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I think sometimes we judge events based on the outcomes not on the intent. If one of those people who got inside the building gained access to one of the member

I think sometimes we judge events based on the outcomes not on the intent. If one of those people who got inside the building gained access to one of the members of Congress or Vice President Pence and took them hostage or harmed them, would you think that it were closer to a coup attempt? There were reports of how the National Guard seemed to be getting delayed because of not having the approval of, I believe, the President through the Department of Defense, to enter. As a person sitting here in my home, some of it looked rag tag and yet 1) I don't know what happened behind the scenes and 2) rag tag groups can cause a tremendous amount of chaos, e.g., if bombs had gone off outside the RNC or DNC.

roenxi 6y ago
For starters, a right-wing coup that kicked off by taking outgoing-VP Pence hostage would be beyond ridiculous. Instead of own goals we'd all be using "Pence-d" as an idiom. If they'd taken Congresspeople hostage that would have been terrorism not a coup. The mob was totally unprepared, unimaginative, achieved no strategic outcomes and half of them are going to be in jail from now to forever. This is a coup in the same way that the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone was a succession. It is clueless protestors playing around.
- jimkleiber 6y ago
  Well, if they may have believed that if he didn't certify the election, then Trump would not have been the outgoing President. Maybe you're right in that the word "coup" is not the most precise one to use, I think what I meant more than anything is that sometimes we see something as less serious violence because the action didn't result in as severe of an outcome as was intended. So maybe not coup, but terrorist attack or insurrection or whatever word portrays the gravitas but aligns better with the meaning of the action. On a second note, I think we do this a lot in law as well—if I get into a tussle with someone and push them softly and they trip and hit their head and die, I will probably go to prison for much longer than if I repeatedly and angrily punch someone in the face and they don't die. I guess I'm just curious about how that works in our psyche.
- jcranmer 6y ago
  > For starters, a right-wing coup that kicked off by taking outgoing-VP Pence hostage would be beyond ridiculous. Are you aware that Trump through Pence under the bus Wednesday morning for being unwilling to use his (nonexistent) unilateral authority to discard electoral votes? In the (brief) time between Trump's speech and the seditious mob's invasion of the Capitol, there was already some commentary about increased threats to Pence's life as a result of the speech. As far as that mob and its supporters are concerned, Pence is a traitor as much, if not more, than the entire Democratic Party.
SergeAx 6y ago
There is no "what if" in history, you just cannot argue from that position. There were events and there are facts about those events and participants. That's what matters and it should be investigated, tried in court and punished accordingly.
- jimkleiber 6y ago
  I'm confused as I didn't think I was arguing for a "what if" of history. I was just trying to say that not only are we criminally liable for the outcomes we cause but also the intentions we have and just because something doesn't have an illegal outcome doesn't mean it didn't have an illegal intention, e.g., murder vs. attempted murder.
  - SergeAx 6y ago
    Okay, then you are attributing an intent to harm or take hostages government officials to undetermined members of Capitol takeover gang, is that correct?
    - jimkleiber 6y ago
      I'm saying I have no idea what their intentions were but that in terms of the law, intentions matter and I believe law enforcement should investigate to determine what they intended to do.
      - SergeAx 6y ago
        100% agreed. But before that let's not assume anything that is criminally and even capital punishable.
        jimkleiber 6y ago
        I agree. I leave it up to the professionals in the respective fields to figure out what all happened and which laws were broken.
belorn 6y ago
When Trump called the national guard to deal with rioters during the summer it was globally criticized. The military do not have the training to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right equipment to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right organizational structure to deal with rioting citizens. The result of sending the military against your own citizen is always unnecessary violence and death. Feel free to complain about the delays in requesting additional police from nearby cities, or the inability of the few thousands police officers for not be able to secure the building and the people inside. Complain that they did not have a good plan and assessment of the situation. But please, do not complain that they did not send the military. It is never a good idea unless the other side also have military gear and military training operated by a military organization. Would anyone here be happier of the military was used against the rioters in the capital and a few hundred or thousand people died from machine fire?
- mullingitover 6y ago
  > Would anyone here be happier of the military was used against the rioters in the capital and a few hundred or thousand people died from machine fire? No, I would be happier if they hadn't been lied to for months and then invited to the capitol and incited to do an attack on congress in the first place.
  - tetrometal 6y ago
    > No, I would be happier if they hadn't been lied to for months You keep asserting this as fact. It is not. Again, please demonstrate that Matt Braynard's evidence has been addressed. https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/11/matt_braynards_data_analytics_have_paid_off.html https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/11/matt_braynards_...
- jimkleiber 6y ago
  > When Trump called the national guard to deal with rioters during the summer it was globally criticized. At least from what I recall, it was criticized because the President was ordering the national guard into a state, whereas I'm pretty sure it's the state's decision whether it wants to deploy its national guard or not, not the President's. > The military do not have the training to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right equipment to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right organizational structure to deal with rioting citizens. The result of sending the military against your own citizen is always unnecessary violence and death. I don't have a military or law-enforcement background so I don't know if they have the skills or equipment or not. You seem to speak with utmost certainty on this so I assume you may know more than me, but with the anonymity of the internet, I have no idea. I don't know why the national guard seemed to be delayed, I don't know if that were because someone thought they weren't the right ones to do the job or if it would be too much of an escalation, or adversely, they thought they would do a really good job at protecting and not harming people. I have no idea. What I was trying to say is that I don't know what the plans were, what the coordination was behind the scenes, and how few of us actually know the full scope of actions that were planned or intended and that just because a plan fails doesn't mean it didn't break the law in a serious way.

