Termites

On Meet the Press today, a review of the planned takeover of our government by Trump and his supporters, at the (almost) one year anniversary of his mob attacking the Capitol.

We're learning more and more about the complexity of Trump's plot to stay in power despite losing the election, thanks to investigative repporting and the work of the January 6th committee.

One of the horrifying things about this is that Trump and his supporters are even closer now to making this country a dictatorship than they were a year ago. Now almost all Republican voters believe his lie that the election was stolen from him, and almost all Republican politicians are willing to go along with that lie, whether they believe it or not.

According to a recent Washington Post survey, One in three Americans say violence against government justified.

People make excuses for those who are ready to use violence. They say that those poor people were lied to, that if they then believed the election had been stolen from them, of course the natural response would be to use violence to reverse that.

No, no no.

First, those people, let's just call them Republicans, are responsible, as are all people, for what they choose to believe, who they choose to trust. They have chosen to believe and trust Trump - a known liar and crook - not because he has proof, but because they *want* what he's peddling to be true.

And second, if I had learned that the election had been stolen from my chosen candidate, my first reaction would not be "I'm gettin my gun so I can kill me some bad people". A normal persson under those circumstances would try to find legal ways to redress the injustice. But Republicans are willing to turn to violence because violence is what they want. Any group that demonizes their opponents by portraying them as Satan-worshipping child-molesting bllod-drinking lizard people (or termites) is preparing to justify the violence they crave.

Trump and his Republican politicians are planning for the 2024 election - restricting voting and replacing local officials in charge of counting the votes. They might get away with subverting the election next time, but whether they do or not, they have whipped their followers into such a frenzy of hatred, there will be hell to pay.

Think Rwanda.