Columns, Congress, Constitutional Law, Media, Politics

A Crisis Of Faith: Why We Should Be Worried More About A Desecration Than An Insurrection

Below is my column in the Hill on the riot at Congress and its implications for our country.  As shown by the unfounded rush for a “snap impeachment,” we are experiencing a crisis of faith in this country — not only in our Constitution but ourselves.  Pushing for a snap vote (and snap judgment) on these issues will only exacerbate our divisions. This is a time for deliberative, not impulsive, action in Congress.

Here is the column:

All the images of protesters scaling the walls of the Capitol and briefly occupying Congress will remain seared in our collective memories for decades. Some called it a riot. Others called it an insurrection. Whatever you call it, it was a desecration. The rioters desecrated the most sacred moment of our constitutional system when the nation comes together to certify our next president. That is why it is too easy to treat this like an insurrection crisis. It is far more dangerous. It is a crisis of faith.

There were some truly dangerous people in this mix, such as the agitators who had pipe bombs and ropes. Groups like the Proud Boys and antifa have fulfilled these roles in violent riots on the left and the right for years. However, the vast majority of protesters on Wednesday were nonviolent. Indeed, if this was a real effort at insurrection, we can take great comfort that many of our homegrown revolutionaries have come across as more Groucho Marx than Karl Marx. Those in the Capitol were spread across the spectrum, from mocking to menacing. There were the various costumed characters but also men in camo with suspicious backpacks. Yet the guy taking a selfie with his feet on the desk of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seemed more interested in Instagram than insurrection.

The ease with which protesters entered the Capitol was shocking. Despite reports in advance of their plans to march there, Capitol Police seemed undermanned and unprepared. Once inside, protesters seemed to have the run of the building. Many of them seemed as shocked as the members of Congress fleeing the House and Senate chambers. This has happened before, although not to this extent. When I was a young page in Congress, a protest by truckers led to an ornate Capitol building door getting broken down, followed by a rampage through the halls of Congress.

The media portrayed the disgraceful rioters as unimaginable. Yet it was entirely all too imaginable. We have had four years of violent protests, including the attacks on federal buildings, members of Congress, and symbols of our democracy. Former Attorney General William Barr was heavily criticized for clearing Lafayette Square last year after protesters injured numerous law enforcement officers, were injured themselves, burned a historic building, caused property damage, and threatened to breach the White House grounds. There were violent riots during the inauguration of Donald Trump and a lethal assault on some Republican lawmakers playing softball. Indeed, this year started as last year ended, with attacks on federal buildings in Portland and other cities.

Several people viewed those violent protests against the police and the White House as sedition, including Barr. I criticized such labeling of Black Lives Matter or antifa riots as sedition or terrorism. I view those labels as undermining free speech. As with the Black Lives Matter movement, I do not believe most of the protesters this week were rioters, let alone part of an insurrection. As with the protests last year, some instigators pushed for confrontations. But most were at the Capitol to voice an opposition to the certification of votes in an election they believe was stolen. I do not share that view, but it is held by some 40 percent of Americans.

What are these people if they are not insurgents or terrorists? The answer is they are faithless. We face a crisis of faith rather than of revolution. Our Constitution is an article of faith. This republic was founded by a leap of faith taken together by people of different backgrounds and beliefs. Yet the Constitution, no matter how well crafted, is ineffectual if people lose faith in its system or, just as important, in each other.

Our system is designed to give everyone skin in the game. It is meant to bring factional interests to the surface. Unlike those that ignore them, our Constitution forces those out into the open in Congress, where they can be voiced and addressed. Systems that ignore all such divisions explode from within, like in the history of France. Our system is based on a type of implosion in which those pressures are directed into Congress, where factional interests are turned into majority compromises.

The violence this week is not what James Madison hoped for in noting the factional interests in Congress. It was a bit too direct for a system based on representative democracy. However, that is precisely the point. Such action taken reflects the same crisis of faith that was evident in Lafayette Park and on the streets of Portland. That is far more dangerous than a few agitators using a protest to commit mayhem. It is not anarchy but instead alienation that we should fear the most in our nation.

