Seems Pointless in a Time When Facts Don’t Matter

I have learned that I was wrong about the Capitol riot.

When hyped-up Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, I looked at the news, and what I saw didn’t seem to be as bad as leftists were saying it was. Here is what I saw:

1. An angry crowd broke into the Capitol.
2. Police shot an unarmed woman who was climbing past a security barrier and killed her.
3. One person in the crowd died from a heart attack.
4. A police officer died in some way related to crowd control.
5. The crowd overcame another police officer and put him on the ground but did not kill him.
6. Some idiots went into restricted areas and posed with selfies.
7. A couple of pipes with wires were found in Washington the same day, but no one had established that they were on the scene at the Capitol or that they were bombs.

I thought the death of the unarmed woman looked more like police misconduct than a necessary and natural consequence of the riot. Rioters generally have not been shot for entering government buildings. If police did that, imagine how many dead leftists there would be.

I thought the death of the heart attack victim didn’t have anything to do with the people who entered the Capitol. The press harped on it because it helped them inflate the casualty toll, and that was dishonest.

I found out one other woman was trampled and died, and another man who was somewhere among the DC protestors, or maybe among the rioters, died from a stroke. Back when all the riot news was emerging, I didn’t know about those deaths because they weren’t mentioned in the stories I read. That being said, the woman who was trampled is no different from the people BLM and Antifa have accidentally killed, and the stroke victim shouldn’t even be in the news.

It looks like I’m still right about the woman who was shot and the heart attack victim, so no apology there. I have to add that it’s strange how leftist journalists treated all the conservative casualties as though they were targeted victims of the mob.

I will also say I don’t apologize for saying the riot was overhyped. It was not a coup or an attempt to kill legislators. It was also much gentler than most leftist riots. Amazingly, the rioters went home when they were confronted and scolded. Try that with BLM. Leftist terrorists have attacked local and federal government buildings many times, and they have tried to burn them with government employees inside, and while all that was going on, the press called them “protestors”, and businesses like Amazon signaled their solidarity with them.

Was the riot terrorism? Terrorism is the use or threat of violence in order to force political ends. This riot doesn’t qualify. The participants were generally trying to demonstrate their disapproval of the way the election was handled. There may have been a few hard core types among them who wanted to terrorize, but overall, they were just acting out, and they had no plan to occupy the building, destroy it, take hostages, or kill congressmen. They didn’t intend to frighten the government into overturning the election, and they weren’t trying to scare people into voting conservative.

So what was I wrong about?

First, the cop who was killed did not die in an accident. I have learned that someone hit him with a fire extinguisher. That looks like first-degree murder to me, and since it occurred in a federal district, I assume the death penalty applies. People who murder cops need to be prosecuted. Of course, I’m saying all this with limited knowledge of the facts, so I may be wrong.

Second, the cop who was knocked down says more than one person urged his assailants to kill him with his own gun. The rioters themselves protected him and prevented this from happening, but they should never have battered or restrained him in the first place. They should be prosecuted for whatever battery offense applies, on top of the charges related to breaking and entering, and anyone who suggested killing him should do multiple decades in prison.

I never supported mobbing the Capitol. I think all political rioters should be arrested and prosecuted. Unfortunately, leftist politicians and prosecutors have established a bad precedent by restraining the police and dropping charges for BLM and Antifa, so the picture becomes cloudy when it comes to the DC riot. Surely, right-wing rioters will be treated much worse than leftists, but I think they would be in bigger trouble had left-wing rioters been getting what they deserve.

As for the general climate, things seem to be much worse than the public understands. I like to shoot, so I have alerts set up to help me get ammunition. The alerts tell me when ammo is available. They have been going off less and less frequently. People are really stocking up. I’m also trying to get parts for firearm projects, and the situation is not good. For example, complete upper receivers for AR-15’s are hard to come by. The easiest products to buy are undesirable junk and high-end products no one can afford.

On a lark, I decided to look at 80% gun frames and receivers. These are unfinished, nonfunctional parts you finish at home. The BATF doesn’t consider them guns, so anyone can order them over the web. The supply has really dried up. A gun you complete yourself has no serial number, so if you shoot someone with it and the police find it, the BATF can’t figure out who bought it when it was new. For this reason, these weapons are called “ghost guns.” They appeal to a lot of people who are bothered by the fact that every single numbered gun you buy new can be traced to you by the BATF. Effectively, there is a “ghost registry” through serial numbers.

I thought it might be fun to buy one of these things and finish it, and that’s why I checked their availability. Things have to be getting pretty bad when guns you have to finish manufacturing are hard to get.

Where are all these products going? People aren’t buying them so they can shoot ducks.

Oddly, conservatives are helping the government disempower their fellows. They’re snapping up gigantic quantities of things they don’t personally need, so they can resell them and make money. Having a few extra dollars so you can buy a new bass boat won’t mean much to you if civil war comes and your allies can’t defend themselves effectively.

People have been selling cheap .22 ammo for 50 cents per round. It usually runs about 6 cents. My buddy Mike wanted to get rid of an unfired Marlin Model 60 he had never shot, so he put it on Gunbroker.com. The new value of the gun and scope should be around $225, but he got $375. He also doubled his money on a shotgun he wasn’t using. The gougers and hoarders have made it possible for sellers with perfectly good intentions to reap windfalls.

Tomorrow is inauguration day, and I am longing for closure. If Biden has to be inaugurated, let’s get it over with. It’s as if America went to a rodeo featuring a dozen capable riders and bet on the clown, but okay, let’s put it behind us. What if we don’t get closure, though? What if something happens tomorrow, or what if something happens next week, and it’s so momentous it’s big enough to topple Biden?

I would love to see him knocked out of office. No doubt about it. I also think we may reach the point where reasonable people choose resistance over tyranny. But there is nothing comforting about any likely scenario, except for God’s protection for a few individuals and the possibility of the rapture. No matter what happens, I think things will go badly for America.