their heart of hearts that they should've voted to certify, but some had legitimate concerns about the safety of their families. They felt that that vote would put their families in danger," said Meijer.

And I talked to a number of folks who believed that. And they believed that because they were being told that, right? They were being lied to. They were being misled. Some of my colleagues in Congress, they share responsibility for that. Many of them were fundraising off of this Stop the Steal grift. I don't understand how you can look in the mirror and go to sleep at night without that weighing on your conscience, I fundamentally do not. I'm just at a loss for words about how some of them have acted in ways that are just knowingly, provably false. And they know they're lying too.

But what to me was the most bewildering was folks giving speeches that were written that morning as if we weren't in a body that had windows broken in just a few hours earlier, law enforcement drawing weapons. As if a woman hadn't been shot and killed 100 feet from where they stood, right? There was still dried blood out there. And they were giving the exact same speeches, the exact same arguments, telling what they thought their people wanted to hear rather than telling them what they needed to hear.

 

[lpetrich]

Ryan Grim on Twitter: "The planning for the January 16 and 17 militia events in DC is quite specific. They want at least 15k people and if they achieve that they plan to block Democrats from entering the Capitol, allowing only Republicans through. Here’s where they plan to meet https://t.co/yh0BcMO1DJ" / Twitter
That's Saturday and Sunday. Why those days?

They'd have to also block the office buildings, since it's possible to enter the Capitol through tunnels from those buildings.

Samantha Barker on Twitter: "@P1thyparty @ryangrim Maybe they would understand the difference between electric and electors or college and collage or at least learn to copy from a tweet the word S-T-E-A-L! https://t.co/xhG6jJGNTi" / Twitter - "Stop the Steel" and "Stop the Electric Collage"

Rioters Who Stormed The Capitol Are Losing Their Jobs

Attorney, professor, and real estate agent lose their jobs after being exposed as Capitol rioters
Libby Andrews exposed herself by bragging about 'storming' the Capitol in a Facebook post.

,,,
Attorney Paul Davis is just one of the rioters who has since lost their job. Davis had shared video of himself inside the Capitol to his Instagram account.

Attention was brought to Davis' actions after a Twitter user tagged his employer, Goosehead Insurance, in a tweet containing the footage.

...
Rick Saccone, a former Pennsylvania state representative, resigned from his job after posting images of himself on Facebook at the Capitol riot.

Saccone had worked as an adjunct professor at Saint Vince College and seemingly stepped down after the school began an investigation.

...
Chicago-based real estate agent Libby Andrews was also fired after admitting to participating in the riot. Andrews, according to Wonkette, shared a Facebook post of her glass of champagne while bragging about "storming" the Capitol.

It's remarkable how many upper-middle-class people had participated in that Capitol attack. A lot of them are various sorts of professionals. Many of them had traveled a long way to that attack.

 

[lpetrich]

The Man Who Saw Yesterday’s Coup Attempt Coming Is Only Surprised It Wasn’t Much Worse | GQ

Arieh Kovler knew. “On January 6, armed Trumpist militias will be rallying in DC, at Trump's orders,” he wrote on Twitter on December 21st. “It's highly likely that they'll try to storm the Capitol after it certifies Joe Biden's win. I don't think this has sunk in yet.” It sank in for the rest of us yesterday, when Trumpist militias stormed the capitol. If Arieh Kovler knew, why didn’t everyone else?

He tried to notify Capitol Police, without any success.

Scarier still is how much worse Wednesday could have gone. Kovler wondered if one way the protesters might swing the election in Trump’s favor was by “forcing Congress to certify him as the winner at gunpoint,” he wrote in the original Twitter thread from December. This wasn’t baseless theorizing, either—it, too, came from online posting visible to anyone who bothered to look. “They imagined that this was the day there were going to be mass executions of Congressmen,” Kovler said. So while DC police assert there was “no intelligence that suggests that there would be a breach of the US Capitol,” Kovler is just surprised it wasn’t much worse.

It wasn't as big an event as they wanted.

They didn't have as many guns. ... And that's how these guys were able to march in. I actually feel like, if they were armed, it would have triggered a more severe response.

...
A lot of these people were there for the ride. I think that had things gotten more violent, there would have been a lot of people who would be very willing to go along with it. I think that ultimately the police successfully kept elected officials out of the hands of these people.

...
Yeah. I don't understand how things went as badly as they did. My only thought is that they were maybe expecting people to be more armed and when they didn't see a bunch of people carrying AR-15s they thought, “Aw, that's all right, it's just a normal protest,” and then failed to understand the gravity of the situation. But this was absolutely predictable.

...
(interviewer)
'm also almost surprised to hear that they sort of were mapping out these pretty specific plans or fantasies, because it does seem that when a lot of them got into the Capitol Building, they didn't really know what to do. They went up on the dais, someone stole a podium, they trashed some offices. But it didn't appear that there was a coherent plan that had been worked out for weeks.

(AK)
That's right. When all these people were talking about their contingencies, it was always if and when Trump tells us to. The overriding message I was seeing was, "We're here to do a job, we don't know what that job is yet. When Trump said we're going to go to the Capitol, I guess our job is to go to the Capitol." But then they didn't get any further instructions, so there was a moment of, "Okay, now what? Surely this isn't why Trump called us to DC, we don't get it. This was where he was supposed to unveil the evidence, or arrest the plotters, or reveal that China is behind it." And then none of this happened.

