Show me who will enforce the law

Marissa Higgins on Daily Kos wrote about conservatives repeatedly ranting about how poor people spend their government assistance. They love to declare poor people shouldn’t be allowed to buy candy and other luxuries with their EBT cards. There are a lot of articles that give “advice” on how to cut spending to get out of poverty. Higgins wrote:

Even if well-intentioned, the advice is generally patronizing because it ignores the fundamental socioeconomic disparities that thrive in our capitalist culture. If you’re only making minimum wage, you cannot save up for a down payment on a house simply because you no longer buy avocados or lattes. If you’re facing a mountain of medical or personal debt, you can’t build up an emergency fund simply by purchasing produce that’s on sale. So, why are strangers so invested in how low-income people spend their money? My personal guess is that people find it easier and more immediately satisfying to judge what’s closest to them. It’s easier to judge an individual person, or a collective group, rather than to judge the structures that keep people in these cycles of poverty. Telling a low-income person to make their own coffee at home, for example, feels like the quicker fix than trying to get elected officials to reform laws and regulations that make poverty a lifelong trap. … All of that said, you can’t personal finance your way out of generational poverty and systemic oppression …

I’m reminding you again one reason why I write this blog is so you can be prepared for what may happen. In the face of what may happen in the coming week being prepared might mean stocking up on extra food, maybe water too, in case the power goes out for an extended period. Also put gas in the car and make sure you have some cash. Because … Dartagnan of the Kos community wrote:

Acting president Donald Trump is dismissing the results of an election that indisputably removed him from office, while loudly rallying disparate factions of his supporters to publicly demonstrate, using loud, angry threats of violence, in an attempt to intimidate elected federal lawmakers into disregarding those election results. The people who he is summoning to fulfill his wishes number among what most Americans would traditionally consider our country’s worst specimens: violent white supremacists, anti-government militia, neo-Nazi groups and others from our society’s fringes. Their collective end-goal, fairly stated, is the transformation of this country into a racist republic, with violence as its means of enforcement.

Dartagnan quoted the Daily Beast on what they read on online forums:

Trump diehards from across the country have organized their travel to Washington on “The Donald” forum. One of the hottest topics on the site is how protesters can bring guns to D.C., which would count as a local crime in nearly all circumstances under Washington’s strict gun laws. Others have talked about breaking into federal buildings or committing violence against law enforcement officers who try to stop them from storming Congress. “I’m thinking it will be literal war on that day,” one popular comment posted last Wednesday read. “Where we’ll storm offices and physically remove and even kill all the D.C. traitors and reclaim the country.”

Dartagnan continued:

That last bit is fairly telling as to what really motivates these people: a blind, mindless desire to inflict pain on others for no good reason other than the fact that they would enjoy it. There is really no issue, no policy outcome, no coherent plan that any of them could point to as something they’d like to see implemented—only the desire to reclaim the hate that Trump has so graciously given them the opportunity to spew over the last four years. This vocal minority has seized on the collective fiction that the election was somehow “stolen” from their hero, not because that narrative makes any sense, but because blind, unquestioning acceptance binds them together and makes them feel strong and consequential. The one thing that unites these criminals and hate groups is the threat of violence that they carry with them, both implicitly and explicitly. Their purpose has nothing to do with defending democracy as we know it. Rather, these protesters’ purpose is to assist Trump’s attempt to unlawfully seize power by subverting our democratic institutions, because Trump has catered to their hate and grievances like no other American leader in modern history. … Left to their own devices, these people do not present a credible threat to our republic. But the fact that they exemplify and represent the delusions of millions of Republican voters, so much that elected officials feel compelled to submit to their wishes, should really horrify all decent Americans. … Americans need to understand exactly what they are going to witness on Jan. 6 as they watch the worst of what America has produced converge on the National Mall. It will be a mob, un-American in every sense, carefully primed for the acceptance of fascism and ultimately, totalitarian rule. It is unthinking and cannot be reasoned with or talked to. It has one purpose: to inflict pain upon—and ideally, eliminate-- those who would oppose it, with no questions asked. And by all indications, it has one of this country’s two major political parties firmly in its grasp.

