Not a great day for America

Craig Ferguson used to begin his late night talk shows with "It's a great day for America"; but today was decidedly not. Trump supporters, egged on by Trump, stormed the Capitol while a joint session of Congress was in the process of certifying the November election. One person was shot and died.

As so often before this was incredibly shocking but completely unsurprising. We saw images that were reminiscent of those from countries like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Russia when the will of electors was was ignored by an undemocratic incumbent. Representative Mike Gallagher (R-Wisconsin), interview on PBS, told Judy Woodruff that he was barricaded in his office in Congress; rioters broke police lines, and smashed windows to break into the Capitol where they roamed around for hours before eventually being evicted by the initially woefully overwhelmed police. 

The image of the Senate chamber being defended from rioters by plain clothed Capitol police with drawn weapons was perhaps the most jarring image I can remember, ranking along side the collapse of the Twin Towers. 

As shocking as today's ugly episode was, and we should be immensely thankful that it was just an episode, it was completely predictable. Indeed, I wrote this post at the end of October suggesting exactly this outcome.  I did get two things wrong; first, I did not expect Trump to insight insurrection so blatantly and explicitly. And I didn't expect the initial police response to be so weak allowing the rioters to enter the Capitol. 

While those involved were relatively few in number, there is a frighteningly large number who likely support their actions. Let's not forget that seventy million people voted for Trump, despite knowing what we now know about his improper, potentially illegal, and routinely dishonest, not to mention incompetent, conduct; that's a problem. 

Making it worse are the cynical actions of members of Congress, Hawley and Cruz for example, who for cynical political  gain, had bolstered Trump's delusional claims. Lending seeming legitimacy to Trump's nonsensical claims about the election creates a problem where none existed. Based on their education they are not stupid, so they must understand that their assertions that the election needs to be overturned because so many people do not believe the outcome is preposterous; the only reason so many do not believe in the legitimacy of the election is that Trump, Cruz, Hawley and so many other members of the GOP had been telling them exactly this for months.         

"The Capitol has now been secured" Woodruff announced on PBS. Who could ever have imagined that in a Western democracy anyone would have to make that statement?  In my lifetime, at least that I can remember, no seat of Western government has been physically assaulted by political extremists. 

The hollowed ground of our democratic government has been violated. Our democratic system has been ill for some time; the cancer that has plagued it for years has metastasized into a stage four life-threatening condition in the era of Trump. The events of today should give us all pause that our democracy is on life support. 

Here are some of the shocking images, courtesy of the Washington Post.