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The Proud Boy sentences being quite severe is on my mind today. 22 years for Tarrio who was not there on Jan 6. He does have text saying it was them who did it. A few others got in the high teens sentences who were there.
I will admit I respect the Proud Boys and agree with a lot of their statements. I do believe the 2020 election was stolen. The lack of a secret ballot thru mass mail-in voting violates every principle of Democracy. Without violating the secret ballot Trump would have easily won in my opinion. The Proud Boys official position from memory was a desire for a new election following Democratic principles. Seems fair to me. So I feel they are directionally correct even if they took things too far.
The right won’t get equal treatment in the court. It seems like the key courts are in cities that are going to have unsympathetic juries and judges. If you flip these courts to rural areas then my guess antifa types are getting 20 years and Proud Boys 2 years. In rural areas they would have judges very sympathetic that the election wasn’t proper and their anger was justified in the same way BLM protestors get courts sympathetic that America is a racists nation.
I think the left is making a mistake with these massive sentences. If they gave them a couple years I would feel it was fair as they went too far. But now I want them pardoned. If Trump pardons them as he should then it’s a slap in the face of the court decision. Delegitimizes the court to have the court decide these are really bad people deserving long sentences for overturning Democracy but then have the next guy release them. It feels very third worldish to me. With other lawfare attempts it seems as though any future POTUS should do mass pardons. I’m not sure how balance of powers can survive this.
The punishment for Proud Boys seems to have some connection to the debates and Biden declaring them “white supremacists” and Trump telling them to “stand by and stand down” (which felt coded). It made it important these guys got long sentences to confirm that they are the bad guys because then a court confirmed what they told you. Same thing with Floyd officers and long sentences which confirmed that they were bad murderous cops. A jury convicted therefore we know it’s true.
It’s another example of punishment for exercising your right to a jury trial.
I agree with Garrett Jones books “10% Less Democracy” and America would be better with less activision and less voting. But America looks more and more like a third word spoils system. Win you get the spoils, lose you go to jail. Which makes elections far more important.
Links aren’t important just sometimes people asks for articles.
https://www.npr.org/2023/05/04/1172530436/proud-boys-jan-6-sedition-trial-verdict
https://apnews.com/article/enrique-tarrio-capitol-riot-seditious-conspiracy-sentencing-da60222b3e1e54902db2bbbb219dc3fb#:~:text=WASHINGTON%20(AP)%20—%20Former%20Proud,for%20the%20U.S.%20Capitol%20attack.
https://www.amazon.com/10-Less-Democracy-Should-Elites/dp/1503603571
https://reason.com/2023/09/06/with-22-year-sentence-ex-proud-boys-leader-enrique-tarrio-pays-hefty-trial-penalty/
Edit: Focus on the punishments and any results from the severity. I used a certain frame to put it in their view. We don’t need to discuss election legitimacy again.
This is such a motte and bailey.
Your discontent with the procedural flaws is perfectly defensible. Even though I disagree with your assessment of the impact, I understand why you and others would feel so strongly. But then you insist that it constitutes stealing. This is wrong on the merits; it is also grossly insufficient to justify the response.
Stealing is a crime. The “violations” of the secret ballot were, as far as I can tell, quite legal. Perhaps they shouldn’t be—I found the arguments in last week’s thread quite convincing. How do you intend to bring those about? Does it involve Proud Boys hanging around polling places, deciding when the vote seems adequately secured? How do you prevent them from democratically deciding who looks too Democratic to vote?
Trespassing is also a crime, along with conspiracy, incitement, and whatever else they tossed at the rioters. They definitely should be. Whatever you think about the un-democratic quality of mail-in voting, it cannot be as bad as throwing out a vote by force. That is the central example of how democracies get dismantled, and ours is right to forbid it.
Hardly. Lose and flip the table, threaten your lawmakers, and demand the result be thrown out until it favors you, go to jail. Which of those factors is load-bearing?
Imagine the counterfactual world in which this mob made it to the Senate and hovered over their shoulders until getting the proclamation they wanted. Do you think that results in a more stable, honest democracy? Do you think blatant intimidation is a winning strategy? That the media won’t mine this for footage of the most intimidating rioter hovering next to the frailest, most sympathetic Senator?
The best outcome is a special election with massive turnout as Democrats (rightfully) claimed election interference. The more likely outcomes involve partisan violence. People who were already inclined to burn courthouses in the name of justice are going to take away a different lesson:
But hey, at least it’d be democratic.
If you found the arguments of a flawed election as with merits then what do you think they should do? Legal of course isn’t the same thing as Democratic. Putin is the legal ruler of Russia.
Reading your arguments makes me think they did the right thing. Block the transition of power and demand a new election under Democratic principles. Limited mail-in ballots. Long election hours due to COVID to avoid crowding but that allows everyone to show up and vote. The special election is exactly what the Proud Boys asked for.
I went with the strong version of the Motte because I too found those arguments persuasive and used it as a way to present their position.
That being said I wanted this discussion to be more focused on the criminal penalties which I do find excessive. And comparing them to penalties the left has received in their protests. Plus any future issues this has with making elections more important and balance of power issues between branches.
I don’t know who would win the special election. I think both sides would have large turnout.
Bear in mind I did say a couple years would be fair. I didn’t say I agree with everything they did.
Legislate it. Use those red legislatures and Senate committees. Collect evidence about how many votes are harvested, then rub it in during campaign season. Make anyone who hands their ballot over to a collector feel like a rube. Run sting operations and put those collectors in jail when they violate state laws.
My single voting issue is electoral reform. If a candidate makes a pitch for literally anything other than FPTP, they get my vote. The existing mechanism has robbed countless third parties and compromise candidates of representation. But it’s still better than rule by force!
We talk a lot on this board about dangerous precedent. Letting an interest group invalidate an election by storming the legislature is particularly bad. One big step closer to bringing out the guillotines or the gulags. The road to hell is paved by people who insisted they’d break the rules in service of an abstract ideal.
It doesn’t matter who would have won the special election. The cat would be out of the bag, and any sufficiently violent group would have a veto of electoral results.
I didn’t comment on the sentences because I didn’t want to go through sentencing guidelines today. My impression was that they were in line. Maybe other commenters will have better answers.
We allow protestors to storm government buildings and interfere with proceedings all the time with little or no legal response. This seems like special pleading to me.
Funny, I was thinking the exact opposite. It’s silly to demand justice for statue-toppling and courthouse-torching, then turn around and insist that the other guys were just being good citizens.
I’m not sure how many of the CHAZ folks ended up arrested or convicted, but I hope it was a lot.
Forty something were arrested following the final unlawful assembly order, and given wrist slaps of zero actual impact.
One man pled guilty to second degree murder for one of the shootings, and sentenced to 14 years.
The fact that J6 protestors/rioters/insurrectionests are being given far longer sentences than actual murderers and rapists is one of the many reasons i have lost all faith in American government and legal systems.
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