Yeah right? Some of these guys really are total dunces, they filmed themselves naked-face... one wore a work ID badge... some even gave interviews to TV crews and provided their details....
It can seem tempting not to worry too much about their future endeavors, taking that carelessness into consideraton along with some other indications that they are not all that connected to the reality most of us live in.
But then we have to ask ourselves where the hell was law enforcement in the upfront of this? In on it or just incompetent or tech-ignorant (social media, duh!) or totally asleep at the switch? Was the whole thing organized and fell apart at the end because someone high up caught on or chickened out or WTF?
When it came down the whole Congress and the VP were in there FFS. Can't even make that up and yet it happened. And even if the insurrectionists loathed the government officials, what about the ordinary workers in there. I saw a photo of the employees carrying the boxes with the electoral votes from each state into the chamber for the joint session... they are just ordinary people the same as an insurrectionist's sister or cousin... with a day job happens to get paid by Uncle Sam. What were these people thinking.
I thought the whole point of our sacrificing assorted personal liberties after 9/11 was to enable greater homeland security. So we take our shoes off and get felt up in airports for the good of the country and then somehow we end up with a President who bans Muslim immigrants and encourages white presumed-Christan boys to run down to the Capitol and overturn his successor's election. Great. I finally know what the Chinese meant by the curse of living in interesting times. I often find myself recalling a verse from a W.S.Merwin poem lately, the last three lines of it:
āSend me out into another life
lord because this one is growing faint
I do not think it goes all the way.ā
-- W.S. Merwin, in āWords from a Totem Animalā
Anyway people whose day job is to worry about extremists don't think it's time to stop worrying yet. I agree. I'm way too old to worry for myself but I sure as hell wonder where we went wrong raising some of the next generations.