Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues The Trump Administration Post-Election Mischief

This is an interesting article from the Atlantic. I'm not sure what to make of it.



They Don’t Look Like Extremists

Just who stormed the US Capitol? Though members of extremist groups were present, Robert A. Pape and Keven Ruby write for The Atlantic that after leading an in-depth study of 193 people charged criminally, they’ve found the Jan. 6 mob didn’t resemble typical extremists.

“The average age of the arrestees we studied is 40,” Pape and Ruby note. “Two-thirds are 35 or older, and 40 percent are business owners or hold white-collar jobs. Unlike the stereotypical extremist, many of the alleged participants in the Capitol riot have a lot to lose. They work as CEOs, shop owners, doctors, lawyers, IT specialists, and accountants. Strikingly, court documents indicate that only 9 percent are unemployed. … [M]ost of the insurrectionists do not come from deep-red strongholds ... more than half came from counties that [President Joe] Biden won.”

The riot, Pape and Ruby conclude, “revealed a new force in American politics”: a “mass political movement that has violence at its core and draws strength even from places where Trump supporters are in the minority.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/a...ters-arent-like-other-extremists/617895/

Yeah...rich people love Trump. Because he is like them.

This is a caricature of Galtism. They aren't going to take their money and leave, they want to run everyone out except themselves and a few poorly paid servants.

Marx shrugged.

They have a lot to lose? Great! Let's make sure they lose it then. Sedition has to have a big cost, or people are going to try it again next time.

"It's not illegal if you are Republican (or White)" has become the norm.

Punishing an extremist by removing them from a committee is a joke! A slap on the hand just teaches an extremist to lay low and wait for opportunities. No HR dept would let a clearly violent Greene whackjob back into the workplace let alone a committee, unless they have a postal committee!

TAT

Removing them from committee is giving them more time to 'explain' the truth to unbelievers! I think she actually said that and thanked them!

I think the issue of Republican intransigence has come up here before. As soon as word came out about her pre-election shenanigans republican's should have sent her packing and cauterized the wound. But the political reality is they can't if they hope to be re-elected.

I think as more and more insurrectionists get sentenced to federal prison, and other Republicans start to suffer consequences like disbarment, a lot of Trump cult followers will decide it's not their patriotic duty to commit sedition. By 2022, if the Trumpistas are still the majority of Republicans, moderates will get primaried. Then the whack-job candidates will mostly lose in the general election. So Democrats will capture more seats in both houses. If they don't get primaried, Trumpistas will boycott the general election, and Democrats will win more seats.

This will not follow the usual midterm seat loss paradigm, but seldom has the party out of power been so fractured.

Remember the TEA Party? Same crowd. The GOP has long catered to a looney-toons fringe. Was it the 2010 shellacking where they filled seats with the same sort of wack jobs. Trump just brought out an even wackier batch than usual.

Way I see it...pandemic's gonna end, economy gonna recover, Biden's gonna ride the coattails and remain popular during midterms, Patriot Party antics will fail and Democrats gain seats.

For those interested, NY-22 has finally be decided. It goes to the Republican. When Tenney’s sworn-in, the Democrats’ majority in the House will shrink to 221-212 over the Republicans.

Two vacancies remain, and they’re both in Louisiana. One is the seat that was held by former Democratic Rep. Cedric Richmond, who joined President Biden’s administration last month. The other was the seat won last November by late GOP Rep.-elect Luke Letlow.

This means the Republicans have a net gain of 13 seats in the house with two to be decided by special election in Louisiana. Chances are those two special's will be split 1-1 bringing the final tally to 222-213. The old house election results from 2018 was 236-199. This also means the GOP will need a net gain of just 5 seats to regain control of the house in 2022.

CARP! Too close to home to this whackjob!


Though DCCC could be slightly biased