This is a good comment for me to lay out some thoughts.
1) We're heading into day three since the storming of the Capitol and I don't think I've seen one Trump supporter in this thread criticize Trump, the Republicans, and the right-wing media for inciting and allowing this to happen. Some have agreed it was a bad thing to happen (some with the lightest of hand slaps), but has anyone laid the proper blame? This is a huge problem.
2) The President of the United States, without evidence, has been claiming that the election was fraudulent and stolen from him. He refused to accept the results of the election. This, more than anything else, fomented the rage in the people who stormed the Capitol, not that the rest of the country "wasn't angry enough" about social justice riots earlier this year. It's pretty telling that the pro-Trump crowd has been steering the conversation away from contesting the election.
3) The President held a goddamn "Save America" rally outside the White House, after losing an election, only a couple hours before the Capitol was stormed saying this:
All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by emboldened radical left Democrats, which is what they’re doing and stolen by the fake news media. That’s what they’ve done and what they’re doing. We will never give up. We will never concede, it doesn’t happen. You don’t concede when there’s theft involved.
That was after Rudy Giuliani called for a "trial by combat" against Democrats on the same stage while Trump spent the whole day berating Vice President Pence because he wouldn't illegally steal the election for him.
4) The election was not stolen. Trump has had 2 months to provide evidence in the American court system and not done so. Normal democratic and legal routes were pursued and he lost.
5) The "honest man has nothing to hide" schtick is funny given the fact that Trump's divisive rhetoric about the election differed wildly versus what was presented in court. Who is the one lying to Americans?
6) Many states did recounts and offered transparency. No voter fraud was found. This in combination with Trump losing dozens of cases in the American court system! Where is all this stuff that is being hidden from Americans? Trump has been trying to steal this election and still it's somehow the other side being blamed for not wanting things looked into?? How does someone even formulate that logic?
7) Mere MINUTES before the Capitol was stormed senator Ted Cruz offered to create a 10-day electoral commission audit of the election and that if Democrats believed there was no evidence of fraud they should rest easy. Again, who is lying and abusing the trust of the American people?
8) Everyone deflecting towards people not being "upset enough" about BLM protests and riots are being disingenuous at best. I think the response from Biden, Democrat leaders, and the general public at large with the rioting was more than sufficient. It was condemned strongly. It's also been no contest between how Biden & Trump have handled both the BLM protests and Capitol storming. Trump has been a national disgrace.
9) What those being disingenuous really mean to offer is that they're upset the BLM/Antifa rioting wasn't damaging enough to Democrats. That's the ugly face of trying to draw a line connecting the riots to storming the Capitol.
10) The riots and looting have to be seen through the prism of social injustice and police reform. For many Americans, those are just causes. That doesn't condone some of the violent actions but there's a moral backstory to that pain. Hence, why the property destruction isn't as politically damaging to Democrats.
11) The riots and looting weren't a one-way street of blame, either. They still exposed problems w/r/t social justice and police tactics with plenty of innocent people being killed, injured, or arrested while protesting. This colors why more people weren't "upset enough" about property damage because it's not quite that black and white as if property damage or injured police were the only bad things to occur.
12) Juxtapose many of the BLM protests and the police response to Wednesday's storming of the Capitol. There's a lot of digging to find out how the Capitol Police failed so miserably but the way people who stormed the Capitol were allowed to just leave freely is a massive failure in every way and only sharpens the critique in this country that white people get treated differently.
13) People stormed the Capitol because they believed the lie that the election was stolen and are being anti-American traitors by trying to steal a fair election. People rioted because of social injustice. These two things are not on equal moral planes.
14) Riots have happened all throughout US history. Storming the Capitol to steal an election is a complete shock to the American system. Yesterday, the Iranian president said how fragile Western democracy is and that a populist led this country to disaster. He shouldn't be right but he is! This is not okay!
15) I really can't stress enough how Republicans have been trying to steal the election, which led to storming the Capitol of the United States, and the pro-Trump posters in this thread have been blaming damn near everyone else (BLM protests, Antifa, media, Dems) while refusing to deal with the undemocratic nonsense that led to this mess.
Lastly, storming the Capitol to take down the American flag in favor of the Trump flag says it all. Party over country.
