The coup has arrived

[lady_*nix]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/liv ... rump-biden

see this entire feed. Also here:

https://twitter.com/evanchill/status/13 ... 15973?s=19

Trumpists forced their way into the House chamber and were firing shots. Yes, inside the Capitol. Pentagon refused to allow the National Guard to be deployed, law enforcement response is reportedly not adequate at all.

[lady_*nix]

Also just so we're completely clear

https://twitter.com/aptly_engineerd/sta ... 7854230530

Just saw a Nazi flag being waved by fascists overtaking the US Capitol building on TV. This is surreal.

[Rommie]

Watching TV right now, done working today. This is nuts.

At least no one can pretend this isn't what these people want anymore.

[lady_*nix]

Also the cops are loving these guys, literally taking selfies with them.

https://twitter.com/bubbaprog/status/13 ... 8461419520

[lady_*nix]

Hahaha wow guess who opened the gates for the Trumpists? The police. It's literally on video.

https://twitter.com/cevansavenger/statu ... 4310867968

[lady_*nix]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/liv ... 1e3e7448fb

Supposedly the Capitol has been secured. YAY.

A lot of Congresspeople are on Twitter being super pissed about how the cops at best treated these actual terrorist goons with kid gloves, which... is nice to see, but also won't amount to anything (at least, not until said Congresspeople start slashing police budgets, ha ha).

[lady_*nix]

https://twitter.com/IwriteOK/status/1346947266444226562

At least some of these assholes were planning to take hostages.

[lady_*nix]

https://indica.medium.com/i-lived-throu ... 7934b1dac3

Seems relevant.

[Rommie]

Videos like this are pretty nuts- https://twitter.com/elijahschaffer/stat ... 49639?s=21

That famous pic of the National Guard arm in arm during the BLM protests on the Lincoln Memorial, and during a joint session of Congress with the president telling people to walk down there you... put four cops with what's basically a weatherproof velvet rope. It's clearly such an egregious breach that shows no one took it seriously, and pretty obvious the reaction wouldn't have been the same if it was a minority group that decided to do the same.

I worry in coming years about the level of domestic terrorism we are going to see, which at minimum is going to look like a weird version of Occupy Wall Street, but more likely going to be far worse. (I mean, amazing how a white nationalist blew up a city block in Nashville just a few weeks ago but we don't think about it cause he died and didn't kill anyone, but that was pretty common during The Troubles in Northern Ireland.) At least these guys were idiots enough to post on social media and not wear masks and wander through probably the most CCTV-heavy region of the world so they can throw the book at them.

[lady_*nix]

Notice how commenters are already blaming it on "antifa"? Expect more of that, including from Congresspeople.

I am... not optimistic at all about any of these people getting the book thrown at them. As usual we even have some Democrats already calling for "turning the page" and "moving on". IDK why they're so allergic to the idea of scumbags facing consequences.

And yeah, I'm also extremely worried this will escalate pretty much without end. Especially if followed up by a complete lack of consequences.

[pumpkinpi]

Notice how commenters are already blaming it on "antifa"? Expect more of that, including from Congresspeople.

I am... not optimistic at all about any of these people getting the book thrown at them. As usual we even have some Democrats already calling for "turning the page" and "moving on". IDK why they're so allergic to the idea of scumbags facing consequences.

And yeah, I'm also extremely worried this will escalate pretty much without end. Especially if followed up by a complete lack of consequences.

Trump will face absolutely no consequences for the crimes he'd committed the past four years.

Neither will his supporters in congress, save for those very few who may be voted out of office because the sensible people in their districts outvoted the magas. There aren't going to be many of those, though. The politicians lead this atrocity, but it wouldn't have happened if there weren't so many idiotic/evil people following them. I am just disgusted that there are people like that in our country.

[lady_*nix]

@pumpkinpi

Welcome to the club.

Meanwhile: https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-a ... ice-2021-1

I'm actually (positively!) stunned that mainstream media sources are covering this, and like... openly discussing the deliberate complicity of police. It's not enough, Congressional acknowledgement and consequences are still needed, but like... it's at least hopeful that news people are no longer maintaining silence or acting like this is normal? Maybe?

[lady_*nix]

https://twitter.com/declanwalsh/status/ ... 7217199105

The Daily Nation, a paper in Kenya: "Who's the banana republic now?"

Well. We had that coming for a while, didn't we.

[lady_*nix]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/liv ... 9a461f5fb2

Yup, there's Joe "still no conviction at all" Biden for ya.

I voted for him because there was no choice, but fuck, I really hate him.

[code monkey]

will no one rid us of this meddlesome president?

[lady_*nix]

Evidently not. ISTG, the cowardice of our "leadership" really is beyond parody.

[lady_*nix]

BTW you know that thing about Pelosi arranging to block Trump's authority to launch nukes?

