An Unsuccessful Insurrection?

I don’t think so. But I understand why the Democrats characterize it that way.

So let’s begin with the definition of insurrection:

Merriam-Webster: a usually violent attempt to take control of a government

Cambridge English: an organized attempt by a group of people to defeat their government and take control of their country, usually by violence

Other definitions appear to use the words “organized” and “armed”.

All of the definitions I have found fail to describe what actually happened. So let’s be clear:

a) There was a protest against the vote count because the former President stoked that fire and fed it for months.

b) Within that protest, there were organized groups of people who were determined to breach the Capitol and did so.

c) Those violent groups of people made their intentions known to the former President through his acolytes and they were encouraged by the President through his actions the day before and through his inaction the day of the Electoral College.

d) The protest was the Trojan Horse that delivered the violence to the Capitol.

e) To continue the deception that this was a spontaneous action, the organized groups did not bring guns or edged weapons to the fray. They used materials at hand as weapons.

Now the use of the word “insurrection” is key because Section 3 of the 14th Amendment says: “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”

If this January 6, 2021 event can be clearly described as an insurrection or a rebellion, then former President Trump is not eligible to run for federal office ever again. And if other Senators or Representatives were involved in planning or supporting these insurrectionists, then they are also unable to remain in office or run for office.

Words matter and perception matters in this case. The key item is IF this was organized with the intent to disrupt the Electoral College, it is an insurrection hiding within a peaceful protest. And it is key whether people participated in or were providing aid and comfort to the insurrectionists and rebellion.

There is an escape clause in the last sentence of Section 3 which allows Congress by a two-thirds vote of EACH house, to remove this restriction. So even if Speaker Pelosi and Chich Schumer are successful in bringing this to the floor of their respective chambers, they still have to deal with getting a 2/3 majority vote to bar former President Trump and his acolytes from office.

This debacle, this disruption of the Electoral College, isn’t over yet.

The MAGA Shame Upon America

Where the inspiring words were once “Make America Great Again, the acronym MAGA has become a pariah of American politics. Where once there was hope, there is now shame.

The President of the United States was actively involved in subverting the Electoral College of the United States of America. The shame begins here.

In an effort to remain in office, the billionaire real estate mogul known as Donald J. Trump set in motion an audacious plan called The Green Bay Sweep to create a constitutional crisis; a crisis so great that he could falsely claim the federal election had been corrupted. He only needed a handful of people to make the same false claim in an attempt to retain his Presidency. He wasn’t trying to overthrow the Constitution, he was bending it to his will. He was willing to break pieces of it, if necessary, to retain his position as President.

When ex-President Donald J. Trump supported the attack on Capitol Hill, he became the enemy within. As described in the President’s Oath of Office, he became a domestic enemy, not because he believed the election was fraudulent, but because he unilaterally chose to exert his will over the political process described in the Constitution.

Previous constitutional crises regarding presidential elections had been resolved by Congress (Compromise of 1877 for example). Of course, those previous crises occurred AFTER the Electoral College had convened and voted.

Because Vice-President Pence would not lie, and would not subvert the vote of the Electoral College as demanded by the Republican Party, outgoing President Trump executed Plan B to physically disrupt the Electoral College in order to prevent an orderly transition of power.

By this act, Donald J. Trump asserted himself as an enemy of the Constitution of the United States of America. He should be charged with treasonous acts, but there may not be a political will to do this. Just as pardoning former President Richard Nixon for his involvement in Watergate was necessary, Donald J. Trump will not likely be charged for his crimes.

The problem in America today is that the two mainstream political parties believe it acceptable to subvert the Constitution of the United States for political gain. Will the Constitution continue to govern the rules of engagement for the two political parties or will it be cast aside in favor of an autocratic ruler?

Will Congress abide and improve the Constitution or will it continue to shirk its duties to the Republic and the American people?

Will a third national party arise to protect and improve the rules of engagement, the Constitution, AND the Republic or will its focus be on other matters?

