This Is Fine

1:58 AM

Twitter ban reveals that tech companies held keys to Trump’s power all along

2:20 AM

The Guy Who Flew a Confederate Flag in the Capitol Has, Predictably, Surrendered

2:44 AM

Ah shit he lives in Delaware, our bad everyone

2:54 AM

@TimStone I alway suspected you were to blame for the all of this.

3:15 AM

> Seems that Trump isn't going to get a state funeral after all: he's already spent four years lying in state.

6:25 AM

Wow, California is the second slowest state in administering Covid vaccines. I hope this is just an artifact of data reporting being slower because the state is so big, but damn

The only state that is slower is Alabama

Memor-X

10:17 AM

US Capitol rioter asks for presidential pardon, saying he was 'answering the call' of Mr Trump

> Mr Watkins said Mr Trump "needs to be accountable" for encouraging the rioters, "and the only honourable thing for him to do for those who were peace-loving, for those who did go there with peace in mind, who weren't going there to be violent" was to "own" those protesters and pardon them.

1:35 PM

Halifax Transit cuts all fares for children 12 and under globalnews.ca/news/7576382/halifax-transit-cuts-fares-under-12

Very nice.

Very helpful for parents with young children who rely on public transport. Especially single parents.

2:13 PM

> Today in DC mad libs: a guy who claims to be the inventor of Bitcoin hired lobbyists to try to set up meetings with Peter Navarro and Anthony Fauci to discuss a COVID vaccine

2:26 PM

@MadScientist …Actually maybe yes?

hmm, so he's probably also carving his initials into the Resolute desk right now

U.S. says Capitol rioters meant to 'capture and assassinate' officials - filing

@BradC Yes

> “Strong evidence, including Chansley’s own words and actions at the Capitol, supports that the intent of the Capitol rioters was to capture and assassinate elected officials in the United States government,” prosecutors wrote.

> “Chansley has spoken openly about his belief that he is an alien, a higher being, and he is here on Earth to ascend to another reality,” they wrote.

What

Although this is probably common in QAnon believers.

Memor-X

2:34 PM

what are they? scientologists?

3:45 PM

> The rioting criminal mob came within 60~ seconds of seeing Mike Pence on Jan. 6. And they were just 90 feet away from a small office where Pence was hiding, before a cop steered them away

4:00 PM

They absolutely would have killed him; we came so close to live-streamed assassinations

Yeah, I think it's not necessarily improbable Pence's security detail would have just killed all the ones committed enough not to run, but that…is still a pretty bad outcome!

@TimStone No, I definitely don't think Pence's security detail (or the security guards barricading the House chamber) would have hesitated to use lethal force

Secret Service director sends memo reminding employees to remain nonpartisan amid 'hyper-charged rhetoric'

> Last night, I received disturbing news, confirmed to me directly by General Perna of Operation Warp Speed: States will not be receiving increased shipments of vaccines from the national stockpile next week, because there is no federal reserve of doses

Oh. Uh

@BradC they did shoot once, at the woman breaking through the barricade. So yes, I don't doubt they would have hesitated

4:14 PM

That seems…not…good

@BradC Right, I just meant that barring a lucky shot they probably wouldn't have gotten Pence, since I don't think the majority of them were willing to risk their lives in a shootout with Secret Service. But some definitely were, so!

Had they gotten to anyone without security detail though, the mob mentality would have definitely let bad things happen

Right. And does any Congressperson, even Polosi, have dedicated security personnel?

Pelosi does since she's part of the line of succession

Anyone in the chambers was probably only at risk of being shot at a distance, but if you were in an office or something by yourself, urgh

To nobody's surprise: Online extremists are ignoring Trump’s call for calm

> A vast swath of the president’s diehard base in MAGA Nation — the conspiracy theorists, the militia members, and the followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory — has disregarded Trump’s Wednesday remarks. Instead, they are dissecting his phrases and using those cues as rallying cries, doubling down on their plans to keep the MAGA movement going after Trump leaves the White House.

@TimStone I believe that Pence and Pelosi were each among the very first evacuated because of that, but I may be wrong.

When Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar announced this week that the federal government would begin releasing coronavirus vaccine doses held in reserve for second shots, no such reserve existed, according to state and federal officials briefed on distribution plans.

This from a guy whose name means bad luck.

Or, quite simply, hazard.

4:48 PM

They’ve Been Calling for Bloodshed the Whole Time - Some on the right have supported violence for years now; the party has built its power on them.

