Welcome to Heil
After setting my phone notifications to Do Not Disturb for the next four years, I spent Inauguration Day watching nonstop sports. All of the teams and individuals I was rooting for lost. (I guess you can run, but you can’t hide.) Since I worked hard to avoid the proceedings, I don’t want to pile on with coverage of them. Instead, I’ll focus on one American splitscreen. On the way out, Joe Biden offered preemptive pardons for members of the House Committee that investigated Jan 6th, and other individuals including Gen. Mark A. Milley, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, and Liz Cheney. As these patriots, truth-tellers, and life-savers were being pardoned because of threats of revenge, America’s richest CEOs locked arms with the guy making the threats. It doesn’t get much more stark than that.
+ Or maybe it does: In a move as shameful as it was predictable, Trump Pardoned the January 6 rioters. “The pardons and pending dismissals also covered more than 600 rioters were charged with assaulting, resisting or impeding law enforcement officers at the Capitol, nearly 175 of whom were accused of doing so with deadly or dangerous weapons including baseball bats, two-by-fours, crutches, hockey sticks and broken wooden table legs.” NYT (Gift Article): What to Know About Trump’s Broad Grant of Clemency to Jan. 6 Rioters.
+ Biden’s concern over Trump’s thirst for revenge seems well-founded. He’s already terminated John Bolton’s security detail, fired Mark Milley and Jose Andres (remember, heroes are villains in the upside-down), and ordered the portrait of Milley to be taken down from Pentagon wall.
+ Meanwhile, Elon Musk appeared to make back-to-back fascist salutes at inauguration rally. Maybe he has a frozen shoulder and was just trying to say his heart goes out to us. In The Atlantic, Charlie Warzel ponders, Did Elon Musk actually toss off a Sieg heil! at Donald Trump’s inauguration rally today? We’re entering a(nother) era in which we’ll be left to wonder whether or not to believe what we see with our own eyes. Might as well get started on day one. Whatever Musk’s intent, right wing extremists and neo-Nazis were abuzz over the salute. It’s unlikely to be the last time this administration goes viral with these groups.