To be determined…

Overthrowing US Democracy: An earlier attempt

Rolling Stone has a fascinating bit of historical lore related to a plot to overthrow America.

As always, American conservative businessmen do not like competition. Whether that competition is unions, governments, treaties, foreigners, or each other, their reaction is always the same: replace the uncontrollable person with someone controllable or, at the very least, incompetent. (Which explains why we are where we are in America.)

The Business Plot Against FDR begins in 1934 with an announcement:

“The Liberty League was announced on Aug. 23, 1934, on the front page of The New York Times. The article quoted its founders’ claim that it was a “nonpartisan group” whose aim was to “combat radicalism, preserve property rights, uphold and preserve the Constitution.” Its real goal, other observers told the Times, was to oppose the New Deal and the taxes and controls it promised to impose on their fortunes.”

A bond salesman, Gerald C. MacGuire, a 37-year-old Navy veteran, was the tip of the spear in this efforts and would later describe the plot to a New York Post reporter: “We need a fascist government in this country, he insisted, to save the nation from the communists who want to tear it down and wreck all that we have built in America. The only men who have the patriotism to do it are the soldiers, and Smedley Butler is the ideal leader. He could organize a million men overnight.”

The story of Smedley Butler is extraordinary and the Business Plot Against FDR is incredible reading. I could never tell the story so well, so I’ll just give you the link to read it yourself. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/coup-jan6-fdr-new-deal-business-plot-1276709/

Who was Smedley Butler? “Butler was, at the time of his death, the most decorated Marine in U.S. history. By the end of his career, Butler had received 16 medals, five for heroism. He is one of 19 men to receive the Medal of Honor twice, one of three to be awarded both the Marine Corps Brevet Medal (along with Wendell Neville and David Porter) and the Medal of Honor, and the only Marine to be awarded the Brevet Medal and two Medals of Honor, all for separate actions.”- Wikipedia

Many American business owners detest Communism, Socialism, unions, liberals, and any other opponent to their livelihood. You can understand that, I certainly do. But to create a Fascist government to destroy the liberty of working men is too much to bear.

We are indeed blessed that America sits on a three-legged stool: business, government, and people. The three legs support the Constitution of the United States. Perhaps someday there will be four legs to even out the instability but it is enough for now.

The Coming January 6th Anniversary

If you have not followed the investigation and documentation of the attack on Capitol Hill, please spend some time at Wikipedia and read what is known.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_United_States_Capitol_attack

In summary, former President Donald Trump AND his wannabees crafted a plan they called “The Green Bay Sweep” to disrupt the Electoral College. The purpose was to prevent the certification of Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 presidential election.

When Vice-President Mike Pence declined to participate in the nefarious Green Bay Sweep, President Trump and his wannabees launched Plan B to physically disrupt the Electoral College, by using right-wing organizations to breach Capitol Hill security.

Plan B was effective and involved a three-hour battle in the Capitol Building, a delay in providing National Guard support to the Capitol Hill police, and the ongoing promotion of a lie that the national elections were rigged for Joe Biden to win.

The one-year anniversary of the Electoral College disruption is approaching. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House, and President Joe Biden are planning a remembrance ceremony to educate the public at large about former President Trump’s planning and preparation for events surrounding that day.

Ex-President Trump is planning to speak publicly from Mar-a-Lago in advance of the remembrance ceremony and is expected to denounce Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, the Select Committee that is investigating the event, and finally, he will continue the Big Lie that the election was stolen.

It will be interesting to see if any political parties make public announcements or not. And it will be interesting to see how the news media covers this event with interviews of politicians, celebriticians, and other key political figures.

The legacy of President Trump’s term in office is already tarnished with two impeachments. His legacy included the establishment of the Space Force, re-shaping the Supreme Court, establishing a new US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement, providing more tax relief (which increased the National Debt), reducing taxes on the wealthy, increasing cybersecurity, promoting permanent federal funding for black colleges, and setting standards for federal grants. And that’s about all that he did.

