UKC

Extraordinary scenes right now as protestors storm the building.

I jested, after the November election result, that many journalists would be setting up a hotkey in MS Word (or whatever), for "extraordinary scenes at the White House" although I didn't think it would be used until inauguration!  edit - NB I do know that The Capitol Building is not The White House

This is a coup attempt. And the security services have just let them in. 

There is a confederate flag inside the Capitol building! 

Very Atwood 

Could make a film on it called 'Les Hickerables'. First song: "Do y'all hear the people sing?"

FFS

If this was happening anywhere else we would call this a coup attempt.

The NYT feed is calling it just that.

Michael S. Schmidt

Washington Correspondent of the NYT:

"Just to give this some perspective: This has gone well beyond a political story. We don’t know where the vice president and speaker of the House have taken refuge. It’s unclear who controls the Capitol and there’s no clear plan for how the government will be able to wrest back control of it."

Remember when anyone warning of exactly this from Trump was accused of "Trump Derangement Syndrome"?

The BBC pointed out that if this was happening on another continent we'd be calling it a failed democracy. Not sure why they didn't even follow it up by questioning whether it was, in fact, a sign of a failed democracy.

Whatever we think of our lives here I'm thankful I'm not living there.

The lunatics have taken over the asylum. 

That happened a while ago.

That may be so but at that time they were democratically elected lunatics.

I'm OK with it. I don't agree with their agenda, but the people have converged on the Capitol building. US political history is build on this stuff.

It's not a coup. But it will be the defining act that solidifies a self-proclaimed revolt. 

Even some republicans are calling in an insurrection.

TBF democracy has worked. It has just stood up to Trumps attacks and the vote of the people is being respected by the democractic process. The founding fathers got a lot wrong but thankfully they had enough foresight to delegate oversight of the elections to the states because of moments like this.

I'd say it hasn't. A significant portion of the electorate now genuinely believes that the whole process has been completely rigged and that the election was stolen, and the president is refusing to pursue a peaceful handover of power.

The repercussions for democracy in the US will be long lasting.

I read that 17% of Democrats think there was fraud. Totally bizarre. 

Some great posts here in the comments section.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mollyhensleyclancy/trump-dc-maga-elect...

One of my favourites -

"Also Trumpers have reduced our country to a 3rd world level.

This is being broadcast to the world. We'll never be leaders of the world again.

We're Iran now. We're those shithole counties now."

F*ck me...

Trump neeeds to be impeached ASAP. There may be only two weeks left but who knows what else he could do.

Which is the real indicator he no longer has command authority?

Pence making decisions with bipartisan senate leadership and the pentagon, or that tweet being deleted?

Well I think many have concerns about voter suppression.

So? That doesn't mean it failed it failing is the winner not being in power after the inauguration. Has it been attacked? Yes. 

Plenty of countries question their elections. Look at the UK and brexit, wasn't their a criminal investigation into some aspects? 

It's quite astonishing the lack of police action. now nearly an hour after curfew the police are just letting the crowd stand there.

The contrast with the BLM protests is astonishing. It's not like these protests were a surprise.

if anyone tries to take over national TV stations - then it's a fully committed coup attempt.

Plus Trump suggesting it to his cult members.

Of course. It's just a violent attempt to subvert democracy, backed, encouraged and praised by the losing side's leader, with other major politicians complicit and law enforcement clearly involved to some degree.

An unsuccessful one, but it's a coup.

Correct but it's not a coup because it's not to overthrow a head of state, it's to keep one. They disrupted a political mechanism, not deposed a Head of State. Yes it has some of the superficial trappings of a coup, but it's messy factionalism. Any attempt to forcefully install an unelected leader (aside from the entire college system...) wouldn't get beyond Congress with it's series of emergency plans and it's nowhere near that. If anything there's been more efforts applied due to this to protect Biden's position than to undermine it.

It's democratic process gone awry because it's used a broken system so it can be hijacked by nefarious idiots, but no one seriously looking at this is calling it a coup (so don't quote most media outlets who are simply selling clickbait and advertising time).

If they try this after inauguration you can have your coup attempt then for sure, but right now it ain't it.

You are nit-picking on semantic technicalities which are largely made up, and mostly irrelevant.

Fair call, so make your case to show otherwise. Of course it's nit picking on technicalities, it's US politics. Perhaps we should just broad brush it for the sake of gratifying consumption like the Proud Boys are. Mostly irrelevant, so which bits are relevant?

I'm calling for not using terminology that doesn't fit so these events can be viewed contextually, not throw around clichés that stir up populist ideals. A coup brings with it a very different chain of response than does factional unrest like we are seeing. But I'm open to hearing otherwise.

That's what doesn't make sense. I don't think Trump wanted this at all.

This was never going to help him, there was no good outcome from this for Trump. If anything it's finished him and even senior republicans are discussing invoking the 25th. Even Lindsay Graham has come out against him. He's really lost the party over this.

I don't think he wanted it because I don't think he ever - or still - had any sense of process where it can even go. I think his actions away from the public have been to a 'let's see' mentality where he looks for opportunities to exploit volatile moments. He, like the mobs running around Capitol Hill are getting off being central to the biggest things that will happen to them. He knows he's conducting much of this so he's making his moves profound, there's lots of precedents to this and Politico has called it as the US is right now one of those shithole African countries.

