In Remembrance of January 6, Go Touch Some Grass
Pictured here: You, leaving your basement, to touch grass
Much of America’s media has been preparing for an all-out assault of January 6 coverage as we head into the one-year anniversary of that terrible day in America’s political history. Tucker Carlson’s infamous three-part documentary is streaming and CNN is even doing a live special on the subject. Be prepared for a deluge of hot takes on the subject tomorrow. They’ve been deprived of opportunities to talk about Donald Trump since he left office, causing their viewership to absolutely tank, and they won’t miss this chance!
Make no mistake that January 6 was a horrible moment for our Republic, a political disaster for the conservative movement, and, more importantly, a very violent altercation between people who were radicalized by the Internet and government agents. This tragic event had very real implications like suicides, months of imprisonment, and even untimely death for some of our fellow Americans.
As serious as that is, that didn’t stop the worst kind of internet celebrities and media personalities across the political spectrum from making a bad situation worse by twisting and outright lying about the event for their own political agenda. The hyperbole surrounding that day’s events is headache-inducing. Contrary to what some Twitter people would have you believe, January 6 was not the same as the burning of the White House during the War of 1812 or worse (or even “1000 times worse”??) than 9/11.
So, on the one-year anniversary of January 6,
I am respectfully asking you to touch a little grass.
For the uninitiated, that’s internet language for: “Go outside, get off social media for a while, and relax.” But before you shut down your computer and breathe some fresh air, let’s address some of the most overplayed misconceptions about that day to help everyone gain some much-needed perspective. I’ve also included the following helpful infographic in case you’re on the fence:
Here are seven statements to keep in mind before you’re inundated tomorrow.
#1: America was not almost overthrown.
This riot did not almost overthrow our country. It did, technically, disrupt government processes by forcing an evacuation but that is not the same as an overthrow or coup. It could technically be qualified as an insurrection but that would make almost any riot about political topics an insurrection and I think that’s too broad. Trump was not meeting with the QAnon Shaman guy about who he was going to choose to be the next Secretary of Transportation once they got in the Capitol Building. (But it would have been nice if one of them could have deleted all my student loans while they were inside.)
It is difficult to even say it was “armed.” I understand people brought firearms to DC illegally but unless these folks were brandishing in the Capitol and firing at government agents, I think we reserve the word “armed” for firearms, not “baseball bats, hockey sticks, rebar, bear spray, pepper spray, knives, police shields, a stun gun, fire extinguisher, and a flagpole.” Not to diminish the suffering of some of the officers, but this event mostly resulted in “bone fractures and concussions.” This was not a threat to the existence of the United States of America as we know it.
Barton Swaim at the Wall Street Journal helps explain this in a great article about how the left controls so many institutions that some violent rioters armed with bear spray simply could not have spelled our demise:
After the Capitol riot of Jan. 6, the New York Times and other publications on the left began calling the event an “insurrection” and an attempted “coup.” The riot was an appalling and dishonorable event, and the perpetrators of its crimes are rightly being prosecuted. But to call it an attempted coup is preposterous—and not simply for the practical reason that the prosecuted rioters weren’t indicted for treason or conspiracy to overthrow the government but for obstruction of an official proceeding, trespassing on government property, disorderly conduct and the like. The idea that Donald Trump and his followers had any chance of overthrowing the U.S. government, or even that they aimed at that outcome, is a delusion. That delusion springs from American liberal elites’ failure to accept the fact of their own predominance… To stage a coup, these renegades would have needed the backing of the military; and to govern afterward they would have needed cooperation from other institutions, including the news media and the federal bureaucracy. They had no support from those quarters and no hope of getting it. Their effort was witless and pointless, a dud grenade thrown at an armored division…. Even so, the riot will live on in the public consciousness as an “insurrection” and attempted “coup” because it encourages the left’s irrational fear of conquest by the right. The danger is that this paranoia keeps liberals from understanding their own dominant position—and acknowledging how illiberally they often exploit it.
I was troubled and ashamed when protesters breached the doors. It should never have happened and cannot happen again. That said, it’s going to take a lot more than a bunch of rowdy Internet shitposters to take this country down.
#2: This was not Antifa, folks. It was radicalized members of the far-right that must be reformed or expelled from our movement.
There is another popular theory that the people who breached the Capitol were Antifa and not “us”. I’m afraid that’s just not true. One rioter actually said the quiet part out loud at the time when he tweeted, "It was not Antifa at the Capitol. It was freedom-loving patriots who were DESPERATE to fight for the final hope of our Republic."
