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Post by michaelw on Jan 7, 2021 23:14:32 GMT -5
Beyond that...what were the capitol police thinking...or rather NOT thinking? Talk about ill-prepared. I think it was much deeper than a simple lack of preparation. Another issue seems to be that the police who were present--or a chunk of them--were/are on the same side as the Trump crowd, and they allowed those personal sympathies to influence how they approached their job. Three pieces of evidence for that... 1. the barricades outside the capitol being removed so that the crowd could enter the building. (To be fair, as Snopes pointed out--linked below--it might not be totally clear who actually removed the barricades, although OTOH, they sort of undercut the importance of that point by noting that the police seem to just sort of give up on stopping people from going in after the barricades were removed) www.snopes.com/fact-check/capitol-police-opened-gates/2. The officer who posed for a selfie w/ one of the Trump supporters who made it into the capitol (Snopes rated that one as true... www.snopes.com/fact-check/capitol-police-selfie/)3. the officers who shook hands with the Trump supporters (covered in the previous link) I bring all this up because I bet a lot of people out there would prefer to analyze this as a problem of officers being under-prepared, in which case someone might reasonably think it's also an issue of the police being under-funded, under-equipped, under-manned, or under-whatever, etc. Whereas I would argue that this whole episode demonstrates--yet again--how police departments are often havens for various types of extremists, and have been for a long time. And that's not something that can necessarily be overcome by preparation alone. And of course, unfortunately, it's not in any way, shape or form an easy problem to begin fixing, which is possibly why a lot of people prefer to just ignore it in favor of more superficial solutions (like better preparation or more man-power, or whatever).
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Post by michaelw on Jan 8, 2021 1:10:49 GMT -5
I'm okay with using force to stop people breaking in to the capitol building. I don't know about shooting everyone, however. Because I don't see the capitol as sacrosanct to such a degree that special rules apply. I mean, if people are okay with shooting people who break into the capitol building during a protest/riot, then the same rules should apply across the board: shoot the people breaking into Target and other businesses during a protest/riot. Why would any special rules need to apply? Just apply the same rule that Trump articulated: "When the looting starts, the shooting starts." Correct me if I'm misremembering, but I think you were more or less fine with that general sentiment when it was applied to places like Target. So I'm just curious, is there any particular reason why you would put the guns away in the capitol scenario? That said, personally, I'm not too crazy about shooting people for trespassing or property damage in general, especially if no one is really in any serious danger. Although to echo Prozyan's point, it's kind of hard to argue that no one was in danger at the capitol, IMO, given the full context of what went down.
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 9:17:04 GMT -5
As I said, prozyan makes a fair point, re whether or not Congress is in session.
But no, I don't agree with Trump's rule. It's one thing to allow that police officers--and private citizens protecting their property--can resort to deadly force if necessary, it's something else to call for people to be shot willy-nilly because they're present at a riot or the like. So I wouldn't put away the guns at the capitol at all. In fact, there should have been more officers with more guns.
As to the police being on Trump's side, at least one officer is dead and a number of others were seriously injured. The guy who took a selfie with a protester is an ass, of course (plenty of asses out there in uniform, just as there are asses not in uniform). I saw a number of videos of people pushing through barricades outside where police tried to stop them, but had to basically give up because they had no support.
Regardless, none of this changes the fact that they weren't prepared, does it?
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 9:28:34 GMT -5
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 9:43:46 GMT -5
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Post by michaelw on Jan 8, 2021 9:53:57 GMT -5
As to the police being on Trump's side, at least one officer is dead and a number of others were seriously injured. The guy who took a selfie with a protester is an ass, of course (plenty of asses out there in uniform, just as there are asses not in uniform). Yeah, I saw that, after I posted. Really, it makes the selfie guy seem much worse than an ass. I mean, it's one thing to take selfies with people breaking into the building which you're supposed to prevent them from getting into. That's bad enough, on its own. But it's another thing to take selfies with the people who are injuring your colleagues. Well, I'm not sure. I mean, if we're talking about the basic-level officers who were there, I guess maybe they weren't prepared, although that wouldn't necessarily have been their fault. With the higher-ups who were making actual decisions, I wouldn't be surprised at all if some of them knew full well that something like this was a possibility. If so, then no, I'm not sure I'd frame it as a problem of bad preparation.
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 9:58:18 GMT -5
When I say "they weren't prepared," I mean the capitol police force. And the responsibility for that lies with the leadership, the police chief, not the officers on the street.
