On our way to Biden's Inauguration (Trump #119)

[Roussette]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4128420-Capitol-Hill-and-the-next-2-weeks-Trump-118?watched=1&msgid=103459695#103459695

Here we are on our fast moving theads

Kamala wore sneakers like that throughout the campaign, it became her thing, so that specific detail is not problematic I think.

@NotDavidTennant

However they portrayed Harris on the Vogue cover it would have been found 'problematic'. This is just the way that people signal their progressive credentials now.

To be fair, the responses I've seen come from black women who have every right to point out what aspects of the representation they find to be 'problematic'.

@CaveMum

I forgot to mention the other night while listening to the Americast podcast, that Jon Sopel mentioned a Senator who is going to become pivotal over the next 2 years. He’s a conservative Democrat from, I think they said, West Virginia, and they basically said expect to see a lot of effort from both sides of the aisle in courting him to vote with “their side” and even a few expensive infrastructure projects/investments suddenly springing up in his state #porkbarrel

The Americast podcasts are excellent. They did say that people outside the UK can listen by installing the free BBC Sounds App.

Kellyanne is a professional hypocrite. There is plenty of footage of her laying into Trump before she became his campaign manager. I have no idea how she and George Conway have managed to co-exist in the same household these last couple of years while the Lincoln Project has been active.

There’s something to be said about demographics of US military recruitment

It is surely exactly the same as the UK.
Growing up as a working class Scot we had lots of contact with the army. I came close to accepting a deal that would have covered my Uni costs.
My DH in his English middle class area had never had any contact with the army whatsoever. (Inclined to think he missed out their youth work experience weeks were great)

This is a good example of different military perspectives -- many many people in the military support renaming the bases, because it's ludicrous to have them named after rebels and traitors and segregationists.

It's also important to note that about 43 percent of the US military are people of color, representing several historically oppressed classes in the US.

I listen to Americast through BBC sounds. It is no hassle to download the app in the USA.

Interesting opinion linking back to the Oklahoma bombing as a starting point for the right-wing terrorist actions on Wednesday.

I've been thinking about the Timothy McVeigh attack on OKC, and how that really laid the groundwork for what happened Wednesday. Especially in light of reports showing that the insurrectionists fully intended a McVeigh-style level of violence.

In the aftermath, Bill Clinton barely alluded to what should have been obvious —that an increasingly vitriolic Republican Party and their propaganda machine (which was mostly AM radio figures like Limbaugh) had sown the seeds and McVeigh grew from the soil.

The right pulled a trick that has, since then, become common —in no small part because it works. There was this outsized outrage — they were WAY more outraged at Clinton's words than at the mass murder of children.

And so Democrats retreated. Everyone abandoned the project of holding responsible those who had sown poison for so long — including Reagan — by characterizing all federal employees as evil leeches, winking at white supremacists, and valorizing guns.

And so the situation continued to fester, until, 21 years later, Trump was elected president, campaigning on the same ideology that led McVeigh to blow up the OKC federal building —white supremacy, conspiracy theories, treating normal government functions like a "deep state".

We didn't stand up to it then, and look what happened. If we don't stand up to it now, it will get worse. History shows it. Our current moment shows it. McVeigh used to be a fringe. Now his views are the majority of the GOP. We are in a crisis and inaction is not acceptable.
twitter.com/amandamarcotte/status/1348243956283412480?s=21

Podcast - worth a listen:
Two Minutes Past Nine
Episode 10 The Oklahoma Standard.

25 years after Timothy McVeigh bombed the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City, journalist Leah Sottile investigates the far-right today in a divided and turbulent America.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000myvp

For now, I am very happy for the faces and voices that Trumpies once trusted to be extremely loud in calling him out.

I hope lots of them do, very publicly.

It may provide the off-ramp some listeners need.

After that... Well. I'm not planning to forget their previous behaviour any time soon.

Oh god, the outsized outrage. Yes, that rings huge bells.

I've seen it on MN, too. The article is correct that it's extremely common and now covers a multitude, simply because it works.

Calling someone a racist /anti-semite / whatever is a terrible, terrible thing.

Being a racist /anti-semite / whatever is just fine.