What's useful to follow is the thoughts of political scientists and analysts during this (something you won't find on most big news channels). Axios is good and FP as usual, but oddly Mother Jones has put together some good rolling stuff including a good piece called "Now is this a coup?' with the thoughts of people who know, particularly Naunihal Singh.

The only bonus is it makes the trump name toxic and reduces the chances his kids will ever be able to run for office. 

hmm, I fear that time may sadly prove you wrong on this 

Of course it's intended to "overthrow a head of state". President Joe Biden. Their entire aim is to prevent his inauguration, what else would you call it if they succeeded?

Trump not making sense? When did that ever happen?

I think we continually judge Trump as some clever manipulator with an 'end game' when he's actually a dangerously unbalanced child-man. I'm not convinced he has a plan for what he is going to do from one minute to the next or a grip on reality.

Trump will always have supporters, but I doubt the party will ever risk a trump candidate again. Having armed trump supporters storm buildings is just a step they can't tolerate. 

It's to retain a head of state, not overthrow one. Biden is not the current head of state. And it's not to prevent inauguration, which can be done in a bunker if they choose, it's to prevent confirmation of a result they don't accept. It matters because it frames the government response and course of law.

If after Trump leaves power his mobs succeed in removing Biden and installing a new head of state, that will be a coup.

I refer you to the commentary of Naunihal Singh, he's pretty erudite on what constitutes a coup or not. A quick search will bring up plenty.

You clearly have a lower bar for what constitutes successful democracy than me.

Questions and investigations to establish the legitimacy of the election are an essential part of democracy.

What's not, is the leader of a country whipping up a section of society to violently block the workings of government, for his own personal gain, after the legitimacy of the election has been checked, double checked, and triple checked on the basis of completely unfounded allegations.

What's also not legitimate in a democracy, is a state where the colour of your skin and your political affiliation has such a marked bearing on how your protest will be policed.

I assume the original question was more general: Of course the election was rigged AGAINST Democrats, by gerrymandering and all forms of voter suppression as well as external propaganda.

Cruz's sleight of hand was to cite this as evidence that Democrats supposedly agree that Trump lost due to electoral fraud.

CB

i predict a) an assassination attempt on Biden or b) Trump supporters arming themselves (what am I saying they are already armed) and trying to instigate some sort of coup. The inaugeration will not be the peaceful event of the past

About as bizarre as day one being told 'there is no evidence of election fraud' by most media outlets despite there clearly being no time to hold any investigation into it. You don't get a sense the media on all sides are bending truth to suit there agendas? This is a consequence of people feeling like they are being lied to and manipulated (spoiler: they are). 

This will get worse, the left media will blow this up further (it is clearly a serious incident, but they will pump up and spin it even more) which will generate more backlash from the right. Continue cycle. 

You can tell by some of the language used in the posts on this thread alone (cult members, lunatics etc), both sides look at each other like crazies with potential for serious violence, evidenced by last few years as some have mentioned, proud boys, ANTIFA, BLM, the CHOP and CHAZ, continuing riots in Portland etc etc. Both sides have already shown plenty of willingness to disregard peaceful democracy to further their goals.

As always, honesty and open dialogue are the methods to solve all this but seems to be getting more difficult as tensions increase.

Was democracy thwarted?

Yes I can see both on the table, possible a connected event. I have a feeling the Trumps will form a sort of free state where they don't recognize Democrat rule, and some militia element of that will feel legitimized to make Biden keep his head down.

That wasn't their aim - obviously he's not president yet. I'm not defending them but they went in and took selfies. They didn't actually intend to take power. Maybe they intended to harm politicians I don't know. The videos were quite laughable if it wasn't so serious,they were even staying within roped areas, after smashing through windows to get in.

Well at least the Russians are getting their moneys worth

Ha yes, and the Chinese, Iranians, Kim family & Venezuelans. 

Maybe the UK is not so bad. 

There's photographs of guys wearing pistols and carrying tens of zip-tie restraints. Reasonable assumption that at least some of them were looking for hostages as a minimum.

That they had to go to Pence rather than Trump to authorise the National Guard being deployed says he needs to be removed. Too much could happen in the next two weeks and none of it good.

I guess only if you consider the peaceful handover of power an essential component of democracy.

No. Lets be clear here. There is no evidence of widespread fraud. There have been some cases of low level fraud which isnt suprising considering one of the candidates suggested people carry it out.

The claims were about mass tampering with ballots and whenever the specific claims were investigated they werent supported by the facts.

When the manual recounts were done there was no real change in the numbers (just the sort of numbers which would be expected from manual error).

Now if the election process was entirely under the control of one group then you could possibly claim there was a really well hidden fraud but given the different groups involved the conspiracy would need to be beyond reasonable belief. Aside from anything else remember several of the states being challenged are under republican control and so its somewhat difficult to understand why they would engage in fraud or not notice it?

Its worth noting that in every single court case the lawyers have shied away from any claim of election fraud even when directly challenged by judges.

So yes it was perfectly reasonable for the media to say there was no evidence of widespread fraud.

Yes of course. It is all the lefts fault. 

That isnt going to work with one side who have pinned their colours to someone who has no interest at all in honesty. If it was the republicans under Dubya Bush etc then yes it could work but whilst one side follows someone who is a proven and repeated liar then good luck with honesty as a tactic.