roenxi 6y ago

For starters, a right-wing coup that kicked off by taking outgoing-VP Pence hostage would be beyond ridiculous. Instead of own goals we'd all be using "Pence-d" as an idiom. If they'd taken Congresspeople hostage that would have been terrorism not a coup. The mob was totally unprepared, unimaginative, achieved no strategic outcomes and half of them are going to be in jail from now to forever. This is a coup in the same way that the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone was a succession. It is clueless protestors playing around.

jimkleiber 6y ago
Well, if they may have believed that if he didn't certify the election, then Trump would not have been the outgoing President. Maybe you're right in that the word "coup" is not the most precise one to use, I think what I meant more than anything is that sometimes we see something as less serious violence because the action didn't result in as severe of an outcome as was intended. So maybe not coup, but terrorist attack or insurrection or whatever word portrays the gravitas but aligns better with the meaning of the action. On a second note, I think we do this a lot in law as well—if I get into a tussle with someone and push them softly and they trip and hit their head and die, I will probably go to prison for much longer than if I repeatedly and angrily punch someone in the face and they don't die. I guess I'm just curious about how that works in our psyche.
jcranmer 6y ago
> For starters, a right-wing coup that kicked off by taking outgoing-VP Pence hostage would be beyond ridiculous. Are you aware that Trump through Pence under the bus Wednesday morning for being unwilling to use his (nonexistent) unilateral authority to discard electoral votes? In the (brief) time between Trump's speech and the seditious mob's invasion of the Capitol, there was already some commentary about increased threats to Pence's life as a result of the speech. As far as that mob and its supporters are concerned, Pence is a traitor as much, if not more, than the entire Democratic Party.

SergeAx 6y ago

There is no "what if" in history, you just cannot argue from that position. There were events and there are facts about those events and participants. That's what matters and it should be investigated, tried in court and punished accordingly.

jimkleiber 6y ago
I'm confused as I didn't think I was arguing for a "what if" of history. I was just trying to say that not only are we criminally liable for the outcomes we cause but also the intentions we have and just because something doesn't have an illegal outcome doesn't mean it didn't have an illegal intention, e.g., murder vs. attempted murder.
- SergeAx 6y ago
  Okay, then you are attributing an intent to harm or take hostages government officials to undetermined members of Capitol takeover gang, is that correct?
  - jimkleiber 6y ago
    I'm saying I have no idea what their intentions were but that in terms of the law, intentions matter and I believe law enforcement should investigate to determine what they intended to do.
    - SergeAx 6y ago
      100% agreed. But before that let's not assume anything that is criminally and even capital punishable.
      - jimkleiber 6y ago
        I agree. I leave it up to the professionals in the respective fields to figure out what all happened and which laws were broken.

belorn 6y ago

When Trump called the national guard to deal with rioters during the summer it was globally criticized. The military do not have the training to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right equipment to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right organizational structure to deal with rioting citizens. The result of sending the military against your own citizen is always unnecessary violence and death. Feel free to complain about the delays in requesting additional police from nearby cities, or the inability of the few thousands police officers for not be able to secure the building and the people inside. Complain that they did not have a good plan and assessment of the situation. But please, do not complain that they did not send the military. It is never a good idea unless the other side also have military gear and military training operated by a military organization. Would anyone here be happier of the military was used against the rioters in the capital and a few hundred or thousand people died from machine fire?

mullingitover 6y ago
> Would anyone here be happier of the military was used against the rioters in the capital and a few hundred or thousand people died from machine fire? No, I would be happier if they hadn't been lied to for months and then invited to the capitol and incited to do an attack on congress in the first place.
- tetrometal 6y ago
  > No, I would be happier if they hadn't been lied to for months You keep asserting this as fact. It is not. Again, please demonstrate that Matt Braynard's evidence has been addressed. https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/11/matt_braynards_data_analytics_have_paid_off.html https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/11/matt_braynards_...
jimkleiber 6y ago
> When Trump called the national guard to deal with rioters during the summer it was globally criticized. At least from what I recall, it was criticized because the President was ordering the national guard into a state, whereas I'm pretty sure it's the state's decision whether it wants to deploy its national guard or not, not the President's. > The military do not have the training to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right equipment to deal with rioting citizens. They do not have the right organizational structure to deal with rioting citizens. The result of sending the military against your own citizen is always unnecessary violence and death. I don't have a military or law-enforcement background so I don't know if they have the skills or equipment or not. You seem to speak with utmost certainty on this so I assume you may know more than me, but with the anonymity of the internet, I have no idea. I don't know why the national guard seemed to be delayed, I don't know if that were because someone thought they weren't the right ones to do the job or if it would be too much of an escalation, or adversely, they thought they would do a really good job at protecting and not harming people. I have no idea. What I was trying to say is that I don't know what the plans were, what the coordination was behind the scenes, and how few of us actually know the full scope of actions that were planned or intended and that just because a plan fails doesn't mean it didn't break the law in a serious way.