On Whether to Pardon the J6rs

Even Democrats must have a spideysense, deep down, that prosecutors and judges are charging and sentencing based not on the law but based on the wanting to send a message, to prevent future riots by making the law up as they go along. 

(And the terrifying problem is that there is no “jury of your peers” anymore in blue cities for MAGA types and perhaps vice-versa.)

So I don’t get how pardoning the J6rs is controversial given they will all have served serious jail time and pre-detention time before a pardon could happen. 

From J. Kelly: "The major issue with Jan 6 prosecution isn't just the absurd nature of the charges (seditious conspiracy, obstruction, parading) but provable disparity in how J6ers are treated vs 2020 rioters. Show one 2020 rioter sentenced to 10 years for assault on police."

I get that rioting at the Capitol is seen as infinitely worse than rioting in the streets of Seattle. But then the answer is make new legislation enshrining that! Don’t use a justice system in a two-tier way even to accomplish the “good end” of discouraging future Capitol rioting. The end doesn’t justify the means. 

See this interview with non-violent Brandon Straka. 

A Sparrow, a Wren, and a Cardinal Walk into a Bar...

...or fly into my backyard. 

It feels, in my gut at least, it's peak birdsong season in Ohio right now. Last year I discovered the Merlin Bird app and it promises, from the comfort of your own lawn chair, to identify the symphony of voices that visit the backyard.  

I'm not sure of its accuracy given that the only constant (besides death and taxes) is the well-grounded American robin. This morning I received a house wren and house sparrow, an ovenbird, and a mourning dove. Then a couple minutes later I get a Cape May Warbler, House Finch, Blue Jay, Marsh Wren (in addition to the ubiquitous robin and house wren).  Apparently a whole lotta birdin' going on. Or it reveals the limits of the app.

Meanwhile in the fake world I see that Matt Taibbi is feeling the burn and becoming reasonably black-pilled. There was always the sense that Tucker was the canary in the calming and the canary has been taken offline. Taibbi describes looking for the ever elusive nugget of truth: 

"[T]hrough the Twitter Files experience, I kept thinking of the book [The Castle] by Kafka. I found myself behaving a lot like the main character in that book, the Land Surveyor, who kept throwing open doors with clownish self-importance, thinking that he had made an awesome discovery, only to find that there were 50 other levels that he had to get to before he even got to the bottom bureaucrat he needed to reach. That journey he imagined was just minutes away from getting to the decision-making official who could solve his employment situation in the Castle was actually lifetimes from even beginning. I think there’s something to that. Kafka was describing the position of the modern person, he himself was a bureaucrat in a system that was far more primitive than this one, but he was correct in predicting that any attempt to try to cut through it all would end a comedy.

[Walter Kirn]: We think we’re going to break through to the final revelation. I’m going to finally see that video, or, read that blog, or you hear that commentator that will make it all make sense.

[Matt Taibbi]: It never comes. It’s always over one more ledge… The idea that you’re going to summon all your strength to get there, well, in the process you’re going to waste everything in life. You’re going to miss everything trying to get to some truth that is never going to be accessible to you in this system. The truth is somewhere else, it’s within yourself."

Why it's Trump or Nobody in '24 and '28 and...

The weaponization of justice system and Fed agencies against MAGA was certainly a work of political evil genius that puts the GOP in a bind that will perhaps last generations. At the very least it will divide the party for a lot longer than needed. 

It has altered GOP politics like Roe v  Wade did national politics. By taking something that was meant to be solved within the political system (i.e. whether to allow abortion) and giving it to nine justices, it created a dramatic gravitational pull and division between the parties such that the pro-life Democrat and pro-choice Republican became the last passenger pigeons.

Similarly by taking the 2020 presidential race out of the political system and have it decided by the FBI (via the Russia hoax, censoring speech on Twitter & Facebook, failure to investigate the Hunter Biden laptop, and ignoring voter fraud) they've created two armed camps within the GOP. The last passenger pigeon in this case is the pro-Trump and pro-Pence Republican.

The quandary for GOP candidates is how to be critical of the Deep State without being blackmailed/lawfare’d/turning off donor class...That is a square that can't be circled except by a dynamic, outspoken, fearless, charismatic person gathering a lot of small donations. Sound like anybody we know? 

DeSantis could instantly gain popularity with the base by moving to the right of Trump on the weaponization of government by visiting the political prisoners in the D.C. gulags and donating to their causes. But that could never happen given donor class and complete ostracization of the media. 

So the Democrats have effectively penned the GOP in, leaving no options other than Trump. Republicans can't morally unify around an establishment Republican like Haley or Tim Scott willing to overlook the abuses in Whitmer case, Jan6, TwitterFiles, etc… But neither can they unify around a divisive figure like Trump who, like it or not, is the only one who will war with leviathan. 

Ideally, a potential GOP candidate needs to explain to the base the case for sweeping that stuff under the rug and explain why/how it won’t happen in the future. Honesty and transparency would go a long way instead of the pretend game they’re now playing. Not holding my breath. 

Twenty Minutes in Franklinton

Dog Watching

Crime notice with Mercy Devotion

Mary Behind Bars 

Colored Signage

Artificial Forest