Do you have a link to these photos?

I’m asking because I read a headline in the Independent about armed protesters but haven’t seen any photographs to back up this claim.

If there's some unhinged bloke wandering around with an assault rifle I'm not sure my first priority would be to get a snap.

Totally agree with you there!

Don't mess with Venezuelans, Chuck Norris is nothing compared to this Chavez guy who can hack voting machines 13 year after his death!

They are trying to depose  the president elect so technically I'd say it was an attempted coup.

Remember that the whole Brexit adventure started with the murder of an MP...

Nothing to do with US politics. All to do with you using a absurdly narrow and obtuse definition of a « coup » in order to make a purely semantic point.

Bunch of people with guns storm federal building to prevent the certification of the president elect. It isn’t a stretch to call this an attempted coup, and if it happened anywhere else; this is exactly how it would be called.

The reports day one didn't say low level or widespread, they said definitively no evidence of election fraud, prior to any investigation taking place. They took an immediate, unjustified stance which to me reeked of political gamesmanship. I am not making any claims about levels of fraud being enough to change the election result, I'm just criticizing what I was told, and how quickly.

Not at all what I said. Are you telling me you don't think there's likely to be any level of needlessly hyperbolic reporting on this from the more left of center outlets that won't cause more animosity? That the far left won't leverage this, in turn fueling the far right? This all starts way before Trump, I'm not here to play chicken and egg.

Ok so honesty won't work, what's the solution? Everyone knows what happens between opposed groups when dialogue breaks down. If you think demeaning/demonizing the other side repeatedly will work then continue by all means, though that's exactly what's been happening for the last 4+ years and we aren't getting great results are we.

No it didn’t.

I don't remember that at all. However, we have been through the bizarre and profoundly undemocratic process where the most significant change in several generations has been pushed through despite only being supported by a minority of the population (and a proportion that was reducing even as Brexit was being implemented.) If that's democracy I'm a banana. 

Are you denying the murder of Jo Cox took place ? You really are a bigger piece of work than I thought.

Well I remember clearly the murder of Jo Cox days before the EU referendum.

Of course I’m not denying that Jo Cox was murdered!

I’m saying that the whole Brexit adventure didn’t start with the murder of an MP as you stated.

Stop trying to twist the facts.

The murder took place a few days before the EU ref, I don’t see how that is twisting the facts.

I didn't say he was.  I said their aim was preventing him from becoming their president (which amounts to the same thing as overthrowing the president), and it absolutely was.

It's what Trump himself told them they would be doing when he urged them at his rally to march on the Capitol building (and lied that he would go with them).

A few days before the referendum is hardly the start of the Brexit adventure, is it? Although it probably is in your world.

Well yes thats because there wasnt any evidence.

The claim being made was there was evidence of fraud. The media looked at the claims and saw no support for them hence when reporting it would have been wrong for them not to state that those claims arent supported by the evidence.

If I claim that I climb E10 it would be reasonable for anyone reporting it to say there is no evidence for it (well actually it would be more reasonable not to report the claim at all......) even before carrying out an extensive investigation into my claims.

This is completely separate to any future investigation it is in direct response to the claims being made at the time that there was fraud.

Well since you think that accurate reporting is wrong I think we are going to have to agree to disagree

Unfortunately by allowing the right to push ever further without question or challenge by bleating on about having dialogue and honesty with people utterly disinterested in it it has made it far harder to repair things but simply continuing to bend over isnt going to work.

Me too. However, I think you need to refresh your memory. The lead up to Brexit was well underway long before her death. An extreme right wing bell end wanted to kill traitors (sounds familiar), to spark the brexit revolution. Rather than a brexit surge from 'patriots', or a left wing backlash in favor of remain, nothing much happened. It didn't swing the vote either way. It was a pointless death of a good person, for no reason.

Nobheads with guns trying to overthrow democracy and provoke a revolution, is where the similarity ends.

you clearly dont watch the news outlets; even the previously trump supporting outlets are pretty clear in their unanimous condemnation of yesterdays events. And your obsession with the "far left" (whatever that is in the USA) is odd - these events have been 100% fuelled by the "far right", and by Trump himself. There is nowhere else to go for a cause or to blame; your attempt to push this onto the "far left" and "hyperbolic reporting from the more left of centre outlets" is pretty transparent, and pathetic.

Any other president would not have led the USA into this situation; you are correct in that the demeaning / demonizing of any opposition by Trump has led to these not great results.

Here's the main one doing the rounds.

https://www.trendsmap.com/twitter/tweet/1346977323086729218 

Seems perfectly reasonable to define the referendum as part of the start of Brexit.

Anyway, as usual you seem to want to make a purely pedantic point, instead of adressing the point I made which is that we had our share our violence tainting the political process in the UK as well.

They are right. By announcing the murder as the start it ignores everything which led up to that murder. It puts it completely out of context.

I didn’t say the Brexit process was started by this murder. I said it started « with » . Surely you understand the difference.

I’m not ignoring anything that led up to it, I am simply pointing out that we had our share of violence tainting up the political process in the UK as well.

Why not address that instead of making a pedantic point based on things I have not said ?

Thanks for that, I’ve just found a similar image of the same guy on the Business Insider website.

Scary!