 

[lpetrich]

Lucas Brown Eyes on Twitter: "They are trying to slap a Native man with 17 years in prison for supposedly grabbing a police shield during the Black Hills protest. This guy is taking pictures with one. (pic link)" / Twitter
Looks like that NYC conservative in furs.

John Holland on Twitter: "Hahaha. #Republican terrorist put on the no fly list. (vid link)" / Twitter

E.J. Montini on Twitter: "Arizona Reps. Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar implicated by activist in Capitol insurrection (link) via @azcentral" / Twitter
noting
Reps. Andy Biggs & Paul Gosar implicated in Capitol insurrection


Parlertakes on Twitter: "RIP PARLER. Update from John Matze. (img link)" / Twitter

I wanted to send everyone on Parler an update. We will likely be down longer than expected. This is not due to software restrictions-we have our software and everyone's data ready to go. Rather it's that Amazon's, Google's and Apple's statements to the press about dropping our access has caused most of our other vendors to drop their support for us as well. And most people with enough servers to host us have shut their doors to us. We will update everyone and update the press when we are back online.

Parler is my final stand on the Internet. I won't be making an account on any social. Parler is my home. See you all soon (hand clap)

 

[lpetrich]

This is ugly.
Max Burns on Twitter: "It is quickly becoming clear ..." / Twitter

It is quickly becoming clear that senior figures in our government--and in the White House--not only supported the idea and goals of the January 6 terrorists, but provided material support, funding, and operational intelligence.

It got as far as holding the Guard in barracks.

The State Department has condemned foreign coups where strongman regimes kept their armies in barracks while inflicting violence on their political opponents. We correctly call them attacks on the rule of law itself.

THAT is what President Trump wanted, and why he must go. That Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz cynically cheerled this insurrection is true. It also pales in severity to a public effort by the President of the United States to terrorize his own government into violating the Constitution.

Follow the thread on the National Guard story. Trump's power is in freefall--chasing down the leads and getting people to talk shouldn't be hard.

This is a Truth and Reconciliatiion Committee-level attack on democracy such as our country has never experienced before.

The clearing out of the Pentagon and its filling with Trump loyalists now appears in much darker and more calculated terms. It was that Pentagon that prohibited the D.C. Guard from carrying weapons during the protests. It is that Pentagon that refused repeated requests for help. Donald Trump decided for his own reasons to test the limits of his power, both official (through his remaining loyalists in the Pentagon) and the unofficial (through the paramilitary he unleashed on the Congress he despises.)

We cut out the cancer now or it grows out of control. So I hope you'll consider sharing this thread with your members of Congress, and amplifying it to those you think need to hear this. The time for action is now, and our nation will be measured by the decisions we make over the next 48 hours. Thank you for providing the visual aids!

I will simply add that reports from the NYTimes and WaPo that detail an increasingly contained Trump--an internal attempt to "25th" him without formally doing so--indicates at least a few key WH officials are trying to put obstructions between Trump and power. That's telling. If even some senior WH officials are concerned enough about the president's involvement in this terrorist attack that they are working around him, there is likely broader @GOP support for removal than is currently being publicly expressed.

These insurrectionists built a gallows in front of the Capitol. They kicked in the doors of a federal building. They had zip-ties. They had guns. They had explosives.

We must be clear-eyed about exactly what Donald Trump incited Americans to do, even if that hurts. These terrorists wanted to hang Mike Pence just as much as they wanted to hang @AOC. They faced no meaningful resistance because the White House actively prevented the National Guard from entering.

This was an attack on all of us, for the benefit of one man.

Seems like Trump's Pentagon loyalists were very convenient for him, until they were overridden by Mike Pence.

 

[fromderinside]

Trump tends to say what makes him happy. Unfortunately saying thus tends to make Trump look as if he is planning something. He is, but not really. His intentions are to look kgood to those who follow him rather than have those who follow him execute some sort of systematic agenda.

That is where looking and doing diverge. He inflates him self by wishing out loud for his sycophant's for to be his faerie princess. His is a voiced faerie tail and not a general leading his troops.

Yes there are consequences, bad consequences, but not intentionally commanded consequences. Those lie in the actors who will carry out his wish. They equip themselves, They build capabilities to carry out their intentions and bring them to the place he speaks. Then they use his wishes to act out. Its all the development of capabilities, self wishes, to execute dreams.

All must be punished since their preparations and which expressions lead to something horrific. But they must be punished as would one would do in a monstrous game rather than as criminals acting on a plan.

Yes he is unfit for office. So disqualify him as would a gamer be disqualified by those who in positions of authority, participated. Do so through the 25th amendment.

After all it is those who were in position to constrain him who didn't. Now they must enforce sanctions and flagellate themselves publicly. If those close to him don't act then those who hold power in the system he infected must be pulled forward to act. The light of public sanction must be carried by those who are responsible and held up proudly in this process.

This is what the country must expect from it's leaders.

Democrats must come forward and admit they pushed aside rather than surveilled and monitored. Republicans must stand up and admit they chose to use a known crazy person and the garbage he carried to influence the unhappy in their quest for stuff. They must point out where they failed to lead, to educate those they deceived by chanting all the measures government exercised to lay waste to their claims of fraud. their deceit, their systematic monstrous lie.

I'm not sure its in our nature to doe these things. I am sure that children should have their educations changed so they have the tools to carry out the basic operations of truth finding from published law and data. We must remove blinders to governance that permits ones to deceive others out of presumed and accepted ignorance.