RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-mob-on-the-hill-was-far-from-a-coup-11610061914?mod=opinion_lead_pos7

Insurrections are common but Wednesday’s aborted insurrection on Capitol Hill was unique. The usual purpose of mobilizing a mass of people and deploying their sheer momentum against the edifices of power, a royal or presidential palace, or a parliament is to seize power—through the act of seizing that iconic building. But that is logically impossible when the ruler is not the enemy to be replaced but rather the intended beneficiary of the insurrection.

What happened was certainly not an attempted coup d’état, either. Coups must be subterranean, silent conspiracies that emerge only when the executors move into the seats of power to start issuing orders as the new government. A very large, very noisy and colorful gathering cannot attempt a coup.

There have been quite a few cases around the world of what is best described as mass intimidation directed against parliaments. But in all such cases it was some specific law that was wanted or not wanted, which legislators under the gun might then vote for or against. For that to happen, the legislators have to be all gathered in the legislature and kept there to be coerced. Most recently in Beirut last August, Lebanon’s Parliament was besieged by a crowd demanding and forcing the government’s resignation. This conspicuously did not happen in Washington on Wednesday because it was a crowd that invaded the building, not snatch teams sent to seize individual legislators to be cajoled or forced into their seats.

Given all these exclusions, only one description remains: a venting of accumulated resentments. Those who voted for President Trump saw his electoral victory denied in 2016 by numerous loud voices calling for “resistance” as if the president-elect were an invading foreign army. These voices were eagerly relayed and magnified by mass media, emphatically including pro-Trump media.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/republicans-fight-isnt-in-congress-11610061953?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

On Wednesday the Capitol of the most powerful nation the world has ever known was stormed by an angry mob. Americans surely never thought they’d see such a scene: members of Congress barricaded inside the House chamber, Capitol Police trampled, and four Americans dead. A woman was shot near the elevator I use every day to enter the House floor. It was a display not of patriotism but of frenzy and anarchy. The actions of a few overshadowed the decent intentions of many.

Why?

Perhaps we should ask our Founders. They were not oracles, but they were borderline prophets. In Federalist No. 68, Alexander Hamilton lays out the purpose of the Electoral College, arguing that an independent and decentralized body of electors should elect the president. “The choice of several, to form an intermediate body of electors, will be much less apt to convulse the community with any extraordinary or violent movements.” According to Hamilton, the only people in America who should not be allowed to be named an elector would members of the House and Senate and any “other person holding a place of trust or profit under the United States.” Electors would “exclude from eligibility to this trust, all those who from situation might be suspected of too great devotion to the President in office.”

Our Founders thought it crucial to entrust a temporary body with electing the president for the simple reason that a standing body like Congress would face enormous pressure from voters, officeholders and interest groups. That could be, for example, pressure from a president or from 10,000 protesters outside the Capitol. For this reason, the Founders opted to diffuse responsibility to electors from each state.

They sought to avoid the exact situation we saw on Jan. 6. Millions of Americans were falsely led to believe that the final say in the election of our next president lay with a single body, Congress. And so it was no surprise that thousands showed up to make their voices heard. But the belief that Congress has any say whatever in the “certification” of electoral votes has never been true. It has always been unconstitutional and against our Founders’ intent, as it was when Democrats attempted the same stunt in 2005.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/01/what-one-party-oligarchy-means-going-forward-lloyd-billingsley/

“Even though I totally disagree with the outcome of the election, and the facts bear me out, nevertheless there will be an orderly transition on January 20th. I have always said we would continue our fight to ensure that only legal votes were counted. While this represents the end of the greatest first term in presidential history, it’s only the beginning of our fight to Make America Great Again!”

President Trump issued that statement early Thursday, and Democrats were quick to follow.

Joe Biden said those who stormed the Capitol were “domestic terrorists. It’s that simple.”

Nancy Pelosi and Charles Schumer called for Trump’s immediate removal under the 25th Amendment, calling Trump “a very dangerous person” who committed an “act of sedition.”

Joining Schumer and Pelosi was Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger, on the grounds that Trump is unfit for office and to “ensure the next few weeks are safe for the American people.” Pelosi also supports a resolution by Democrat Cory Bush to expel from Congress unnamed Republicans who allegedly enabled Trump.

He had the temerity to interrupt the previous president’s plan to transform America into a one-party oligarchy, and that launched the left’s jihad against him. In four years, in the face of furious opposition, President Trump achieved more than anybody thought he would, and Trump’s middle-east peace accords drew widespread praise.

Trump never got his day in court, so by all indications the president of the United States has no standing to present evidence of election fraud. The illegitimate Joe Biden now reprises the ancien régime of 2008-2016, and that should have 74 million Trump voters appraising the forces arrayed against them.

Long before they caved to election fraud, federal legislators were representing the Washington establishment to their districts, not the other way around. As the late Frank Zappa put it, those folks up in Washington just look out for number one. And number one ain’t you. You ain’t even number two. Powerful precincts of the establishment deployed against Trump supporters, and that will surely ramp up under Biden.

http://www.chicagonow.com/dennis-byrnes-barbershop/2021/01/understanding-the-anger-that-fueled-the-washington-protests/

Why did thousands and thousands of people go  to Washington yesterday to protest? If you’ve wondered why so many fellow Americans did,  then you should read this. Even if you didn’t wonder, this is a must read.

I know a couple of people who went. I don’t presume to speak for them, but I can tell you what I see and hear, They were angry, but they didn’t go to Washington to invade the Capitol. Unlike those who did, they love this Republic and they understand that an assault on the seat of government betrays the very principles of the Republic itself.

To ignore their anger because of the violent assault on the Capitol only adds to that anger. Anger that has been growing for years, cultivated by decades of being ignored and ridiculed. They feel surrounded by a hostile government, dishonest media and corporate bias.

I know that some of you will stop reading here because you’ve heard this all before. But you’ve heard it all before because that’s the truth.

There’s a lot of talk about the “root causes” of poverty and racism, but virtually none about the root causes of the protestors’ anger. The anger was fueled by being called “deplorable,” people who are irrationally devoted to their faith and consumed by their love of weapons. Insult piled upon insult, as if only the stupid, ignorant, uncaring, self-centered and hateful could believe what they believe.

But those were just insults. The realty goes further. Their jobs disappeared into the international ether. Thank you to a corporate America that feels as distant as the the place their jobs went. Take the media, an industry in which my former colleagues are blind to their own uncaring prejudice that denies so many a fair shake. It’s not something the protestors imagine.