Nobody disputes that or had said anything contrary, so this is a moot point.

And that is the similarity I am pointing out.

The U.K. has a fairly long history of protest against the political process, some of it at a level far above that seen in the US yesterday.  As seen in the security screens in Parliament and the gates at Downing Street.

None of which I’m denying.

Thanks for confirming that you in fact agree with my point.

Both sides are demonizing each other and both have committed violence, this is just the current high water mark. To me it's self evident this will escalate just by how the discussion is panning out here. I don't agree these events have been 100% fueled by the far right and Trump, this kind of thing doesn't happen in a vacuum and it'll take more nuanced discussion in the mainstream than we've seen so far to understand what's happening. What's the alternative?

I'm trying to suggest current political dialogue and media apparatus (all sides) are insufficient to deal with the issues of polarisation we're facing. I literally mentioned far left once in reply and you've called me obsessed, does that seem fair really? Or this in indicative of the problem?

What planet are you living on. Can you say with a straight face the Trump administration, and prior to that the election campaign, faced no question or challenge? That can't be your position.

To be realistic, he's been criticised about every single decision and action he's made (assume fairly for the sake of this discussion if you wish), impeached and accused of Russian collusion. So what does not bending over anymore look like? Would you have forced him out via extra-legal means?

I actually think the violence will calm quite quickly once Trump is completely out of the way; most of those yesterday are firmly in the "rent-a-mob" category; without anyone to incite them, they aren't capable of organising themselves. For this reason (as a slight aside) I am against impeachment of Trump - the more he is allowed the oxygen of publicity, the more he will be able to stoke the flames of hatred and division. The faster he disappears, the better.

Thats better - I agree that the polarisation of the media and politicisation of reporting is a bad thing - just look over here; did you see the side by side of the two express headlines regarding fishing exclusions? I'm not sure how to deal with it either; it relies on individuals using whats available to look at more than the one or two outlets that confirm their personal bias. And when that is combined with newspapers that are content to allow their headlines to go beyond fact, bypassing opinion, and straight to outright dishonesty, we have a problem. Is the answer to "censor" newspapers by allowing them to only publish provable or at least evidential pieces? Maybe, but its bye bye Daily Mail for example.

You did only mention far left once, but it was fairly prominently positioned in the dock! Maybe i was too sensitive and took the words too literally, but this did seem to be a direct piece of deflection and whataboutery pinning the blame on a group who had literally zero involvement. And wait for the inquiry into the response.....as was said on the telly news last night, what response would the protesters have go it they were black, or it was a blm march? At least the two heads of national security have resigned.

A lot  more sensible one than someone babbling about honesty whilst equally complaining that the media accurately reported no evidence of fraud.

No I didnt say that. Maybe I could have made it clearer so here it is.

Your attempts to blame both sides and going on about honesty is what has enabled trump and his crew of liars to get away with it. The false equivilence and demand to represent both sides and not accurately report the facts.

So no..

You are without doubt the most unpleasant person I have come across on these forums. Arrogant, patronising, often ill informed, and completely oblivious to how offensive you are.

Are you absolutely incapable of admitting you're wrong for once?

Meanwhile daily USA Covid death toll yesterday was 3,963......

Alyson 30 the worst? Bloody hell, you've led a sheltered life on here.......

Ah, now that's different........

And they've managed that without the added excitement of the new strain of the virus....which just appears to have got off a plane from heathrow at JFK.........

This is going to get messy...

Trump has been stoking the flames of racism for a long time. 'Very fine people' remarks about racists. Telling the proudboys to 'stand by'.

Even before the bodies were cold, the right wing media, Fox and others were saying 'trump supporters dont behave in this way'.  They are trying to blame it on antifa and others as a false flag operation. Which conveniently ignores the years of trump whipping crowds into a frenzy with 'lock her up' chants and other tactics. Not to mention all the very public messages about calling supporters to the capital to disrupt the hand over.

Suggesting that these events are not fueled by the far right, kinda plays into the propaganda.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/internet/trump-loyalists-push-evidence-free-cl...

Good we're getting somewhere! You might be right about the violence disappearing once Trump is out of office, I tend to think perhaps not. I see him more as the symptom that everyone is trying to get rid of without dealing with the actual underlying illness, while many others see it the other way around.

I think it's incredibly dangerous to play with the idea of censoring newspapers. Who watches the Watchman? That's an extremely fast track to a bad outcome IMO. A functioning democracy requires people to discuss/debate as we are and come to their own rational conclusions, not monolithic fact checkers telling us what to believe. 

I do think a big part of this is 'traditional' media and 'new' media competing against each other, and people making decisions on who they trust more. 

We don't know that. It's all over the US already. 

Well as I said, you and I clearly have a different opinion of what constitutes a successful democracy.

Lawmakers being intimidated inside their own chambers by armed insurgents is a funny way to demonstrate successful democracy.

As is a president openly inciting riots in a bid to hold onto power.

If you elect such a man, and don't remove him when he demonstrates his unwillingness to serve the will of the people or to uphold the constitution, democracy has failed.

Democracy requires rule of law in my book. Laws are of course fictional, and rely on sufficient numbers of people believing them. When enough people cease to believe in them, democracy has failed.

I had a dump a few days before the EU ref - if only I'd known

There's violent acts all the time. Of course it was awful but democracy won. The law makers went straight back in and worked through the night to ensure biden rightfully takes over.

