Jan. 6 was not a riot. It was an insurrection.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

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It’s infuriating whenever someone in the media or a pundit insists on calling Jan. 6 a riot. What millions witnessed live at the US Capitol was not a protest spurred by passions that spontaneously combusted. Long before the first insurrectionists breached the Capitol, a coup was plotted by President Donald Trump, members of his Cabinet, and dozens of Republicans in the House and Senate to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory and overthrow an American election.

There’s no ambiguity here — only the intentionality of language dulled to diminish the sting of facts.

It’s not unlike all the reticence that too many wrestled with in calling the lying former president a liar or the unwillingness to recognize that Trump ran for the White House not to ease economic anxieties but to stoke racism and protect white supremacy. Every media refusal to speak that truth helped Trump garner power and perpetuated his lies.....

During a recent appearance on MSNBC’s “The Sunday Show with Jonathan Capehart,” Michael Beschloss, the esteemed presidential historian, said, “If we lose our democracy this year, we are unlikely to get it back during our lifetimes.” Think about that. Lessening the insurrection is flinging open the doors to authoritarianism and ushering in the death of all we claim to hold dear. America dodged nothing on Jan. 6; the brickbats are still flying. The next insurrection is already here.

[Walleye]

1. I've been to plenty of protests. No one brought bear spray, flex cuffs, baseball bats etc.

[BeckyDem]

2. They did not succeed, but that doesn't change what was intended.

Noam Chomsky: That it was an attempted coup is not in question. It was openly and proudly proclaimed as just that. It was an attempt to overturn an elected government. That’s a coup.

https://truthout.org/articles/chomsky-coup-attempt-hit-closer-to-centers-of-power-than-hitlers-1923-putsch/

[LetMyPeopleVote]

3. For this thread

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