It's Been a Week...

It's a form of PTSD in a way.

Watching California right now and remembering the BLM protests in Portland in 2020.

For those of you that were around me back then you know I pushed back hard on the narrative that the right and Trump and the MSM were pushing at the time. The one that said Portland was burning to the ground. That it was lawless. That anarchists had taken over and the only way out was through sending in the National Guard.

There were protests. Mostly nonviolent. Especially during the day. Then the sun would go down, the police would move in and escalate and boom! In about a two block radius around the courthouse. That's it. Just a small section of downtown. And one where many protestors were corralled into dead ends and forced into confrontations.

Portland has paid out a ton in damages to protestors that were hurt during this time. "Less than lethal" rounds fired at people's heads. Lung damage from tear gas released without regard to where all it would go.

It was a terrible time.

Now, yes, I will say that I'm not a fan of the damage. I don't like it. I think it's generally opportunistic not actually people protesting with good intent. Just people who like to break things and set things on fire. BUT...that handful of people can easily be contained without spraying an entire crowd with tear gas or rubber bullets. And even those people, the ones setting things on fire or breaking glass serve the purpose of calling attention to the protest and what is being protested. Which is the point of a protest, is it not?

California, LA specifically, is facing the same thing. A small handful of fires and damages within a much larger peaceful protest. Nothing that their local law enforcement can't handle. Though I've seen a few things that will probably result in lawsuits against them as well. Depending on how the country falls, or doesn't fall. But there is no need for the federal government to get involved.

Except it's what Trump wants. I've talked about it before, he wants to invoke the Insurrection Act. He wants total control. He has no intention of there being a way to remove him from office and this is a start of that. Kristi Noem just gave a press conference where she said the feds were there to liberate California.

That's a coup. She just said they were committing a coup.

In a public press conference.

And when California State Senator Alex Padilla tried to ask her a question, again during a PUBLIC PRESS CONFERENCE, he was forcibly removed and handcuffed.

This is authoritarianism.

This is fascism.

I don't know what happens next. I don't know where this ends. I will say it looks really bleak from here.

Stay strong.
Stay safe.

Good luck to all of us.