Our Felonious Ex-President

I guess the personal death threats were enough to finally wake Pence up.

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As an outside observer…

Were I inclined to be cynical, I would find it rather fitting that the metaphor for American democracy be a movie-prop sword wielded by a fictional character.

I have no doubt he’s being sincere. And as a Republican, that’s practically radical speech But having watched the whole thing…

No, Arnold. We don’t need to “come together and heal”. ONE side did this. ONE side cheered this on (at least until it became too inconvenient) and made it happen. Yes, you have spoken out in dissent, but you have never taken the steps to disassociate yourself from those same people.

Like A.R. Moxon said

Yes, they were sad, old, drunken men, broken by what they’d seen and done, but compared to what they did, what they enabled… the harm the continued to do to their families… they never fully had to take responsibility.

Sure, you’ve spoken out against Trump in a very celebrity-feud kind of way, but that’s not enough. You’ve stood by this party as it has been setting the explosive charges on the weak points of democracy for decades. And now that the bridges have been blown up, you’re asking the people who tried to warn about those charges and tried to defuse them to build another bridge.

Get your own fucking house in order, first. Clear out those who even think about suppressing votes and gerrymandering, or that they are somehow more naturally fit to rule.

No, America, you should not “come together” or “get over this”. This should be seared into your national consciousness, forever.

Besides, those words (as multiple people have pointed out, lately) are abusers words. “Look what you made me do.” “You need to forgive me so we can work past this.” “It’ll never happen again, I swear.”

Nope, sorry. It’s going to take a lot more than some fancy words and a Hollywood fake to make this better.

Image source: A.R. Moxon: Sky

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Remember when the same folks whom he’s now denouncing wanted him to run for POTUS - despite what the Constitution says, as well as what they said about Mr. Obama’s birthplace.

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This is always said by republicans when a Democrat takes over. I agree. We don’t need to come together. We need to get rid of them, somehow.

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The guy in the costume and horns has been charged:

Chansley has been charged with knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority, and with violent entry and disorderly conduct on the Capitol grounds. He is in custody pending a hearing on Monday.

Why not accessory to murder? Assault? Sedition? Why such minor wrist-slaps (compared to what happened)? He’ll get what? a couple years’ at most? If that?

From what I’ve read, so far all of these assholes have been basically been charged with double parking.

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I didn’t quite take it in that way. Mainly because, before talking about healing, he basically compared Trump directly to Hitler, called out the other politicians who were supporting the lies, and said “We need to hold accountable the people that brought us to this unforgivable point.” Which is a heck of a lot better than most of the other mealy-mouthed GOP who have been talking about how we need to “move on” and “heal”.

I also feel like it’s targeted more at Republicans… with the rah-rah, we can come out of this stronger, etc at the end. Not as strong a call to action against Trump as I’d like, but the call was there, and it didn’t strike me as arguing against it.

Could just be my reading of it, though.

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House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.) said Sunday that the House plans to vote this week to impeach President Trump — but that the chamber may wait a few months to submit the articles of impeachment to the Senate.

Democrats are weighing whether to wait until after the Biden administration’s first 100 days to send articles of impeachment to the Senate, to allow the new president to install key members of his team.

Hrm. That isn’t going to help us much now, against anything Trump may drum up before he’s out. It sounds like they’re worried that even with the whole coup attempt, the Senate would still be likely to vote down impeachment.

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I would say his video is the best we can hope for from Republicans at this time.

One question I have about the video is, is he wearing some kind of uniform? And if so, what is it?

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It’s tough to tell, but it might be the same jacket he’s wearing in one of the pictures on his wikipedia page:

Schwarzenegger, pictured with 1987 world champion American Karyn Marshall, presenting awards at the USA Weightlifting Hall of Fame in 2011 in Columbus, Ohio

The patches look like they’re in the same positions. There’s the California State Flag and the US Flag, not sure what the circular patch on the left breast is though.

[Edit]
Ah, I expected as much: That last patch is the California Governor’s Seal

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Like I said, it’s radical speech for a Republican. But it’s also still treating this as an aberration caused by other people, with no acceptance of the role he and others have played in the years leading up to this. This wasn’t a pop quiz on democracy that the US magically passed. The party he remains a proud part of has been systematically dismantling democracy for decades. The party of “You’re with us or against us” and “Freedom Fries” after 9/11 wants to make all this just go away.

I agree, but that says a whole lot right there. “The best we can hope for” doesn’t make it good enough. It just means that they’ve got a long fucking way to go before we can even consider letting them be part of the conversation around what happens next.

They’ve got a lot more work to do, first.

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see my post re having to “make do” with what’s available. sigh

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There’s that “increasingly isolated” phrase that has been used to describe Trump since approximately February 2016. Maybe there’s an actual wolf now, but they’ve cried wolf so many times before…

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But [Michael Sherwin, acting U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C.] tells NPR he’s being careful about how he uses the most serious charges.

“I don’t want this tyranny of labels saying this was sedition, this was a coup,” Sherwin says. “But what I will say is, it was criminal.”

Isn’t sedition criminal? Why are they being so careful not to charge these guys with the most obvious crime of all? Or do we need to take it to the Grand Court Of The Galaxy?

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So Arnold just hangs around on the weekend wearing his gubernatorial jacket and wielding a Conan sword?

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:man_shrugging:
Beats me, I’m just guessing that it’s the same jacket.

Although, as a former governor, he’s still entitled to the title. And I wouldn’t doubt he has a collection of a lot of very interesting old props. And if I were a Republican right now making a video that compares Trump to Hitler, I’d probably want to have as many bona fides visible as possible.

Though if you want to go tell the Terminator that he shouldn’t, I’ll be, uh… behind you all the way.
Waaaaaay behind you… :smiley:

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Not sure if it’s the same zip tie guy, but…

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Roseanne?!?!

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Oh that’s the same jacket. I’m just glad he wasn’t wearing the Terminator shades or the Turboman costume.

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