Is there racism? of course.

I think yesterday totally got away from Trump, he's a bully who is full of bluster. It's been the hallmark of his presidency. That was why he meekly headed home. The idea was March to the building and shout a bit. They couldn't have had any idea how easy it was to get inside.

Well you seem to understand me perfectly, so I'm not babbling. You don't usually report no evidence of fraud before an investigation has even taken place. It's unusual and have never heard a story reported in that way, which is why it stuck out.

I think in your mind I'm trying to defend the actions or blame both sides equally, I'm not. I believe it's open and honest dialogue or continued and escalating violence, so I'm in favour of honesty while you seem to be getting very emotionally invested in more blame and acting as if there's been no misdeeds on the other side of the fence. You do need to understand the opposition properly if you want a peaceful outcome, that's not really debatable is it? If you think all these people are total lunatic neo-nazis then the stage is set and I can't see a way out of this.

Are you comparing yesterday with an active terrorist campaign. Because that is why we have security screens at Parliament and gates at Downing Street.

No, I was replying to Rom who seemed to think that I was denying that there was protest in British politics.

Protest is a legitimate part of democracy, the reasons we have the measures you list are nothing to do with legitimate protest.

Elections are observed. By Democrat observers. By Republican observers. By independent observers. By international observers 

None of those observers reported any visible fraud occurring during the election. That was the basis for news agencies reporting no fraud.

Subsequent investigations, including those performed by Republican authorities, have found no evidence of fraud during the voting.

Well they do if you were a member of the IRA.

I’m not sure what point you are trying to make?

You have made it for me. You are comparing the actions of the IRA with the actions of those claiming to be acting for the President of the USA and being encouraged by that President.

I'm not sure that the media did announce that there was no evidence of fraud. 

What they actually said was that Trump had made accusations of fraud without producing any evidence. 

Didnt realize that - i thought it was a recent addition to your Stateside woes.........good luck with it anyway!

Despite your claim that I am « wrong » I see no argument nor any evidence in  rebuttal of my claim in your response. Only bile and unpleasant personal attacks. Which is very much your habitual style.

Anybody can verify that Jo Cox was murdered days before the EU referendum: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Jo_Cox

 If stating the facts is offensive to you, there is not much I can do about it.

Am I?

I’m not convinced that the actions of your average IRA ASU bear much resemblance to what I saw on the news yesterday.

If you don’t get that you taking a dump isn’t as relevant to the discussion as much as the murder of an MP, I am not sure we have any basis for further discussion.

Yes you are, although you might not realise.

I hope i'm not being too optimistic, but there has been nothing like this before, and nothing like Trump before. There is certainly something else underlying it; maybe its because anyone with enough money and a little "charisma" can almost buy the presidency these days?

Me too, but how can you call some of the printed media outlets we have newspapers.?  some people still buy the Daily mail, even though it appears to be going back to its 1930's fascist period again; the downward slide of the Telegraph into the Torygraph is worrying (remember only 10 - 12 years ago when it provided us with the MP's expenses scandal? Halcyon days for a paper i used to read regularly, but don't touch now because of its overt bias and willingness to spout whatever the Tories tell it to. Its got to the point where I read overseas papers as much as uk ones, as they are less likely to be biased. And what type of censorship should we have - i'm not advocating a ban on certain subject, or that it has to pass before a censor before publication, only that the editor is happy that he / she can back up the piece with facts, or at least evidence backing up the story. It would at least get rid of some of the more lurid headlines; and it is headlines that catch peoples attention. Too late to tell them 3 or 4 weeks later "oops, sorry, that was wrong". 

Agree; however too much of the "new media" is just soundbites on FB or Twitter, which is not news at all. Any of us can come up with any old tosh and tweet it. Many do. There are also many online news sources that do try to compete properly with traditional printed / broadcast media; they are perfectly legit, but should be subject to the same "you'd better be able to prove it" law (should that be invoked), or be subject to punitive sanctions.

Nonsense. I’ve never denied such a thing, on the contrary.

BTW, to attempt to categorise the murder of an MP as merely « protest » says everything when need to know about your politics.

What are you dribbling on about?

Perhaps you’d care to explain that to me?

I don't. Most have clear bias and it's routine to 'take the average' across multiple outlets. I trust you could name some from the left of center as well. If not then I'd suggest that's a blindspot.

There are many very relevant and intelligent discussions and opinions outside of the corporate press, as well as a number inconvenient facts that can often go unmentioned. It's what's so maddening to me that you can hear very sensible bipartisan and nonpartisan discussions, as well as totally fresh ideas, outside the gates while the least articulate and least representative people get the spotlight. I don't use FB or Twitter as it is extremely short form medium, which I believe is totally antithetical to what we need right now and partially to blame for our current predicament. The earlier forum era of the internet was better (hence here we are).

In your post at 13.19 you indirectly but insidiously referred to the murder of Jo Cox as an example of « protest ». 
A particularly nasty categorisation, I find.

" are nit-picking on semantic technicalities which are largely made up, and mostly irrelevant."

I'm appalled at what happened, absolute disgrace. But it's giving these people too much credit to call it a coup or a realistic attempt to put Trump in power, ignoring the semantics over whether Biden is in power yet. They walked around taking selfies. They wouldn't even step over roped off areas after smashing windows to get it. It was very odd.

