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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 7, 2023

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Tucker Carlson is the maddest of lads.

Among the speculation about why Tucker Carlson was fired, so suddenly, and without any actual reason, was this interview. He had one version of it taped for Fox News, and they still own that tape. So he had the Chief of the Capital Police come in again and tape the interview again.

This makes things notable in a few ways. I'm still digesting this interview, mind you. But for starters, there is the surface level that the Chief of the Capital Police feels like he was set up to fail. Tucker takes this further, and heavily implies or leads that the whole damned Jan 6th was a setup. Then on a deeper level, there is the fact that this is the second time they've done this song and dance, so the Chief of the Capital Police knows this is Tucker's angle, beyond a shadow of any doubt, and he's still doing the interview again.

But here is Zerohedge's takeaway from the interview.

It Was Pelosi: Former Capitol Police Chief Reveals 'Set Up' Behind January 6

Perhaps most damning is Sund's claim that then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) refused to authorize the deployment of the National Guard at the Capitol despite Sund's pleas, and that federal agencies withheld information and warning signs of potential dangers prior to the riot.

"This sounds like a set up to me," Carlson said, adding "I'm sorry, it does."

To which Sund replied:

"It gets better. So I beg and beg and he goes ‘well, I’m gonna walk down the hall and we’ll talk to the Secretary of Defense or whoever he’s gonna talk to. Right then I get a notification, oh, I’m still on the call, we have the shooting of Ashli Babbitt. And I said we have shots firing, I still remember yelling over the phone. We have shots firing on the U.S. Capitol, is that urgent enough for you now?"

According to Sund, the National Guard didn't show up until 6 p.m., hours after the fatal shooting of Babbitt. He also claimed that the Pentagon deployed resources to the homes of generals, but not the Capitol.

I can think of a couple reasons they weren't prepared:

Also, since when does Nancy Pelosi have veto power over deploying the DC national guard? The President of the United States has that authority.

cui bono?

Anyone who didn't want the certification of the election to be contested. The theory that I've read that makes the most sense is that the emergency was necessary to derail the procedures for contesting electors, and once the emergency session was reconvened, without the ability to contest anything and for the sole purpose of validating the election, all of Trump's avenues of relief would be closed.

An explanation of sorts here.

Well, that's certainly a take.

"but please…step back and understand WHY these things happened…examine the chain of events in congress…why those two motions that would have at least paused the certification THAT WOULD GIVE VP PENCE THE CONSTITUTIONALLY RECOGNIZED POWER TO MOVE TO SUSPEND THE ELECTORAL CERTIFICATION AND THEN EXAMINE THE IRREGULARITIES AND CLAIMS OF FRAUD!"

What I don't get about all these zany electoral certification theories is this: Suppose Pence does have that constitutionally recognized power; suppose they do launch an investigation into the irregularities and claims of fraud. What actually happens? Trump's campaign had been spending two months looking for fraud with no success. Why should we expect a congressional investigation to be any different? The plan seemed to be:

  1. Mike Pence has courage

  2. ???

  3. Two scoops, two terms, two genders

Surely the investigation would take more than two weeks. What happens on January 20, when the 4-year terms of Trump and Pence end? The constitution doesn't say the President and Vice-President serve until they are replaced. It says they serve 4-year terms. The 117th senate had a 50-50 split. What happens with no VP to break ties?

Actually, suppose they do find fraud. What happens then? Do they just subtract the fraudulent votes? Is there a new general election? How do we know there won't be fraud in that election too?

You should read the Eastman memos but there was a plan to get from claims to fraud to reelecting Trump.

These are much better ideas, but if this was the plan, Trump should want more chaos and/or emergency rules, not less.

If the plan is to not count votes from certain states at all, and emergency rules "EXPEDITE the certification and dismiss all prior regular session procedural rules," (I have no idea if this is true, but it's in the above linked comment) then you want emergency rules so that you can ignore objections.

If the plan is to declare that no candidate got a majority, and that the house of representatives gets to vote on the next president, then you want the mob in or surrounding the building for the intimidation factor. The 12th amendment states, "if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President."

This idea that the capitol riot was actually the Democrats' fault doesn't make any sense. Trump had the motive and the means (after all, it was his mob).