The Widder Curry Looks Back at the Jan. 6 Riot at the Capitol

By Judi Curry

In beginning this blog I want to point out that this is MY opinion. There is too much going on to have to defend myself to those of you that will disagree with me.  You already know that I am an “anti-trumpster” and January 6th, 2001 did nothing to change that; rather it only reinforced my beliefs about the evilness of this man.  With that in mind……

I am not a television fanatic.  With the exception of MSNBC, local news daily, and an occasional “Jeopardy” I seldom have the television on.  After the Chargers left San Diego my interest in football stopped; I have never been a Padres fan, and I do not like to watch movies or sitcoms on the tube.

So when I began watching the news on January 6th, 2001, I wondered why a movie about the Civil War was being shown?  I certainly recognized our Capital Building; I recognized many of the people that were shown running down hallways to safety, and then my brain said to me – that isn’t about the Civil War you dummy; that riot is happening right now!

I watched hordes of people climbing up the walls of the building; I watched people hitting police officers with table legs; spraying them with who knows what.  I watched people break into doors and windows to do harm to others.  And I realized that behind it all was the President of the United States, egging on his followers to prevent the certification of Joe Biden as the new president because he – trump – continued to falsely claim that the election was stolen from him.

For some unknown reason, trump is unable to tell the truth.  He continued to reiterate many falsehoods, including that the Democrats had committed voter fraud.  His speech, early in the day, took over an hour to deliver and he kept telling the crowd to “never give up” and/or “never concede.”  He kept saying that he won the election and he won it by a landslide.  He encouraged his followers to keep fighting and urged them to mount an insurrection against constitutional order.  His followers had heard this before, but this time it was interpreted as a “call to arm” – and that is exactly what they did.

And all during this long and very violent day the president urged his followers to remember “forever”.  He lied; he attacked the media; he was the center of attention, just where he always wanted to be.

Now it just wasn’t that day that called his followers to Washington. Obviously because there were so many people this had been planned for a long time.  And, of course, it also spilled over to other States as well, and there was more than one State that had to evacuate their own buildings for fear of violence.

The sight of rioters holding guns and slashing out at people will always be a memory I will carry with me.  So many of them were wearing Trump hats, or other Trump insignia’s.  They were chanting his name.

I heard that there were several trump supporters that implored him to stop the mob – to condemn them, but he didn’t.  As we are finding out he was sitting down watching it all play out on his television just miles from where the insurrection was taking place.  And, it is my guess, enjoying all that he was seeing.

It was hours later that he suggested to his followers that they stop the violence, but stating that “he knew their pain; he said that he realized that the election was stolen from him.  His final comment was that “everyone knows it was a landslide election, particularly the other side, but you have to go home now.”

And before he made that speech several officers had been injured; a woman from Ocean Beach had been killed – and let me say right now that I have no sympathy for her.  She went there with the express purpose of causing chaos, and no matter how “sweet” she was, she got what she deserved.  I feel for the police officers that have lasting repercussions from this violence; the police officers that were killed defending the United States of America.

I read yesterday that over 738 rioters have been charged in the Capitol insurrection.  That’s only a handful of the people that were there.

There is talk that today, January 6, 2022, might have a repeat of that fatal day last year and that the Capitol police and others are gearing up for another violent day.

What the hell?  Is this America? Is this what we want for our sons and daughters and their sons and daughters?  What happened to us?

Is the hatred so severe that the only way to reach agreement is to slaughter those that disagree with us?  When did the United States become a country of dissidents that now take matters into their own hand to make changes?  What happened to the intelligent people of America?  What happened to the thinking process that has made us such a wonderful country in the past?  How can one ignorant human being affect the thought process of so many that they follow like the “nation of sheep” we have read about in the past.

Where is this all going to lead us to?  Another Civil War?  Brother vs brother; mother vs son?  Wife vs husband?

What happened January 6, 2021 should never have happened. It should never be allowed to happen again.  The penalties for those inciting the insurrection should be severe and quick.  There are all sorts of proof about what trump did, yet he has not been charged with anything and it’s been a year.  In fact, not only hasn’t he been charged with anything he had scheduled a conference today – that has been cancelled – to extol the virtues of last year.

But because today was cancelled doesn’t mean anything, because he has scheduled a rally in Arizona next week.  And, as a former resident of Arizona, I am willing to bet that the rally will be full; that he will once again be acclaimed the rightful president; that the attendees will be ready to riot again, and it will be worse this time.  And the Republican members of Congress will continue to sit on their hands and do nothing, and support trump when it comes to a vote.  It is a very, very sad time for the United States.  The best I can hope for is that many of the attendees at the rally have Covid, and it will make them unable to attend the next insurrection