Oath Keepers Trial

[Kurt]

It’s astonishing how naive they are.

It really reminds me of when I was a kid and I would get caught at something red handed and I would desperately try the most convoluted lie possible to get out of trouble but it would always fail because the adults in my life were kids once as well and they could demand I answer their questions.

These guys don't have to testify in their defense. They seem to think they can explain themselves and use their natural charms to get away with it. But they have no charms beyond the pantomime, folksy patriot veneer they have given themselves and that just does not hold up to any real questioning.

The Butt-Wipe Doorknob guy, Thomas Caldwell, talked about how attacking a crowd of "Democrats" with suppressed AR-15s would kill about 25 people before anyone even knew they were being shot.

He claimed he was talking about getting suppressors for his friends granddaughter who was a competition shooter and suppressors were "different" than silencers. He then asked the prosecutor if he wanted him to explain the difference between the two.
The prosecutor did not want to hear a defendant provide a definition. He would go by the US National Firearms Act of 1934 which defined "Silencer" (NFA-1934 definition says reduction of noise is a silencer based on a commercial product called "Maxim Silencer" which was the "Kleenex" of suppressors at the time) and it was like Caldwell had never had his bullshit challenged ever. So much so he probably did not even believe it was bullshit.

But he did know you cannot go around planning to do a mass shooting of Democrats in DC.

What was funny is that the Prosecution did not even enter his planned, random massacre as evidence before he agreed to take the stand. The massacre of Democrats was not part of the January 6th insurrection so not relevant, but it was relevant to countering his claims of being nice, misunderstood disabled veteran.

Imagine if a high school student did that kind of talk about a Mall or classmates? He would still be locked up to this day. This guy was actually let off the hook for planning a mass killing with his buddies via Signal.

MAGA is violent. MAGA thinks people who disagree with them are "The Enemy" and they want the Enemy to die. It's just that they are such authoritarians that they want someone to give them permission to do it.

[Kurt]

Jessica Watkins was on the stand yesterday and is again today.

For her testimony yesterday she was quite sympathetic. Transexual in the time of "Don't Ask Don't Tell" and caught by someone in her unit who said "I know what you are, faggot" and then went AWOL, turned herself in after two months. Her parents kicked her out and disowned her. But then later she got a boyfriend, opened up a bar with him, her parents welcomed her back and instead of feeling lucky that she got more breaks than most Transexuals do she instead started calling homosexuals "faggots" and was concerned by the gay agenda and wanted to join a military again because she liked the feeling of comradery before her comrades began to threaten her and expressed open hatred for her.

But today the "Poor me" thing washed the fuck away. During cross examination she was asked if she saw any violence and she said she did not. Then she is shown a video of her "stack" fighting capitol police and she yelled that she was angry, and that she already said she was sorry (yesterday) and she did not understand why the prosecution asked her about it when she already said she was sorry.

She seems to think a trial is a chance to say sorry and then be let go from consequences.

When pressed about her violent rhetoric before and during January 6th she started to yell again that:

"Half this country feels this way still. Half this country still feels disenfranchised by this election. We didn't have a fair election!"

oops, the whole point was conspiracy to stop the election certification. Some defendants claimed that they were there to "help" Biden get certified, Watkins claimed that she was there to "Help law enforcement" and "prevent Chinese invasion and forced vaccinations"

But credit to the Oathkeepers. As long as you were an idiot just like them they were more inclusive than many Liberal groups I have known.

[Kurt]

Other conviction for Seditious conspiracy for the Oath Keepers. A batch of Proud Boys is now on trial. One of them, Rehl of Philadelphia, showed up a a friend of mine's house with a gun printing and threatened her for being a communist (she's not) and then he and a bunch of Proud Boys threatened her neighbors for being her neighbors basically. When a group of people called the cops the cops laughed and said nothing happened, even though it was on video.
So fuck them.

The conviction tally for J6 is now 90% for juries and 87% for judges. If you are a J6 person you should go in front of a judge and have a 3% better chance. Still, the Government has been treating this as a Fish + Barrel situation. Next time probably won't be so easy.

[Mr.PocketsOfSteel]

TWELVE posts by Kurt in this small thread of how many? <heh>

[Kurt]

TWELVE posts by Kurt in this small thread of how many? <heh>

You probably could have counted the other posts too.

