I saw something pretty disturbing yesterday on Twitter yesterday, a girl said she knew one of the guys and it was someone who went to good schools and had a good job. I think most of us assume these are all unemployed losers but unfortunately I’m not sure that is the case.
It is absolutely not the case these people are all unemployed losers. On the school centric forums I post on all of the posters lamented the fact that there was a "God, Country, Notre Dame" flag seen in photos of the insurrection. MAGAts are not some monolithic paint-by-numbers redneck.
What we need to see, and what we will not see, is an overwhelming criminal justice response to this attempt to overthrow the government. If we don't draw the line right here and right now, then the next time the insurgents will go further. Recall how up in arms we were when some congressman couldn't hold his tongue and blurted out "you lie" when Obama told the truth about something in a State Of The Union speech? How many hundreds of miles further down the road are we now?
Since the early 90s (or maybe the late 80s and the beginning of the growing popularity of nation-wide, right wing nut-job talk-radio) we have been moving in precisely this direction. With every passing year, with every subsequent administration, it has gotten worse. We've seen quite a few steps to the bad in just the last year, with actual credible plots to kidnap a governor. And now the violent storming of the Capitol to thwart the functions of our government.
The police yesterday needed to use whatever force was necessary to clear the Capitol and stop the rioting. There should have been mass arrests of insurgents. And if it meant using overwhelming lethal force, sadly, that would have been entirely justifiable. It appeared that, at least after the rioting started, very little deadly force was necessary. And who knows, perhaps the one rioter who was shot and killed served as a cautionary tale for the some of the rest. Remember, these people WANTED the violence and the war. I shed zero tears for anyone hurt or killed.
We have a choice as a country. We can demand that the laws are followed. All the time, and by everybody. Or we can let this all get worse. What if the Capitol Police and other law enforcement weren't complicit and instead they were just incompetent? The next time their complicity will mean members of congress don't just get scared and scrambled. The next time Speaker Pelosi or maybe some RINO like Mitt Romney gets killed. We're heading down that road. Unless things change and that line is drawn it will happen.
