Looking at the kooks and missing the danger

I spent two evenings writing my commentary on the latest episode of Gaslit Nation then took an evening off. And the browser tabs kept opening with interesting articles. I’ve closed a few of them but have more than a dozen I’d like to mention. I didn’t get to them all and will face whether to close them or save them for a future day. Walter Einenkel of Daily Kos reported the National Rifle Association has filed for bankruptcy. It has also announced it will move to Texas to be “free from the toxic political environment of New York” and where the rent for office space is cheaper. Hunter of Kos discussed police who allied themselves with the insurrection.

Law enforcement agencies around this country are dens of racism, white supremacy, authoritarianism, and fascism. This has been true, and has been known, forever. The duties of the job naturally attract not just those individuals who most want to protect their communities, but those who salivate over the prospects of using violence under cover of law, either for personal pleasure or to enact an agenda that requires violence to maintain. If you're an American fascist, there's no better place to be than in a position where you are allowed to brutalize your enemies with the nearly assured backing of peers and some of the most powerful organizations in the nation. And so they flock in, often in such numbers as to drive those with integrity out. At least 28 sworn members of law enforcement have now been identified among those who attacked Capitol Police and offices, and this number is likely to grow. … The department's own history of enabling racism raises legitimate questions as to whether some officers allied themselves with the invading fascists. The installation of dozens upon dozens of Trump-loyal authoritarian incompetents raises more. We are likely to learn a great deal about the true fragility of our government in coming months, and it is likely to be horrifying.

Mark Sumner of Kos told the stories of some of the particularly heroic cops and what they did during the insurrection, such as the black cop who led rioters away from the open Senate door, giving them time to close and lock it. Sumner contrasted those heroes with the cops within the ranks of insurrectionists. He then concluded:

The insurgents didn’t need to fire a shot. Thanks to some of the assistance they received, they barely broke a sweat. And at the same time, other officers were fighting, being injured, and even dying to hold the same line that white supremacist cops were willingly surrendering. That’s not something that can be solved with sensitivity training. That’s something that demands a purge—and indictments. There is no greater threat to the life of a police officer, white or Black, than racist police officers within their own ranks.

Sulome Anderson, a journalist, quoted a Buzzfeed article:

The officer said that many of the widely spread images of smiling marauders, wandering the halls dressed in absurd costumes, had the effect of downplaying how well prepared some of the rioters were to overtake the building, and even to capture and kill Congress members.

Anderson added commentary:

Shaman and his band of weirdos were 100% a distraction from the trained militia terrorists, who were not in costume. Please stop letting this furry neo-Nazi make you take what's happening less seriously. … The real terrorists were much less visible, obviously, but still--everyone was looking at the kooks and missing the danger. Shows how these people understand and effectively manipulate the media. Please, journos, don't fall for this s--- again.

Kerry Eleveld of Kos reported that many businesses and, more importantly, the US Chamber of Commerce are pulling away for GOP lawmakers who supported the insurrection. And a Republican who has lost the Chamber is in a deep hole, even though there is a lot of dark money flowing into GOP coffers. Let’s hope this squeeze of the seditious members lasts long enough to make a difference. Joan McCarter of Kos reported on a few legal scholars that studied the Constitution and say a person can be impeached and convicted after leaving office and disqualified from running again. One reason is to handle the case of the president committing a crime, resigning before impeachment, and then running again. Meteor Blades, in his night owl column for Kos quoted Fred Wertheimer at Medium:

Among other fundamental problems Trump has caused is the grave damage he has done to our democracy and the legitimacy of our elections, Trump has conned tens of millions of Americans into believing, through his blatantly false claims and lies, that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him through massive voter fraud. Some Republican state officials already are using Trump’s Big Lie as cover to pursue new laws to make it harder to vote—in other words, new voter suppression laws.

There are 25,000 National Guard troops in Washington right now. The area they are protecting has been closed. That means no nearby restaurants. So how are they being fed? Jessica Sutherland of Kos reported that Chef José Andrés and his World Central Kitchen have taken on the job. To do that he has been paying local restaurants that are open to make the meals. A lot of winning all around. Sutherland included photos and videos. Yeah, Andrés and his Kitchen are the ones who keep popping up at disasters with tasty food. His first big story was a few years ago in Puerto Rico after hurricane Maria. Laura Clawson of Kos wrote it is hard to fix our democracy if we don’t understand the problems. Clawson turned to political scientist Douglas Amy and his website Second Rate Democracy. It lists 17 ways America lags behind other major Western democracies. Clawson noted a few things in Amy’s introduction. Some of those are: * Demnark is the only one that appoints Supreme Court justices for life. * None have anything like an Electoral College that allows the minority of voters to win. * They use different voting systems that make gerrymandering impossible. * None have a Senate like ours where the 40 million voters in 22 states get 44 Senate seats while the 40 million Californians get two seats. * They all rely much more on public money for campaigns, not private money. A thread from Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg:

A guy came to the sage Hillel & (obnoxiously) asked him to teach all of Torah on one foot. Hillel said, "What is hateful to you, do not do to others: this is Torah; the rest is commentary; go and learn.” If you wouldn’t like it if a policy was applied to you, don’t pass it. It’s so straightforward and yet US policy has been propagating this other thing for... well, centuries. Definitely decades. Most certainly the last four years. Don’t want a mass shooter in your office? Don’t want to be placed in horrific detention because you’re trying to keep your family safe? Don’t want to lose everything just because you get sick and can’t afford the healthcare bills? Huh. No, I’m not done feeling fury at those who were perfectly fine as long as the leopard was eating everyone else’s faces, just as long as the leopard never ate theirs. … Notably Hillel’s formulation is negative—don’t do what you wouldn’t want. Does not presume (as the Golden Rule does) that you know exactly what another person DOES want (how to find out? Ask them!) but rather that you have a basic understanding of harm and how not to cause it.

David Rothkopf tweeted:

The death toll from Trump's biggest lie (COVID) & from Bush 43's big lie (Iraq) are the same. Let's not forget that the lies, terrible policies & inhumanity of the last 2 GOP administrations cost so much & let's not think Bush's is any less because his admin cost us Iraqi lives.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris held a 13 minute COVID memorial service between the Reflecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial. Already, he has done something sorely needed his predecessor refused to do. I didn’t watch it live. Most news sources have videos of just a couple minutes of the service. Here’s a site with the whole thing.