[ReptilianKittenEater]

I am guessing this is Mr. 25 posts vs Mr. 21377 posts.

[el3so]

That sedition sentencing is coming up no? Again, MFs better kiss their hands McCain is no longer alive.

[Kurt]

That sedition sentencing is coming up no? Again, MFs better kiss their hands McCain is no longer alive.

Politicians got little to do with sentencing.

They are lucky they were not leftists. Leftoids commiting violent acts against property tend to get 6 years in the Federal pen. So far out of 900 arrests the longest sentence has been 7 years. Less than 1 year will be the average.

We will see what sentencing phase brings.

[vagabond]

That sedition sentencing is coming up no? Again, MFs better kiss their hands McCain is no longer alive.

Politicians got little to do with sentencing.

They are lucky they were not leftists. Leftoids commiting violent acts against property tend to get 6 years in the Federal pen. So far out of 900 arrests the longest sentence has been 7 years. Less than 1 year will be the average.

We will see what sentencing phase brings.

Was curious what some of the minimum sentencing guidelines were for weed when I came across something 'interesting' from the US Sentencing Commission pdf (FY2014 - so possibly out of date):

The average sentence for identity theft offenders subject to the mandatory minimum penalty was 66 months (with relief, 38 months).

So that's 5.5 years (or 3-ish) for ID theft vs storming a government building, shitting in it, breaking into gov't officials' office, etc.

It's like the wrist slaps we give banks. Sure, these useful idiots' lives are not going to be great after (if they even were before) but it's setting things up for worse, especially when the enablers are going to get off scot-free.

[Kurt]

So that's 5.5 years (or 3-ish) for ID theft vs storming a government building, shitting in it, breaking into gov't officials' office, etc.

It's like the wrist slaps we give banks. Sure, these useful idiots' lives are not going to be great after (if they even were before) but it's setting things up for worse, especially when the enablers are going to get off scot-free.

Basically if you are a crim be a white collar one. ID theft is now a druggie crime so they get nailed.
If you are political and protest, be a right wing one or you will get beaten, gassed, and jailed for up to 3 days without a charge for no reason other than you think trees shouldn't be cut down or black people should not be murdered by the police.
If you are lefty and actually commit a violent act then you will always face 20 years in prison and if you set a cop car on fire the press will claim you burned a city down.

The Republican Convention that was protested in 2000 was mostly about opposing the Death Penalty and 420 people were arrested, kept in an abandoned jail and about 8 of them were facing actual life sentences for misdemeanors (dismissed). The reason this was done was to keep legal and permitted protesters out of the city. That later lead to Police Departments spying on defendants lawyers and spying on them after the cases were dismissed as well.

Way back in 2001 a friend of mine who was a defense attorney with the National Lawyers guild was constantly followed by an operative of Bo Deitle and Associates. I was asked to find out who was following her and I had no fucking clue. So I looked for Private companies who did cop work and were politically connected. I called Bo Dietles company and asked for her case worker and got connected to a guy. Private Investigators never really expect to be investigated themselves so they kind of suck, but I told him that she did not hire them for "protection" (they claimed they were hired to protect her) and would not give me the name of who hired them (NYPD did) so I said they had to stop. He said that she would have to make a "Formal request" and I said that she should not have to do work to not be followed.

So they stopped. Or got better at following her.

But I can almost guarantee that when Law Enforcement started getting tips about J6 their first reaction was to increase surveillance on known leftists. Why? Because even when they are not breaking the law LEA's have decades of treating their existence as being illegal. That's why the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys were able to operate in plain site because they fed into Law Enforcement's existing biases.

[Alphabet]

Actually, the PB, Oathkeepers, whatever adopted specific tactics and strategies ANTIFA, etc uses, and that's how they flew under the radar, and became successful in countering ANTIFA Street violence during the summer of love.

The one thing they did fuck up was bringing their smartphones with them, and traveling on debit/credit cards on Jan 6.

No one who remembers the 90s thinks the Feds and law enforcement just lets right wing militias/whatever, off with a pass.

[Kurt]

Actually, the PB, Oathkeepers, whatever adopted specific tactics and strategies ANTIFA, etc uses, and that's how they flew under the radar, and became successful in countering ANTIFA Street violence during the summer of love.

