Interesting Times: America's Ultimate Sore Loser Attempts a Coup and Sparks a Backlash

“May you live in interesting times” is a curse for good reason. These are interesting times for America. I’m sure most of us would prefer to be living in much less interesting times, but like Gandalf said, that’s not up to us.

Quite a bit has happened since I last posted here, so let me sum up:

After a clear majority of American voters shouted “You’re fired!”, the ultimate sore loser currently infesting the White House refused to accept the election results
Election officials (including staunch Republicans), state and federal judges (including many appointed by Trump himself), and the Supreme Court (including justices he appointed) all informed him there was no evidence of voter fraud, and he’d lost fair and square.
The Ultimate Sore Loser and his merry band of enabling lawyers continued to get spanked in courts throughout the land.
The USL whined on Twitter about how unfair everything was and he totally won if you count only the votes he likes.
He whined that ballots in swing states that didn’t swing his way should be thrown out (which would have ensured Senate Republicans from those states would lose their elections).
Not content with whining, the USL decided to break state and federal laws to call Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and threaten, cajole, and beg him to “find 11,780 votes” so he could pretend he’s actually a winner.
(Meanwhile: Because the USL is an incompetent buffoon, and his fans are selfish, science-denying jackasses, the United States racked up more than 350,000 COVID-19 deaths by the end of the holiday season.)
Republicans in the House and Senate who had their noses too far up Trump’s ass to tell when something smells bad jumped on the election fraud wagon, even though many of them won on the ballots they were pretending were fradulent.
The USL’s biggest fans became even more spectacularly untethered to reality.
Russians, the USL’s BFFs, hacked many important agencies of the United States Government. The USL didn’t really care.
States certified that the USL is, in fact, a legitimate loser despite all his bleating about fraud.
Because Stacey Abrams is a get-out-the-vote machine, Democrats were all “Oh hell no,” and Republicans were too busy believing in voter fraud to bother voting, Georgia turned solid blue and Senate control passed into Democratic hands.
The two shiny new Democratic US
Senators-elect were the first African American and first Jewish senators from Georgia.
The USL fed his fanbase delusions of glory and invited them to cosplay revolutionaries on Capitol Hill.
The Sedition Caucus promised to turn the ceremonial counting of the states’ foregone election conclusion into a shitshow.
The Rule of Law Defense Fund, an arm of the Republican Attorneys General Association, robocalled supporters, telling them to join them in their “march to the Capitol building,” where they planned to “call on Congress to stop the steal.” Yes, this came from people who know the law, know this election wasn’t stolen, and thus absolutely should know better.
All of the agencies in charge of safeguarding the very heart of this nation’s democratic institutions decided that angry white people forming mobs, carrying deadly weapons, and promising to murder elected officials as they rushed the Capitol were just peaceful citizens out having a good time, and didn’t bother to mount an effective defense until it was far, far too late.
This is in stark contrast to how they panic and call in the entire police force, plus the National Guard, at the slightest hint black people might hold a peaceful protest somewhere in the area.
Blue Lives Matter aficionados took a blue life during their inept physical assault on democracy. They also dragged an officer down some stairs, then kicked, punched, and beat him with a flag pole sporting an American flag, while singing the national anthem. In total, they injured more than 50 police officers, some of them so severely they had to be hospitalized.
Seditionists were shocked, shocked, I tell you, to discover that one police officer in fear of his and lawmakers’ lives would actually shoot an unarmed lady seditionist dead as she forcibly broke into the Capitol’s inner sanctums.
Another seditionist, who apparently had been carrying a flag with the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me” earlier in the riots,unfortunately forgot to wave it in the faces of her fellow seditionists, and was uncemoniously trampled to death.
Two more seditionists got so excited by playing New 1776 Total Patriot Heroes that one had a heart attack and the other a stroke. Bet you a dollar they opposed universal health care.
Some Republicans, who had previously been all in favor of watering the Tree of Liberty with the blood of tyrants, suddenly changed their minds when they discovered their blood would be included. Others decided to triple down on sedition and fascism, and are starting to discover that money and book deals are drying up in consequence.
Furious House Democrats, led by Rep. Ilhan Omar, reached immediately for the impeachment pen, and Nancy Pelosi didn’t slap their hands away.
Vice President Mike Pence discovered his lips aren’t actually surgically attached to Trump’s ass, and finished certifying Biden’s win. He’s now standing over the USL with the 25th Amendment stick, daring him to step one toenail back over the line.