They weren't prepared. It's a statement of fact, imo. It's not about framing. I don't care which "side" is protesting, the police at the capitol should always be prepared for the worst, don't you think? The chief has already resigned.
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Post by michaelw on Jan 8, 2021 10:07:39 GMT -5
Well, I think it depends. If it was an honest mistake and they just miscalculated, then sure, maybe you could say it was mainly an issue of bad preparation. But of course, there are also higher possible levels of complicity. It's even possible that some of them, as I said, knew this might happen, in which case one might wonder if they wanted it to happen (or at the very least, didn't care if it happened.)
And, it seems to me that the higher you go up on the scale of complicity, the less sense it makes--IMO--to describe it as a case of bad preparation. If a bomb had gone off at the Capitol and it turned out later that Steven Sund had personally planted that bomb, it obviously wouldn't make any sense to say, "Oh wow, Sund was really under-prepared for this whole thing."
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Post by Optimus on Jan 8, 2021 10:57:05 GMT -5
Seems like people like Devos (i.e., cabinet members) might be quitting because they're too chicken to invoke the 25th. Others, as you said, are likely just trying to save their future employability by publicly distancing themselves from Trump.
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 11:16:58 GMT -5
I saw something yesterday about how the mood in the White House had become horribly grim, because most everyone who worked in the Trump admin realized they were completely unemployable. As bad as it was in general, Trump encouraging the riots seems to have really hammered home the danger they are all in, career-wise. Consider how tools like the Lincoln Project crowd tried to destroy law firms that worked for Trump, entities with actual resources. What is the assistant to the under-secretary of transportation gonna do when they get dog-piled by the anti-Trump crowd?
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 11:22:55 GMT -5
Well, I think it depends. If it was an honest mistake and they just miscalculated, then sure, maybe you could say it was mainly an issue of bad preparation. But of course, there are also higher possible levels of complicity. It's even possible that some of them, as I said, knew this might happen, in which case one might wonder if they wanted it to happen (or at the very least, didn't care if it happened.) And, it seems to me that the higher you go up on the scale of complicity, the less sense it makes--IMO--to describe it as a case of bad preparation. If a bomb had gone off at the Capitol and it turned out later that Steven Sund had personally planted that bomb, it obviously wouldn't make any sense to say, "Oh wow, Sund was really under-prepared for this whole thing." I think you're wandering into Trumper-level conspiracy stuff, honestly. Sund and others effed up. Whether it was because he thought all Trump supporters were inherently peaceful (unlikely), because he was worried about more bad press if there was too much of a show of force (more likely), because he just didn't properly assess the risks (highly likely), or because of some combination of these things (most likely), it was fundamentally just poorly handled. The idea that Sund and others wanted this to happen is ridiculous. Trump is leaving office in a couple of weeks, time to start phasing out the wacky conspiracy theories.
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 11:44:51 GMT -5
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 12:23:02 GMT -5
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Post by Vince524 on Jan 8, 2021 13:04:33 GMT -5
So a few thoughts and questions for discussion
The federal gov't doesn't have the authority over the Captical Police, do they? If so, who does and why didn't they get the national guard in there? I think they need to be put under oath and asked that. Is it possible someone wanted this to happen? Either because they supported the effort, or wanted the backlash?
I've seen a lot of people from both sides comparing this to the BLM riots, and responses to that.
On the one hand, it's pretty clear the police force response was far more subdued than it was at those other protests. Racial or political? Or maybe both. Is someone who complains that the cops should have just stood aside and watched any particular city burn in the BLM protests/riots practicing hypocrisy when they want these protestors/rioters to be pepper-sprayed/shot/made to listen to Justin Beiber?
Is there evidence Trump specifically orchestrated this? If not, are there grounds for the 25th to be invoked or impeachment? I don't know that any decent argument can be made to defend Trump in terms of what he did or didn't do. He enjoyed this. But are we asking to extend the pain we've been under and the divide by going into this? I'd rather they make him (even if we never know about it) that they can impeach him, jail him, whatever, but won't as long as he doesn't attempt to run in the future. Otherwise, it'll just be a shit show. And the longer that shitshow persists, the longer Joe Biden gets to do what he wants and anyone who opposes him will be written off as wanting the country turned back over to white supremacy.
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Post by robeiae on Jan 8, 2021 13:37:07 GMT -5
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