It's Never Hammer Time

   It's terrifying enough when your home is invaded. It's even more terrifying when it's two in the morning. It becomes more terrifying still when the home invader is larger than you, is carrying a hammer and is bellowing for your wife.

    That's what Paul Pelosi went through at his and Speaker Pelosi's San Francisco home 18 hours ago. Mr. Pelosi had called 911 when he saw the invader and used code to convey to the emergency dispatcher what was going on. By the time the SFPD arrived, the lunatic, David Depape, was striking the 82 year-old Mr. Pelosi on the head with the hammer he brought.

    "Where's Nancy?" he demanded at last twice and when the police showed up, he told him they were "waiting for Nancy."

    As CNN's Dana Bash observed earlier tonight, that was eerily reminiscent of one of the chilling refrains we'd heard on January 6th. "Where's Nancy?" and "Hang Mike Pence" have long since burrowed its way into the American consciousness if not our lexicon. And, yes, Depape had a Facebook page as well as a Wordpress blog that was active until August 26. But more on that later.

     Mr. Pelosi had to undergo emergency brain surgery for several hours today. I think it's past the point where we should have to say, "Enough is enough." Maybe the only reason why Nancy Pelosi is still alive is because of Depape's bad timing.

     Yes, Depape also thinks that January 6 was merely "a peaceful demonstration". It's warped rhetoric and equally warped thinking that made the attack at the Pelosi home possible. He is a right wing conspiracy theorist, no doubt about it. 

     This, obviously, never should have happened but if it had to, it's better it happened right before the midterms than after so saner voters know what we're up against. The clown car is going over the cliff and we're all in it while the calliope plays its demented tune at 100 decibels. No, we're not going down, we're going up. No, Nancy's to blame for the National Guard not being called, not Trump.

     I mentioned Depape's Facebook page. Yeah, it used to be up until today. Before today, he was allowed to post some of the vilest shit on the internet and, considering today's climate, that's saying something. But while Fuckbook was busy taking down my accounts because I posted antifa memes and sometimes not even that, they cheerfully allowed this right wing asshole Depape to put up whatever right wing dog shit he wanted. And they wouldn't take down his page until after his name was in the news.

    So when his name went out there, I linked to a legitimate news site that gave his name, that Mr. Pelosi was in surgery, etc. I put up my post quickly enough so that when you went to the news feed page, my post was the third from the top, therefore getting more attention than subsequent ones.

     Within minutes, I was getting inundated with scores of laughing emojis and typically misspelled, misinformed right wing dog shit from every crank on Facebook and their brother. Finally, I took down the post, put it back up and that pushed it toward the bottom of the news feed  so it wouldn't get as much attention. But some of them were amazing.

    They largely denied that Mr. Pelosi was ever assaulted, that he was in brain surgery, that he was attacked by one of their own. Oh no, they said, he comes from Berkeley, that proves he's a liberal (Hint, it's not still 1968, morons), he attended a protest at the Castro years ago (as if gay men can't be conservatives. You ever hear of the Log Cabin Republians? Plus, we don't know what his orientation is nor do I care).

    No, no, no. He is one of you. You own him. You helped make this loser.  He is cut from the same cloth that shot Gabrielle Giffords in the head over 11 years ago. You. Own. This. Your idiotic rhetoric and totally misinformed opinions on my Facebook wall prove it.

     Just as Wordpess owns this. Mark Zuckerberg owns this. Every right wing site that ever hosted this asshole's toxic thoughts owns this. Every elected official who does not decry violence and violent rhetoric owns this.

 

    As California Congressman Eric Swalwell, who has himself been on the receiving end of death threats, said on The Reidout tonight, it's a "green light" for right wing terrorists to go after Democratic lawmakers and their families. When elected officials such as MTG and Lauren Boebert use threats of violence against their self-perceived enemies, people will listen to them and they will inevitably take those threats of violence to heart as if it's their duty to inflict injury and terror. And the more threats we hear from the MAGA caucus, the more it gets normalized.

      Because the next right wing asshole who shows up may bring something deadlier than a hammer.