Absolutely Appalling

Everyone's hope for a better 2021 was already shattered today at least in the political world.  Since the November election, Trump had publicly accused the Democrats of cheating to win the presidency.  Although there had been no proof of this legally and the Supreme Court had ruled that the states' certified election results were valid, he and his base chose to dominate social media with erroneous conspiracy theories to the contrary.  In the Heinisch home we had chosen to ignore the arguments and accept that Joe Biden was elected the 46th President of the United States.  We had hoped that the run off elections in Georgia yesterday would produce a Republican controlled Senate, so that there would be a party balance in Congress between the two houses.  When this did not happen we understood and accepted that the next two years would be dominated by the Democrat party.  Trump did not agree with these results, however, and organized a "Save America" rally in Washington D.C. today as Congress was set to certify Biden's win.

None of us were surprised by this, but the aftermath that followed the rally was absolutely appalling.  At the end of the speech to his zealot followers, Trump encouraged those in attendance to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue and "let their voices be heard to the weak Republicans that would not contest the election results."  The crowd took this as a free pass to storm the Capitol Building and soon were entering its hallowed halls with the intent on destruction and mayhem.  The entire area was put on lockdown as the Senators were safely ushered to the walkways in the basement where they would remain for the next four hours.   Upstairs, priceless historical artifacts were destroyed and the floors were littered with debris.  The National Guard was deployed and in the end four protestors and one police officer died in the fiasco. 

There had been multiple riots this year, but this one seemed more personal. Our family had visited the Capitol multiple times over the years and Brett had worked in it for a summer.  We loved the rotunda and were disgusted by the lack of respect for our nation's history that was shown there today.  We shouldn't have been surprised by this behavior as we had spent this past year listening to the ignorance spouted by our President and watched those in our area repeat his every word.  The selfishness of those involved mirrored the rhetoric of President Trump and his worshiping group of MAGAs.  Although many Republicans spoke out this afternoon condemning the riot, I still worried that this behavior would continue well past inauguration day.  On January 1st, 2021 I knew that a new year would not stop the pandemic or the political unrest, but never thought that it would escalate to the ignorance that we saw today.  What a sad day in American history.