Yeah, she can't do that.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... pert-says/

also, interesting tidbit

The United States is one of the only countries to have sole launch authority — even Russia does not. It is striking that the Russian system requires an additional vote to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s, but America’s does not.

The US has supposedly tried for a long time not to be a dictatorship, but we give one man (always a man so far, mind) absolute central authority to destroy the world on a whim. That's not fucking democratic. Authority to destroy the world is authority to demand anything by threat of destroying the world.

(How many Presidents so far do you think have demanded money, or sex, or the destruction of criminal evidence, under threat of nuking some city? I bet it's at least one.)

[code monkey]

I woke up this morning with the thought that he's going to pardon everyone. and I mean literally everyone.

[lady_*nix]

https://mobile.twitter.com/shannonrwatt ... 8377587713

https://mobile.twitter.com/HelenKennedy ... 5754394624

So Republican members of Congress led some of the insurgents on tours of the building before the attack... and also, Ayanna Pressley's chief of staff says all the panic buttons in her office were disabled. And the attackers knew about rooms they shouldn't have, and knew where Pelosi and Pence were...

It's getting increasingly very clear that while the mob was mostly useful idiots, the amount of information they had must have been an inside job. Seeing as there are still Republican Congresspeople openly siding with the attackers and Trump, it's not that hard to conclude that some of them actually tried to get their fellow Congresspeople killed.

We got really, really, really lucky. This could easily have ended with multiple assassinations and the official end of democracy in the US - still could, in fact, if the intelligence bureaucracy doesn't do its job well.

[pumpkinpi]

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/northamerica/ ... page=true+

Three US lawmakers have tested positive for the coronavirus after sheltering for hours with colleagues during last week's deadly assault on the Capitol.

House Democrats Bonnie Watson Coleman, Pramila Jayapal and Brad Schneider have announced their diagnoses.

Last Wednesday they hunkered down in secure rooms, seeking refuge from an invasion of Congress in which five people died.

Some Republicans were not wearing masks during the ordeal, footage suggests.

Video shared by Punchbowl News shows several lawmakers apparently refusing facemasks offered to them.

I just received a positive COVID-19 test result after being locked down in a secured room at the Capitol where several Republicans not only cruelly refused to wear a mask but recklessly mocked colleagues and staff who offered them one.https://t.co/wVmgroKsdf
— Rep. Pramila Jayapal (@RepJayapal) January 12, 2021

FUCKERS!

[lady_*nix]

Yup. Never doubt that Republicans' refusal to wear masks was a way of weaponizing the virus, literally weaponizing it, against their Democratic colleagues. "If we have to go down, we'll take you down with us."

Edit: and Republicans have a number of advantages over Democrats, too, in how COVID impacts them. e.g. They tend to come from wealthier and whiter backgrounds and probably have better health overall, and they're allowed to just slack off and talk shit, while Democrats are expected to actually govern. Their entire behavior around the pandemic reeks of deliberate bad faith.

[Rommie]

And, Trump is impeached again.

I will say, all of like 10 days ago I expected many things to happen in Trump's last days, but the fact that we'd impeach Trump a second time because of an insurrection was not one of them.

Also, the fact that McConnell and I actually agree on something (that Trump should be convicted, even if McConnell says so in a wishy-washy way) shows we're clearly in the end times or something. I do kind of like the pet theory though that the Republicans should get on board for the purposes of their own self interest- who wants to run for president in 2024 if Trump is doing so again? And imagine what a headache re-election will be even if you're not running for president when Trump is campaigning in your state to support some batshit crazy primary challenger! Well, one can dream, a ton of them are clearly locked into a death cult.

[lady_*nix]

@Rommie

I expected the insurrection, or something along these lines - though TBH I was expecting a bunch of fascist street violence and some targeted bombings, not a mob attack breaching the Capitol. (Jesus fuck.)

What I didn't expect at all was the second impeachment, or (federal) law enforcement actually arresting insurgents en masse; or pretty much any coordinated response from authorities other than a bunch of empty words. I still fully expect McConnell and other Republicans to break their word, and the second impeachment to die in the Senate just like the first one did. The whole party is thoroughly compromised and thoroughly fascist, and I would not at all put it past men like McConnell to weaponize false hope.

[Rommie]

Oh I fully expect if they decide to convict it will be out of their own self-serving interests over a grand sense of the integrity of the republic. Trump is clearly toxic (check out what happened in Georgia), and it's questionable how much use he is to them now that he's leaving office versus a liability. So they might fall in line anyway- as I said, it's a death cult- but if those self-preservation instincts kick in at this point I'll take it.

[lady_*nix]

*nods* yeah, I can see that. I guess TBH I just trust their desire to hurt People They Don't Like (and to just take everyone else down with them) to override even their self preservation instincts. But my brain might be that bit too fired after four years of nonstop sadism, IDK.

I'm still stunned that literally anything is being done about this at all, and waiting for the other shoe to drop.