It wasn’t a categorisation but a reason.

Which was your initial point wasn’t it? That Jo Cox was murdered as a protest against Brexit?

We're hoping it's behind the surge but we've had Thanksgiving, Hanukkah (we've about 7 million jewish people in the US), Christmas and NY so a surge was fully expected.

They estimate it has been here since early december but it's hard to know for sure. January is going to be very bad regardless. I'm seeing friends test positive who are asymptomatic (I'm in a small city with a massive regional hospital and 9 colleges so we test lots) and very cautious and risk averse with covid so I do wonder if its now hitting people who are careful because its so much more transmissable. 

??? Where did you read me claiming that the murder of Jo Cox was a protest against Brexit ?

If you are going to lie at least don’t make it so bleeding absurd.

4 dead. Seems a bit more than « walking around taking selfies » to me.

That would be the bit where you said she was murdered at the start of the Brexit adventure?

3 had heart attacks by the sounds of it, fat man climbing walls doesn't end well. One was shot climbing through a window.

What was the plan to take control? There was no long term plan to subvert democracy. A coup tries to install another leader. 

https://theconversation.com/was-it-a-coup-no-but-siege-on-us-capitol-was-th...

I said it was disgraceful. But I just don't think we can call it a coup. Of course some wanted to cause harm, there were bombs after all, but long term planning? 

Watch these guys? They seem totally bewildered to be in there. 

https://twitter.com/zackbornstein/status/1346903734698168320

there was an article in the Washington Post a couple of days ago discussing various types of coups. Unfortunately searching on 'coup' produces dozens of pages of results (surprise, surprise). One of the types of coup they described used a Spanish word and was loosely defined as someone who had been legitimately elected but then was trying illegitimately hold on to power. Which seems to me is what Trump has been trying to do since early November.

As much as I've not liked it, it has been acceptable to do what he did from November in the courts. The disinformation campaign was not good but sadly this is the US and lying is basically a protected right and a cost of free speech. But he has every right to legally fight it all the way, even up to yesterday in the objections. That's the constitutional process. What happened yesterday outside of congress was much worse than anything he's done before.

That's why I don't agree with conservatives saying these people had no option but to riot. They had 2 months and 60 odd court cases to get the evidence of fraud across and failed. Even yesterday its fine to voice objections in congress, the dems have done it previously. It's why we have that sitting of congress although it will never change a result.

I still think he was totally blindsides by yesterday, he's just a bullshitter totally detached from reality. And now he's accepted defeat. I suspect he was told to accept defeat or be removed. It's largely about money for him, even Rubio has finally called him out in a tweet for https://twitter.com/marcorubio/status/1347189693310513153

Oh hell yeah, mirror and Guardian, but both are significantly, demonstrably more honest than their "right wing" competitors (sun, telegraph for eg. It just weems in the UK we have many more tory supporting papers than labour supporting. dont start about socialist worker, thats just a comic, although having said that, the mail ad express are getting close as mirror images across the spectrum.

Yup. This. I would like to see some of the new internet outlets thrive; and can see it happening as the print media move towards being net based. Instead of taking the guardian or the telegraph or the mail for all your news and views, I can certainly see the move to reading a wider range of more specialised news outlets. I certainly seem to have drifted in that direction, getting football and sport from one place, financial news from others, politics from another, etc etc

autogolpe (auto coup or self coup are the English translations)  I think is the one you are looking for. Gets into power legitimately but then tries to retain power normally by subverting the legislature etc.

They were pretty much all shouting that it was their intention.

I didn’t say it was a successful or clever coup.

It was a particularly poorly organised, poorly executed and unsuccessful coup attempt. Still a coup attempt, though.

In what world is that « claiming that the murder of Jo Cox was a protest against Brexit ».

It seems to me that at this point you are just posting bizarre and random claims as a distraction, another frequent rubbish tactic of yours.

Fair enough, I just think it's giving them far too much credit. I think insurrection is more accurate because I just don't see any belief that they'd take control. 

On CNN they had cameras in with the protestors, some had gone in to smoke weed in there. It's a strange mix of those who think they are waging civil war and those just wanting to experience something.

The interesting one is the fact that that it is the first time that the Capitol (I know that spelling is correct, but if seems odd) Building has been breached since we (the British) did in 1814 as part of the War of 1812.

You would think that “Patriots” would understand shit like that. I’m sure Philip Roth would have written a wonderful novel about such events.

For some reason you feel you need to subject the blindingly obvious to forensic scrutiny. What happened yesterday was something we all saw, as clearly as we saw the planes crashing into the World Trade buildings. Don't try to be too clever. That's what people like Sen. Cruz do. 

That's rubbish.

There's plenty of redundancy built into the system which they go through to verify the results. Paper as well as electronic ballots that get compared for example. There was plenty of investigations and audits, that's why they found the 1-2 examples of fraud. 

There's been 60 separate court cases as well. 

Many of the examples floating on right wing media we're bollox. There was one about more votes than voters in michigan, when (think it was MI) MI allows same day voter registration and the list of voters was from 2018.

Also many of the GOP allegations weren't about fraud but changes to election law. These changes were made through the courts months ago, and then the GOP wanted the laws retrospectively changed and millions of votes rejected. They could have appealed when the laws were changed but changing it then would have allowed them to vote in other ways, and they didn't want that.