For years, the public has shown a lack of trust and faith in our political system. There also is a wide rejection of the media, which once was a shared resource for information. The media has destroyed its credibility with years of bias, including blackouts on stories viewed as harmful to Democrats. Without faith in our leaders or the media, more than half of this nation appears to be untethered from the political system. That detachment is perilous for a representative government.

We need to hold accountable all those who committed violence in the Capitol. However, after we determine who stormed Congress and how they succeeded in doing it, we have a far more difficult task to address. After all, an insurrection can simply be put down, but a desecration is much more insidious and dangerous for our democracy.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can find his updates online @JonathanTurley.

436 thoughts on “A Crisis Of Faith: Why We Should Be Worried More About A Desecration Than An Insurrection”

      1. Yep, Trump hasn’t been trying to lock up any Americans as undesirable and politically dangerous. (sarc)

        1. Deporting someone is not locking them up and illegal aliens are not Americans.

  2. Heather McDonald eloquently put it this way

    “Biden has since negated that elevated tone by embracing the preposterous Democratic conceit that the ineffective security measures at the Capitol demonstrate pro-white favoritism on the part of law enforcement. The fact that those allegedly white-coddling security officers killed a white woman has been swept from public discourse. The claim that riot response is more resolute when black people are rioting is equally ludicrous considering the far worse damage inflicted over the summer on federal, state, and local government facilities. Throughout the entire period when cities burned and rioters attacked police officers and struggling businesses, not one Black Lives Matter protestor or antifa agitator was killed by the police.”

    1. Continued from Heather McDonald

      “ While Trump behaved with characteristic self-absorption, the hypocrisy of the mainstream press and of many Democratic politicians in responding to the January 6 storming has been patent. These are the same people who have either ignored the destruction of federal property and the desecration of national monuments over the last year or glorified that mayhem in the name of racial justice. Speakers at the Democratic National Convention stayed silent about the anticop riots (“mostly peaceful protests”) leading up to that convention.”

      City-journal.org

      1. understand why. they wanted to taunt trump people and condition them to believe that rioting was OK

        now that Trump people are disappointed and angry, they riot

        but NOT OK– with the billionaire globalists who control the purse-strings

        understand this. it will not ever get better until we HAMMER THE BILLIONAIRES

        Sal Sar

    2. “Throughout the entire period when cities burned and rioters attacked police officers and struggling businesses, not one Black Lives Matter protestor or antifa agitator was killed by the police.”

      That’s not true. For example, Jorge Gomez was shot to death by Las Vegas police.

  3. BLOG TROLL: “CAPITOL IS JUST A BUILDING”

    Our blog troll labors to suggest that the U.S. Capitol is “just a building”. He “only worships God”. “Congress is sick”, he declares, which seems to justify the terrorism we saw. But in the same comment he maintains that damage to the Capitol was limited to the “same damn desk” and “broken glass under one window”. “This country was founded on sedition”, he notes, as though the riots were a positive event. The puppet ‘Howard’ echoes this last part with, “Violence and insurrection is a healthy way to protest”. The last puppet puts Silicon Valley on notice “violence will follow” their efforts to censure calls to violence.

    Anonymous says: January 10, 2021 at 1:47 PM

    Desecration? i don’t worship the Republic, the Striped Banner, nor the Constitution.

    I only worship God! All these three are false gods. We can respect them, but idolizing them is wrong.

    semcgowanjr says: January 10, 2021 at 12:10 PM

    First, the Capitol building is just that, a building. It’s not a shrine. The Constitution was not written there; it’s merely a place where Congress meets – and that is the issue right there. Congress is no longer what the Founders intended. They set up the government so that we, the people, would be REPRESENTED by our elected representatives. Instead, political parties took over and now it’s merely a place where two parties, not much different from each other, battle each other for control. That’s the problem Congress is SICK!!!! By the way, the videos and photographs of the “damage” show the same damn desk over and over, along with some broken glass under one window. Also, of the five people who died, EVERY SINGLE one was a Trump supporter. As for insurrection, sedition, what have you, this country is founded on sedition, insurrection and revolt. If some of our ancestors hadn’t revolted, we’d be singing God Save the Queen.

