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Donald is about to go through some things...

Gameface said:
They thought they'd be greeted as liberators.
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If that's the narrative, it doesn't hold up. Aren't they terrorists though? Don't terrorists take their guns with them everywhere they go? How many planned violent insurrections by terrorist groups have hardly any guns? How many governments have been overthrown by terrorists with hardly any guns?
 
Mongoose said:
If that's the narrative, it doesn't hold up. Aren't they terrorists though? Don't terrorists take their guns with them everywhere they go? How many planned violent insurrections by terrorist groups have hardly any guns? How many governments have been overthrown by terrorists with hardly any guns?
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I know I'm not particularly funny but do you lack the ability to see an attempt at humor?
 
Mongoose said:
I would expect many, many, many more guns at a planned and orchestrated attempt by terrorists groups to overthrow the US government. I dunno? These idiots thought they'd overthrow the government with pepper spray and sticks?
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There were a few terrorists mixed in with many people who were not. The assumption that this was a monolithic group is incorrect.
 
One Brow said:
There were a few terrorists mixed in with many people who were not. The assumption that this was a monolithic group is incorrect.
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Or that "terrorist" means something extremely specific. No one considers themself to be a terrorist. So no one goes around role playing as a cartoon version of a terrorist.

As the saying goes, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.

I don't think they were actually attempting to seize the capitol and thus take control of the U.S. government. I think they thought they could disrupt the process and that once they did their part others would "activate" and do other parts of what I think they imagined would be to show that Trump actually won the election. I have no doubt that the vast majority of the people who acted illegally believed that Trump either won the election or deserved to be elected regardless. Those people think they're the ones upholding our national values. They think they are the "true" Americans. They thought what they did was patriotic.

They were wrong.
 
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Mongoose said:
I would expect many, many, many more guns at a planned and orchestrated attempt by terrorists groups to overthrow the US government. I dunno? These idiots thought they'd overthrow the government with pepper spray and sticks?
How many of the hundreds of charges even included violence let alone guns?
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I actually think I could beat Nancy pelosi and Mitch McConnell in a fight without a gun.
Especially if it's thousands against hundreds and the hundreds are lacking guns.
Also probably thought that if they had guns then they would be much more likely to be shot or have to shoot someone. I don't think they wanted to do either thing.

They were simply trying to stop/slow down the count. Not take over, occupy, and hold the Whitehouse against all comers (military and police) or something.
 
Mongoose said:
If that's the narrative, it doesn't hold up. Aren't they terrorists though? Don't terrorists take their guns with them everywhere they go? How many planned violent insurrections by terrorist groups have hardly any guns? How many governments have been overthrown by terrorists with hardly any guns?
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Why is this important to you?
 
fishonjazz said:
Why is this important to you?
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It’s another pathetic MAGA trope that J6 couldn’t be an insurrection if they were not armed. Which some were.

Look up the seditious conspiracy changes. Dudes had a strike force ready and waiting in case they needed it.
 
You know what pisses me off about J6? How much of a pathetic failure it was, and how those involved absolutely ruined our ability to do something like that for a reason based in reality.

They blew it on a stupid conspiracy created by the worlds greatest grifter.

Good job!
 
BabyPeterzz said:
You know what pisses me off about J6? How much of a pathetic failure it was, and how those involved absolutely ruined our ability to do something like that for a reason based in reality.

They blew it on a stupid conspiracy created by the worlds greatest grifter.

Good job!
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Because this… even folks here are willing to admit it was mostly peaceful and it was a protest. Americans need the ability to protest. Because folks were willing to demonize people there and throw them in jail, many, if not most, for non-violent offenses. They told us it was a “violent insurrection” and took yet more freedoms and means for making a difference politically from regular Americans.
 
Mongoose said:
Because this… even folks here are willing to admit it was mostly peaceful and it was a protest. Americans need the ability to protest. Because folks were willing to demonize people there and throw them in jail, many, if not most, for non-violent offenses. They told us it was a “violent insurrection” and took yet more freedoms and means for making a difference politically from regular Americans.
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wut?

do we live on the same planet?
 
Mongoose said:
Because this… even folks here are willing to admit it was mostly peaceful and it was a protest.
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The protesters who stayed on the lawn were peaceful. The ones who broke into offices or carried zip ties were not. We don't define the Russian Revolution as mostly peaceful due to most of the peasants staying on their farms.

Mongoose said:
Americans need the ability to protest.
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I have no objection to protesting on the lawn of the Capitol.

Mongoose said:
Because folks were willing to demonize people there and throw them in jail, many, if not most, for non-violent offenses.
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For a leftist, you seem to repeat a lot of right-wing talking points verbatim.

People go to jail for burglary, prostitution, and drug possession every day, and none of them are violent offenses.

Mongoose said:
They told us it was a “violent insurrection”
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There was an insurrection, and there was violence.

Mongoose said:
and took yet more freedoms and means for making a difference politically from regular Americans.
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Name 1 freedom I have lost since 2021-JAN-06.
 
One Brow said:
For a leftist, you seem to repeat a lot of right-wing talking points verbatim.

People go to jail for burglary, prostitution, and drug possession every day, and none of them are violent offenses.
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I know it must be hard for the hard core blue maga cultists to understand, but I’m skeptical of what I’m told by powerful warmongering criminals and I draw my own conclusions.
I even like to give fellow Americans the benefit of the doubt even when I disagree with them politically, because both parties are serving the same oligarchy many folks just don’t want to see it.
BP sees how this can seriously hamper americans ability to protest in the future. I didn’t learn it in history class, but I know our government organizations have been involved in some very nefarious **** in the past and I don’t see all of this so cut and dry. I’m not attacking anyone, just asking questions.
 
