The Blitz On The U.S. Capitol To Restore Trump’s Presidency Failed

It never would’ve worked. And the fact it happened wasn’t at all surprising, but it has left us with a few takeaways.

Just when you thought 2020 started off with a bang, 2021 came in swinging.

January 6th 2021 will live in infamy.

Everyone will probably be covering this event for the next few weeks, so I wasn’t sure if there was anything I could add to the conversation.

But after watching a siege unfold in real time, I did have a few thoughts.

The Confederate Flag makes its way into the U.S. Capitol

Despite what Confederate sympathizers would want you to believe — the Confederacy was composed of men who firmly believed in keeping slavery as a part of their every day lives. Their southern pride was merely smoke & mirrors.

Just years later after the south lost the Civil War, what southerners viewed as their “culture & heritage” can be attributed to the Lost Cause of the Confederacy and the United Daughters of the Confederacy — a group of women who helped promote the aforementioned ideology and the KKK. Among brainwashing White children and other things, they convinced many people that their loss to the Union was bravery.

It’s hard trying to tell them that their flag symbolizes treason and pro-slavery sentiments, because it’s so entrenched into their lifestyle and the flag imagery was everywhere including in pop culture and music. Stripping that away becomes personal.

But it’s time to leave such a racist relic in the past. Store it in museums, place it in textbooks and other reading material for the sake of historical purposes and education; but it’s time to let it go.

Seeing the flag being strutted around the halls of the U.S. Capitol was staggering. Not even Confederate soldiers were able to make their way into the Capitol to hoist it.

While it doesn’t necessarily feel evil nor does it invoke anger; it definitely feels wrong.

It was demoralizing to see history being made for all the wrong reasons.

A treasonous flag on full display will go down in the history books. These terrorists need to retire that flag, the Nazi flag/symbol, and Blue Lives flag.

They serve no purpose other than racism.

Speaking of Blue Lives…

The U.S. owes Colin Kaepernick (and Black people) an apology

During the raid, one of the people referenced on social media was American football player Colin Kaepernick.

During the National Anthem several years ago, Kaepernick took a knee to protest police brutality.

An onslaught of criticisms, threats, and jokes from right-wingers were unleashed and it plagued him for years.

The NFL engaged in a secret understanding that no team would pick him up after he opted out of his contract before the San Francisco 49ers could release him.

He was called a communist and a thug for sticking up for voices that felt silent; voices that were reasonable and not just bored and there to peddle conspiracies.

After being blackballed from the league and a couple of years later — NFL commissioner Roger Goodell recognized it was a mistake though his apology came a little too late.

Even Donald Trump himself had sent a wall of criticism and an expletive towards the NFL and players who knelt. He other Republicans consistently pushed a false narrative as to why Kaepernick chose to kneel; it was gutted, filled with lies, and packaged to Fox News viewers as the ex-NFL player taking shots at the flag and the troops.

Blue Lives Matter was trending around that time, but what transpired at the U.S. Capitol proved that Blue Lives much like All Lives was always crock of nonsense used to silence Black and minority voices.

The world saw through the lies of a growing fascist Republican party which helped popularize right-wingers such as the Proud Boys. And after the death of Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor — all which happened in the same year — Kaepernick clearly had done what he did for the right reasons.

The siege amplified it a trillion times over: White people defied the Blue Lives they championed, broke down barriers, and entered a Federal building with congresspeople working to ratify President-elect Joe Biden’s win.

Despite 4 people dying with others injured and arrested — the fact the rioters were able to even do this was not lost on everyone.

Kaepernick was fighting for people like Arbery, Floyd, and Taylor; Republicans were fighting against an election loss that even most of their own members believed happened fair and square (which it did and that can’t be stressed enough).

Tucker Carlson and right-wing media and personalities should just be ignored

Yesterday, people took to Twitter to bring up old Tweets from people like Tomi Lahren, Kaitlin Bennett, and other right-wing media personalities who vilified George Floyd and Breonna Taylor protestors last year.

When you’ve heard one of their garbage takes — you’ve heard them all.

But what stood out to me was Tucker Carlson’s segment.

The longer he drones on, the more angrier it will probably make people.

I’ve understood for a long-time people like him, Lahren, and Bennett have made “political shock-value” their bread and butter; it’s always about ratings and scraping up every penny while simultaneously dividing the country while pandering to their audience about how the Left and Liberals are doing it.

Carlson also addresses the incident of the woman who was fatally shot, Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt.

If the Tweet above isn’t available — the clip shows Carlson looking into the camera to appeal to viewers in a somber voice saying,

“Imagine for a second getting the call and learning that was your daughter.”

This was an obvious eye-rolling moment, but again, this all hinges on predetermined choices his network makes. They know very well how the parents and supporters of Breonna Taylor feels.

But I’ve felt compelled to just ignore them. Every time they trend, they’ll just keep coming back for more. Obviously, this entry is counterintuitive, but I’m hoping right-wing outlets increasingly become less popular.

Society doesn’t need the provocateurs who are mostly White and contribute directly and indirectly to right-wing supporters. They solely exist to gain money from there positions which sometimes comes with a power to sway people into becoming more extreme in real life who lash out against other people who have different political views.

Democracy won, but don’t forget about the people who were prepared to throw it out the window

Despite Trump’s best efforts asserting there was election-fraud — he has finally lost: fair & square.

Congress has formally recognized Joe Biden’s victory and now there’s nothing left for Trump.

But people like Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, Jim Jordan, Devin Nunes and many others have sworn so much loyalty to Trump that their role these last four years shouldn’t easily be forgotten.

Some of the Republicans that were going to reject the election results had only done so after the siege took place, so they’re not exactly heroic in their desperate act to save their political careers.

For now, democracy lives another day.