    Howardb says: January 10, 2021 at 1:23 PM

    I guess we haven’t progressed very much over the last 300 years. Violence and insurrection is a healthy way to protest.

    Anonymous says: January 10, 2021 at 1:51 PM

    When voices are silenced, and censored, people will turn to the deeds instead, to make their anger known

    By censoring heavily Silicon Valley has almost guaranteed that more violence will follow

    This drama unfolds almost like a textbook CI analysis
    ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

    For months this troll has dominated the comment threads with total impunity to smear other commenters. Because of the troll’s presence, real discussions rarely transpire anymore. The troll has no inclination to let discussions develop that might allow real facts to be posted.

    Professor Turley is well-aware of the troll’s work-like efforts. Yet the professor has been curiously content to let his blog become a megaphone for this odious radical. In this regard Johnathan Turley has served as enabler to the rioters who laid siege to The Capitol.

  6. Rioters at the capitol were private citizens and not connected to or authorized by any organization they had previously visited or patronized.

    All political rallies excite and energize supporters – increasing enthusiasm is the generic function of political rallies.

    Movies, stage plays, concerts, etc., are designed to stimulate the emotions of audiences and attendees who are private citizens and accountable for their actions as individuals after the performance.

    Democrats and liberal republicans are insidious, disingenuous and fraudulent when they claim otherwise.
    __________________________________________________________________________________

    “During the melee, Trump tweeted pleas to the crowd to ‘stay peaceful,’ adding ‘No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order.’ As the confrontations continued, the President tweeted again, posting a video of himself. ‘You have to go home now,’ he said, adding, ‘We don’t want anybody hurt.'”

    – Time.com
    _________

    The rioters had been to a Trump Rally, Walmart, McDonald’s, Home Depot, Amazon, Dick’s, Starbucks, CVS, Lowes, Macy’s, Costco, Olive Garden, Bed Bath And Beyond, Apple, PetSmart, Chick-Fil-A, etc., etc.

    Rioters had no connection, affiliation or authorization to act for any entities they had previously visited, encountered or patronized.

    The Trump rally was over and, after the rally ended, rally attendees were private citizens responsible, as individuals, for their own particular personal actions.

    Rioters were not connected to or authorized by Trump.

    1. At 5:30,

      Of BLM and Antifa rioters,

      “They’re not gonna stop, they should not stop.”

      – Kamala Harris

  7. Billionaires are the enemy.

    In terms of who are their strategic lackeys:

    1. central reserve banks like the Fed, ECB.

    2. Silicon Valley and all its corporate structures and enterprises most of all social media

    3. mass media, legacy mass media, ie tv and newspapers

    4. universities particularly, private ones and IVY league

    5. bureaucracies

    The protest at the Capital was one thing, a manifestation of righteous citizen anger, was one thing.
    The breach and vandalism, was another.
    Both show that the protesters were angry and not thinking. If they were thinking, they would have hit at mercenary force number one. The FED.

    When they start thinking, that’s when it’s going to get really interesting.

  8. Desecration? i don’t worship the Republic, the Striped Banner, nor the Constitution.

    I only worship God! All these three are false gods. We can respect them, but idolizing them is wrong.

      1. I was born here and had ancestors going back nearly 300 years now.

        As for so-called Russian trolls, I tell you a lot of those people who say that, their great grandparents lived in the Pale of the Settlement, in and nearby Russia.

        None of mine did, but i ask, did yours?

        Let us know. Spasiba, tovarische!

  9. Black police officer, Captain David Dorn, killed by BLM and Antifa rioters, June 2, 2020.

      1. George is dismissing the deaths of Capitol Police Officers with a cynical What About. Like, “Well this cop in Saint Louis died, so why make a big deal out of Capitol Police getting killed?”

        1. IOW, he is just a n1gg1r !r so he doesn’t matter in your racist mind
          Thanks for removing any doubt how vile the Left are

          1. REGARDING ABOVE:

            Here the troll coldly dismisses the Saint Louis retired officer as “just a n1gg1r”.

