Relax

Photo Credit: Juliana Dacoregio || Please relax, it is not that bad

What happened at the US Capitol today was unusual, but it was nothing severe. Don’t get me wrong; those that illegally entered the Capitol should be prosecuted. When I say it was not severe, I mean that it was unlikely to do any permanent damage.

Those who threaten violence, even if non-lethal, have to understand that once they fail, society will do the opposite of what they wanted. There is a saying that if you want to kill the King, YOU MUST KILL THE KING! Don’t do something halfway. It will result in your own demise.

What happened at the Capitol today was the actions of a bunch of disorganized malefactors who lucked into a situation where the guardians of the Capitol were inadequate to deal with their shenanigans.

Was it a coup, as some Democrats allege? No, it was just slop from a bunch of disorganized Trumpers. There was no chance that they could have taken over the US Government. If they had been organized, there could have been a lot of people killed, but that was not the case.

Was Trump culpable for their actions? Yes. He incited them by alleging election fraud with no detailed evidence. Even when telling them to go home, he still incited them by saying the election was stolen.

I think the greatest risk lies ahead, as the odds of assassination are relatively high, because of the stolen election rhetoric. I hope I am wrong, but in unstructured situations, the advantage is always with the offense. (Think of defending a fixed base against pirates.)

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Republican government and democracy are still experiments. Much of the world has not experienced these for any great length of time. In the United States, the great temptation is not Socialism, but the One Great Leader who will solve all of our problems. It is embarrassing to think that an idiotic liar like Trump could fill that desire, but the American people are genuinely that stupid. (No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American people.)

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So why should we relax? Because there never was any significant risk to the US Government as a whole. There was a lot of incompetence on the part of the Capitol police.

And though I sympathize with those that want to sideline Trump with the 25th Amendment, I would simply say bear with the indignities of Trump for two more weeks. After that, he will be gone, never to return, as his name is now tarred with violence. The tendency of the American people is not to return to someone who lost, but to seek someone new.

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PS — to my fellow evangelical Christians: why are you supporting a liar? Don’t you know what damage that does to the Gospel? Support someone noble, like Mike Pence. The Lord is our protector; we do not need Donald Trump. Let us not do evil, that good may come from it. Winning an election is far less important than keeping a clean testimony before God and the watching world.