The Speaker of the House had to reach out to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to ensure that a sitting United States President would not be able to start a war or launch a nuclear strike because he’s upset at losing an election.
A mask-refusing ignoramus infected at least one congresswoman with COVID during lockdown. Doubtlessly, many other COVID-19 cases will result from this mess, since anti-mask Republican lawmakers got stuffed into tiny rooms with defenseless people for many hours, and Capitol invaders wouldn’t even mask up to conceal their identities while committing federal crimes.
Twitter permanently suspended the one thing that matters most to Trump in this world, and Facebook blocked him for a couple of weeks with the option to make it forever.
European security officials with direct knowledge of how democratic institutions are supposed to be protected said it sure looks like Trump staged a coup attempt, and some key personnel in US federal agencies probably provided at least tacit support.
The media learned how to apply the terms “mob,” “rioters,” and “domestic terrorists” to conservative white people.
One of the nation’s largest conservative talk radio companies told its extremist hosts to STFU about the election being stolen, or get sacked.
Administration rats began deserting the sinking ship of state as fast as their little legs could carry them now that their great orange sugar daddy had. nothing left to offer them.
Mitch McConnell and other Senate Republican shitlords saw their political careers flash before them, and denounced the wanna-be tyrant for life they’ve energetically, enthusiastically enabled for over four years.
Seditionists and their fellow keyboard insurrectionists were dismayed to discover that the vast majority of Republican politicians, including their God-King Trump, never actually meant all that stuff about taking the country back by force, and have now abandoned their sorry asses.
They’re extra dismayed that the rabid right-wing media and politicians are trying to call the attack on the Capitol a false flag operation, and blaming it all on antifa and BLM. They want credit for their crimes, damn it!
Many of them are shocked, shocked, I tell you, to discover they are being given credit for their crimes – by being placed under arrest by law enforcement folks who’ve identified them by the pictures and videos they’ve been giddily publishing on social media. Bonus hilarity: the facial recognition software law enforcement agencies uses works best on white faces.
Apple and Google have booted right-wing fever swamp Parler from their app stores due to its distressing tendency to allow users to plot federal felonies without restraint. Amazon kicked it off their servers. Parler’s lawyers, SMS, and email providers all ditched them, too.
Instead of pulling himself up by his bootstraps and creating his own services from scratch, as conservatives advise liberals to do when shit like this happens to them, Parler’s CEO whined about how unfaaaiiir it all is. Then he sued Amazon for enforcing their TOS.
Swipe and Shopify dropped the Instigator in Chief like a hot potato, which will make it harder for him to sell MAGA merchandise and beg money from his cult following for a while.
Right-wing fever swamp federal felony plotters are now busy promising Insurrection 2.0 by Inauguration Day, complete with added murder and mayhem, on every platform they haven’t yet been banned from. Unlike BLM, antifa, and Women’s Marchers, they’re coming with guns, bombs, molotov cocktails, and other sundry weapons. You know, just like they did when they invaded the Capitol, only this time they plan to bring more. And they’re also planning attacks at all 50 state capitols.
Perhaps this time law enforcement will take them seriously? The National Guard, at least, is planning on deploying up to 15,000 members for the inauguration.
Big Golf ran as far and fast away as they could from a pathetic president whose identity is nearly as enmeshed with golfing as it is with tweeting. Now that they don’t have to worry about Papaya Pol Pot siccing the IRS on them, the PGA has yanked the 2022 PGA Championship away from Trump Bedminster, and despite several famous golfers still having goo goo eyes for Trump, it looks like the divorce will be permanent.
Corporations, companies, and banks who love throwing their money at Republicans for those sweet, sweet tax cuts announced they would no longer be throwing any dollars at any Republicans who thwarted the peaceful transition of power our democracy relies upon. This is bitter news for the 139 House and 8 Senate Republicans who went all in for Trump even after he incited insurrection. Hallmark Card’s PAC even asked for its money back from Senate Sedition Caucus members Josh Hawley and Roger Marshall.
After releasing a scathing indictment of Trumpublicans on the day of the failed coup, the Lincoln Project announced a blistering campaign against any companies still tempted to provide money to the seditionist wing of the GOP.
Dominion Voting Systems sued Sidney Powell, one of the most asinine of Mango Mussolini’s merry band of malpracticing lawyers, for over 1.3 billion dollars for defamation etc. That’s billion, with a B.