    2. He wasn’t killed by BLM and Antifa rioters.

      He was killed by common thieves.

        1. https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2020/07/05/say-their-names-20-people-killed-in-the-george-floyd-riots-n592577

          Say Their Names: 26 People Killed in the George Floyd Riots

          Black lives matter, and that should include the lives tragically lost in the riots following the horrific police killing of George Floyd. The riots have destroyed black lives, black livelihoods, and black monuments. As Black Lives Matter activists continue to repeat the names of unarmed black men and women killed by police, Americans should respond with the litany of victims killed in the George Floyd riots.

          Some of these victims died at the hands of police, but in every case, the riots created the tense situations that led to their deaths. Left-leaning commentators continue to insist the protests were “mostly peaceful,” and it is true that the vast majority of people in the streets — especially during the day — were peaceful protesters. However, many instigators used large crowds as an opportunity to loot, vandalize, and destroy. Portland journalist Andy Ngo has explained how antifa instigators weaponize such situations, and some “Boogaloo” extremists may have done the same.

          While the protests were peaceful, extensive riots across America emphatically were not. These riots came with a death toll of at least 21 people.

          Say their names!

          1. David Dorn

          Looters who broke into a pawn shop ran into David Dorn, a 77-year-old retired St. Louis police captain, on June 2. Dorn was checking on a burglar alarm. That night in St. Louis, rioters shot four officers, burned and looted businesses, and threw rocks at police.

          St. Louis police arrested Stephan Cannon, 24, charging the suspect with first-degree murder, first-degree robbery, first-degree burglary, felon in possession of a firearm.

        2. Maybe you’re too lazy to look up the names of the people who were charged in his death. I’m not as lazy as you are.

          1. You are not lazy based on the number of postings on this blog. You don’t care what you sound like and you don’t care that most of what you say is junk. All you care about is maximizing the number of posts you make.

              1. Anonymous the Stupid, to a hammer everything is a nail. To Anonymous the Stupid everything is Allan.

  10. “On November 6, 1917, leftist revolutionaries led by Bolshevik Party leader Vladimir Lenin launched a nearly bloodless coup d’état against the Duma’s provisional government.”

    – Amanda Onion, Missy Sullivan and Matt Mullen.
    ______________________________________

    On November 3, 2020, leftist revolutionaries, led by Democrat Party leader Barack Obama et al., corrupted, vote-tampered and stole the U.S. Presidential election.
    ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    Trump Won!

    The U.S. Constitution Lost.

        1. you ever wonder why the whole election fraud thing was handled so incompetently, looking back on it?

          here’s one company involved that they never even mentioned

          https://www.parascript.com/signature-verification/

          yeah, top guy is a pro Democrat Russian guy. yeah, they were verifying signatures. the clowns leading the Trump “resistance” never mentioned them

          some strange things are coming out now that the whole shindig has collapsed

          Saloth Sar

        2. Young, as you say the country lost. Anonymous the Stupid doesn’t care about the nation. He doesn’t think. He says what he has been told to say and has no intellectual capacity to stray from those comments.

  11. SECOND CAPITOL POLICE OFFICER DIES FROM INJURIES

    Police have confirmed more charges against rioters who stormed the US Capitol, as more graphic details of violence and brutality emerge.

    By Saturday, prosecutors had filed 17 cases in federal district court and 40 in District of Columbia superior court for offenses ranging from assaulting police officers to entering restricted areas, stealing federal property and threatening lawmakers.

    As politicians contended over Trump’s fate, alarming footage of the riot continued to emerge. Some captured a bloodied officer being crushed in a doorway and screaming. Other officers were reportedly beaten with pipes, with one seen tumbling over a railing into a crowd below. The officer had been body-slammed from behind.

    Brian Sicknick, 42 and a 12-year veteran officer, died after he was struck in the head with a fire extinguisher while “physically engaging” the rioters, according to a statement from Capitol police.

