January 6 Hearings Live

[lpetrich]

Staff would quit if Fox News warned white supremacist terrorism is a dire threat: Tucker Carlson - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism

Congress should censure Marjorie Taylor Greene so she has 'the stink of living death' on her career: columnist - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism
She also deserves to be kicked off of her committees, like the Education and Labor Committee.

QAnon congresswoman suggests 75 million Americans will be ‘canceled’ if Republicans stand up to her - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism

Controversial Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) on Friday refused to take personal responsibility for her past conspiracy theories, including the absurd idea that the California wildfires were started by a giant laser in space.

Shortly after she was blasted by the Republican Jewish Coalition for anti-Semitism, Greene released a defiant statement.

She directed her statement to "the radical, left-wing Democrat (sic) mob and the fake news media trying to take me out."

Jewish Republicans ‘offended and appalled’ by anti-Semitic QAnon congresswoman - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism
noting
RJC Statement on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene - Republican Jewish Coalition

The RJC took the unusual step of supporting a primary opponent for her last year.

 

[lpetrich]

New 'Treason Caucus' campaign targets Cruz, Hawley, and others for role in deadly Capitol insurrection - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism

Demands for accountability ramped up on Friday as the progressive organization MoveOn Civic Action launched a "Treason Caucus" campaign calling on Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas to resign or be expelled from office for his role in helping to incite the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6.

Horrifying video shows woman's last moments as she's trampled by Capitol rioters - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism
She traveled from Georgia with a friend, and she was carrying a Gadsden flag that shows a rattlesnake with a caption, "Don't Tread On Me".

Body Camera Footage Shows Capitol Rioters Trampling Over Woman - The New York Times - "Video obtained by The Times provides a police officer’s view of the deadly battle to defend a key entryway from the surging mob."

An arcane section of the 14th Amendment could cause serious trouble for Trump - Raw Story - Celebrating 16 Years of Independent Journalism

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment was created to tackle a different problem related to the Civil War: insurrection.

It prohibits current or former military officers, along with many current and former federal and state public officials, from serving in a variety of government offices if they “shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion" against the United States Constitution.

This section was created after the Civil War as part of the 14th Amendment to bar military officers and civil officials who joined the Confederacy from serving in government again.

I've seen mention of Section 3 elsewhere.

 

[lpetrich]

Mainstream Republicans already surrendering to Trumpism - "From opposing conviction in his impeachment trial to a surprise Senate Republican retirement, the GOP establishment anticipates a Trumpian future."

Senate Republicans are now finding reasons not to convict Trump in next month’s Senate impeachment trial (all but five voted Tuesday to dismiss it as unconstitutional), as they absorb polling showing Republican voters still sticking with the former president. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has gone wishy-washy in his support of leadership partner Liz Cheney, one of the 10 House Republicans to vote for impeachment. Most of those 10 lawmakers who stood up for democratic values are facing the likelihood of tough primaries next year. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, a likely 2024 presidential contender, is a telling bellwether for this political moment. The day after the attack, she said Trump would be “judged harshly by history.” As the political winds shifted, she went on Fox News to rail against Trump’s impeachment, calling on Democrats “to give the man a break.”

What excuse-making. But all too typical. Nikki Haley, South Carolina Governor, Selected As Trump's U.N. Ambassador : The Two-Way : NPR during a Marco Rubio event during the primaries, she stated that "Donald Trump is everything I taught my children not to do in kindergarten."

He's R-OH

Sen. Rob Portman’s surprising retirement announcement Monday, despite previously indicating plans to run for reelection, put the capstone on the GOP’s acquiescence to Trumpism. While Portman cited partisan gridlock as driving his decision, the reality is that his bipartisan instincts and genial tone were increasingly out of step in a party defined by grievance.

 

[lpetrich]

Marjorie Taylor Greene and the QAnon theories surrounding her social media posts, explained - Vox
noting Speaker Nancy Pelosi on MTG:
CSPAN on Twitter: ".@SpeakerPelosi on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene: "Assigning her to the Education Committee, when she has mocked the killing of little children...what could they be thinking?!? Or is thinking too generous a word for what they might be doing? It's absolutely appalling." https://t.co/LtHtA4l6C1" / Twitter

Greene, a first-term Congress member representing a district in northwest Georgia, was widely criticized during her campaign for Facebook posts featuring photoshopped images of Democratic women of color alongside images of her holding a rifle. One of her fundraising messages said, “we’re going to kick that bitch [Pelosi] out of Congress.” She suggested Muslims shouldn’t be allowed in government and spread anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about billionaire George Soros.

