When I woke up this morning, I knew it was going to be a scary day. Hate and white supremacist groups had already hinted at, and blatantly stated, they were going to take action when the Electoral College certification was taking place.
It was still shocking, but not surprising when, while on a call with a colleague, I look over at the news on my iPad to see a mob storming the Capitol Building. I told him what I was seeing. We ended our call.
At that moment, I’ve never felt more afraid. It was a scene right out of The Handmaid’s Tale. White supremacist terrorists storming Congress, intent on doing what?
In the book all of Congress ends up dead with martial law and a whole new type of government formed. One in which being a woman, a gay, a lesbian, a transgender, a doctor, a professor, and many others, is extremely dangerous. In fact life threatening. Were we about to lose our democracy, our Republic.
What was the most frightening, was watching how ineffectual, and in many ways, accommodating, law enforcement was in defending the Capitol. It was almost as if the rioters, the insurrectionists, the seditionists were being invited in.
No tear gas was sprayed, no rubber bullets were fired, no batons were brandished, no helicopter blades threatened, not even riot gear in sight. Even the National Guard were denied to help intervene at first. Then, it took an extremely long time for reinforcements to arrive to clear the building.
The storming was a national disgrace and a stain on our country. Our standing in the world as a democracy, with a peaceful transfer of power, has been marred for the foreseeable future. In the lack of a security plan to protect the Capitol Building, that is a national embarrassment and a threat to national security.
I’m not quite sure how we begin to recover from the national embarrassment of this one-term lame duck. He has failed in fulfilling his duties to protect and defend our country against all threats, foreign and domestic. It is hard to defend it when he himself is the domestic threat.
My hope is the American people will do our duty over at least the next six years, and beyond. Our duty is to vote out each and every elected official who supported and defended this domestic threat over the past four years.
They should not get a pass, nor should we ever forget, how the Republicans, now trumplicans, allowed us to arrive at this point in history. A point in which a person presiding in the White House was allowed to destroy us from within without objection by his party members. A point where a party chose an autocrat over country. A point where ethics and integrity were absent and impugned.
Let us not forget. Let us voice our objections each and every day, and especially at the ballot box.
Let us not forget what occurred the afternoon of January 6, 2021.
Personal Reflections of a Middle-Aged Man 