    On Sunday it was reported that another Capitol officer had died, though the cause of death was not released. Speaking to CBS’s Face the Nation, the Missouri senator Roy Blunt said: “Officer Sicknick, now Officer [Howard] Liebengood, both their lives were ended this week. I’ll be interested in finding out if there was a connection with Officer Liebengood.

    Edited from: “Police Arrest More Capitol Rioters As Details Of Violence And Brutality Emerge”

    Today’s Guardian

    1. Where are the charges against the rioters who destroyed buildings, businesses, looted, murdered, assaulted and committed other felonious acts in our cities? The so-called “Progressive” DA’s who were often elected with financial support from American billionaires who made their fortunes under capitalist society are refusing to bring charges. Where are the petitions for the recall of those who refuse to do their duty?

      1. Over 14,000 people were arrested in the summer protests. Why are you asking about the charges instead of looking up the answers to your question?

    2. SECOND CAPITOL POLICE OFFICER DIES FROM INJURIES

      The preliminary reports are that the 2d officer committed suicide. People have personal problems, Peter. That’s not a function of the protest.

      And, no, there has been no ruling that Ofc. Sicknick had a head injury. He had a blood clot, but it’s not evident why. After the melee he texted his family that he’d been pepper sprayed, but mentioned no blow to the head or any other part of him. He collapsed in the ‘division office’ hours after the incident.

  13. RIOTERS WANTED TO HANG MIKE PENCE

    Twitter stopped the phrase “Hang Mike Pence” trending on Saturday, but not before it trended on the social media platform in the aftermath of the company’s decision to suspend Donald Trump’s account.

    The chant was heard in the US Capitol on Wednesday, as a mob incited by the president mounted a putsch, roaming the halls, confronting law enforcement and in some cases apparently planning to kidnap lawmakers.

    Jim Bourg, a Reuters picture editor in Washington, said on Twitter: “I heard at least three different rioters at the Capitol say that they hoped to find Vice-President Mike Pence and execute him by hanging him from a Capitol Hill tree as a traitor. It was a common line being repeated. Many more were just talking about how the VP should be executed.”

    Edited From: “Hang Mike Pence”, Twitter Stops Phrase Trending After Capitol Riot”

    Today’s Guardian
    …………………………………………………………..

    Initial media reports tended to portray the rioters as overly-spirited yahoo’s. But as this story develops, one hears more references to episodes of genuine violence and threats to life.

  14. Jonathan.

    I think all that people want and need is Justice. It isn’t seen to be done, particularly when we expect the lawmakers in Congress etc. bicker and backtrack, even now at a serious time.
    They have been irritating people for years with corruption and wrong-doing not challenged enough. So I think we’re all sick of it and what movement now.

  15. More garbage from our Trump enabling host. Who cares what he writes anymore?

    Here’s the deal: Dems hold off on impeachment while GOP gets Trump to resign ASAP and agree to a congressional censure of him. Pence can pardon him if he wants. Who cares and it’s the GOP mess to clean up.

    As to Turley’s trying to justify suspicions on the election, just stop. You were wrong. I want the apology and then maybe I’ll take you seriously again. The Big Lie campaign on this was begun by Trump months before the 1st vote was cast as he was obviously setting up his excuse when the most likely scenario would occur – he lost. There have been no significant irregularities reported – there are always some – on a scale having any chance of causing a different result, and most importantly, no description of how the alleged conspiracy happened and who are the hundreds of people who pulled it off. Hey, we don;t even need the proof to start with, just describe the scenario, the how and where. Keep in mind that the convenient premise of this Big Lie is that it only affected the Presidential race and not the down ballot congressmen and women from those same states who passed on a challenge to their credentials.

  16. Normalizing the storming of the Capitol building with explosives and flexcuffs is quite a look for a member of the Bar.

    Riots and disturbances that came from the BLM protests were denounced by every Democratic elected official. They supported peaceful protest, and spoke out unequivocally against the violence that occurred.

    Sitting members of the House and Senate *encouraged* this attack on the Capitol. They must be removed from power, investigated, and potentially prosecuted for their participation in organizing the attack.

    They have broken their oath of office by pretending that the Senate can simply choose to overturn an election during the certification process.

