The Capitol building is breached by the Retrumplicans NOW!

[FlashDangerpants]

... sarcasm is antithetical to sincere ...

Words of Genius.

[commonsense]

It's easy. You just make a left at Albuquerque.

What’s up, Doc?

But seriously folks, previously I had thought sarcasm was simply explained as anger disguised as humor. Having read the posts in this thread, I now see that sarcasm calls for more thorough attention. Thanks to all for the insights.

[UniversalAlien]

The Capitol building is breached by the Retrumplicans NOW!
- Are you sure

I saw it, blamed Trump, have been hating Trump ever since he would not accept his loss of the
election and had already seen how inept he's been since the Covid19 catastrophe.

But apparently he has a hard core group of followers that will believe anything he says
- that is a danger to many inside and outside of government.

But what keeps bugging me is how, when you know there is going to be a massive rally, and you know rallies can go south - How can you not have a massive police and/or military presence ready for any and old possibilities

Unless you {whatever special interest} want things to go south and want to happen exactly what did happen ?!?!

Trump has never reminded me of being a very smart man - Clever politically sometimes,
but more often he is just plain dumb - Another reason he lost the election.

But he commands a huge popular following and both liberals and conservatives are afraid of his power - They want him off the political stage - They want him to go away.

Now I'm going to ask you - Is it possible 'the fix was in' on January 6 ?
Did 'the powers that be' set Trump up to take a dive? Make it look like he engineered a coup, when anyone watching the chaotic nature of the riot, could see it was just that, a bunch of nuts hell bent on destruction - The type of nuts that you see on the Right, Left and middle.

What do you think

[Walker]

[Dontaskme]

What do you think

I think all humans are dumb and stupid. They have no natural predators, and so utter boredom drives them to invent excitment in the form of weapons that are used to destroy each other. Fighting with bare hands is not exciting enough for human animals.

Weapon wielding is the only game worth playing, and they call their weapon wielding game WAR.
Human animals are craving the war game right now, it's been a long time since the last one. The addiction to war is passed on to every new generation, and this current generation's hunger to play is unfolding upon the worlds stage in many subtle forms. The stage is always being set-up for war games to commence, there can be no action without actionmen. We love to play the game of actionman.

We've been practicing how to play actionman since we were children, and now as adult children, we get to act out for real.



Popcorn sales must be going through the roof right now.



.

[Sculptor]

The militarization of the Election will be Trump's lasting legacy.
He shall be remembered as America's worst ever President.

[Sculptor]

A Left turn off I-40 puts you right into the barrio, Amigo.

A right turn runs you into a mountain of immoveable rock.

But only if you're heading West.

Isn't each way left?

I'm surprised to see you on THIS topic.

I suppose you think that Trump is not responsible for whipping up the seige of the Capitol.
I suppose you think that lying about the election since November has nothing whatever to do with the violence.

[Walker]

What do you think

National Guard presence is closing the barn door after the horse is loose, and it's likely the intent was to loose the horses. Perhaps even loose the dogs of war for the class conscious.

Among the people, the concern is that the doors to public and private buildings will all be under armed guard, with admission contingent on an acceptable social credit score, which will consist of vaccination proof, acceptable political affiliations, proper identification (except for voting), proper work history, a receipt for selling weapons back to the government, and so on, ideally with a bar code tattoo somewhere on each human.

Perhaps pronouncing certain words properly will also be required to pass by the guards unmolested instead of experiencing other consequences, perhaps from devices.

Eventually ... while sliding down the slope.

[Walker]

The militarization of the Election will be Trump's lasting legacy.
He shall be remembered as America's worst ever President.

Certainly that will be the history if maniacal Leftists/Progressives have the say of the way things are.

[Terrapin Station]

I suppose you think that Trump is not responsible for whipping up the seige of the Capitol.

Correct that that's my view.

I suppose you think that lying about the election since November has nothing whatever to do with the violence.

This, however, isn't something I'd say. Trump's comments have something to do with the Capitol incident in a manner with similarities to Salinger's Catcher in the Rye having something to do with John Lennon's death. We can't say that the latter had nothing to do with Lennon's death, because in Chapman's mind, it did. It was a motivating force for him. However, obviously Catcher in the Rye didn't cause (in the sense of forced action) Chapman to murder Lennon.

[Walker]

How could a violent mob manage to get past Security? There must be an inquiry into who was in charge of security. This was the USA, not some Balkan disaster!