I think their point was that software engineers is solving a coding problem because they have been told to make 'x', they are neither the person using it or the one deciding on the top level design of the product/it's terms and coditions/data collection etc.

'Software engineering' arose as a discipline precisely to get away from the 'being told to make x' - yes there are still coding 'factories' where requirements are thrown over a wall - but its certainly not general practice anywhere. The shift to 'agile' has emphasised the need for the (small) team as a whole to consider and understand all aspects of the design and use of the software. (I dislike agile for all sorts of other reasons but not this.)

Also, in the UK at least and in all the major systems integrators ethics is a big part of the culture. The BCS is a minor player these days but back in the 80's initiated an ethical dimension to the delivery of computer systems. Software engineers are people - it's not OK to assume they are unethical.

Watching CNN now and there's a newly elected female Republican senator who is currently receiving death threats. Scary.

www.cbsnews.com/news/joe-biden-dog-major-indoguration-white-houses-first-rescue-pup/

Travelling round Europe in the 70s I met loads of Americans who had dodged the draft in some way, for very good reasons. The Vietnam war was a disgrace. However the vast majority were from affluent backgrounds, who had the wherewithal to leave. The troops who actually went were, I believe, largely from poorer and minority backgrounds. There seems to be a big gap between “traditional” military families and those who sign up because they have few other prospects.
We used to get loads of kids here sign up for the armed services at my school up to about 2000, after that hardly any.

@TheNorthWestPawsage

Has Kellyanne suddenly found an "alternative" conscience? (And a big pot of whitewash)

Nah, Kellyanne has suddenly remembered that she's soon to be unemployed.

She's trying to make herself 'marketable'. I don't think she wants to end up as a commentator on ONAN or Newsmax. She wants to stay in the 'real' political arena.

The Nevada GOP letter is surreal
but I'd love to see pictures of their "stop the steal" rally on the 16th
if they are in Nevada, they are not in DC

twitter.com/Schwarzenegger/status/1348249481284874240

A lot of thought has gone into making this video, hopefully it will be a step forward.

I sort of disagree with that interpretation of the Oklahoma City bombing. It was not so much the beginning as the culmination of a lot of white nationalist rhetoric and violence -- there were a number of incidents before this, like Waco. Gingrich and his ilk did massively play to this sentiment pre OKC, back then we talked about radio playing the same radicalising function as the internet today.

But OKC was truly shocking -- they pulled dead children out of the rubble, from the day care on site. It brought the reality of all this activity home to people and there was a massive backlash against Gingrich and Limbaugh etc. They had to tone down their rhetoric. The FBI broke up loads of domestic terrorist groups. The problem didn't go away but there was a fairly robust response to it.

I think where the Democrats went wrong was after Bush came in and then 9/11. Everyone forgot about the white nationalists, now it was all about Islamist terrorism and the wars, all about 'homeland security'. The Democrats went along with all this. And it all supported white nationalist ideas about foreigners and minorities threatening 'real' America.

Then Obama came in and all hell broke loose, with an explosion of hate crimes and racist violence. And here again, I think the Democrats did not push back enough. Michelle Obama said, when they go low, we go high -- it's a very admirable sentiment but it sort of sums up a non-confrontational approach.

It's possible the Capitol attack will be another OKC -- a successful attack that ends up being somewhat counterproductive. The new administration can learn a lot from the response to OKC. To me it's more about learning from later mistakes in the 2000s.

(sorry that's so long!)

@MrsPernicious

twitter.com/Schwarzenegger/status/1348249481284874240

A lot of thought has gone into making this video, hopefully it will be a step forward.

Hmmm, cometh the hour ?

Says it all perfectly. I like the sword bit too.

Found that Arnie tweet very moving.

That Arnie video is pretty great. He compares the Capitol attack to Kristallnacht, I hope that wakes some people up.

Arnie has often tried to hide his father's Nazi past.
His use of it there was SPOT ON

Do you think Arnie will throw his hat in the ring for 2024 as a republican candidate?

@Clicketyclick21

Do you think Arnie will throw his hat in the ring for 2024 as a republican candidate?

He can't as he wasn't born in the US, which disqualifies him from being President.

@Clicketyclick21

Do you think Arnie will throw his hat in the ring for 2024 as a republican candidate?

He cannot. He was born in Austria.