Category: January 6

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Capitol Insurrection Donald Trump Elections January 6

Trump’s January 6 Coup Only Failed Because He Was Unable To Get To The Capitol: Report

Despite having been a failure at almost everything he’s attempted during his life, one-term, twice-impeached former president Donald Trump came incredibly close to pulling off something that had never been attempted in the history of the United States: A coup that would have allowed him to remain in office even though he had lost the 2020 election.

So what went wrong? As it turns out, a last-minute limo ride to the U.S. Capitol was all that stood in the way of Trump being installed as dictator for life.

Thanks to the superb investigative work of the January 6 House Select Committee, we learned this week that the Secret Service was unable to get adequate police protection for Trump to travel to the Capitol and complete his illegal takeover.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert on fascism and the author of Strongmen: From Mussolini to the Present explained Saturday on CNN just how close the United States came to being an absolute dictatorship, with host Jim Acosta asking her:

“(Liz) Cheney also said Trump had a sophisticated seven-point plan to overturn the election and the chair of the committee, Bennie Thompson, called this a coup attempt. Ruth, you’re an expert on coups. What’s the significance of that?”

Ben-Ghiat responded:

“I was really pleased to see Chairman Thompson use that word because it’s the right word for something that’s the result of a process that started — in a sense it started before November 2020… because Trump had been trying to discredit elections for several years and forming his personality cult so the faithful would rally when he summoned them.”

She then added:

“But coups can take months or years to plan and this was a multi-pronged attempt to overthrow our democracy. It’s worth reviewing that he tried so many things simultaneously. He had General Michael Flynn trying to have martial law or military intervention and he tried the trickery that happened with the Georgia Secretary of State. And when none of that worked, he went nuclear and did what autocrats have done in the past and used violence, summoned the people there to right this monstrous wrong on his behalf.”

But it was what the author said next that stunned Acosta:

“It’s interesting, what came out recently, is Trump was trying to get to the Capitol on Jan. 6. He couldn’t get there. This is consistent, if you’re having a coup and summoned everybody and you expect to be anointed as the head of a new illegitimate government, you have to be there. There’s a phase in coups. They’re violent, quick, and then you have the pronouncement of the new order. That’s why he was trying to get there.”

Acosta could only respond:

“Wow! That’s a great point.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqwJKh_fjoo&feature=emb_logo

If Trump had made it to the Capitol, we would now be living in a totalitarian state. We just barely avoided what the Founding Fathers most feared.

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Donald Trump January 6 Media in America

Two Murdoch-Owned Newspapers Destroy Trump In Op-Eds – Say He ‘Bears Responsibility’ For Jan. 6

Even though his cable “news” channel refused to air the first public hearing of the January 6 House Select Committee on Thursday evening, two influential newspapers owned by Fox chairman Rupert Murdoch lit into failed, one-term former president Donald Trump in blistering op-eds they published, suggesting that the ex-president “bears responsibility for the mayhem” that took place on that fateful day.

The first op-ed appeared in the Wall Street Journal, and it didn’t pull any punches regarding Trump and the horror we watched unfold on the day thousands of Trump supporters attacked the seat of government:

The President spread falsehoods about the election. He invited supporters to Washington on Jan. 6, tweeting on Dec. 19 that it ‘will be wild!’ He riled up the crowd and urged it to march on the Capitol. After violence began, he dawdled instead of sending help. Mr. Trump bears responsibility for the mayhem. But inspiring followers to march is not the same as leading a criminal conspiracy.

The Journal editorial board was also critical of Trump’s attacks on the committee:

“Mr. Trump betrayed his supporters by conning them on Jan. 6, and he is still doing it.”

There was a similar op-ed in the New York Post, along with a warning for Republicans to stop spreading Trump’s lies about the 2020 election:

Trump has become a prisoner of his own ego. He can’t admit his tweeting and narcissism turned off millions. He won’t stop insisting that 2020 was ‘stolen’ even though he’s offered no proof that it’s true. Respected officials like former Attorney General Bill Barr call his rants ‘nonsense.’ This isn’t just about Liz Cheney. Mitch McConnell, Betsy DeVos, Mark Meadows — they all knew Trump was delusional. His own daughter and son-in-law testified it was bull.

Of course, if Murdoch had any balls, he would have demanded that Thursday’s hearings be aired in full on Fox. Instead, he and his son, Lachlan, caved to the whims of right-wing douches like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity, both of whom deserve to be locked up for their roles in January 6.

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Fox News January 6 Media in America

The Ratings Are In: 20 Million Watched The Jan. 6 Hearing – Only 3 Million Watched Fox

Based on the numbers from the first televised hearing of the January 6 House Select Committee, it appears that Fox News dropped the ball in a big way and got destroyed in the ratings.

