Happy Anniversary

Tradition dictates that to celebrate a first anniversary, a gift of paper is the time-honored way to recognize the occasion.

And I agree.

So it is only appropriate that on this, the first anniversary of the seditious attacks on the nation's capitol, a blizzard of paper gifts be bestowed upon the participants. Things like warrants. Subpoenas. Complaints. Indictments. Citations. Etcetera.

While a fair number of the rioters have already been charged, too few have been treated with the severity their acts of insurrection demand.

Sentencing is always a nebulous affair, with judges given to wide interpretation of events and circumstances. But how is that tears and flimsy excuses are exchanged for slap-on-the-wrist sentences of (gulp) probation and home detention?

Seriously?

That's the price for participating in an organized effort to overturn and deny the results of a presidential election? For storming the nation's capitol and killing three cops? Taking part in a mission with a stated goal of hanging the vice-president?

Huh?

Too typical is the case of Anna Morgan-Lloyd. In an Oscar-worthy performance, Morgan-Lloyd convinced judge Royce Lamberth she was ashamed of the “savage display of violence” she oh so eagerly partook in.

Just a day later she related to Fox News that people were actually “very polite” during the riot and that she saw “relaxed” police offers conversing with rioters and that she didn't really believe the events of that day constituted an insurrection..

(Don't you just hate it when Trumpers don't take their meds?)

Furthermore, when do Marjorie Taylor-Greene and Josh Hawley take the stand? Ted Cruz? Tommy Tuberville? How about Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller, who ordered—in advance—that the National Guard not respond to any calls for help originating from the nation's capitol?

The events of January sixth were as spontaneous, as impulsive as the Super Bowl. We know everything we need to know. January 6^th demands top-to-bottom accountability. Scrutiny. Investigation. Hearings, trials and imprisonment.

Excuse the raw language, but we need to treat the participants as if they were Black.

We need to get angry. Stay angry. And make sure January 6th is treated as seriously as it needs to be, with severe punishment for the participants at each and every level.

And to impart to the mentally-ill folks across the aisle and their brain-damaged supporters that sedition is not okay.

Never.

Ever.

The Shifting Sands of Republicanism

After four years of angry and contrarian Republican rule that saw them wield power like a policeman does their truncheon, Republicans are suddenly concerned with healing.

Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) are reluctant to consider impeachment because it might—in their words—add to our collective sense of divisiveness and interfere with our nation's unity. Awww.

What a shame that wasn't on the agenda in 2017. Or 2018. Or 2019. Or most spectacularly, in 2020.

Why weren't you concerned about healing two months ago instead of fueling the fire of a deranged mob's belief that the election had been stolen? Why weren't you concerned a month ago? Why did it take the loss of the White House, the Senate and a violent mob's break-in of the Capitol to work 'healing' into your vocabulary?

Listen. I'm all for healing. Unity. I pray for them. The reduction in national stress would be profound.

But in diverting attention away from an unhinged psychopath and allowing him to continue in office—yes, even for eight days—you're doing more harm than healing. The law-abiding portions of this country demand consequences for Donald Trump.

You belong to the self-declared party of law and order. Don't you?

I ask you, Senators: what's more pressing than disconnecting a terrorist from his ability to terrorize? From acting to ensure the democracy of the United States survives him and the legion of goons at his beck and call?

It's probably because I'm a libtard and/or radicalized socialist, but I can't think of anything. When the house is on fire gentlemen, job number-one is to put out the fire.

Too many Republicans continue to fear Trump. They fear backlash should they grow a spine and say “Enough!”

Snowflake I may be, but I know a self-centered pig interested only in nourishing his bottomless craving for adulation and attention when I see one. This is not about conservatism. It's not about immigration. It's not about abortion. It's not about god. Or guns. Or country.

It's about Donald J. Trump. It's about the United States of Don. Make no mistake. It's not about you or what you believe. It's about Don. 

First, last and always.

To his followers, I'm sorry you're unhappy and angry and desperate to the point where Donald Trump is an answer. I respectfully inquire: to what?

Is the ability to freely call a Black person a nigger or to harass gays or to abuse women really that important to you? Is it really worth of all of....this?

Is it?

Again, I'm sorry for your pain. I'm sorry you feel ignored. But um, didn't your guy win last time? Didn't you have four years of government just the way you like it? Tell me: after having it your way for four years, are you any happier? Do you feel more satisfied? Fulfilled?

Or are you just more angry?

I invite your commentary.

And Senators? Some things are more-important than party. I hope you're big-enough to acknowledge it. But I'm not holding my breath.

The Trump Tantrum: Day 64

With an unbalanced and deranged man presently heading the United States, you have to ask yourself what's next?

This creature, completely unable to process the events of November 3^rd, is suffering a catastrophic psychological episode and everything—everything—is on the table that might reconcile his battered psyche with what is no doubt an unimaginably twisted sense of retribution.

This man is a terrorist. He needs to be treated as such. Twitter understands this. For starters, he must be censured. Then he must be removed from office.

On a more humane note, he should be checked into a psychiatric facility until he is well. Then it is critical he be made to face the mountain of charges filed against him. Accountability has never been needed more-urgently.

By rights, he should be stripped of his presidential pension and his lifetime of taxpayer-supported security. It is obscene that those who have suffered at his hands financially, materially and health-wise be made to ensure a lifetime of safety for him and his family.

Supporters embraced Donald Trump because he was an outlier. A maverick. I've never fully understood how a billionaire real estate developer from Manhattan qualifies as an outsider, but then I have a brain. 

An outsider as president is a good thing because? 

Finally, isn't it pitiable that the abundant law enforcement agencies in and around Washington DC didn't treat this as a BLM march? Just imagine the scores of heavily-armed militia that would have ringed the Capitol building!

Sigh.

As a nation and a society, we have nowhere to go but up. I pray we make it.