    Note that any efforts at comparison between the violence during months of protests of millions should include the most significant facts:

    Over the course of several months, tens of millions of peaceful protesters made their voices heard while small numbers of violent criminals engaged in violence and serious property damage. During that time, not even 20 people died.

    In one day, a small number of criminals stormed the Capitol, many with weapons such as taser, pepper-spray, and improvised explosives, and 5 people are dead.

    There is an order of magnitude difference between the levels of threat in these situations.

    Anyone pretending otherwise is not a trustworthy source of information or analysis.

    1. The bar, ooooo ooooo who actually respects it now?

      A law license is akin to a communist party membership card in the old USSR

      They would take it away if you violated the “party line”

      More and more lawyers will see their “party cards” revoked as the globalist lackeys seize control ever more of the bureacracies

      Some lawyers will rebel

    2. Blunderdog. You blunder indeed. Kamala Harris said the BLM riots will continue and should continue. Tell the business owners whose property and lives were destroyed that it was a peaceful protest. You write that those who dismiss violent actions should not be listened to. With your dismissal of actions by BLM you argue for the dismissal of yourself. “But look he cried”. My opinion is the gospel written by my very hand. Our judgement as to the trustworthy will indeed be rendered.

      1. This is a pathetic lie. You people will believe anything.

        Harris said the protests should continue.

        If people want to protest, more power to them. When they attempt sedition, they’ll go to prison, even if the President told what to do.

  17. We are, in fact, suffering from a series of desecrations. To our Constitution. To our Constitutional Republic, and a huge wave of idiots in the Stupid Party who think there is something big time about impeachments. they won’t change a thing. They will still be look down on. The inevitable outcome is President Trump will leave office with one failure. That is NOT declaring martial law and forcing the military to uphold their Oath of Office. As it stands now the Oath of Office means nothing. So first question here. Hey socialists WHO is going to protect you now dimwits? Gonna hire Antifa?
    s
    But let’s continue having gone ahead with stupidity with their meaningless impeachment they give the opportunity for a legal Federal Pardon. And that is where they hit the quicksand and slowly sink into oblivion as the time wasters who couldn’t get a budget in on time, who screwed their own party’s constituents on the very late stimulus deal and then ignored their own vote for a larger stimulus.

    The Party who twice failed to carry out an impeachment the first by failing to present any sort of evidence and the second by championing a Federal Pardon. Can’t impeach and try someone who has a Federal Pardon. the State and City of NY can’t continue their tax or whatever. Mr. Trump will be washed in the blood of the lamb while the DNC aka socialist communist party will be remembered as the party that couldn’t learn to goose step no matter how many ghosts of Stalin and Adolf they called up with their witches conventions.

    No one can charge him again if it barely touches on the past. Smooth move botox. She’s got a better chance of being convicted of … stupidity and thrown out of office

    So whose going to protect them? Not the military. Anything they say or do is political. including foreign wars.

    1. So you think Trump’s one fault was not doing an actual coup with the military. That is the opposite of upholding their Oath of Office.

      1. LOL Molly. Nobody at the top cares about any socalled “oaths”

        you are a babe in the woods if you believe that

  18. Overall, a good article, Professor Turley.

    I do not think people have lost faith in the system, in the Constitution. It is good. We have lost faith in each other because the rules of the game, of the Constitution and of the Social Contract, too, have been twisted and ignored by those charged with upholding it in spirit and in law. The media, too, has made a concerted effort to perpetuate and widen tiny cracks in trust through deliberate misrepresentation and censorship, they who have been expected to embody free speech and the accurate representation of facts and occurrences.

    I wonder now whether we are indeed a Banana republic, that Bernay’s Guatamalan “protests” happened on Capitol Hill.

    Who is guilty of undermining the nation?

    The elites have the high ground.