A few days ago Rep. Louie Gohmert filed a suit demanding the vice nasty guy be allowed to throw out votes when the Electoral College is counted on Wednesday. When that actually got to a courtroom it was quickly rejected. Aaron Rupar tweeted what came next:

Louie Gohmert on Newsmax: "But if bottom line is, the court is saying, 'We're not going to touch this. You have no remedy' -- basically, in effect, the ruling would be that you gotta go the streets and be as violent as Antifa and BLM."

Never mind that Antifa and BLM are rarely violent. Ben Franklin responded:

Louie Gohmert is explicitly telling people to use violence for political ends. While the knuckle dragging midwits who constitute our thought leaders were counting court cases like kids with their Halloween candy the GOP radicalized their supporters to overthrow the government. We have the dumbest goddamn people with the largest platforms who poison our discourse with galaxy brain takes like we don’t need to worry about trump seizing power illegally because it’s against the law therefore impossible. But the GOP is sure acting like they intend to. …I’d like to remind everyone that we are one reichstag fire away from losing our democracy right now and given that our institutions won’t even check an open sedition movement I’m skeptical of all the cowardly “X won’t let it happen” talk. Can we prevent this? Maybe, if tens of millions of people take to the streets immediately if Trump et al try to seize power.

In a second thread Franklin continued, referring to the date of the EC count:

140 House Republicans and 11 Senate Republicans are trying to overturn the election result. This number will go up by the 6th. This is a coup attempt by the GOP and should be taken as a serious, imminent threat to our democracy. The fact that there will be a mob of trump supporters in DC happening in tandem means that this coup and attempt to overturn the election results will be backed by a physical presence. Politics is getting physical. Total physical politics is war and we’re getting closer. Louie Gohmert has given marching orders which will be amplified via the GOP media network in the next few days. I can't tell you specifically what's going to happen but things are pointing in one general direction. Do not listen to people ignoring this. Do not, I repeat, do not listen to the people telling you nothing bad could happen or making this into a joke. We are in serious danger. If this were any other country in the world you'd say it looks like one side is winding up to seize power. … This is just the beginning and if they fail now they will be back in a matter of years.

Another thread from Franklin:

Not sure why this is a hashtag since there is an open sedition movement being backed by the institutional GOP that is increasingly making violent threats against elected officials and not a single person has been arrested or even given a stern warning. #SeditionHasConsequences Honestly getting a little sick of people blustering about how we're gonna get them any day when the hallmark of the last four years has been the near total impunity with which the GOP has operated - maybe let's start asking why that is the case and what that means for us.

A commenter responded that sedition does have consequences even if the people leading the sedition aren’t the ones facing the consequences. Franklin mentioned there is talk of storming the Capitol and its office buildings. Who would stand in the way? The DC police? Franklin responded to a tweet saying the DC police would do exactly that by first quoting Chuck Modi:

Stop this Antifa nonsense. The Proud Boys came to DC twice & were violent AF. Assaulting, stabbing & rioting across city tearing down BLM signs, incl. Black Churches. All as MPD watched.

Franklin added:

Anyone who thinks the DC police are going to stop people like the proud boys on January 6th has managed to learn nothing about what’s going on over the last four years which is an impressive feat.

The military? The nasty guy is their commander in chief. They might not obey an order to shoot at protesters, but that doesn’t mean they’ll leave their bases (which are outside DC) to protect the Capitol without an order from him. Who else is there? A few individual tweets from Franklin:

If things go south, the political crisis will be in every city by the end of the week. The caravans in 2020 were dry runs. They have to be stopped.

And:

No one is coming to save us. The constitution is not coming to save us. Nancy pelosi is not coming to save us. It’s the coup and the people who are against the coup. Only one side emerges victorious.

And:

Stop telling me what the laws about coups say and show me who will enforce them.

And a final thread from a week ago:

Not sure what’s more irresponsible punditry - telling people trump is going to prison, telling people that he becomes irrelevant, or saying there’s nothing he can do to terminally f--- up the peaceful transition of power. They’re all bad takes in their own way. He’s not going to prison because his people have stolen state secrets that make him invincible. He’s not irrelevant because he will continue to undermine the country, leading his massive cult of personality. And until Biden’s in office a lot can go wrong.

A few words from me: If all that is happening in DC why should we stock up on supplies here in Michigan? I’ve written about the Russian hack that has gotten into many government departments. That hack also got into several hundred businesses. Perhaps also electric and water companies. I see a possibility (and I’d be delighted if I was wrong) that someone could turn off the power for much of the country, which would also create a news blackout of the Capitol being stormed.