Do any of you remember that line from 9/11?
I was zooming with my friend, JLQ, on Wednesday morning. While we were zooming, she said she just saw that a mob was storming the Capitol!
Wednesday’s events brought 9/11 to mind as a reminder of the last very dark day in U.S. history. Looking back, we were all at least united as Americans. Not so much on Wednesday!
I happen to love D.C. I have been there for work a number of times. I’m a lifelong government worker. Maybe that is why the sight of the Capitol can kind of choke me up. I have wanted to return to DC since I retired but haven’t had the opportunity.
That brings me back to Wednesday’s chaos when the mob stormed the Capitol and broke in.
I usually don’t go down this path on my blog, but I saw some things on Wednesday so I am saying some things today!
Boy was the insurrection (quoting George W. Bush) ever hard to watch! It made me feel like I woke up in another country. Who could have expected something like this in the U.S.? And I am saddened by the leaders that brought our country to this moment.
Heiko Mass, the German foreign minister, drew a parallel between the storming of the Capitol and the recent attempt by a mob of far-right German protesters to enter the Riechstag (the building that houses Germany’s Parliament.
Inflammatory words will lead to acts of violence – on the steps of the Reichstag and now in the Capitol
Heiko Mass (on Twitter)
There is going to be a lot of hindsight on this one, including starting why wasn’t there more security in the first place! There are certainly are going to be lots of tough questions to answer and undoubtedly there will be plenty of blame to go around.
It is hard to even glimpse a path forward. I would like to think things will settle down after the inauguration, but I think that might be a fantasy on my part.
I believe President-elect Biden will do his level best to govern the entire nation, not just his party. But his best is probably not going to be good enough for people who don’t trust the results of the 2020 election. According to this NPR piece, more than 60% of Americans trust the results, but only one quarter of Republicans do.
That, my friends, is kind of scary! But hopefully cooler heads will eventually prevail and we will remember we are ‘one nation’.
See you on Monday,
Allene
Travels with Allene 