Let me lay out my assumptions right up front, before making the point I want to make.
- The President didn’t incite violence. His comments were within the boundaries of appropriate political discourse, whether or not he was correct in the views he expressed about the election. (In fact, I’m sure he was partially, though not wholly, correct.)
- I categorically condemn mob violence, and this instance is no exception: everyone who broke the law should be charged, tried, and, if convicted, punished. Whatever the motives of the lawbreakers (and I don’t know who they are or why they did what they did), I reject any claim they might have to legitimacy in their actions. Lock them up.
There. I hope that’s sufficiently clear. Now here’s the point of this post.
For months, businesses have been destroyed by lawless mobs. Billions of dollars of damage have been done to the private property of American citizens as shops were burned, windows smashed, stores looted. Through it all, the President called for a restoration of law and order, and offered federal support in that effort. In each instance he was rebuffed.
Because the destruction of private property and livelihoods doesn’t matter to folks on the left.
The Capitol break-in didn’t endanger anyone’s livelihood: no one will go out of business because of it, no Senator or Congressman will miss a paycheck or lose his life’s savings because thugs broke in to the building and damaged the nation’s property. Democracy, the Constitution, and the nation were not at risk.
The optics were terrible. But the optics were also terrible when Mainstreet USA was burning; the difference is that we didn’t see that, because the left didn’t care, and so didn’t want us to care either.
By all means prosecute the thugs who broke the law in D.C. this week, and good riddance. But remember that, when it came to demanding justice for regular American citizens faced with the loss of their jobs, businesses, incomes, and savings in the hundreds of Antifa and BLM riots this past year, it was the President who was calling for an end to the violence and the protection of regular American citizens. And the left fought that at every turn, choosing to side with lawlessness and the mob.
So to anyone who couldn’t be bothered to stand up for regular American citizens all summer long — and that’s essentially everyone in mainstream news and every Democratic politician at the state and federal level: go back and report on the tragedy of all those shuttered businesses and destroyed lives before expressing your faux outrage over this most recent event. And explain to me why all those people didn’t matter while they watched their hopes and futures burn.