Dealing with Politics and Family

As the first wave of rioters breached the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, Capitol Police officer Eugene Goodman wielded a baton as a bearded man in a QAnon shirt chased him up a stairway — a moment captured in a now-famous video.

Now, Douglas Jensen, the man who prosecutors say chased Goodman, claims he was misled into joining the deadly insurrection by QAnon, an extremist ideology the FBI has deemed a domestic terrorism threat.

“Jensen became a victim of numerous conspiracy theories that were being fed to him over the internet by a number of very clever people,” his attorney, Christopher M. Davis, wrote in a court filing on Monday asking for the 41-year-old Iowan to be released until his trial. “Six months later, languishing in a DC Jail cell, locked down most of the time, he feels deceived, recognizing that he bought into a pack of lies.”

A Black officer faced down a mostly White mob at the Capitol. Meet Eugene Goodman.

But Jensen also argued that prosecutors have misconstrued his role in the riot. Although he admits to carrying a pocketknife while pursuing Goodman, Jensen also claims in the new filings that he was simply there to “observe” the riot — and even argues that he was “threatened” by Goodman, who was honored with a Congressional Gold Medal for his heroism.

Jensen is just the latest Capitol riot suspect to express remorse and to blame QAnon or former president Donald Trump for inciting the deadly insurrection. So far, those lines of argument have failed to sway the federal judges overseeing the cases, as The Washington Post has reported.

Capitol riot defendants facing jail have regrets. Judges aren’t buying it.

Among the hundreds now charged in the Capitol riots, though, few had as visible a role as Jensen thanks to the viral video of Goodman’s standoff and the plaudits the Capitol Police officer later received for goading the mob away from the Senate chambers.

Jensen, a Des Moines native, traveled to D.C. for the rallies hosted by Trump supporters as Congress worked to certify President Biden’s victory. As the crowd coalesced into a violent mob, prosecutors said, he was “among the first … to push his way inside the United States Capitol.”

As captured in the video, prosecutors said, Jensen “led the crowd toward [Goodman] in a menacing manner” and repeatedly ignored his demands to stop. He later told police that he purposely jumped to the front of the crowd because he wanted his QAnon T-shirt to be prominently seen on TV, so that “Q” would “get the credit” for the insurrection.

Jensen turned himself in on Jan. 9 back in Des Moines. After holding him on a number of counts, including assaulting officers and civil disorder, prosecutors later added elevated charges including entering a restricted building with a dangerous weapon.

But in his new filings seeking to be released from custody, Jensen’s attorney casts his actions on Jan. 6 in a different light.

Describing him as a “blue-collar union laborer,” Jensen’s attorney said he became a “true believer” in QAnon “for reasons he does not even understand today.”

“In any event, he fell victim to this barrage of internet sourced info and came to the Capitol, at the direction of the President of the United States, to demonstrate that he was a ‘true patriot,’” the filing says.

Jensen’s attorney disputed claims that he played a significant role in the deadly violence inside the Capitol.

“Jensen was not an intended part of any group or mob at any time that day,” the filing claims. “He was at the front of the crowd, but in no way leading anyone.”

He also argues that the video shows Jensen never touched “anyone in an aggressive manner.”

“Even when threatened by Officer Goodman, armed with his baton hoovering over Jensen’s head, Jensen simply states, ‘I will take it for my country,’ ” his attorney wrote.

In the filing, Jensen asks to be released so his wife can pick him up and return him to Des Moines where he would remain on house arrest while working to support his family, which “is now suffering extreme financial hardship.”

There’s no indication in court records when a judge will rule on Jensen’s request.

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hanimmal said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/06/08/joe-biden-live-updates/#link-PV45CERUFBBHTAET4T4337QOME
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'QAnon Shaman' Jacob Chansley moved to federal prison for 'forensic evaluation'

NBC News reporter Scott MacFarlane reported Monday that the so-called "QAnon Shaman," Jacob Chansley, is being transferred from the jail in Alexandria, Virginia, to Colorado where he'll undergo a forensic evaluation, according to the Justice Department.Chansley, like many involved in the attack...

www.rawstory.com

hanimmal said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/06/08/joe-biden-live-updates/#link-PV45CERUFBBHTAET4T4337QOME
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schuylaar said:

this is going to be funny how they're trying to get out of this. QAnon Shaman cut all his hair and now looks like a cleaner version of Charles Manson. They're moving him here to Colorado Federal lock-up i wonder if he tried to make a break? it says psych eval and they have to move him that far?

