Problem is he wasn't the first, and won't be the last. These people tried to storm the Capital and assassinate the Vice President, and the Secret Service and Pentagon were in on it. Getting the home address of some judges or members of a jury will be piss easy for them. Hell here in Missouri before the primary we had Republican radio adds where the candidates vowed to mobilize the National Guard to march on Washington to "protect the Constitution" which is code for have a Republican president. This was on public radio. This is what they're saying out in the open.
I find it more likely that he thought he was the hero of his own action film, the good guy who was going to shoot all the bad guys and get a parade. Trump supporters are dangerously insane and Republicans are egging them on in the hopes that all their political enemies die before the crazies do.
I don't disagree with this characterisation, but what would you say the Democrats should do? They're in a very restricted position, and the few actions they could take would harm them in the midterms and end up assisting the Republicans.
I mean letting Republicans openly say shut down the FBI and calling for the arrest/impeachment of the AG, and saying they will raid all of Biden's homes come 2024 is probably not the way to go.
It would be briefly cathartic for them to try those things, but they would be enormous own-goals.
I guess just concede the country to them, then? All us liberals should just go off into the woods to die of exposure, because holding the rightwing white nationalists to any legal standard would just hurt their feelings too much? This is the problem the Dems have. I get what the Republican plan is - let Trump run for re-election and no matter what happens on election night, declare victory and then have his followers start rounding up Democrats and capping them in the head. What kills me is apparently that's the Democrats plan too.
Not concede. Defeat them electorally, and when there're sufficient numbers in Congress to do so, reform those areas of government that are structurally unrepresentative or inherently weighted in favour of the Republicans-- the Senate and Supreme Court.
Except the electoral system is on the honor system, and Republicans are fresh out of honor. And what happens if you do beat them in an election, what you think they'll suddenly see the light on numbers and facts? You think the people who plotted Jan 6th are going to let another Democrat take the oath of office without trying it again? You really think the average Republican voter is going to wise up between now and the midterm to give Biden an overwhelming majority? Or are they going to hunker down in their little spider hole getting more and more wound up on conspiracies about Jewish ghosts stealing votes and faked FBI raids, until they, I dunno, try to storm an FBI outpost.
I don't doubt they'll try again. It failed, remember. The Jan 6th insurrection failed. It caused a lot of damage, but the solution is to minimise that damage, not to give them more avenues to exploit it.
Expanding the legal definitions of sedition etc is not going to prevent calls for violence. Its going to increase them.
It barely failed. And as we're now learning, everyone save the mook ground troops are going to be free to try again, and this time with more practice.
That's going to be difficult when the new Republican modus operandi is to not admit defeat.
They've learned from their last loss, and they're not going to let it happen again. They're installing election officials who deny Biden won the election, and getting governors elected who are promising to disregard vote tallies if they don't add up to their side's victory and instead send electors who will say their guy won.
And let's be clear, it failed because they stumbled at the end and milled around the government buildings instead of using force. Right now the right's only stumbling block to violent takeover is that they still don't understand how political (and extrapolitical) action works. As soon as they realize they're supposed to do something when they show up somewhere, they're just going to start overthrowing things.
I would possibly accept that most of the Capitol rioters probably did not have the intent or will to completely wreck the place and start killing senior politicians. As with many demos, one might assume a relatively small hardcore of serious troublemakers, some angry mob types who get sucked along by them, and the rest bemused by events unfolding more radically than they expected.
Not exactly. I'm not saying Democrats should run elections from the same milquetoast playbook they've been using. They've certainly been too meek in calling anti-democratic moves what they are, and in abandoning popular left-of-centre policies to pander to a non-existent centre ground and an abominable right-wing.
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