I had a guy lose it when I told him the constitution could be changed, he took off on me about how the 2nd amendment and the constitution could never be changed. Even the guy who was originally supporting his view had to point out what amendment meant... The general understanding of US history is pretty awful. I often think immigrants learn it better because we're so fascinated by the history of the US, plus have to learn it for out civics test.

1. Oh hell yeah, mirror and Guardian, but both are significantly, demonstrably more honest than their "right wing" competitors (sun, telegraph for eg. It just weems in the UK we have many more tory supporting papers than labour supporting. dont start about socialist worker, thats just a comic, although having said that, the mail ad express are getting close as mirror images across the spectrum.

Without a balanced press democracy doesn't stand a chance. I am coming to think that the media should only be allowed to report facts, not opinions. If something they say is proved to be untrue then large fines need to be applied.

The reason we had Brexit is because the right wing press have been banging on about how bad the EU is for over forty years. This drip drip of lie after lie does have an effect. The populist movements, success both here and in the US can be laid squarely at the door of the right wing press. Unfortunately the majority of media outlets in the UK are on the right and have moved further to the right over the years.

Before the Second World War the Daily Mail was firmly in favour of the German Nazi party. Given the same circumstances ......

"We're storming the Capitol; it's a revolution"

Elizabeth, Nashville, TN

😭

In her defence, she did appear to be mind-numbingly stupid, so her understanding of what a revolution really entails may be a bit limited. 

Tongue was firmly in my cheek. I found that video hilarious.

ps. She was at Trump rally. Mind-numbingly stupid...

Being (at least in my own mind !) an intelligent human being, I find it difficult to understand how anyone who has supported Trump isn't both "mind-numbingly stupid" and of "limited understanding".

After all, when you examine his past, he is a proven incompetent and failure at just about everything except getting his self in the public eye and is from the "elite" of society that doesn't know a thing about the real world.

Yet he campaigned by spouting how brilliant a businessman he was, and claimed he was one with the downtrodden.

(Those Republicans who "held their nose" and voted Republican I can understand, but only to a degree).

Just currently sat in quiet remembrance of the Trumper who died on Wednesday from a heart attack caused by accidentally tasering himself in the balls whilst trying to steal a painting from the Capitol Building.

We'll never see his like again.

Wow. I suppose that counts as a “medical incident”, or however it was described 

where are you reading that...?

If it's not true it ought to be. 

I read 'over excited' 

https://www.revolt.tv/news/2021/1/7/22219433/man-died-at-us-capitol-taserin...

That's the one, thanks.

It's surprisingly common for American gun nuts to accidentally shoot themselves in the bollocks.  This photo is a clue why. (I'm not talking about the guns he's holding in his hands.)

This is the same guy btw - his name was Kevin Greeson.

There's something desperately poignant about that picture in its Christmas context. The guy reminds me of me when I was 8 years old and Father Christmas brought me a plastic cowboy rifle. I had the same pride and couldn't wait to get outside to have a gun battle with my pal.

It strikes me that all these Trumpers and Q types are just giant children at the stage before the Superego develops. These are the foot soldiers of the Right. 

Now lighting a candle for the female Trumper who was trampled to death holding a "Don't Tread On Me" flag.

https://www.9news.com.au/world/rosanne-boyland-trampled-dont-tread-on-me-ga... 

Sombre mood here.

There's already been posts on Parler claiming the woman who was shot and killed was actually an AnTiFa spy.

Although I think Google has just given Parler 24hrs to moderate their platform or be removed so that will be interesting.

Lot of salty MAGA chud tears out there over the free market in action today.

Yeah I just went on TheDonald. Lots there saying it's all faked.

Pete Pozman is clearly a nicer man than me because I see nothing poignant in Kevin's demise at all.  Pure karma and a 100% chuckle-fest as far as I'm concerned.  He seems to have been an overt neo-nazi and a racist thug. I only hope he had time before the end to realise he'd be forever remembered as the chump who tasered his own 'taters in the noble attempt to nick a souvenir.

Still, chin up.  I guess it's the next best thing to cold dead hands for an American gun nut, the federal authorities finally taking your weapon from you only when they prise it off your hot, smouldering testicles.

Roseanne Boyland though, I dunno man..  Sympathy is too strong a word, I mean she was inside the rotunda and all it's not like she was an innocent bystander but..  I'm not quite as comfortable mocking her, she seems like a mug more than a villain somehow.  I guess in her case I can see the poignancy.

The irony of the flag thing is darkly funny, but it's actually not all that weird.  It seems to be a pretty common motif for a flag among the MAGA crowd.

Lots of lessons to be learnt from this.

Don't keep your taser next to your testicles..

But I'm going to talk to my students about mob mentality. I bet many there didn't go for violence but followed along, swept up and got in the building (I think they were those looking like tourists) and will now get knocks on their doors. They are running faces through the DVLA facial recognition software at the moment. Lots of lives will be severely affected. I saw two police officers from Seattle have been put on leave and will be dismissed if its proven it was them in the pictures.

But even just being there they could have been part of the stampede, possibly as shots were fired, they also affected to the policing and speed with which they could clear the area.