According to the New York Times, at least 20 million viewers tuned in to watch the hearings. Only 3 million opted for Fox, which deliberately avoided televising the historic event:

An audience of at least 20 million people watched the first prime-time hearing of the House Select Committee’s investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on Thursday night, according to Nielsen.

ABC attracted the biggest audience, with 5.2 million viewers. NBC and CBS each had an audience of more than three million. MSNBC averaged more than four million, and CNN drew 2.7 million. (The 20 million figure did not yet include PBS, so the total audience was most likely a bit bigger.)

MSNBC did especially well compared to Fox:

MSNBC averaged a whopping (for them) 4.161 million total viewers, trouncing both Fox News (2.957 million total viewers) by 29 percent and CNN (2.617 total million viewers) by 37 percent. CNN finished way ahead of its direct cable news competition in the key demographic for news programming, adults 25-54, with 709,000 viewers from that age range vs. 555,000 on MSNBC and 513,000 on Fox. That’s a 22 percent advantage over MSNBC and 28 percent win over Fox News.

The three Fox hosts who provided anti-coverage and criticism of the hearings — Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham — saw their numbers crater, which is bad news for the conservative network with more public hearings on the way in the weeks ahead.

Once again, Fox would rather lose tens of millions of viewers than air the truth. It’s one of many reasons they should remove the word “news” from their propaganda network.

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Capitol Insurrection January 6 Social Media

Twitter Had A Field Day With ‘Soulless’ Ivanka’s Video Deposition To The January 6 Committee

If you watched the first half-hour or so of Thursday evening’s public hearing of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, then you saw a clip from a video deposition from Ivanka Trump, daughter of failed, one-term, twice-impeached former president Donald Trump in which she made it clear she didn’t think her father had been cheated out of a second term in office.

Specifically, Ivanka said when former Attorney General Bill Barr stated there had been no voting irregularities in the 2020 presidential election, that sealed the deal for her:

“It affected my perspective. I respect Attorney General Barr. So, I accepted what he said and what he was saying.”

What struck many people about that clip, however, was how completely empty Ivanka looked. Her eyes appeared to have no light to them. It was like watching a zombie testify, and it was downright creepy.

Of course, when you consider that the entire Trump family has always had a supreme sense of entitlement, it makes sense that Ivanka would look hollow and sullen. After all, her dream of a Trump political dynasty has been irreparably smashed and now she and her brothers will be lucky if they can even manage to grift enough money to keep them ensconced in the luxury they’ve grown accustomed to. They might even have to go out and (gasp!) work for a living.

It didn’t take long before Twitter was alight with all sorts of remarks about Ivanka’s appearance:

https://twitter.com/PentUpPower/status/1535088159393980416?s=20&t=6fY12i56pRMVu9ozOMZAJQ

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Congress Fox News January 6

Tucker Carlson Pitched An On-Air Hissy Fit During Thursday’s Jan. 6 Committee Hearing

Fox News host Tucker Carlson proved once again Thursday evening that he and the network he works for have zero credibility and are nothing more than a propaganda outlet for the Republican Party and its would-be dictator for life, Donald Trump.

As the first evening of hearings from the House Select Committee investigating the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol were beginning at 8:00 p.m., Carlson was starting his nightly show, and he made it clear from the get-go that he had no intention of letting any truth into his broadcast:

“This is the only hour on an American news channel that will not be carrying their propaganda live.

“They are lying, and we will not let them do it.”

HuffPost notes it wasn’t just Carlson’s ranting that was completely fact-free and at times hysterical:

He and his producers plastered hysterical chyrons across the screen for their millions of viewers to see: “JAN 6 CMTE FUELS FALSE NARRATIVES AS SHAM INVESTIGATION DRAGS ON.” “LEADERS WILL SPEND 90 MINUTES GIVING MORAL LECTURE.” “OUR LEADERS ARE FOCUSING ON JAN. 6 WHILE IGNORING THE REAL THREATS.”

And if all that wasn’t bad enough, Carlson also suggested that investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection might just led to another insurrection, which is ironic since he insisted there had been no insurrection in the first place:

“This was not an insurrection, but you know what will give you an insurrection? If you ignore legitimate concerns of a population. If you brush them aside like they don’t matter when gas goes to $5 and say ‘Buy an electric car.’ When cities become so filthy and dangerous that you can’t live there. When the economy becomes so distorted your children have no hope of getting married and giving you grandchildren. When you don’t care at all about any of that and all you do is talk about yourself, nonstop, you might get an insurrection if you behave like that, speaking of insurrections.”

Is that right, Tuck? Well, at least the FBI will know who to visit if and when that happens.