by Steve Timmer

Jan 10, 2021, 7:00 PM

“A major tipping point”

On Wednesday, January 6^th, a day which will live ignominy, and maybe infamy, too, a gang of anarchists, nihilists, and just plain thugs broke into the Capitol in Washington, D.C., seeming intent on taking hostages and executing the vice president of the United States, causing extensive property damage, terrorizing Congressional members and their staffs (and the vice president’s family which was there), and as a crowning touch, killing a Capitol police officer. Not a bad afternoon’s work.

At least the aforesaid gang of anarchists, nihilists, and just plain thugs think so. They’re crowing about it incessantly on social media and saying it was just a warmup for the Inauguration and beyond. I, for one, don’t doubt it.

Of that awful day: Senator Amy Klobuchar says this:

“That moment [when she and the vice president shared a non-COVID protocol fist bump when the Electoral College vote was done about 3 AM on Thursday] was about a peaceful transition of power,” she said. “The whole day was about that.”

Sorry Senator, the peaceful transition’s ship sailed a day earlier. It wasn’t a moment for back patting or fist bumping. Sack cloth and ashes were the appropriate attire. There is no way to call dragging the box of Electoral College ballots around the Capitol to keep them out of the hands of violent insurrectionists and seditionists “peaceful.” Even if they wore funny clothes.

The “transition of power” hasn’t even happened yet, and the senator seems to be declaring that all’s well that ends well. She is quoted earlier in the linked article that the nation was at a “tipping point,” and that’s the headline, too: “Nation is at a ‘major tipping point’ after Capitol breach.” I thought that was an appropriate expression of alarm.

But it’s clear the senator meant “turning point” when she goes on to say that people were turning away from Trump, as evidenced by the results of the Georgia runoffs. Surprisingly, then, there were enough people remaining with heart for the cause to sack the Capitol the next day – which had not been done since the British did it in 1814 – to give one pause about the strength of the senator’s evidence. There’ve been bilious and menacing protests around the country’s capitals, too, since then, including twice in Minnesota in recent days.

If you give Senator Klobuchar a chance to trot out the benign bipartisan line, she’ll take it every time. Her remarks in the article are so on-brand.

Until about Tuesday, Vice President Pence was Trump’s groveling, sycophant lap dog, and he still wouldn’t take a call from Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer on Thursday to even discuss invoking the 25^th Amendment, that after being chased around the Capitol by a mob the day before. Don’t be misled by a fist bump, Senator Klobuchar.

In a video posted on Twitter today, Arnold Schwarzenegger draws the appropriate comparison for the sacking of the Capitol: Kristallnacht.

My message to my fellow Americans and friends around the world following this week’s attack on the Capitol. pic.twitter.com/blOy35LWJ5

— Arnold (@Schwarzenegger) January 10, 2021

We know that Kristallnacht was just the beginning, or one of the stations of the swastika anyway, in a terrible chapter in history, for Germany, and everybody else, too.

The Proud Boys and other assembled thugs, Hitler’s Brown Shirts on Kristallnacht, and the Klan during Reconstruction are all of a piece. We’re fools if we don’t recognize that. But the article also reports:

But Klobuchar hopes the inauguration of the new president, the confirmation of his Cabinet members and more work to combat the coronavirus pandemic will start to bring people together.

She is one of a handful of lawmakers in Congress who will be leading joint hearings on how the breach happened and how to make sure it never happens again, a task that is critical as the inauguration approaches. [Anybody who thinks this will all be sorted out before the Inauguration is deluded. ed.]

“It has to be safe,” she said. “For the world to see.”

Lotsa luck, Senator. If the Republic has any regard for itself, or for the new president and vice-president, the Inauguration will be an armed camp, and hardly a showcase for the world.

If the Democrats say, “Let’s turn the page and let bygones be bygones,” as they have done countless times before, well, I’ll let you imagine your own denouement.