One of the healthcare workers at my wife's hospital was filmed stealing a phone at the protest and got punched, she also broke our states quarantine rules so has been sacked already. We're an 'at will' state so you don't need a reason to be dismissed that day.

Lots of victims of Trump's recklessness and ego and the pedlars of groundless conspiracy theories that day.

No, I am laughing at the demise of these idiots. I do feel sorry for the cop who died, seems to have been a decent enough chap and an opponent of the war he participated in.

The rest, just congratulations of removing themselves from the gene pool!

F*ck them, but the rest of the would be revolutionaries seem to be just as stupid. Anyone see the guy with the Trump 2020 and Georgia double flag? Seems just about bright enough to order stuff from Amazon, but apparently no one told him about the difference between Georgia (US state) and Georgia (former Soviet republic)...

To be honest, I would not normally know the difference either, but I did recognize the flag immediately since Georgia type II happen to be REALLY good at my main sport, judo.

CB

Seems he was a trump fan. That means all the people who died were his followers.  Sacrifices on the altar of his ego. 

That is bloody hilarious. Comic and criminal. Reminds me of the film "Four Lions". 

Will any of them ever realise how much they have been used? Probably they won't have time as at least 10% will be dead from covid in a month. 

I don't think they will.

I removed a few people off facebook as I was sick of talk of patriots saving the country from communism.

One of them was a two time olympian, banned for EPO use, who was convicted of benefit fraud for falsely claiming thousands in benefits, yet hates all these free handouts... It was scary how brain washed she'd become. Her and her friends really now believe Trump is just vying for time and that the vatican or Italy swung the election and it's all going to come out this week. 

They are convinced no Trump supporters were involved in the attacks and it was all ANTIFA.

"Nigel Farage has said he would, “don khaki, pick up a rifle and head for the front lines” if Theresa May fails to deliver Brexit in the fashion he wants."

When I think that this malign bit of flesh was pals with Trump it makes Brexit inflicted on the UK seem even less palatable.

Oh please, please God when the FBI dig down into the events leading up to this let them find a reason to extradite Nigel Farage!

Meanwhile, Jon Schaffer, Guitarist/Songwriter/Boss of Iced Earth was pictured inside the Capitol and is now wanted by the FBI. Very well known libertarian in the metal circles.

Brexit was a policy endorsed by Trumputin!

Extradition is too good for Farage.

eh? Why they have they decided vatican/Italy are the villains?

Libertarian is not the phrase I would use but he is well known within metal circles.

He's not exactly the only one sadly.

It's their turn? Some sort of rotation?

Of course Trump regards the Holy Father as an arch enemy, but Cardinal Pell, recently released from an Australian gaol where he had been serving time for child sexual assault, took it upon himself to say that although Trump is a barbarian, he is "our barbarian". A massive number of catholics (especially the Latin mass/Rees-Mogg/Franco kind) are very big for Trump.

A really thoughtful and disturbing (and long) piece in the NYT today by Timothy Snyder, history prof at Yale and specialist in fascism.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/magazine/trump-coup.html?action=click&am...

Trump has what he needs to carry on - the Big Lie that the election was stolen which, to be believed, necessarily brings descent into paranoia and conspiracy theory. To keep this lie going for four years courts terrorism and assassination.

"America will not survive the big lie just because a liar is separated from power. It will need a thoughtful repluralization of media and a commitment to facts as a public good."

No it doesn't.  Trump fan or otherwise he died on duty, the other four died in the process of committing a crime on behalf of their Mango Mussolini.

E2A:
Oh, I see what you mean.  Ok, maybe it does.  But he really doesn't deserve to even seem to be lumped in with the others.

We really need to distance ourselves from the usa being in the EU would help. Our version of the big lie was Brexit.

Liza Hunter-Galvan?

And we have our own, stupidly-coiffed Trumpling.

possibly..

I don't fully understand. Somehow Italy was involved in changing the votes in the Dominion machines I think - and it was Obama's fault.

https://www.italy24news.com/a/2021/01/renzi-and-obama-against-trump-for-the...

https://money.yahoo.com/fact-check-claims-electoral-fraud-020827880.html

I'm not sure at all where the vatican come into this. I saw one of my old colleagues from a Catholic school I worked at get a really grilling off her mother and that the vatican will release the truth. She's liberal but both her parents and her in laws are crazy right wingers.

I was just curious if there was anything vaguely sane they were hanging the accusation off since the choice of Italy seems random but guess one of them was eating pizza when they heard the results and it grew from there.

Yeah occasionally the ones that get some traction get explained on the main stream news. The problem is there probably is issues to be concerned about with Bidens son and I do think we can make voting more secure but they throw so much shit at the wall you've no idea what is remotely true. But I think that's Trump's strategy. He creates so many alternative realities the truth has become meaningless.

Italy, pizzas, Pizzagate, Crooked Jilray. It's all making sense now.

Its all linked to pizza

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/mar/25/comet-ping-pong-alex-jones

This is possibly the scariest clip that I have seen https://www.newyorker.com/news/video-dept/a-reporters-footage-from-inside-t...

You think?  I've seen scarier stuff down the Bigg Market on a Friday night.

Friday? You pansy. Saturday was where it was at down there.......

Maybe they are thinking of Trump's attempt to interfere with the US postal service and the routine gerrymandering and voter suppression that Republicans usually indulge in.