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'QAnon Shaman' Jacob Chansley moved to federal prison for 'forensic evaluation'

NBC News reporter Scott MacFarlane reported Monday that the so-called "QAnon Shaman," Jacob Chansley, is being transferred from the jail in Alexandria, Virginia, to Colorado where he'll undergo a forensic evaluation, according to the Justice Department.Chansley, like many involved in the attack...

www.rawstory.com

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DIY-HP-LED said:

Fuck him, throw the book at him, if the cops were doing their jobs properly he's be dead with two rounds in his chest while he was walking towards them with his hands in the air and refusing to comply. He should have died on the capital steps along with many others, that would have ended that shit pretty fast and they would have run like rats freaking out all the way.

Next time anybody tries that kind of shit they will shoot them, rather than fist fight with them. If they were black protesters the cops would have run out of ammunition while they were running away off the steps.

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DIY-HP-LED said:

Fuck him, throw the book at him, if the cops were doing their jobs properly he's be dead with two rounds in his chest while he was walking towards them with his hands in the air and refusing to comply. He should have died on the capital steps along with many others, that would have ended that shit pretty fast and they would have run like rats freaking out all the way.

Next time anybody tries that kind of shit they will shoot them, rather than fist fight with them. If they were black protesters the cops would have run out of ammunition while they were running away off the steps.

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hanimmal said:

Our prisons are full of people who were taken advantage of by people who do not have their best interests in mind.


I am pretty proud of how our capital police didn't end up killing lots of people. I think that it is how all Americans should be treated.

12 Americans will decide this guy future, and that is good enough for me with this guy.

As for all of the people that took advantage by scamming all of these vulnerable people by trolling them into insanity. They should not be able to get away with it. They are the real ones that deserve to have the law applied to them fully IMO. And if they are found to have been working with foreign governments, they should be treated just like anyone else that is working with any foreign organization to attack our nation's citizens, again IMO.

We will see what happens.

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hanimmal said:

Our prisons are full of people who were taken advantage of by people who do not have their best interests in mind.


I am pretty proud of how our capital police didn't end up killing lots of people. I think that it is how all Americans should be treated.

12 Americans will decide this guy future, and that is good enough for me with this guy.

As for all of the people that took advantage by scamming all of these vulnerable people by trolling them into insanity. They should not be able to get away with it. They are the real ones that deserve to have the law applied to them fully IMO. And if they are found to have been working with foreign governments, they should be treated just like anyone else that is working with any foreign organization to attack our nation's citizens, again IMO.

We will see what happens.

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schuylaar said:

you got all that right..why WAS there just fist fighting and not mowing them down on the steps? WHY? if it was even you or me?

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schuylaar said:

why did some cops take their lives afterwards?

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DIY-HP-LED said:

Attack the capitol in an act of insurrection with most of the government inside and they deserved to die. The capitol hill police failed in their duty by not using deadly force on the steps, if they had succeeded and killed the government (no one knew what would happen then), then Trump would have been the only government in the USA, mission accomplished. It's just dumb luck, stupidity on their part and lack of a plan that it turned out the way it did. It did turn out for the best, but that was just luck, dump people and nothing more.

If they try that shit during Trump's trial at the courthouse in NY city, the cops will shoot the fuckers rather than fight a pitched unarmed battle inside the courthouse, or even on the steps. That's just a courthouse, not the seat of nearly the entire government of the USA including the VP, who they wanted to hang!

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hanimmal said:

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hanimmal said:

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My guess is that the trauma was very real and living through it shook them up, but really who knows. It could be that they were as deep in the conspiracy theories and saw the worst of it come alive and it lost so they were devastated putting everything on the line for the turd who was POTUS.

It is easy to assume the worst, but that is not usually reality when dealign with actual people.


That is the time of Wealthy Melanin-lite Heterosexual Human Male Only agenda type of thinking that got us here IMO.

I dont agree at all that the Capital police failed at their jobs. Those were American citizens most of which were conned by the POTUS to show up, if bullets start flying and those people were used as cover by the MAGA insurrectionists, it would have been far more horrifying than it was.

No elected or innocent citizens were harmed from what I have seen, and would point to that being why the Capital police succeeded in their job. It is the rest of the backup that should have been ordered by Trump or his political trolls that failed our nation.

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schuylaar said:

they could've let a few go in the air to back the crowd up and didn't but do you remember this spoiled child and what they did to everyone including Media?

the peaceful protesters.
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the spoiled child- i wonder if he had 2 scoops of chocolate on his cake that day to celebrate..you know he looked at everyone else's plate to make certain he was the only one who got 2.

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hanimmal said:

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Reacting to an interview Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg gave on CBS Thursday morning, where he attempted to defend his social media platform from accusations about allowing COVID misinformation to proliferate, MSNBC contributor Mike Barnicle related a story about a close friend he lost because they went down the Facebook rabbit hole of "crazy, crazy theories."

Speaking with host Joe Scarborough, Barnicle admitted he doesn't "even know" the unnamed friend anymore.

"Their algorithms still encourage the most controversial, craziest posts to share," host Scarborough offered. "And they just simply are not putting a big enough investment into getting more people to scan their own website to find this information.