Here is another doozy of a quote. One online thread included specific calls for violence when they said, “Be ready to fight. Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, and blood from their BLM and Antifa slave soldiers being spilled. Get violent. Stop calling this a march, or rally, or a protest. Go there ready for war. We get our President or we die. NOTHING else will achieve this goal.”
I saw way too many (more than zero) Confederate flags and racist t-shirts in the footage I watched. Riots and protests bring these people out of their caves. Every time. Protests that you know radical Three Percenters and militia dudes and Proud Boys are going to be at should be a signal that something is wrong. They are basement dwellers who wait for their moment with this kind of stuff. So, I think we need to admit that there is a radicalized faction of our movement that exists and will cause more and more trouble if we do not acknowledge they exist and then either educate or expel them. And soon. This is another entire article in itself but these people are our Antifa and we need to attack their dangerous ideologies head-on.
The people that did this are dangerous and the former President was cozier than I would like with them even though he has spoken against racist groups and ideologies of hate before. Those previous Trump statements, though, don’t sit well when compared with these ones from former Trump advisor Steve Bannon on January 5 who used metaphors of war to describe what would happen on January 6. He shared, “All hell will break loose tomorrow. It will be quite extraordinarily different. All I can say is strap in. Tomorrow is game day. So many people said, man, if I was in revolution I would be in Washington. Well, this is your time in history.” Rep. Lauren Boebert, a darling of the far-right, tweeted that fateful morning, “Today is 1776.”
The pathway is very, very short between these people and the White House and the Republican Party as a whole. Avoid people who think this way like the plague. They exist and a lot of Republicans are listening to them. This is not who we are, folks.
If that’s you on the left, chances are you’ve never touched grass… or a woman.
#3: These people were a public relations disaster for the legitimate election reform and voter security movement.
If we’re going to try to tie moderate Democrats to the Antifa riots of Summer 2020 in their upcoming re-election bids this fall, we now are at risk of Republicans being tied to these rioters and goons. They are the absolute worst America has to offer and are using our legitimate grievances as a reason to commit crime. These goons were calling for Mike Pence to be hanged. They’re not Republicans, they’re vigilantes trying to circumvent regular democratic processes.
These people are not our allies. Their actions allowed incorrigible pieces like this one in Salon (of course) or this one to claim democracy was “under siege”. It allowed a platform for sound bites from perpetually cringey Rep. Eric Swalwell to gush about running for his life in a place that used to be “sacred.” Magically, all of those politicians who couldn’t fathom desecrating DC were utterly silent when a similar incursion with left-leaning protesters outside of the Department of Interior happened just a few months later.
The biggest irreparable damage caused that day was what it did to tarnish the legitimate cause of election reform and voter security with independent and unaffiliated voters. For those of us with serious concerns about election security the left now has the license to lump all of us in together. Just be ready for them to tie your favorite popular Republican to Steve Bannon for the rest of eternity. So… thanks January 6 dudes!
#4: The 2020 election was not stolen. Trump lost and Mike Pence did the right thing certifying the election.
You can’t talk about January 6 without talking about the 2020 Election. Listen, I was very sad that President Trump lost the 2020 election. But… he lost. And Mike Pence did the right thing to certify the election. President Trump lost the election because (a) Democrats and their allies outmaneuvered and outplayed Republicans during a year where they changed all the rules and (b) the American public was unhappy with President Trump’s handling of the pandemic (even though things are arguably worse under President Biden).
Still not convinced? Let’s put on our tinfoil hat for a moment and say that there is some mystical Democrat Voter Fraud Button that they press each year. I’m talking legions of dead-eyed union lackeys with gallons of White-Out fixing ballots in a smoky backroom downtown.
Why would they use it to ONLY secure the Presidency, barely control the US Senate, lose seats in the House, allow a Governorship to go Republican, and allow over 140 state legislature seats flip Republican?
This seems like the worst possible outcome for Democrats, honestly. Arguably, the Democrat Voter Fraud Button that led to a Biden presidency with slim electoral margins has been a major fundraising boon to congressional Republicans… and President Trumps’ war chest too. It has all but stalled President Biden’s progressive agenda and forced them to consider the wildly illiberal and unpopular removal of the filibuster to force through a bloated BBB bill and who knows what else. If they are successful at removing the filibuster, it will spell utter doom once Republicans someday get back into control and can exploit that loophole they opened.