Mongoose said:
I know it must be hard for the hard core blue maga cultists to understand, but I’m skeptical of what I’m told by powerful warmongering criminals and I draw my own conclusions.
I even like to give fellow Americans the benefit of the doubt even when I disagree with them politically, because both parties are serving the same oligarchy many folks just don’t want to see it.
BP sees how this can seriously hamper americans ability to protest in the future. I didn’t learn it in history class, but I know our government organizations have been involved in some very nefarious **** in the past and I don’t see all of this so cut and dry. I’m not attacking anyone, just asking questions.
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I think BP is saying that this ill-advised attempt at storming the castle will hamper future attempts that might just be grounded in reality, not the reaction to the Jan. 6th crimes that hundreds upon hundreds of protestors committed.

I'm all for charging people that rioted after BLM demonstrations when they committed crimes and I'm all for charging people who broke laws on Jan. 6th.

I can imagine circumstances where I would be willing to break laws as part of a demonstration/protest/riot, and I would do so accepting that I might be charged for it.

I haven't seen frivolous prosecutions of Jan. 6th protestors. Everything I've heard about has been aimed at people who clearly broke the law.
 

Yes, the prosecution of a leading presidential candidate could set a troubling precedent. But the other option, non-prosecution, would also set a troubling precedent: that attempting to steal an election is legal.

Of course, political candidates have a right to challenge election results, demand recounts when legally available, and expose fraud or tabulation errors. Trump was calling the election fraudulent months in advance and simply manufactured ludicrous claims of fraud as a pretext to retain power.

Perhaps the argument Graham has in his mind is that safeguarding candidates’ right to demand limited, reasonable election challenges means allowing figures like Trump to pursue unlimited and unreasonable ones.

To not prosecute Trump’s coup attempt would effectively legalize the tactics he employed. It would consecrate a new system in which an election result, even a clear one with multiple states providing a margin of error, would merely be the start of a negotiation. The outcome of the process would be determined not just by the votes but also by which party controls the legislative and judicial channels that will steer it and has the willpower to assert the most favorable claims.

Graham’s threat that prosecuting Trump will trigger Republican retaliation echoes the same warning he made when Democrats impeached Trump for inciting the insurrection. “I fear that if this model is followed in the future, impeachment to disqualify one from holding office based on partisan hatred will become the norm,” he argued. “I hope I will be proven wrong, but it seems that impeachment based on partisan differences seems to be becoming the norm, not the exception.”

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As Will Saletan has pointed out, Graham led the effort to impeach Bill Clinton for lying about an affair, and has called for impeaching Biden over his immigration policy. So the outcome he claims to fear is actually a course he has already taken.

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Graham bitterly opposed convicting Trump in the Senate. Now he opposes convicting him either at the federal level (because the Justice Department is subordinate to Joe Biden) or the state or local level (because they are “liberal jurisdictions”). Instead he deems the sole legitimate venue for holding Trump accountable to be “at the ballot box.”

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Yet Graham has endorsed Trump’s presidential candidacy! Which is to say, despite all his crocodile tears about preserving norms, he believes Trump’s scheme to install himself as an unelected autocrat should not be punished at all, but rewarded.
 
Mongoose said:
Because this… even folks here are willing to admit it was mostly peaceful and it was a protest. Americans need the ability to protest. Because folks were willing to demonize people there and throw them in jail, many, if not most, for non-violent offenses. They told us it was a “violent insurrection” and took yet more freedoms and means for making a difference politically from regular Americans.
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We had held an election, including an election for president, some two months earlier. Trump lost that election. I was one of 10’s of millions of Americans who found themselves saying that day: “wait, we held the election, the guy I voted for won, wtf is this all about? A few thousand people cannot take matters in their own hands, at the loser’s urging, and cancel my vote and millions of others, just because they don’t agree with the outcome. This is third world country stuff, we held an election, and we know who the winner was. What the hell are you people doing?”.

I know all about the right to protest, coming of age in the Vietnam era. But, on 1/6/21, it seemed like they were taking away our expectation that the winner of a presidential election will always be decided by ballot, and never by a mob smashing windows and searching out a vice president in order to hang him. Something told me, “gee, this isn’t the way we do things now, is it?”

Those protestors were not speaking for me. They could protest to their heart’s content, it was certainly their right. But they had no right to speak for 100% of the American people, by storming the People’s House, when the election results were already decided and absolutely not in the least in dispute.

And the “means for making a difference politically” was not taken from the protestors and “regular Americans”. If eligible, they had every right to vote on Election Day, and make a difference politically. They did not have the right to try and change the outcome by smashing windows and invading the People’s House. That is not the way to “make a difference politically”. Americans are free to protest their government, but they don’t have the right to smash their way into the People’s House.
 
Every high profile politician goes in knowing that the opposition is constantly watching and constantly looking for an opening to attack you. The other side is always trying to tear you down.

This is a benefit of a two party system, not a flaw. The other side is there to keep you honest, keep you vigilant against corruption and impropriety.

If criticism is only valid when it comes from your own team then there will be no criticism. We've seen that for decades in law enforcement, where they investigate themselves and determine everything is fine, meanwhile the community they police no longer trusts them and no longer sees them as a protector, but as predators.
 
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