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s space laser and the age-old problem of blaming the Jews - Vox

Let’s get this out of the way: First-term Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s claim that the 2018 California wildfires were ignited by a space laser controlled by a corporate cabal, including the Rothschild banking firm, is objectively ridiculous. It’s okay to laugh about it.

And yet it is, at the same time, kind of horrifying. It’s the latest in a long line of conspiracies about the Rothschild family, and those conspiracies are always, at root, anti-Semitic: Since the 19th century, people have used claims that this one particular wealthy family controls the world to cast aspersions on Jews in general.

Nor is this an isolated anti-Semitic incident for Greene. In December 2018, she shared a video on her Facebook page, which features a prominent British anti-Semite explaining that “Zionist supremacists have schemed to promote immigration and miscegenation.” This is a conspiracy theory that seemingly motivated the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter’s rampage in October 2018, less than two months before Greene’s post. Despite concrete evidence that these ideas were endangering American Jews, Greene chose to spread them anyway.

I once created a thread on Conservatives against Capitalism?
I noted that the Right has generally been much less successful in taming capitalism than the Left. It sometimes seems that right-wingers find it hard to object to nasty capitalists unless they can convince themselves that those capitalists are Jews or globalists or whatever villains.

Right-wing conspiracy theories go back a long way. Like the John Birch Society around 1960, with its conspiracy theories about Communists everywhere, like President Eisenhower having been a Communist.

 

[lpetrich]

Right-wingers had plenty of conspiracy theories about Clinton and Obama, but they got especially big on such theories in the Trump years.

And in any climate where conspiratorial thinking is prominent, Jews will inevitably become the target. In the polluted right-wing media ecosystem, where conspiracy theories are omnipresent, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists will have an easier time getting a hearing for their ideas. One way or another, ideas from the fringe right slip into conservative media outlets like Fox News and, from there, straight into GOP legislators’ ears.

The result is an increasing presence of and tolerance for right-wing anti-Semitism in American public discourse. Notions like assigning blame to wealthy Jews like George Soros for non-white immigration, an idea that has its origins on the far-right anti-Semitic fringe, are not only acceptable but echoed by Republicans at the higher level.

There is no parallel phenomenon on the American left, which is much more careful both about both its epistemic hygiene and rhetoric that could offend historically marginalized groups. There is a reason that Omar apologized for her comments and faced backlash from party leadership while Greene is blaming the media and being given prestigious committee assignments (though the Republican Jewish Coalition has criticized her).

Here is another source that agrees with this assessment of the Left having more rationality and skepticism than the Right:
Inside the Macedonian Fake-News Complex | WIRED - 2.15.17 - about some young men of Veles, North Macedonia, who ran some fake-news operations.

For a week in July, he experimented with fake news extolling Bernie Sanders. “Bernie Sanders supporters are among the smartest people I’ve seen,” he says. “They don’t believe anything. The post must have proof for them to believe it.”

He wasn't very successful with that, so he quit.

 

[lpetrich]

Epistemic hygiene? Epistemic Hygiene - LessWrong and What epistemic hygiene norms should there be? - LessWrong were the first two hits at Google.

LessWrong has its own wiki, with Epistemic hygiene - Lesswrongwiki

Epistemic hygiene consists of practices meant to allow accurate beliefs to spread within a community and keep less accurate or biased beliefs contained. The practices are meant to serve an analogous purpose to normal hygiene and sanitation in containing disease. "Good cognitive citizenship" is another phrase that has been proposed for this concept

The 10 Commandments of Critical Thinking According to Bertrand Russell – Wabisabi Learning - another statement of epistemic hygiene

I'm not saying that the Left is perfect. There are lots of left-wing anti-vaxxers, for instance. But no big-name left-wing politician supports them. AOC posting video of herself getting vaccinated is the opposite of the anti-vaxxers.

 

[lpetrich]

FBI finds evidence of coordination at Capitol riot - The Washington Post

When die-hard supporters of President Donald Trump showed up at rally point “Cowboy” in Louisville on the morning of Jan. 5, they found the shopping mall’s parking lot was closed to cars, so they assembled their 50 or so vehicles outside a nearby Kohl’s department store. Hundreds of miles away in Columbia, S.C., at a mall designated rally point “Rebel,” other Trump supporters gathered to form another caravan to Washington. A similar meetup — dubbed “Minuteman” — was planned for Springfield, Mass.

That same day, FBI personnel in Norfolk were increasingly alarmed by the online conversations they were seeing, including warlike talk around the convoys headed to the nation’s capital. One map posted online described the rally points, declaring them a “MAGA Cavalry To Connect Patriot Caravans to StopTheSteal in D.C.” Another map showed the U.S. Congress, indicating tunnels connecting different parts of the complex. The map was headlined, “CREATE PERIMETER,” according to the FBI report, which was reviewed by The Washington Post.