- It's obvious that you went right to the crux of the situation.
- Such a security lapse is no accident and the bad consequences are easily predictable.
- All that's required to implement lock-downs and suspend civil liberties indefinitely is that something bad happen.
- Crowd estimates were high, Capitol Police is a huge, well-funded department, they had advance knowledge, and they have a lot of experience with crowds.
- To say they didn't know what could happen defies common sense.

[tillingborn]

This, however, isn't something I'd say. Trump's comments have something to do with the Capitol incident in a manner with similarities to Salinger's Catcher in the Rye having something to do with John Lennon's death. We can't say that the latter had nothing to do with Lennon's death, because in Chapman's mind, it did. It was a motivating force for him. However, obviously Catcher in the Rye didn't cause (in the sense of forced action) Chapman to murder Lennon.

From what I can make of it, your argument hinges on the moral equivalence between a book that inspired a crime 30 years after its publication, and a sitting President telling a crowd that included people in combat gear that 'If you don't fight like hell you're not going to have a country anymore'. What exactly are the similarities?

[Terrapin Station]

This, however, isn't something I'd say. Trump's comments have something to do with the Capitol incident in a manner with similarities to Salinger's Catcher in the Rye having something to do with John Lennon's death. We can't say that the latter had nothing to do with Lennon's death, because in Chapman's mind, it did. It was a motivating force for him. However, obviously Catcher in the Rye didn't cause (in the sense of forced action) Chapman to murder Lennon.

From what I can make of it, your argument hinges on the moral equivalence between a book that inspired a crime 30 years after its publication, and a sitting President telling a crowd that included people in combat gear that 'If you don't fight like hell you're not going to have a country anymore'. What exactly are the similarities?

They're only "morally equivalent" on my view in that there's no moral responsibility in either case. I'm of the view that speech does not cause subsequent action. That would only be the case if we're talking about a device that is triggered by speech (for example, if we were talking about an Alexa device, and let's say that we've rigged one to fire a weapon when we say, "Alexa, shoot"). It's not the case when we're talking about people with free will making decisions to act however they've chosen to act.

The point there was that I don't agree that the choices that were made have "nothing to do" with the Catcher in the Rye or with Trump's comments. They obviously did have something to do with the choices made, because of how the actors in question made their decisions--what they were thinking about in relation to those decisions, what those things meant to the actors, etc.

[tillingborn]

They're only "morally equivalent" on my view in that there's no moral responsibility in either case. I'm of the view that speech does not cause subsequent action. That would only be the case if we're talking about a device that is triggered by speech (for example, if we were talking about an Alexa device, and let's say that we've rigged one to fire a weapon when we say, "Alexa, shoot"). It's not the case when we're talking about people with free will making decisions to act however they've chosen to act.

Out of curiosity, if only the people who physically act of their own free will bear moral responsibility, how do you view the killing by drone of Qasim Soleimani just over a year ago? As a major general, he is unlikely to have personally committed any acts that warranted a drone strike, and is therefore not morally responsible, by your reckoning. If that is so, and Soleimani was unjustly murdered, presumably only the crew member who of his own free will pushed the button that launched the drone is guilty of any crime.

The point there was that I don't agree that the choices that were made have "nothing to do" with the Catcher in the Rye or with Trump's comments. They obviously did have something to do with the choices made, because of how the actors in question made their decisions--what they were thinking about in relation to those decisions, what those things meant to the actors, etc.

In that case, do you think Trump is too stupid to understand, as you do, that words have influence?

[Terrapin Station]

Out of curiosity, if only the people who physically act of their own free will bear moral responsibility, how do you view the killing by drone of Qasim Soleimani just over a year ago? As a major general, he is unlikely to have personally committed any acts that warranted a drone strike, and is therefore not morally responsible, by your reckoning. If that is so, and Soleimani was unjustly murdered, presumably only the crew member who of his own free will pushed the button that launched the drone is guilty of any crime.

I don't know exactly what Soleimani was blamed for (I don't normally follow political news very closely). If we're basically at war with foreign militaries/militias, etc., then as a member of that military or militia, you may end up killed simply for that fact. In those situations, I wouldn't say those deaths are unjust. However, I also wouldn't blame a major general for deaths committed by underlings. Whether those deaths are just or not depends on the political situation re war status, etc. If a military leader gives an order that's unlawful in context, then it's definitely the responsibility of folks under the leader to refuse to follow the order.

In that case, do you think Trump is too stupid to understand, as you do, that words have influence?

I'm sure he understands that words can have influence. Influence is different than force.