> What happened last week should not have been a shock to any of us. It has been *years* that hard right-wingers — including but most definitely not limited to the man who is still president of the United States — have been openly threatening violence grounded in racist and misogynistic resentments.
> For *years*, they’ve made it clear that they see their only path to victory as being through bloodshed. What’s interesting is how those threats have been heard, and by whom they have been taken seriously before now.

@BradC Strongly related

> Secret Service officers eventually spirited Pence to a room off the Senate floor with his wife and daughter after rioters began to pour into the Capitol, many loudly denouncing the vice president as a traitor as they marched through the first floor below the Senate chamber.

I imagine they would've killed them too. Jesus.

@BradC Oh golly. It's almost as if Trump has spent the last year telling them to be ready for violence and to fight for him.

@Wipqozn yep

@BradC Yeah, this isn't a surprise at all.

This is exactly what the alt-right has been aiming for all this time.

IT's why people keep comparing them to Nazis. Nazi germany just dind't poof into existence over night. It was an on going escalation, which started off just like the alt-right movement.

5:06 PM

@Wipqozn As Rome was not built in a day, neither did it fall in a night, be that Republic or Empire.

I still always think of alt.right as some USENET group.

A tale told by idiots, full of cranks and fury, signifying nothing. But this is wrong, and a dangerous dismissal.

Unionhawk

6:33 PM

lol holy shit

Signal has added 40 million installs since the beginning of the year

when WhatsApp changed their ToS

(it's down as a result)

9:12 PM

The NRA has filed for bankruptcy

2

@TimStone Oh no. Anyway...

Part of this is a ploy to get out of NY and move the group's registration to Texas I think, but

Mike Pence calls Kamala Harris to offer congratulations

...finally?

9:44 PM

@TimStone Certainly sounds like it

It's really unfortunate that we still have to contend with the actual My Pillow Guy

Anyway attempting to invoke the Insurrection Act as a result of the insurrection you were responsible for is certainly a play

@TimStone I see the words "His is an attorney with cyber" and believe the sentence just ends there and nobody can tell me otherwise

10:00 PM

WaPo Op Ed: A former president Trump won’t ‘need to know.’ Cut off his intelligence.

> Every former president in the modern era has benefited from a unique national security perk after leaving the White House: routine intelligence briefings and access to classified information to support his continued involvement in advancing America’s interests.

I guess I didn't realize that was a thing that happened.

Yeah, I think it's ostensibly supposed to be so that an ex-President can advise on matters that might impact their successor?

But like, obviously not relevant here because lol

Nor do I imagine the Trump admin was all that forthcoming with Obama on national security matters. Soo.... yeah. Don't tell Don a thing

10:17 PM

@BradC The problem is that he is still the POTUS, and if this is actually done then America's adversaries will take advantage of this weakness in the executive branch

@PrivatePansy no, its talking about after Trump leaves office

Oh, huh, I didn't know former presidents have that privilege

Interesting...

Mildly surprised Trump didn't revoke Obama's just out of pure pettiness

Incidentally this came up when he revoked John Brennan's clearance

> Capitol Police confirm they’re investigating whether members of Congress gave unsanctioned tours of the Capitol that could have been used for reconnaissance ahead of the riots last week

10:37 PM

So... maybe not? Feds walk back claims Capitol rioters meant to 'capture and assassinate' elected officials

Hmm. This twitter thread sounds like it is a bit more nuanced:

twitter.com/ZoeTillman/status/1350202382597070848

> Allison asks to strike the line referring to an intent by the rioters "to capture and assassinate elected officials." He says it "may very well be appropriate at a trial ... and may very well characterize the evidence and his intent that day"

> Allison says they're asking to strike it now because they don't want to mislead the court by getting into a discussion now about the strength of the evidence they have now backing up that allegation

So, not that it isn't true, but just that they are going to save the evidence for that aspect of it until trial

The article itself also says it's possible the local prosecutors may have different or more evidence than the federal ones

> Quebec in Canada has announced a curfew - 8pm to 5pm ... there is police apparently everywhere ... and Ontario has announced a stay-at-home order.

About the NRA bankruptcy thread above, the NY AG would need to sign off on anything like a move out-of-state:

twitter.com/teamtrace/status/1350194228937285633

Why would an org need bankruptcy for it anyway? Not entirely sure if I'm familiar with all the nuance here but if they want to move why can't they just move

Violation of NY law, which is where the NRA is registered. See this Newsweek article linked in the tweet above

> If the NRA wanted to relocate it would first have to file a certificate of dissolution with New York's Department of State, and only after the attorney general's office has given its stamp of approval.
> "Under New York law you have to get permission from the state's attorney general to do that," James Fishman, a Pace Law School professor and the author of New York Nonprofit Law and Practice, told Newsweek. "That's really to stop organizations that, say, are crooked from dissolving and running away to another state. The NRA is stuck."