There were failures, too, but they pale in comparison to his attempt to thwart the Constitution and disrupt the Electoral College. There’s no need to pour salt into the wound by listing his failures.

The Republican Election Steal

You can read about it at The Daily Beast or you can click it here:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-advisor-peter-navarro-lays-out-how-he-and-steve-bannon-planned-to-overturn-bidens-electoral-win?ref=home

One thing that most people don’t get is how the Republican oligarchy actually operates. Whether they prevent people from voting, or from buying homes, or causing them to live in certain areas, whatever. The Republican oligarchy manipulates the law to work in their favor. And because this manipulation is lawful (at times borderline illegal), the Party of Elite Wealth creates a process or a situation that benefits them.

In the article, if you read it, one of the leaders and influencers of the Republican Party outlines how they intended to steal the election from Joe Biden: create a false concern about fraudulent voting, delay the Electoral College from certifying the election, and use VP Pence in the process.

“This last-minute maneuvering never had any chance of actually decertifying the election results on its own, a point that Navarro quickly acknowledges. But their hope was to run the clock as long as possible to increase public pressure on then-Vice President Mike Pence to send the electoral votes back to six contested states, where Republican-led legislatures could try to overturn the results. And in their mind, ramping up pressure on Pence would require media coverage. While most respected news organizations refused to regurgitate unproven conspiracy theories about widespread election fraud, this plan hoped to force journalists to cover the allegations by creating a historic delay to the certification process.”-Peter Navarro

One routine tactic of the Republican Party is to accuse Democrats of the exact same objective that the Republicans are putting in place: stealing the election in this case.

The beauty of the Republican plan was they already had 100 Congressmen signed up to go along with their perfidy. They didn’t need the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys invading the Capitol but this is what Donald Trump wanted. When VP Pence declined to participate in the Republican Party initiative, Plan B was put into place to seek revenge against Pence. It was Trump’s Order of the Day.

And we know how that turned out.

Lock Him Up!

Democrats don’t chant like MAGA supporters do. More’s the shame, I guess.

In the 2016 campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump agreed with his MAGA crowd that Hillary Clinton should be locked up. Candidate Trump began a series of unfounded allegations that Hillary Clinton gained millions of dollars because she used her influence to steer a uranium deal to the Russians. The chant became a staple of his campaign as candidate Trump began calling her “Crooked Hillary”. NONE of those allegations were proven to be true. President Trump is a veteran liar. It’s likely he has awarded himself medals to his villainy.

The mountain of evidence continues to grow that President Trump was an actor in the events of January 6, 2021. The evidence shows that President Trump was unsuccessful in coercing state government officials to overthrow the election results of 2020. Knowing that his Attorney General Bill Barr refused to lie, knowing that the Trump campaign efforts to overthrow election results in 6 states were failing, President Trump applied pressure to VP Mike Pence to simply declare the vote count fraudulent during the Electoral College process.

Meetings in December 2020 and testimony from government officials demonstrate that President Trump was more knowledgeable about the attack on Capitol Hill than President Nixon was about the Watergate break-in. The failure of the Senate to convict President Trump for his role in the Capitol Hill attack is all about the Republican Party’s failure to hold one of their own accountable.

Will Democrats begin to chant “Lock him up?” Probably not.

But they should.

The War on Reputations

There’s a new Civil War in progress and nobody’s winning. This Civil War is all about destroying the reputations of political partys, politicians, news media, government institutions, and ordinary people who have found themselves in extraordinary situations.

This is a many-sided war with battles being fought over the reputations of participants. In politics, it’s about Republicans vs Democrats and who will bend the government to their will while it loots USA national treasure for its party.

