There’s additional news most every day concerning new revelations about the Jan. 6th insurrection. Pat Bullard recaps recent news with additional commentary about our local paper and Republican response.
The Jan. 6 Committee hearings continue to reveal evidence upon evidence that the former President was responsible for the Jan. 6 Failed Coup Attempt that violently attacked the US Capitol. A number of articles in the Salisbury Post on Sunday, July 17th, reveal much about the state of the US democracy after this coup attempt.
Even before the November election, Mr. Trump was throwing doubt on the validity of the election process, and plots to overturn his election loss began to unfold. Around 60 legal cases were filed by his supporters claiming voter fraud, but all were unfounded and failed. His own Attorney General, Bill Barr, told him he had lost the election and there was no evidence of voter fraud.
Mr. Trump incited the domestic terrorists vigilantes and some are testifying to that and many have been tried and found guilty. The rioters were complete with gallows, shouting to hang Vice President Mike Pence because he followed the law and refused to follow the former President’s pleas to help overturn the free and fair election. Testimony shows he was pleased by the attempt to hang the Vice President.. The lives of all Congresspersons and Senators were threatened. The rioters brutally beat the police trying to protect the Capitol and its inhabitants, and there was death.
Many insiders in the White House have testified that Mr. Trump was told continually that he lost the election. Yet he continued to tell his followers that he had won and they should riot to overturn the election. Many pleaded with him to stop the rioters while he watched with glee and failed to call for assistance to stop the rioters.
The former President fought against our country, our Constitution and its Constitutional Republic (democracy). He failed to live up to his Oath.
Yet the 7/17 Salisbury Post articles clearly show the large amount of his followers refusing to listen to and face the facts of the Failed Coup Attempt and Mr. Trump’s crimes, as the local ‘Battle for the Republic’ rally clearly cites. In NC, the trumpian GOP parrots Trump and talks about saving the republic, when it is the trumpian GOP in many states changing laws to make it possible for the next coup to succeed and take down the Republic.
Amanda Sturgill talked about ‘I solemnly swear to take this oath seriously.’ Roger Hull in My Turn quotes a German pastor from the ’30s ‘if a few thousand Christians had spoken up, even at the risk of losing their lives, maybe several million other lives would have been saved.’ We know how the Holocaust happened in Nazi Germany. By not speaking out, Germans had been complicit through their silence.
Adding the meaningful poem, ‘First they came for the Jews’….women…..people of color,…..LGBTQ…., ‘Then they came for me And there was no one left to speak out for me,’, so indicative of what is happening in the US…
Yes, Amanda Sturgill, ‘Faithfulness to one’s oath’ should be the rule for all lawmakers, President, …….Even Leonard Pitts talked about Trump being under malignant influence. But as Liz Chaney stated, Mr. Trump is an old man and not a child and makes his own choices. Meanwhile, the former guy continues his rallies, suggesting he will run again.
Folks, if this continues and these trumpian GOP forces continue and gain further control of our democracy, we will no longer have a democratic government. We watch daily as authoritarian Russia under dictator Putin steps up his vicious unprovoked attacks against democratic Ukraine, as I recall the former guy being beholden to Putin and saying he liked his strength in launching the attack against Ukraine.
Will the US democracy be the next to fall to authoritarianism? Voters hold this in their hands, and we must vote in force against the GOP to prevent it.
Pat Safrit Bullard