10:52 PM

A friend I work with lives within the newly declare Green Zone in DC. He's sent me pictures: the street where he lives is blocked off with plenty of pacing National Guard holding semiautomatic rifles.

How... Green?

From here

He lives within the cordon sanitaire.

I see, thanks.

The first comment is a telling sign, imho.

> How many of them would side with the Trump insurrectionists if it came down to it? I worry about that

IF it comes down to it?

11:08 PM

The National Guard may not strictly outnumber the insurgents, but you can be sure they're better armed. The Old Guard stands ready at Arlington, too, which is the real thing.

Insurgents! We have bloody insurgents.

There are something like 10k troops deployed there, I don't think there's any chance they'd be overpowered. But it would be really ugly if anyone tried to actually overpower them

At the rate of the SARS COVID-19 mutations, who knows what the future could bring.

@MadScientist National Guard are military, yes, but they aren't the same as regular army. You still don't want to mess with them.

@MadScientist May be twice that figure by Inauguration Day, or even more.

There's a really ugly difference in outcome here compared to some regular police action for a protest. Their mandate isn't to keep some protest under control, it's to protect the people at the inauguration. In a protest in the worst case you pull back and let stuff burn, if you have to protect people you start firing

Shoot to kill.

11:16 PM

That's why we are incredibly lucky the protesters didn't get into the chamber with Pence. His Secret Service detail could easily have mowed them down.

@tchrist did you see the video about the situation where the woman was shot when they were trying to get into the Capitol?

They aren't interested in "Keeping the Peace". That's not their job. They're only interested in "Keeping the Pence".

@MadScientist Yes. And that was merely Capitol Police, if I recall correctly, not Secret Service. They were plainclothes in jacket and tie, though, but I think that's a requirement to be on the floor of the chamber.

And it was not military.

They backed off very quickly once a shot was fired. So while I see quite some potential for things to get out of control, I don't think most people there would run into gunfire

What if they roll in the tanks?

They already have military vehicles inside the Green Zone, although I haven't seen full tanks yet.

11:26 PM

The insurgets will not back down.

That depends what you mean by back down.

From the path of a tank.

The ones facing troops will back down to avoid being mowed down. The training camps and such though may not evaporate.

This won't be a Tiananmen Square

It will almost certainly not get to the point you would have to summon the Old Guard.

@MadScientist I understand that to have been a very conscious decision.

11:31 PM

I think it could get ugly if they have to protect the people from a mob, but if they have a choice they will avoid violence

National Guard don't need tanks or even half-tracks to mow down civilians, trust me.

I have family in the Guard. They really aren't set up for that anyway.

They can. But this just isn't how they're wired.

Domestic-facing troops are really different from foreign-facing ones. Different missions.

But even in the military, policing units are different from combat troops.

You don't want regular combat troops doing policing if you can possibly avoid it.

You want military police doing that.

Even regular military has strict rules on what you can do when civilians are involved, I still remember some of them

The Washington police sent black officers to the riot.

@MadScientist Considerable ones.

@user726941 What are they supposed to do? More than half of DC Police are black.

A civilian is never an "enemy combatant".

Avoid it?

11:36 PM

Why?

Confederate flags?

Racism

So just send rednecks?

slightly tanned necks :-)

@user726941 Members of Congress introduced a bill Thursday to honor an officer for his bravery during last week's siege on the Capitol. The bipartisan bill was introduced to award U.S. Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman with the Congressional Gold Medal for his bravery and quick thinking.

Airborne Corpsman him.

He offered himself at "bait"?

11:42 PM

Smart guy.

“In pushing him, the lead rioter, he’s attempting to get him to follow along,” Burkhalter said of Goodman. “He’s trying to bait them.”

38 mins ago, by tchrist

Insurgents! We have bloody insurgents.

These are racists.

Most racists don't try to take over the Capitol while it is in session. For them we reserve other, sterner terms of endearment.

And of incarceration.

And it wasn't like it was merely "in session".

@tchrist "We love you, you're very special"?

Insurgents are actively rebelling against their lawful government. They made sure to bring the Confederate Flag along to make sure you understood this.

43 mins ago, by user 726941

At the rate of the SARS COVID-19 mutations, who knows what the future could bring.

11:54 PM

We don't usually need to find words to describe those who take up arms against their own government.

At least, not our own.

Confederate soldiers?

Yes.