  19. First, the Capitol building is just that, a building. It’s not a shrine. The Constitution was not written there; it’s merely a place where Congress meets – and that is the issue right there. Congress is no longer what the Founders intended. They set up the government so that we, the people, would be REPRESENTED by our elected representatives. Instead, political parties took over and now it’s merely a place where two parties, not much different from each other, battle each other for control. That’s the problem Congress is SICK!!!! By the way, the videos and photographs of the “damage” show the same damn desk over and over, along with some broken glass under one window. Also, of the five people who died, EVERY SINGLE one was a Trump supporter. As for insurrection, sedition, what have you, this country is founded on sedition, insurrection and revolt. If some of our ancestors hadn’t revolted, we’d be singing God Save the Queen.

    1. I guess we haven’t progressed very much over the last 300 years. Violence and insurrection is a healthy way to protest.

      1. When voices are silenced, and censored, people will turn to the deeds instead, to make their anger known

        By censoring heavily Silicon Valley has almost guaranteed that more violence will follow

        This drama unfolds almost like a textbook CI analysis

    2. “its’ merely a place where Congress meets”

      They started building it in 1793 and have been meeting there since 1800. That’s 220 years of meeting there, but you consider it insignificant. Shame on you. I’m sure you also the WH “merely a place where the President lives,” right?

  20. Turley says, “Several people viewed those violent protests against the police and the White House as sedition, including Barr. I criticized such labeling of Black Lives Matter or antifa riots as sedition or terrorism. I view those labels as undermining free speech. As with the Black Lives Matter movement, I do not believe most of the protesters this week were rioters, let alone part of an insurrection. As with the protests last year, some instigators pushed for confrontations. But most were at the Capitol to voice an opposition to the certification of votes in an election they believe was stolen. I do not share that view, but it is held by some 40 percent of Americans.”

    Turley in his never ending pretzel logic loves to play the “unbiased Intellectual” in his columns. Truth is Turley is just as much of the problem as trump is. Turley complicity and coddling of trumps behavior and actions makes it grotesquely hypocritical when he complains about the left and its own actions. He’s falsely comparing the actions of BLM and trump supporters at the captiol as equivalent. This is where Turley is deliberately lying to himself in order to avoid the truth about what he’s seeing. He cannot bring himself to admit that what happened at the capitol was an insurrection, an attempted coup because in his mind this just doesn’t happen in this country. Guess what? It can and it did. Turley admitted that trump himself incited the mob. He admits he criticized trump’s speech as it was being spoken. That means he KNEW what trump was doing. What he was intending to do. But his blind adherence to free speech didn’t let him see what it was, an insurrection.and sedition.

    “I don’t not believe most protesters this week were rioters, let alone part of an insurrection.” Turley is doing exactly what turmp did when he got permanently kicked off twitter. Giving a pass to the rioters by making it a point that “most” were not rioters. Pure BS. He didn’t accord that same “courtesy” to BLM protests and he knows that.

    ” But most were at the Capitol to voice an opposition to the certification of votes in an election they believe was stolen. I do not share that view, but it is held by some 40 percent of Americans.” Turley excuses the violence and seditious actions because the view is only held by 40 percent of Americans. Turley you d!psh#t, the only reason why those 40 percent hold that “view” is because the president himself, for months, has been perpetrating the lie that fraud was committed, that mail in ballots were unconstitutional, that states were not following their own laws, etc. None of that was proven to be true in court. Every lawsuit brought forward by the president, GOP legislators, trump supporters, etc. NONE provided any proof of the allegations and claims. All were debunked or proven to be just stupid logical reasons that made complete sense to trump’s supporters because these are the same people who are ignorant enough to believe anything they are told because they don’t want to admit or show that they really don’t understand what they are arguing against. This is not about not listening to these people, this is about these people not having the capability to listen themselves.

    Impeachment is completely appropriate here because trump clearly crossed a line. He deliberately violated his oath to the constitution by inciting a mob to disrupt and overturn a duly elected candidate. It’s clearly sedition.

    1. The BLM protesters this summer pushed on the barriers in front of the White House numerous times. They had to construct another higher layer of barrier.
      What if they had been successful and streamed onto the White House grounds?
      Ponder that.

      1. All law enforcement would have to do is follow the lead of the Military. Sorry it’s political.

        Treat your security forced despicably they learn to despise you in return.

        Whose going to protect you now. A few Secret Service Agents?