“Be ready to fight. Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in,” read one posting, according to the report.

Notice that the attackers came from all over the US. I notice that whoever was following them in the White House does not seem to have tried to discourage them.

For instance,

Video and court filings, for instance, describe how several groups of men that include alleged members of the Proud Boys appear to engage in concerted action, converging on the West Front of the Capitol just before 1 p.m., near the Peace Monument at First Street NW and Pennsylvania Avenue NW. Different factions of the crowd appear to coalesce, move forward and chant under the direction of different leaders before charging at startled police staffing a pedestrian gate, all in the matter of a few minutes.

 

[lpetrich]

Self-styled militia members planned Capitol storming in advance of Jan. 6 - The Washington Post

Self-styled militia members from Virginia, Ohio and other states made plans to storm the U.S. Capitol days in advance of the Jan. 6 attack, and then communicated in real time as they breached the building on opposite sides and talked about hunting for lawmakers, according to court documents filed Tuesday.

While authorities have charged more than 100 individuals in the riot, details in the new allegations against three U.S. military veterans offer a disturbing look at what they allegedly said to one another before, during and after the attack — statements that indicate a degree of preparation and determination to rush deep into the halls and tunnels of Congress to make “citizens’ arrests” of elected officials.

Was Trump following any of this? Anyone in the White House?

FBI report warned of 'war' at Capitol, contradicting claims there was no indication of looming violence - The Washington Post - I may have posted on it earlier.

Proud Boys Charged With Conspiracy in Capitol Riot - The New York Times

In an indictment filed in federal court in Washington, prosecutors charged the two Proud Boys, Dominic Pezzola, of Rochester, N.Y., and William Pepe, of Beacon, N.Y., with 11 counts, including conspiracy, assaulting an officer and civil disorder. Both Mr. Pezzola, a former boxer and Marine, and Mr. Pepe, an employee of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, were already facing lesser charges connected to the Capitol attack, which followed a Jan. 6 rally in support of President Donald J. Trump.

While more than 170 people have been charged in the deadly assault on the Capitol, most have been accused of relatively minor crimes like disorderly conduct and unlawful entry. The only other serious conspiracy charges in the inquiry have been brought against three members of the militia group the Oath Keepers, who are accused of organizing since a week after the November election to stop the certification of the vote.

 

[lpetrich]

'Blame Trump' defense emerges among Capitol riot suspects - YouTube
"CNN legal analyst Paul Callan says that he expects more people arrested for participating in the deadly riot at the US Capitol to employ a "blame Trump" defense to limit bail or jail time, but says that it likely won't work."

Publix heiress gave ‘lion’s share’ of money for Jan. 6 rally before Capitol riots, newspaper reports
noting
Jan. 6 Rally Funded by Top Trump Donor, Helped by Alex Jones, Organizers Say - WSJ - "Publix Super Markets heiress donated about $300,000 to the Ellipse event; far-right show host pledged seed money, organizers say"


Marjorie Taylor Greene claims Trump's backing amid intra-GOP debate over her fitness to serve - POLITICO - "The purported endorsement comes after the former president met with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy."

Utah’s Mitt Romney, the lone Republican senator to vote to convict Trump last year, laid into the pair on Twitter on Saturday.

“Lies of a feather flock together: Marjorie Taylor Greene’s nonsense and the 'big lie' of a stolen election,” Romney wrote.

Smerconish: Who elected Marjorie Taylor Greene? - YouTube - "CNN's Michael Smerconish says the behavior of Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene before and after getting elected is a greatest hits reel of truly deplorable conduct and examines how the lawmaker was elected. Dr. John Cowan, who lost a Georgia primary runoff to Marjorie Taylor Greene, shares his thoughts on the controversial congresswoman."

 

[Angry Floof]

'Blame Trump' defense emerges among Capitol riot suspects - YouTube
"CNN legal analyst Paul Callan says that he expects more people arrested for participating in the deadly riot at the US Capitol to employ a "blame Trump" defense to limit bail or jail time, but says that it likely won't work."

Probably won't work but it'll be good for Trump supporting Republicans to see those headlines over and over.

 

[lpetrich]

Video posted by Greene shows part of mask altercation with Bush - YouTube

Democratic Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri announced that she will be moving her office away from GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, following a heated exchange earlier this month where Bush confronted Greene about not wearing a mask in a hallway on Capitol Hill.

The fallout led Speaker Nancy Pelosi to take the extraordinary step of ordering Bush's office to be moved away from Greene, following a request from Bush, the latest signs of the growing tensions between the two parties in the aftermath of the deadly riot on Capitol Hill.

