No one

Sauce for the goose=Sauce for the gander

In their right mind wanted this. Once again, my dad was right, “A crowd is like a wild animal; you never know what it’s going to do.” When I saw the size of the crowd Wednesday afternoon, my heart sank. The nerves kicked in. Went to bed late, got up early – more had arrived in D. C. I was happy for the folks that President Trump addressed them and at the same time thought, ‘this is not good’.

But never in a million years did I ever expect to see what we saw this afternoon at the Capitol. It was like a horror movie come true. Churches are sacrosanct. Schools are sacrosanct. All governmental buildings are sacrosanct – or should be. We all know how we reacted to what we saw; how we felt when we saw it. How to equate it? Like a 9/11 we perpetrated on ourselves? I don’t know. Right now I have no words, just inexpressible sadness. Maybe we have, indeed, become a banana republic – that’s the sort of place this sort of thing happens, isn’t it?

How did we get here from where we started? Through one of the toughest summers America has seen in a long time, we – meaning conservatives – managed to keep our cool, keep our baser natures in check, act reasonably and responsibly. And then this happens. We can’t use the poor excuse, “They did it to us, we’re gunna do it to them” or “what did you expect; people are pissed”. We don’t do this. We march, we carry signs, we write or call our elected officials, at every level, to be sure our voice is heard. We write in our blogs or talk in our vlogs. But we don’t break into a government building. We don’t act like buffoons – or baboons! – and sit in the prominent seat in the House of Representatives; that’s kid stuff, that’s like a 13-year-old kid giving the finger to the grouchy neighbor.

What has been done can never now be undone. They have made a bad situation worse. They just gave the left the victory by pulling the same crap the left did all summer. We have seen the enemy and it’s no longer them.

I think we are now one minute before midnight for America.

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From Neo:

I petty much agree with Audre here, I don’t really see violence as being a cure for much of anything, and watching the storming of the Capitol broke my heart.

And yet…

It happened now, and I think it was going to happen if not this week, then next week, or next month, because the grievances were, and are real, starting with election fraud, and the ridiculous response to the Chinese flu, and continuing on to the GOPe ignoring and lying to the base since Eisenhower was president. I know exactly how they felt because I have the same urge. Why?? via Ace of Spades

From Willis Krumholz (@WillKrumholz):

 

Lots of people doing the “oh look at me, those bad Trump supporters” posts now. Today was unacceptable. Absolutely.

But what just happened? The Mayor of DC ordered police to stand down and a handful of idiots entered the Capitol…

Just last night, a violent mob surrounded a Senators wife at home with their newborn baby. They tried to force themselves into the home. In the last four years, Congresspersons were shot at and Rand Paul and Steve Scalise were almost killed.

This year, whole cities were destroyed and cops were targeted and killed.

Today at the Capitol, a woman–unarmed–was shot and killed. Nobody cares, apparently.

If your outrage only flows in one direction, which is even true of many GOP people, you are not the solution.

Why are we drawing the line at office buildings where Congress works as opposed to people’s homes and businesses?

Whole city blocks were destroyed this summer. Anyone who isn’t equally incensed at both is not a patriot.

Also, nobody is going to change anyone�s mind. The “GOP people” blaming Trump have always hated Trump. People who like Trump will point to stuff from this summer.

Maybe the answer is a Conservative/Traditionalist party that actually reflects working people (the base).

I can say with absolute assurance that the current GOP (“yay corporate tax cuts and staying in Afghanistan another 5 years”) does not reflect the base, let alone a good chunk of the country.

That’s true for me, and I’ll bet it’s true for many of you. Do you feel represented by your Senators, your Congressperson, your governor, or state legislators? When you write or email them do you ever get more than a pro forma (often automated) response, thanking you for writing without taking any notice of your views? Yeah, me neither. And I live in one of the reddest of red states, but it doesn’t matter. I could just as well be a Republican in Lori Lightfoot’s Chicago, for all anybody in Lincoln or Washington gives a good goddamn what I think. They’re too busy feathering their own nest to have time for their employers.

That’s the Republicans, the Democrats are worse. They’ll happily stand aside as their stormtroopers burn down whole cities of poor people without a qualm, but boy they looked scared on Wednesday, didn’t they?

For all that there are many credible reports that this was an Antifa/Democrat false flag operation, they suddenly came face-to-face with their employers the taxpayers that make it all possible while sending our kids to die in stupid forever wars.

And now I see that the authoritarian neocons allied as usual with the left-wing want to crack down even harder on dissent. Well, dictators gotta dictate till they’re stopped. These people evidently think a civil war in America is a good thing. I don’t, but I live in the real world, not Washington, and I know damned well it will destroy a republic that has taken 250 years to build.

Wave good-bye to the Republic, it died Wednesday, not in the protest but in the response of the idiot political class to the demands of the people.

Audre was wrong about that, it’s not 11:59, it’s more like 20 minutes after midnight.

Good luck, we’re all on our own now.