It happened because of bad incentives and lack of heroes. What some may call the “greed” of Twitter, facebook, Youtube, amazon and others. But it’s par for the course. They’re not greedier than more traditional tobacco, oil or Murdoch’s Fox news.
Those social media companies should have implemented their perfectly fair anti-hate and anti-disinformation algorithms. They didn’t because the algorithms revealed the republican party is a sewer and the algorithms would have ruthlessly cracked down on them instead of pretending both sides are equivalent. Worse. This would have significantly cut profit for well known reason. Profit and worry about political repercussions won that battle over ethics. As a result, companies crippled their algorithm or didn’t didn’t implement it.
The response should be for 60% of the country’s politicians to truly come together and do the right thing despite it not being great for their career, and would likely end it. Most of those same politicians are either vandals like the tea party or treason caucus who primaried others
and know the playbook, and so, elect to go along to keep power “because if I stand up, i’ll just be replaced by someone worse” or they care more about themselves than their country and will happily reflect any batshit crazy view their base wants to keep power another 2, 4, 6 or 10 years.
Needless to say, we can’t even get people to agree to wear masks or get vaccinated with the most harmless vaccines ever made. mRNA vaccines with literally 0 virus in it (unlike traditional vaccines, which often can’t be used by immunocompromised people) and incredibly good efficacy. What chance do we have to accomplish anything?
It’s like we can’t convince a man dying of thirst in a desert of drinking fresh water because "What if this water is poisoned like in all those movies and cartoons I watched? Can you PROVE the water isn’t poisoned? And no, drinking it yourself, and having everybody important drink it in front of me isn’t proof enough. ya’ll may have ingested a counter-poison beforehand! "
And you want to enact meaningful change? Republicans are already saying impeachment for sedition is divisive and the dems should be ashamed of themselves. I meaaaan, we all live in The Onion now. That’s probably why I feel like crying all the time.
Personally, I’d think the Capitol Police response plan needs to change; maybe have a small-moderate presence at each of the buildings on the Mall, AND something like a 50-100 man quick reaction force located somewhere nearby. I mean, there’s no reason something like this couldn’t have happened at the Fed, one of the museums, or really any building around there, and the Capitol Police should be prepared to respond quickly at any nearby building with enough force to stop a riot like that.
Also, I think they should have been much more aggressive once the crowd got past the barricades- tear gas, night sticks, etc… and once they got inside the building proper, the guns should have come out. Not just shooting right off, but a series of escalation tripwires. Maybe even publish those ahead of time so it’s not a surprise to anyone. But I bet that had they shot dead a half-dozen rioters, it would have taken the steam out of the riot, AND potentially deterred any future shenanigans a week from now, if that crowd KNOWS that they will get shot if they go past a certain line.
I dunno about guns out, but how about making the doors/windows harder to breach. Requiring more than a stout pole.
Then, make sure you have reinforcements - whether Nat’l Gd, DC or State Police - on standby. If not in the Capitol cafeteria/tunnels, in any building /on busses nearby. Lethality can depend on how the goons respond to that.
I lean more towards bad planning, along with a handful of sympathizers who probably didn’t take the neo-confederates seriously enough.
Trump mobs are nothing new, but they figured that they’d probably just make a lot of noise and beat up some liberals, so the cops probably weren’t overly concerned at first.
The problem is that that Capitol Police have no authority anywhere but the Capitol Complex, which includes the Capitol building and grounds, Library of Congress and some staff buildings. The Mall, monuments and museums all fall under the (sometime overlapping) jurisdiction of other agencies.
Probably. But I don’t know about rubber bullets, tear gas, etc.
It is so shocking to see these white guys punching cops and being pushed back, where you see black folk shot down like dogs. Yeah, different 1-on-1 vs a crowd, but a striking distinction. Who on earth thinks they can punch a cop and get away w/ it?
If I were put in charge of Capitol security in the future, I would have essentially 3 zones.
The first zone is where you are supposed to be. Chant and yell to your hearts content.
The next zone is where you are not supposed to be, if you enter that zone, which would be well marked and fenced off, there will be rubber bullets, tear gas, that sort of thing.
The third zone, inside the building, is where we don’t play any games, and we just shoot you dead.
This is obviously for during sessions and protests. It should be open to the public normally.
I remember going there as a teen, back in the early 90’s, and you could pretty much wander around. I’m sure that there were some areas that were off limits, but for the most part, you could go where you wanted.
My father knew a congressman, so we just stopped by his office while we were there and said “hi”. The only “security” was his secretary.
You’re joking, right? I agree with Flurb’s three levels of escalations – by the time the protesters reach the third line they’ve proved that they aren’t peaceful.
Seeing those idiots inside (and outside) of the Capitol infuriated me. I posted a couple of times of wishing the NG or mounted police or SOMEONE would rain holy hell down on them.
But the calmer part of me wishes to acknowledge that non-lethal force is very often sufficient in response to crimes against property. Where is the final line? I dunno. Can be tough in emotionally charged fluid situations. I think the cop who shot the woman in the Capitol was well-justified - she was well beyond the perimeter, trying to break into an inner area in defiance of clear orders. But that doesn’t mean I wanted to see 10s-100s of folk mowed down inside the Capitol, with the floors running with blood.
I don’t want to draw a direct comparison to police treatment of people of color, but wasn’t a major issue the unnecessary use of lethal force?
I don’t either, which is why I would advise having a sufficient deterrent and defense to keep them from entering the Capitol.
But once they have, then they are well beyond the perimeter. They aren’t protesting anymore, they are assaulting.
It’s not about property at that point, it is about the lives of the people that those insurrectionists are coming to kill, and about the continuation of our democracy that they are trying to end.
Yes, and the key word there is unnecessary. If you have a group of protesters on the street, then use of force on them should be somewhere between non-existent and minimal.
When you have people assaulting the Capitol, then lethal force is a bit more necessary.