Outside of national politics, it’s about the reputations of celebrities, businesses and their leaders, and the burgeoning growth of internet personalities. The destroyers attack the reputations of famous people, the reputations of historical events, and the reputations of religion, morality, and financial institutions. And they especially attack the reputations of hard work, civility, deferred gratification, and common decency.

The weaponization of social media is the suitcase bomb of the 90s. The tools of social media allow everyone to become a potential bomb maker and everyone else a potential bomb thrower. In the hands of irresponsible people, the innocent-and-imperfect are attacked with weapons in which there is no defense. There is no defense from the lies that are told or the misrepresentations of the truth. It is scorched earth warfare.

The War on Reputations is an ugly war. It is anarchy on the internet. A “hater” chooses a target and launches his/her hate bomb. Others pick up the same material and fashion it for their own purpose. When government or businesses attempt to stop the bombmakers, other haters attack those same governments and those same businesses and accuse them of denying free speech or being fascist, communist, anti-this, or a sympathizer for that.

The only way to win this war is either not to play the game (a la War Games) or become totalitarian and control the content. For humankind, it appears that controlling the content is the only viable option. Self-control is preferred but “from the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.”

Just as newspapers and magazines controlled the content of their publications, the ISPs may be required to control the content in their e-publications.

Accusations and mudslinging will need an outside force to control them. And that is exactly what many fear.

The legislation that controls the content of the US internet will be foreboding at best; but to live with a free market of smearing, sneering, and fleering seems impossible. To give every person access to social media bomblets and permit the desecration of the innocent-and-imperfect seems too permissive. Not everyone is an adult and not everyone is equal. We should recognize that.

The War on Reputations could use a few Rules of Social Media Warfare and violations of those rules should likely become Social Media War Crimes with attendant consequences. Perhaps a new Geneva Convention is needed to craft those rules.

Any takers?

Sen. Ron Johnson- Naked and Unafraid (cough) in Oz

“This will get me in trouble, but I don’t care,” Johnson said. He argued that “groups of agitators” are to blame for the Capitol riot and not “tens of thousands of Trump supporters.”

“The group of people that supported Trump, the hundreds of thousands of people who attended those Trump rallies, those are the people that love this country,” Johnson told Weber. “They never would have done what happened on Jan. 6. That is a group of people that love freedom; that’s a group of people we need to unify and keep on our side.”

The woke Senator from Wisconsin is laying it all on the line, isn’t he? I mean , really, do you think he might pick up a brain while he is in the Land of Oz?

So, let’s begin by re-asserting what everyone else knew on January 6th and in the thousands of videos seen after that but NOW Sen. Johnson also knows this:

a) Of the tens of thousands of MAGA supporters in Washington on January 6th, a few hundred actually invaded the Capitol building while tens of thousands stood outside of it.

b) That invasionary element disrupted the Electoral College vote count and forced Senators to take shelter. They broke windows, broke doors, beat police officers, sprayed tear gas, and violently forced their way into the building. They stole mementos as trophies of their incursion.

c) That element was prepared to take prisoners and was shouting hang Mike Pence and seeking out Nancy Pelosi and AOC and any RINOs they could find.

d) The President ginned up his base and they believed they were acting on instructions from President Trump to “Stop the Steal”.

e) The President did nothing for two hours except rub his hands in glee as he watched everything unfold on TV.

With a medal of courage from the lion in Oz, Sen. Johnson doesn’t care if you know the truth that the people who committed this disruption are the ones who were inside the Capitol Building and not outside of it. NOW Sen. Johnson says it was just some agitators carrying Trump flags, shouting Trump slogans, and stopping the steal but they were not really MAGA supporters.

Sen. Johnson says this even though there is a photo of Roger Stone (dear friend of Pres. Trump) and six Oath Keepers (far-right anti-government militia) together in Washington that day.

Sen, Johnson goes on to say that this “insurrection” was no big deal. (I hope he finds a brain soon.) AND blames the House Managers for cheating on the delivery of evidence.