"Joe, we will cover and talk about no sadder story than the story we're talking about right now. those children in Mississippi -- Mississippi is led by a governor who refuses to acknowledge, really, the extent of the dangers involved in covid," Barnicle began before getting personal.

"The roots of the misinformation, you're right, it's Facebook," he continued. "I'm not on Facebook, but a friend of mine who I've known for a long time, is on Facebook. and I no longer know this person because he has been so victimized by the level of misinformation that he's been absorbing each and every day now for over a year about the variants, about the virus, about the vaccinations."

"I no longer know this person, he's a captive to the information. The information and misinformation that he reads each and every day is addictive and supports his crazy, crazy theories about the dangers of the vaccination," he continued. "You multiply that by hundreds of millions of all people in this country and around the world, and Facebook is an active accomplice in the rising scale of fear and deaths due to the virus."

"There's no doubt about it, none, zero, no matter what Mark Zuckerberg says. None," he added.

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hanimmal said:

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hanimmal said:

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Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump have a lot in common. But here’s one similarity you probably haven’t thought of: A lot of their supporters trust Putin and Trumpmore than they trust their own families.

Let’s start with Vlad. In case you missed it, Sunday’s New York Times reported that some Ukrainians are facing “backlash from family members in Russia, who refuse to believe that Russian soldiers could bomb innocent people, or even that a war is taking place at all.”

One Russian father told his son, who actually lives in Ukraine, “There are Russian soldiers there helping people. They give them warm clothes and food.” And one Russian woman told her sister, who lives in Ukraine, that “No one is bombing Kyiv, and you should actually be afraid of the Nazis, whom your father fought against.”

Who are you going to believe: Something your dad saw on Putin’s state TV or your own lying eyes?

For Ukrainians fighting for their lives, these are not esoteric political disagreements between two family members with a similar claim to the truth. In this case, one group is getting its news from Russian propaganda outlets, while the other group is getting news firsthand—in the form of bombs, bullets, and rockets.

But hey, gotta hear both sides, right?

Of course, for American readers, the elephant in the room has orange hair and a comb-over. At the risk of conflating an authoritarian state where there is no independent media with Fox News viewers in the U.S., this New York Times piece reads like a giant subtweet.

Trump is never mentioned, and yet, there is an unspoken subtext. After all, a lot of us live in a world where a significant number of our friends and family still believe (often, despite pleas from family) that Donald Trump won the election and that Democrats are operating a vast pedophile ring.

And—as Ukrainians may soon learn—sometimes our refusal to endorse these delusions leads to familial estrangement.

“My dad’s cousins sent me a petition—a certified letter—saying they disowned me because I’m in ‘the devil’s army’ now,” Rep. Adam Kinzinger disclosed last year in an interview last year with Anthony Fisher (now my editor at the Beast). “It’s been crazy, when you have friends—that you thought were good friends that would love you no matter what—that don’t.”

Kinzinger, one of the few GOP members of Congress to resist Trump’s attempts to overturn the election, represents an extreme example. But numerous Americans have a similar story.

I’m not a congressman, but I, too, was stunned back in 2016 when most of my extended family started moving toward Trump. Then, days before the 2016 election, and after I told my mom that I feared Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, she voted for him.

I love my mom, but I was perplexed. If your family member worked in politics or journalism and personally knew many of the players, would you take his or her warnings to heart? Would you trust the lived experience of your flesh-and-blood relative (assuming he or she is a decent person who shares your general values) who has expertise regarding the topic over that of complete strangers on TV or radio?

After four years of Trump, my mom and one of her sisters decided to sit out the 2020 presidential election—unlike most of my large extended family, who happily pulled the lever again for Trump.

The main difference between mom and the rest is that she doesn't watch Fox News.

“The Fox News effect” is real. A few years ago, author Luke O’Neil interviewed people whose families were changed by Fox News.

One story involved a man who watched his Puerto Rican uncle “becoming a Fox News junkie, and turning on his own people,” as he put it, in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. “He was literally sitting in the dark and still defending Trump,” the nephew said. This story reminds me of the people who would rather die of COVID than betray their Trumpy politics by getting vaccinated.

As I write this, millions of people in Ukraine are enduring a brutal assault by one of the most powerful armies in the world, and some can’t get their Russian parents to believe it is even happening. The lesson here is that propaganda is powerful, and nobody is completely immune.

In the past, I thought the inability to distinguish truth from falsehoods occurred rarely, and only in delusional minds or cult members who needed to be deprogrammed. But this phenomenon is so pervasive that I am inclined to believe that simply preventing our own brainwashing may be the greatest individual responsibility of the modern media age.

Eventually, you are what you see and hear.

Now that Putin has shut down any trustworthy media outlets in the country, the people of Russia can be forgiven for believing misinformation.

What’s our excuse?

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