> I don't think America has seen this before

I think that says more about how boring & peaceful the late twentieth century was. The number of people old enough to remember more interesting times is declining quickly.

As a sidenote, this is probably why our Covid response has been so awful. We have no real living memory of a collective calamity.

Half of the Union literally seceded because it didn't like the winner of the 1860 presidential election.

That...is a pretty revisionist take on the civil war. More popular is the opinion that the south wanted to perpetuate chattel slavery for economic gain, masquerading beneath ‘states rights’.

I mean, damn, there’s a reason Buchanan is said to have caused the war—and it’s not that he just happened to have been president before Lincoln.

I didn't mean to imply slavery wasn't the motivator - but the trigger was the election of a (moderate-ish) anti-slavery president from an anti-slavery party, who explicitly called for the end of admitting new slave states to the Union. Secessions all happened between Lincoln's election and his inauguration, and the declarations of causes almost all cited Lincoln's election as proof of Northern anti-slavery intent.

Similarly, the refusal to accept Trump's loss is rooted in deep gulfs on identity and to a lesser extent on issues. I don't think you can separate the end-of-the-world paranoia from attitudes on BLM, for example.

There was a little matter of the Civil War that might deserve some of your attention.

The people that lived through the American Revolution would strongly disagree with you that the current situation is worse.

I didn't say it was worse or better, just that it's not the same.

What are you suggesting by "the vote didn't matter?" Just because they might believe Trump's lies about the most recent election doesn't mean their emotions are justified.

> What are you suggesting by "the vote didn't matter?" Just because they might believe Trump's lies about the most recent election doesn't mean their emotions are justified.

I believe, they believe the election was rigged. Justified or not, it doesn't stop them from doing stuff.

Isn't the remedy to that to show them less of the guy who's been lying to them? How will allowing him to continue lying and myth building avoid further violence?

You could also have investigated voter fraud. You know, the whole reason why they came there to protest in the first place. That's an option. You will likely dismiss it because you've been told that there is no voter fraud, but dismissing something doesn't actually address it. Nothing about the objections brought up when states like Pennsylvania were being reviewed was actually addressed by the so-called winning side.

1) Why would it be necessary to investigate where there has been no evidence to show that an investigation is even warranted? Where does the line get drawn?

2) Even if they did investigate it clearly wouldn't work. These conspiracies are self sealing - lack of proof is itself proof. If you're capable of rigging an entire election, then of course you will be able to do it without leaving any evidence.

I wonder why Kris Kobach keeps coming home empty handed from his fishing trips

There is nothing to investigate. Did you read any of the affidavits filed with the so-called "fraud" lawsuits? There were election observers complaining that they saw lots of military ballots for Biden, which is proof of fraud because they "knew" military members were "supposed" to vote for Trump. There was another observer who complained that he saw an Asian person working the polls, which was proof that the CCP had infiltrated the elections. The lawsuits were just hundreds and hundreds of pages of conspiratorial nonsense like that. The lawyers filing these things are QAnon cultists.

How do you "investigate" allegations like that? If you've really fallen for this scam then you have been thoroughly brainwashed by the far right internet.

Everyone came forward with whatever they thought was suspicious, but we're at the point now where things that even sound like "voter fraud claim" are automatically dismissed.

Take for example, this: https://mapthefraud.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DATASCIENC/pag....

If the thousands of votes here were fraudulent, the quantity is sufficiently high to assume that some organization is trying to interfere with the election. If there is an organization capable of creating thousands of fraudulent votes in this instance, then what instances are we unaware of that the same organization is also involved with.

I'm not asking for a 2-year investigation based on allegations of a pee pee video recorded in a Russian hotel, I'm just asking for:

"Republicans opposing Wednesday's electoral count have one proposal to deal with the controversy — that Congress delay action for 10 days so an "emergency" electoral commission can audit the results and investigate voter fraud claims in the contested states."

https://www.npr.org/sections/congress-electoral-college-tall...

Spurious speculation does not qualify as evidence under the burden of proof you would need to delay a Constitutionally mandated certification. You're explicitly calling for throwing away the Constitutional process.

They had 2 months to litigate those claims, why do they need 10 more days? After 10 days are they going to invent more nonsense claims and then insist they need more time? Delay the inauguration indefinitely?

> Take for example, this:

More crank garbage. The voting histories of every voter are public domain, if you think there are more votes than voters why are you trying to scrape some random web portal through questionable methods instead of checking the voting records directly?

If this allegation were really credible can you point me to a lawsuit filed by an by a plaintiff with standing (e.g. Trump or another Michigan candidate who allegedly had the election stolen from them, NOT some 3rd party QAnon crank) that presents this allegation to a court? If no such lawsuit exists why do you think that is the case? Maybe because no competent lawyer wants to destroy their reputation by arguing obviously fake conspiracy theories in front of a judge?