Johnson said in the interview that the videos were “highly selectively edited” and that the trial lacked due process. He also questioned whether the group was truly an “armed” insurrection.

“When you hear the word ‘armed,’ don’t you think of firearms? Here’s the questions I would have liked to ask — how many firearms were confiscated? How many shots were fired? I’m only aware of one, and I’ll defend that law enforcement officer for taking that shot, it was a tragedy, but I think there was only one,” Johnson said. “If that was a planned armed insurrection, man, you had really a bunch of idiots.”

(Due Process? More evidence that Sen Johnson doesn’t have a brain. There is no due process in an impeachment. It is not a criminal trial! Sheesh. Maybe he should read Mark Twain: “It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.”)

So now Senator Johnson is claiming this just didn’t live up to the claim of being a planned armed insurrection! This is how Senator Johnson lies. He lies by conflation: mixing two things up and then saying: See? It doesn’t measure up!

I think Senator Johnson doesn’t measure up as a Senator for the United States of America. He falls woefully short because he lacks a brain and he lacks courage.

I don’t think he has a heart either. To the best of my knowledge, Senator Johnson has not expressed his empathy to his colleagues who were emotionally impacted by the days events. Nor to the families who lost their loved ones on that day.

Maybe Senator Johnson should ease on down that yellow-brick Republican road in 2022 and let a better American take his place. Or else fly his monkey-ass back into the sky.

p.s. Aren’t you getting a little tired of Republicans saying that it is all a fraud and the Dems are making things up? I am.

an idiot speaks

Not me…a different idiot..

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/no-cancel-culture-isnt-a-threat-to-civilization/ar-BB16IcBA?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=mailsignout

“Moreover, free speech has never been more widely available than it is today. So much so that the cacophony of voices liberated by digital media too frequently drowns out well-informed and sensible opinion. Trump, who blurts out several hot takes every day, is himself an example of the verbal incontinence enabled by Twitter in recent years.”

Please don’t be stupid enough to think that Free Speech has anything to do with Twitter and other social media. Your speech may be curtailed by any person, organization, church, or motorcycle club in your neighborhood who chooses to block you from their website, newspaper, podium, or whatever. You do not have the right to have your barbaric yawp printed or distributed by everyone.

Free speech is about what GOVERNMENT cannot do. They cannot stop you from saying cruel and heartless things… unless you advocate insurrection, the overthrow of the government.

Cancel Culture is the negation of public figures by withdrawing support for them, their history, their products, and/or their contributions. This is rejection, not censorship. It is revisionism of the highest order. It is oppression.

I’m beginning to think we live on the island described in Lord of the Flies. You and I and others like us are “Ralph”.

The rest of the world is like Jack’s savages and soon they will be hunting us. They wish to put our heads on a spike because we adhere to morality rather than savagery.

We may need the military to save us. It’s happened before. Different places and different times.

Insurrection, my butt

Here are 6 examples of Insurrections.

https://www.history.com/news/6-violent-uprisings-in-the-united-states

Definition of Insurrection:: an act or instance of revolting against civil authority or an established government

There are weapons and political aims and people are killed. They are not protests with anarchists. They are not looters or flash mobs.

Videos of looters carrying a vacuum cleaner out of Target is not an insurrection. It is an opportunity crime.

The only thing this President wants to do is to find a bigger stick than other people so he can threaten and bully anyone in opposition to him.

He looks for the worst and then uses that to humiliate and defame. He continues to ARROGANTLY debase others.

We should worry this President will suspend elections for made-up reasons and assert himself as president with emergency powers until the made-up reason no longer exists. If his big business donor base abandons him and he is facing his own humiliation, he may say “try and stop me”.

Who will stop President Trump? Mitch McConnell? Not likely. Nancy Pelosi? That’s a stretch. The military? Maybe, but not likely.

We have not seen the likes of a destroyer like President Trump since Napoleon.

This President could bring Civil War back to America.

What are you going to do when he comes for you?