Two Capitol Police officers were suspended, and over a dozen more are under investigation for either supporting the attack on the Capitol, or being for too cozy with violent seditionists.
House Democrats are crafting the Congressional Oversight and Unjust Policing Act to investigate issues such as how police let rioters breech the Capitol so easily, and “What role did racial bias play in the police response to this attack?” Note bene the acronym for this Act.
House Democrats introduced one article of impeachment on Monday outlining how Trump incited the Capitol rioters. This is only the beginning.

House Democrats considered not sending their articles of impeachment to the Senate until after Biden’s first 100 days, so as not to interfere with getting his administration off and running. Biden, rather than grabbing the excuse to play the forgive and forget game, became an actual “Why not both?”meme. He asked the Senate to see if it could manage an impeachment trial and handing important business simultaneously, plus made it clear there would be hell to pay for those who attacked the Capitol.
Schumer is eyeballing the option of bringing the Senate back into session now since this debacle is basically a national emergency, which is a power both majority and minority leaders were given after 9-11.
Pelosi placed Pence on notice: remove the orange stain from the White House now, or we will remove it for you. Sure, impeachment can’t boot Trump out before Inauguration Day – but it will forever bar him from holding public office again, thus crushing his 2024 dreams.
Historians pointed meaningfully to the post-Civil War era 14th Amendment as an additional option for punishing seditious leaders. They said we should make especial note of Section 3: “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.“
The Supreme Court refused to expedite legal challenges to the 2020 election results. Not even the Trump Trio will save his losing ass by subverting the law of the land.
The Secret Service is looking for additional orange stain removal techniques just in case the inauguration doesn’t get it out of the White House carpets.
Rudy Giuliani, Agent Orange’s favorite [sad excuse for] a lawyer, having incited seditionists to riot, found himself in serious hot water with the New York State Bar Association. He faces possible expulsion and disbarment.
And it’s only going to get more interesting from here.

So yeah, it’s been a lot.

I’m not sure where America goes from here. This may have been the event that turns the country back from the brink of disaster. This may have been the warm-up for a much bloodier insurrection. We’ll know more by the end of the month.

Granted that things don’t erupt into Civil War II, I’ve got some plans. See, we can’t just look at the solid blue House, Senate, and White House, and think our work is done. We can’t assume things will be fine once Trump is dumped. They won’t. The rot was there long before his disgraceful occupation of the White House, and will remain after Biden steps in.

We have a mighty lot of work to do in our institutions, our communities, and ourselves.

I’ve got a few projects simmering here, and resources I’ll introduce you to. I’ll have projects you can get involved in. We’ll find the things we’re good at, and do them. We’re going to learn from history, and do our best not to repeat it. This is too much for any one of us to do, but together? You bet we can bend the arc of history towards justice. All of us doing a part of the work can change things for the better.

And even if things get really, seriously, epically bad, we’ll do our best to hang on together, and get as many through to better times as we can.

May we soon live in much less interesting times soon.

Featured image credit: DHS

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