Federal Judge Overturns Local Courts To Keep Some Accused Trump Mob Members In Custody - YouTube

Rachel Maddow reviews some of the cases in which accused pro-Trump rioters were allowed by local judges to go home after being arrested, only to have a federal judge insist that they remain in jail until trial. Aired on 01/30/2021.

What's with those local judges? At least those Federal judges have done the right thing here.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

What's with those local judges? At least those Federal judges have done the right thing here.

It's called small town politics and it's real.

 

[Worldtraveller]

I don't buy the line that those cops committed suicide because they felt betrayed. I'm withholding giving them the benefit of the doubt until we know if they were part of the insurrection or not.

 

[TomC]

I don't buy the line that those cops committed suicide because they felt betrayed. I'm withholding giving them the benefit of the doubt until we know if they were part of the insurrection or not.

I get what you're saying.
But suppose the cop offed himself because he felt betrayed and humiliated by Trump and Q. He's just as dead, and it's still a tragedy.
Tom

 

[SLD]

How the Coup went down:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/31/...gjKRR-nnex99XKWX68_fMlg7ZnS_q1R_sKoewN2E-DpnU

This is a good description of all that happened from the election to the inauguration. Despicable.

 

[Keith&Co.]

I don't buy the line that those cops committed suicide because they felt betrayed. I'm withholding giving them the benefit of the doubt until we know if they were part of the insurrection or not.

Everyone 'involved' in the insurrection went home, intending to go back to work the next day. They were quite surprised to be held in low regard for doing something wrong. Some legged it, but many just expected to come back on the 20th and do the same thing. Little guilt, maybe a little fear of what the Deep State might do in retaliation.

The cops who tried to protect the Capitol would have gone home. And family, friends, would have asked, "What happened? What went wrong?" And though they meant 'what did the entire chain of command do wrong that ended up in such a failure?' the individuals would have felt personally scrutinized. It would have sounded like, "what did YOU do wrong? How did YOU fail those five dead?"
There are several having a horribly hard time right now. They're feeling the guilt for the entire unit on their shoulders.
I'm going to give the suicides, and the depressed, the benefit of the doubt unless and until proven to have been participants in the insurrection.

But, as TomC says, ultimately these deaths rest on Florida Man's sloping doughy shoulders, either way.

 

[Angry Floof]

I don't buy the line that those cops committed suicide because they felt betrayed. I'm withholding giving them the benefit of the doubt until we know if they were part of the insurrection or not.

I don't, either. Betrayal makes people angry or hurt, but not so much ashamed. Shame often drives people to suicide, though.

 

[Elixir]

I don't buy the line that those cops committed suicide because they felt betrayed. I'm withholding giving them the benefit of the doubt until we know if they were part of the insurrection or not.

I don't, either. Betrayal makes people angry or hurt, but not so much ashamed. Shame often drives people to suicide, though.

+1
Have any of their surviving family expressed anger at the alleged betrayal? Named names, perhaps?

 

[Treedbear]

Marjorie Taylor Greene: Congresswoman faces expulsion threat

On Monday, House Democratic Majority Leader Steny Hoyer delivered an ultimatum to Mr McCarthy, calling on him to remove Mrs Greene from the two committees within 72 hours or Democrats would bring the issue to the House floor.

McConnell: Marjorie Taylor Greene's views are a 'cancer' for the GOP

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell on Monday issued a tacit rebuke of controversial Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, slamming the Georgia Republican's "loony lies and conspiracy theories" as a "cancer" for the party.

"Loony lies and conspiracy theories are cancer for the Republican Party and our country," McConnell said in a statement. "Somebody who's suggested that perhaps no airplane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged, and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.'s airplane is not living in reality. This has nothing to do with the challenges facing American families or the robust debates on substance that can strengthen our party."
While McConnell did not name Greene directly, his statement stands as a scathing rebuke of the freshman Republican House member.

 

[lpetrich]

McConnell says ‘loony lies’ spread by Marjorie Taylor Greene are a ‘cancer’ on G.O.P. - The New York Times
noting
McConnell says Taylor Greene's embrace of conspiracy theories a 'cancer' to GOP, country | TheHill
He criticized embrace of

“loony lies and conspiracy theories” as a “cancer for the Republican Party.”

“Somebody who’s suggested that perhaps no airplane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged, and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.’s airplane is not living in reality,” McConnell said in a statement first shared with The Hill. “This has nothing to do with the challenges facing American families or the robust debates on substance that can strengthen our party.”

He didn't mention MTG by name, and she responded
Marjorie Taylor Greene on Twitter: "The real cancer for the Republican Party is weak Republicans who only know how to lose gracefully.

This is why we are losing our country." / Twitter
At last report, the Democrats are preparing a floor vote for expelling MTG from Congress.