Before I let go of my voter fraud ire, I encourage you to look at the upset election of Governor-Elect Glenn Youngkin in Virginia who showed us that Republicans CAN win when they are disciplined, people-focused, and have a strong message that capitalizes on a moment. Did the Dems forget to press their Voter Fraud button in that crucial election? Not to mention the near-miss in New Jersey that stunned observers across the country. Did the millions of activists and dollars forget to get sent to those two states? If there ever were an election for the Democrat Voter Fraud Button to be employed, that sure was a huge miss.
If you need some more convincing, the voter fraud folks have lost arguably the most conservative activist I know, Chuck Muth. He has chronicled alleged voter fraud in Nevada relentlessly since the election and I encourage you to read his various columns on it, linked below: (His best line is where he explains we lost due to a flawed system, not a fraud system in Part V.)
Part I – Part II – Part III – Part V – The Stan Vaughn Debacle – Voter Reference Foundation Rebuttal
The truth? In 2020, Trump was deeply unpopular with important swing voters, made significant mistakes goiing into Election Day AND presided over the first pandemic in a hundred years and, even though he still claims he “[won] that election in a landslide,” he lost.
#5: The United States Capitol Police failed miserably that day.
It is also fair to admit that the United States Capitol Police failed miserably to do their jobs on January 6. These people should never have gotten as far in as they did.
Bureaucratic misses like being told to hold back the Civil Disturbance Unit’s stun grenades and other tools for effective crowd control, some of the USCP’s shields being inaccessible because they were locked on a bus and other shields that would shatter upon impact because of improper storage prove the USCP was woefully unprepared for their jobs. They have admitted as much with a change of leadership and even suspended 6 officers for conduct violations that day. Their failure to repel borders was so complete that it has been used as a defensive strategy in the courtroom for some of the arrested agitators.
For those who forgot to take their tinfoil hats off from earlier, the USCP similarly was not “in on” the breach or intentionally letting protesters in to create some sort of false flag operation. It’s painfully clear that they were simply overwhelmed and didn’t want to get hurt trying to repel thousands of rowdy people. They didn’t let people in because they didn’t want to be killed.
The United States Capitol Police should have repelled those borders much more forcefully. I’m appalled those rioters were allowed to break windows, steal things, and sit in the desks of Members of Congress. That is unconscionable behavior and all of those people should be charged and punished for doing what they did. Had those protesters gotten near certain Members of Congress things could have gotten ugly.
While there are tons of intelligence failures from that day, Capitol Police should have been much more prepared to protect our national landmarks and seat of government.
#6: Trump absolutely should have and could have done more to stop the riot but he wasn’t orchestrating it.
Trump absolutely should have done more that day. The leaked text messages of top conservative pundits and elected officials that day that Trump wasn’t in charge of orchestrating a coup through January 6 as some have alleged. (Keep in mind that the FBI found that there was “scant evidence” that it was coordinated at all.) Conversely, he sure as hell didn’t do enough to stop it. One half-hearted video message 3 hours later is not the kind of action we needed at that moment. He can only be one or the other: a mastermind in charge of an attempted coup or delinquent in calling it off. It’s obvious which one he was.
Numerous accounts show the rioters thought that Trump wanted them there. Trump's actions ahead of January 6 support that assertion. He failed on January 6 to quell the riot that he helped incite. This might be reason enough for some to not support him if he runs again in 2024 and I wouldn’t blame you. I don’t need a Congressional commission to tell me that.
#7: A congressional commission is not the perfect remedy and there are reasons Republicans voted against it.
While we’re on the subject of the Commission on January 6, an investigation probably wouldn’t do what you think it would. I think an investigation would be useful to determine how much our government failed that day between the FBI and USCP but I get why people voted against the Commission in the House and Senate. There are tons of investigations happening and there is no doubt in my mind that the Commission would just give Democrats the chance to destroy Republicans during a midterm election year. It would have been too partisan and not accomplished what it was intended to do.
To conclude, this was a serious event in American history and we should reflect on the things and the people that got us there. Our American social fabric is in a tenuous place but January 6 should not be hallowed as some dark herald of a coming Civil War or become a national holiday. It surely is not worth the amount of ink the rage machine will spend talking about it tomorrow or in the coming years.
So go outside, take in some sunlight, and take down your holiday decorations in lieu of spending the day inside doom-scrolling on your phone reading about a riot that should never have happened.
Pictured: You, soon