The one thing they did fuck up was bringing their smartphones with them, and traveling on debit/credit cards on Jan 6.

No one who remembers the 90s thinks the Feds and law enforcement just lets right wing militias/whatever, off with a pass.

The O.K and P.B called the cops and said "we are gonna be here doing this, that cool?" ANTIFA never did that.

It was a smart move on their part though, cops don't think they need to infiltrate groups who contact them, even though that would be the easiest group to infiltrate.

Also ANTIFA never allowed that P.B filmaker to film them doing crimes. The only lefty group that did was one called "Black Guns Matter" (who? yah, me neither).

The only guy I know that would have done that is the now Cannonized David Graeber. In 2000 Graeber was supposed to be in my van driving up to Quebec City (He could not drive but he could use a map) but he switched over to one that he thought would get more media attention (people dressed more "Black Bloc" like. So it was me and this 60 year old woman named Natalee with a bunch of punk rockers from Connecticut. But Graeber would have sought out that film maker and embedded him, gave him everything he needed as long as he interviewed him at least 3 times a day.

[vagabond]

1) I get the feeling you're not as big a fan of Graeber as a lot of folks are. Would like to hear more

2) The guys in camo, or black and yellow fred perry shirs, or carrying guns, carrying torches in Charlottesville were 'flying under the radar'? No, they just get a pass, like Kurt details. Look at the difference between the government hovering helicopters against protestors during COVID in DC or having random kidnap vans roaming around like here in Los Angeles vs how any of the right-wing fucks were treated.

As Kurt has pointed out, it isn't new, it's pretty much what happened across the 20th century though now you're going to lose an eye or nut vs being murdered like a Kent State or coal mine.

[Alphabet]

Lol..ok.

I like my freedom, money and job too much to comment further.

If you want to believe the far right has some wink nod relationship with any law enforcement, and po ol ANTIFA just gets kicked around for having slam poetry night, you do you.

[vagabond]

I like my freedom, money and job too much to comment further.

Have you not heard about the people that have been on this board before ? You'll be ok.

If you want to believe the far right has some wink nod relationship with any law enforcement, and po ol ANTIFA just gets kicked around for having slam poetry night, you do you.

Umm...I don't know what to tell you. Kurt has a whole history in those movements. My very narrow parallel example would be how BLM, etc protestors were treated here in LA vs right-wing/anti-vax people.

This LA Times article (paywall bypass: https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fw ... ms-of-bias)

The anti-vaccination demonstrators, Proud Boys and black-clad counter-protesters bobbed around in the street outside Los Angeles police headquarters on Saturday afternoon as if it were a boxing ring, talking trash and raising their fists to fight.

Within seconds a brawl erupted, with people pulling out weapons and throwing punches. By the time LAPD officers in riot gear separated the two sides, several people had been injured and two stabbed — an anti-vaccination activist who suffered a lacerated heart and punctured lung, and a counter-protester whose protective gear likely shielded him from more serious wounds, witnesses say.

The violence in the heart of downtown Los Angeles sparked widespread anger, along with questions about why authorities have repeatedly struggled to deal with such fights at recent protests around COVID-19 restrictions and national politics. The continued unrest has prompted some to question why the LAPD isn’t cracking down more on the right-wing activists who have engaged in the brawls.

vs
[url]
https://laist.com/news/in-their-own-wor ... r-protests[/url]

Since the start of the protests against police brutality following the death of George Floyd, at least 2,700 demonstrators have been arrested in Los Angeles. Booking records show that the majority of the corresponding charges were for looting, vandalism, burglary, and violating curfew, despite the fact that most of the protests we've reported on over the past two weeks have been peaceful.

The arrests have sparked outrage on social media, as well calls from public officials and advocacy groups to drop charges.

Today, the Los Angeles Police Department announced that they are currently investigating "allegations of misconduct, violations of Department policy, and excessive force during the recent civil unrest." So far, the department is investigating 56 complaints - 28 of those involve alleged use of force.

And we live in an age where there's tons of video online.

If we want to get this back to Jan 6th, you know that those barriers wouldn't have been moved aside if a crowd that looked different than the ones present. People have at least been arrested but the sentences are light for what they did and the people at the top that are responsible need to be prosecuted.