Monday, August 23, 2021

If....

If they have a place and time where several hundred of them, nearing a thousand or more is better, can gather. Safety in numbers, after all.  When the herd moves, who’s to say who you are in the herd?  Call it the zebra strategy.

If they have someone who will gather them there, and give them a reason to be there, as well as a target to attack, maybe they'll go.  It's worth remembering that once the 'insurgents' had broken into the Capitol (after as much resistance as Capitol police could muster, which resistance in part urged the invaders on; no fault on the police, btw), and they couldn't find any live Congresspersons to kidnap, harass, draw and quarter, etc., they quickly turned their assault into a tourist visit (sort of) and, with Capitol police no longer offering opposition, they soon got bored and left quietly.  Not to say their conduct wasn't criminal, but the fever, the fervor, the demand for something to happen that usually leads to bombings and severe violence, subsided, and they went home.  Where they were soon arrested by the FBI, as they should have been.

Violence, in short, and it's worth remembering, begets violence.  The Capitol police and Metro police are to be lauded for their efforts, but resistance made the crowd redouble their efforts.  Once that resistance was gone, so was the interest of the crowd.  I'm just sayin':  these circumstances for violence take very particular factors to come off, and what we saw was not exactly pillaging and burning.

If they have somebody who, in other words, will organize them, then they might act.  Acts of extreme violence tend to be the acts of lone wolves.  Timothy McVeigh acted with one other person aware of what he was doing.  Dylann Roof just walked into the church.  The gunman in El Paso just got in his car and made for Wal-Mart on the border.   They didn't plan long and hard, they didn't tell all their friends, they didn't talk about it for months and post ideas and dates and places on the internet (to be fair, McVeigh barely had the internet available).

The guy who drove his truck to the Library of Congress:  it isn't clear he had anything but a truck and an internet connection.  He said he had barrels full of gunpowder, and then that he had a toolbox full of ammonium nitrate.  Last I heard neither claim was true.  In court the next day he told the judge he needed his "mind medicine," lending creedence to the idea all this poor man had was mental illness (and now, more than likely, a criminal record).  He told his Facebook audience he was one of five planning bombings around D.C.  No evidence of that, either.

Bottom line:  talk is cheap.  People love to talk about what they're gonna do; they talk so they don't have to do it.  Those clowns who wanted to kidnap Gov. Whitmer were "inspired" by the FBI informant among them to go from talking to coming closer to doing it.  It's the "doing" that creates the conspiracy charge, and the FBI knew it.  Entrapment?  No, probably not.  But neither were those idiots likely to move from talking big over coffee and beer to actually putting a plan into effect.

Violent groups need someone to organize and inspire them, to point them to a target.  Proud Boys are reportedly targeting school boards right now.  It's a safe, soft target.  They aren't likely to get hurt, or more importantly, arrested. They still have some leaders, they have a target, they have a reaons (masks, if not CRT).  They are a local threat and pain in the ass; they are not a national threat, however.  Trump organized that January 6 rally; whether he can be held criminally responsible is a thornier matter, but he was the reason for it.  He brought the gun (the crowds), he loaded the gun (the speech), he pointed the gun at the Capitol and pulled the trigger.  Trump isn't going to do that again soon; and if he doesn't, who will?

I would point out I have argued here before that "Q" was a group that talked tough, but wanted someone else to do it for them.  John Kennedy, Jr. to reveal he wasn't dead, and start rounding up the "traitors" (through magical powers?).  Donald Trump to declare the storm and incarcerate all the pedophiles and Democrats (one in the same) and free the captive and give sight to the blind.  That sort of thing.  And "Q" adherents would just sit back and watch and enjoy the spectacle being performed for them, justifying their faith in...nonsense.  And what do you hear about "Q" now?  Even the most die-hard Cassandras on the intertoobs have grown tired of trying to fear monger that letter of the alphabet.  Their day has passed, with neither a bang nor a whimper.  Nothing was done for them, so they quietly gave up living in expectation.  Like the unnamed person in Alabama at Trump's rally:

God is going to do it; or Trump is going to do it.  But she's not going to do anything.  Like Chance the Gardener, she just likes to watch.  Ruth Ben-Ghiat retweeted this and labeled it: "Authoritarian Cult Dynamics."  Nonsense.  This woman wouldn't even drink the Kool-Aid for Trump.  The most she'll do is pay to stand in a rainy field for him.  She doesn't want to be in a cult, not a real one. She just wants to think the world will finally make her comfortable.

Pro-tip:  it won't.

Most of the "violent" supporters of Trump are no different.  Talk is cheap; talk is easy.  Action takes commitment, and they really don't have it.  Many of them now claim they were, indeed, tourists on 1/6/21. The consequences of their actions on that day are more than they want to bear, but reality is a harsh teacher and judges are not sympathetic counselors.  Boys with guns and camo playing Army in the woods on the weekend only imagine they are Rambo and The Duke; in truth, they are just superannuated little boys.  They had courage in their numbers, once, but who calls them to arms now?  Who sounds the battle cry and rallies their troops and points out the windmill enemy they should attack?  More importantly, who will pardon them now, when the FBI comes calling?

Police and the FBI should monitor these things, but should the rest of us read Twitter and tremble?  Well, if you want to.  Seems like a helluva way to live, looking for commies....er, insurgents under the bed, if you ask me.
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