      2. We might recall that the media ridiculed President Trump for cowardly hiding in the bunker when Antifa/BLM were demonstrating in front of the White House terrorizing people, tearing down statues and attacking the police during the demonstrations. They mocked Trump repeatedly. Then when Trump visited the damage to the historic church and held a bible in his hand, the media mocked him again. Is anyone mocking the senators and congress representatives for hiding? Why different standards?

        President Trump’s election was never accepted by the democrats, the RINOS and the media. Four years of impeach Trump 45, the media constantly leaking every conversation trying to find a got you moment to impeach him. We witnessed senators and staff being driven out of restaurants, people losing their jobs if they wore a red hat or voted for Trump. Where was the outrage? Where did this hate come from? Why? Non-stop, four years and the democrats still don’t get it. Now they are continuing with their hate – punish 73 million people for daring to vote for an outsider. Congress reeks of corruption, the elite who never keep their promises, have made a mockery of our democratic system who are trying to silence and cancel the voices of 73 million “deplorables”. The people get it especially immigrants who escaped socialist/communist countries.

        1. RSB. Let me explain this to you in case you are new. Global billionaires are the enemy. They own the Democrats wholly. The Republicans only in part. They hated Trump. They were out to get him and make sure he got cancelled in 20. By hook or by crook.

          They still are the enemy. All these events unfold according to how the mass media tailors perceptions about them. And social media too. Which we can see it totally in the pocket of the same global billionaires.

          They were out to get Trump but it will become clear if it isnt already after nearly a year of punishing lockdowns that were premised upon controlling the virus but were proven ineffective, we will see that in fact THE PEOPLE are the enemy and the target of the global billionaires.

          Oh most of all white guys but everybody else too, everyone not in their immediate payroll structures, we peasants are the enemy and they intend to atomize, weaken, impoverish, and eventually destroy us.

          There is no safety in accepting enslavement. There was in the old days when there was a demand for labor. Slaves, whether chattel slaves or wage slaves, had some value to ongoing enterprises owned by elites.

          Now, they have robotics and artificial intelligence. And they can always import more cheaper workers from abroad if they really need them. Natives of the United States of ANY COLOR are essentially, obsolete.

          They are out to liquidate us. Who knows, another virus, or maybe the vaccine, or the next vaccine for the next virus. Depopulation is their goal.

          We will either destroy the globalist billionaire schemers or they will destroy us

          To do this, we are going to have to see that the 2 party system is a control system that is not genuine democracy, that our American trope of “Equality” conceals the reality of economic differences and the massive concentration of wealth in the top stratum of billionaires, and that nothing will change in time without major resistance.

          Fighting for the next election outcome is whistling past the graveyard. Well some effort can be put into that but not everything. Sterner measures and more diverse forms of resistance are needed, across the entire social spectrum

          The people are going to have to unify to get it done. This means we are going to have to find new friends among Democrat voters and common cause with regular folks right in front of our faces. The natural, organic, human forms of social organization still exist, because they are rooted in human nature, which is still the same. We need to tap into it while we can before our human identity is fundamentally enslaved, altered, and erased by the schemes of the global billionaires, which include as an integral goal, depopulation.

          Saloth Sar

      3. Claire, fact is, they didn’t go beyond the barriers. Trump’s supporters smashed thru them and proceeded to to not only force their way in. They literally ransacked offices and stole sensitive equipment and files.

        Pushing against barriers is afar cry from what these insurrectionists did.

    2. Trump perpetuated the false claim that if he loses it’s because the Democrats fixed the election. After the elections, states painstaking and throughly proved that that was not the case, Trump continued espousing that narrative. The 40% that rejected the results of the election is because of the lies of Trump. Trump has the right to reject the results and go through legal means to investigate any fraud, but he went way beyond his legal means to try to cheat and perpetuate his lies to his supporters. Of course, his supporters need to be responsible for not doing their own research.Trump is a psychopath. Why JT doesn’t place the blame on Tump for perpetuating conspiracy theories I have no idea. Trump would overthrow the government and take complete control in the name of saving America if he could.

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