Waiting for the next thing to happen

Amazing how Senate and Congressional Republicans came around when they felt their safety and their privileged little bubble were under attack. Don't like lying on the floor of a room while tear gas and shots go off and shattered glass falls all around you? Funny, it didn't bother you when Heather Heyer was dragged under a car; when peaceful protesters were violently dispersed from any number of Black Lives Matter protests all over the country in the last, let's see, since 2013? May God forgive me, I have lost count of the deaths, And those are just the ones I've heard about. How many (I saw this sign at a protest here in Portland this summer) were not filmed?

Alas, the memory will fade all too fast. Even Mayor Wheeler sounded downright reasonable the day after he personally got tear-gassed in front of the (In)Justice Center. For a whole day.

Now we're all waiting for the next thing to happen. Trump and his camp have been pushed to the wall. A long series of increasingly frantic and incoherent lawsuits (drawing increasingly acerbic judicial responses) has ended. State-level election officials refused to be bribed or bullied. Even VP Pence had no stomach for a coup that was doomed to fail, and would have left his political future irretrievably tarnished. And Wednesday's insurrection not only failed to stop the certification, it may have made some prominent politicians realize they had more to lose than to gain by continuing to support a sinking ship.

But rats are most dangerous when they're cornered.

There will be more violence. Attacks against the inauguration ceremony. Assassination attempts. More, and probably more effective, pipe bombs. Away from the Capitol, ongoing attacks against other state capitols, such as we saw on Wednesday when we were able to find news coming from anywhere except DC.

But, you might say, now the FBI, Secret Service, and police everywhere are alert to the danger. Surely they'll take precautions, even if only to keep themselves from looking incompetent?

Uh huh. What part of that was not true before this week?

So I'm hunkered down, trying to do my job, enduring the endless rain, the isolation, and the creeping galloping dread.

Come on, 2021. We set you a damned low bar, and so far, you're not getting over it.

Books Available
The Day of My First Driving Lesson
Country Well-Known as an Old Nightmare's Stable
High-Voltage Lines
Knocking from Inside