It was just a Special Tourism Operation, Bro (or was it)
It was just a Special Tourism Operation, Bro (or was it)
First Jan 6 Committee Hearing Takeaways and One Important Often Unspoken Reason for Judicial Process and MORE
In this Issue:
The First January 6th Committee Hearing
Dobbs “cramped reading” of Glucksberg
Poem
Out-and-About Photo
The First January 6th Committee Hearing
Watched the first installment of January 6th Committee Hearing last night. Found it to be ably presented by Representatives Cheney and Thompson given the venue. Two highlights I want to bring up: first, it was confirmed by General Milley that it was Vice President Pence pleading directly with the military brass that brought the National Guard out. This put a stop to the rioter component of the putsch, which must have been quite the “animated” phone call (as Milley put it). This is also consistent with former President suggesting maybe it would be good if Pence were hanged that day.
Second, former Attorney General Willam Barr’s quote regarding the basis for the 50+ unsuccessful related cases that the former President’s legal team filed across the country:
"I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff, which I told the president was bullshit. And I didn't want to be a part of it."
I think it was very much proper that Rudolph Giuliani had his law license suspended over it, and the other “bullshit” attorneys were/are also being disciplined by bars in various states.
I am relieved that the committee’s timeline includes the time period after the election and before January 6th. I have found that there has been a lot of overly-charitable talk regarding January 6 from the media (including blogs and podcasts) that I consume. A lot of effort seems to go into limiting the framing of the coup attempt to just that day, to just what was captured on video and known at the time, and/or to just the rioters. I think this position will increasingly seem myopic or overly presumptuous. Withholding an opinion until more information becomes available is respectable, but what appears to be the very conscious attempt at limiting the scope of what is perceived of as January 6 to just the mob/riot activity — is not accurate. The coup (overturning a lawful election using the bullshit that Barr described) seems to have gone sideways when the riot (backup plan?) component got out of hand (as they are want to do), combined with there ultimately not being enough coup sympathetic Congressmen and Senators to continue on with narratives that the former President’s own Attorney General thought were “bullshit”.
There is a rarely spoken, but important, reason as to why it is important to have a January 6 Committee. The idea that if the plan to undermine the United States government in the way the Congress critters had planned (without even the mob breaching the barrier or touching a hair on anyone’s head) would not have also had extreme and horrible repercussions and reactions is somewhat baffling to me. The notion that ackshually it’s not a coup because no tanks rolled, and some loopy acts of chicanery from the former President’s allies in Congress would be enough to dissuade people from acting against the proponents of a goofy American version of Orthodoxy Autocracy and Nationality is surprising to me. If one can get thousands of easy marks to storm the capitol with an extremely flimsy pretext, what do you think the responses might be from the millions that those Congress critters were set to disenfranchise? Did they think that everyone would just be cool with the American experiment in self-governance being over based on “bullshit” as defined by the President’s own Attorney General? Those Congressmen and Senators that wanted the plan to succeed were rolling the dice here in a way that does not get enough attention.
It seems lost on some people that doing nothing regarding January 6 has its own amount of f*** around and find out potential. I do not mean simply that it encourages more coup attempts, which I think it would, I mean the reaction to it from Americans that maybe are not easily duped baby boomers. Even my patience has been tested a bit, and I know these processes take time. This is due in part to the months leading up to January 6th having so much out-in-the-open wind-up and planning alongside a large volume of frivolous lawsuits. One thing I have been wondering throughout this time is the resource allocation and organizational culture at DOJ. Meaning, whether they are looking at this comprehensively like the Committee seems to be doing, and not just a narrow focus on say only finding the schmuck that smeared poop on the walls and plays dumb to everything else. For understandable reasons, DOJ is not always easy to read, so I tend towards giving them the benefit of the doubt, but we shall see.
Speaking of gullible Americans: I think in a society that has Free Speech, one could be held accountable for the “bullshit” they believe and act upon. No one forced these folks to seek out these forums and Facebook groups, or forced them to believe a company that calls its product news in public, but entertainment in court. It is a choice. That the demographic for spreaders of misinformation on the internet being disproportionately baby boomers maybe calls into issues of elder care as well, but lets pretend our parents still have agency and functional brains able to make distinctions for the sake of this post, shall we?
I want to live in the United States of America where we elect our leaders and not have them installed. This is part of the social contract that I expect my government to also pursue and protect, and I do not think it should be unilaterally changeable, especially by a faction that represents a minority interest using “bullshit” pretext. So yes, going through the motions are important. Some blinded by cynicism might go “ah well, whatever,” regarding January 6, but I think they do not realize they put more at risk than just one election. Autocracy is antagonistic to the purpose and reasoning underpinning the American experiment. I have an expectation that my government wants to defend its own existence, and that it also understands that an important benefit of process like the January 6 Committee and DOJ investigations are that they help guard against people taking things into their own hands. This process should not be centered on making political calculations where decisions are made based on whether it will hurt part of the electorate’s feelings, or some vague and insincere talk about unity and division between parties. Folks, that’s why Lady Justice is blind.
As an attorney, I suppose I should be thankful the Congressional coup supporters at least tried to give whatever you want to call this “attempt” some legalistic veneer by attempting to launder this travesty of “bullshit” through a legislative body. However, that “bullshit” stinks so bad it is very apparent what they attempted to do. Had they succeeded, what loyalty could one reasonably expect from Americans towards such a regime? Maybe they were ready to go full bloodbath mode on the opposition, we know the former President, Donald “shoot them in the legs” Trump was probably up for it. Luckily, we still have a professional military that, eventually, showed up on January 6 to put down the riot component of the coup.
In the interest of not just creating an official historical record, but maintaining justifiable loyalty to American governance, especially from those who have so far been exercising restraint in not taking revenge on America’s behalf and allowing for process. I strongly support this committee continuing its work, and hope it will not be plagued by the acts of obstruction that characterize the pages of the Mueller report. I am very interested to see what comes next, and will be following the Committee Hearings here on Substack as it continues.
Dobbs “cramped reading” of Glucksberg
I liked this take from Kenji Yoshino (NYU law professor), on the “cramped” reading of Glucksberg found in Dobbs, as it jives with my fast take a month ago on Dobbs. This is from Professor Yoshino’s recent interview by WBUR (NPR) regarding “The fragility of unenumerated rights.”
Yoshino: I agree that thinking of Dobbs as adopting a very cramped reading of Glucksberg is a really good characterization. ... This is actually Justice Alito's version of history and obviously the people who signed on to that opinion and his version of history is very narrow indeed. So what he's saying is the test here is whether or not the unenumerated right is deeply rooted in this nation's history and traditions. And then he says, abortion is clearly not that. And so QED, abortion is not a fundamental right.
Poem for 2022.06.10
Small bright white petals
On green stems bunched near top
Moved by bee’s touch
Out-and-About Photo for 2022.06.10
Park orchard bunny!
[2022.09.19 Headline Style and Formatting Updates (Link-ablity and Site Consistency)]