Jan. 6 was just a warm-up
Change can be threatening. It can be uncomfortable. What it means to an uncomfortably large number of white men who can’t get over themselves is an occasion for violence, even murder. In Jesus’s name. Spouses, children, and neighbors beware.
Behold the righteous Christian soldier (and sometime bounty hunter) preaching death to MAGA enemies:
Right Wing Watch elaborates:
Stew Peters is a far-right virulently anti-LGBTQ bigot who regularly uses his nightly “The Stew Peters Show” program, speeches, and social media accounts to promote white nationalists and antisemites and to spread wild conspiracy theories, bigotry, and calls for violence.
Lately, those calls for violence have become increasingly explicit, as just last week Peters used his program to urge Americans to begin exploring “extra-legal options” to remove “enemy combatants” like Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs from office.
Over the weekend, Peters joined members of former President Donald Trump’s family and inner circle and a cavalcade of far-right conspiracy theorists for a ReAwaken America event in Las Vegas, where he delivered a bloodthirsty rant that was alarming even by Peters’ already unhinged standards.
Speaking on the same stage as the likes of Donald Trump Jr., Lara Trump, Kimberly Guilfoyle, and Michael Flynn, Peters repeatedly called for his perceived political enemies to be executed.
Dr. Anthony Fauci? Dead. Doctors who treat transgender youth? Dead. Hunter Biden? Dead. Neidermeyer? Dead! (Gallows humor on that last one. Sorry.)
“We are going to see extreme accountability,” Peters asserted. “Maximum accountability. We are going to have permanent accountability, with extreme prejudice!”
Every one of Peters’ violent threats was met by wild cheers from the audience.
A slightly less virulent version of this pitch led a MAGA mob to march on the U.S. Capitol, to battle armed police for hours, and to sack the halls of Congress. We all watched it live.
If Peters used the words “cockroaches” and “snakes” on the ReAwaken America tour, it’s not been reported, but you get the idea. Dave Neiwert has been warning about eliminationism for years.
“Some liberals will argue that this is ‘just rhetoric,’ that nobody is answering these calls,” Jeff Sharlet (“The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War“) posted. “& yet one answer is Jacksonville; another is bomb threats shutting down schools for having queer books; another is schools without books at all.”
“Seems to me they’re eager for someone else to start killing,” responded historian Heather Cox Richardson (Letters from an American). “A sick game, rather like that of Shakespeare’s Iago, who convinces Othello to kill a whole bunch of people and destroy how [sic] own life, just through the power of Iago’s lies. The ultimate power trip.”
Consider the hundreds facing jail time and financial ruin over their embrace of Donald Trump’s big lie, Ruth Ben Ghiat (“Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present“) said recently. Trump will never know their names or care about their fates, yet they sacrificed their freedom for him.
And for whatever demons torment their souls.
Consider a few of the men who answered Trump’s call on Jan. 6 (NBC News):
Joe Biggs, a Proud Boys leader convicted of seditious conspiracy who the government says “served as an instigator and leader” during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, was sentenced to 17 years in federal prison Thursday.
It is among the longest sentences in Capitol riot cases. The record is the 18-year sentence given to Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, also convicted of seditious conspiracy, after prosecutors sought 25 years in federal prison.
It took an unsettling amount of time for the overwhelmed Department of Justice to apprehend and charge the hundreds aho stormed the Capitol. Just as it took the DOJ and state authorities to charge those working in front of the cameras and behind them to attempt the coup that culminated in the Jan. 6 insurrection. But the wheels of justice operate more slowly than a lynch mob with ropes.
Biggs went to trial alongside Enrique Tarrio, Ethan Nordean, Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola. All five were convicted of felonies, and all but Pezzola were convicted of seditious conspiracy. The other Proud Boys were also to be sentenced in the coming days: Rehl on Thursday afternoon, Pezzola and Nordean on Friday and Tarrio on Tuesday.
[U.S. District Judge Timothy] Kelly sentenced Rehl later Thursday afternoon to 15 years in federal prison. Prosecutors had sought 30 years. “You did spray that officer, and then you lied about it,” Kelly told Rehl. “Those are what we call in the law bad facts.”
Here’s another bucking for an indictment and advocating violence where the rule of law should be.