This is part of a statement put out by Chris LaCivita, a Trump campaign spokestroll:
For a despicable individual to physically prevent President Trump’s team from accompanying him to this solemn event is a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery. Whoever this individual is spreading these lies are dishonoring the men and women of our armed forces, and they are disrespecting everyone who paid the price for defending our country.
I don’t know what makes me angrier, his assault on the English language (it’s “hallowed,” you utter dipshit), or his pathetic attempt at DARVO.
Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender for anyone else who didn’t know.
Hollowed, like, they hollow out the place to put in the bodies, ya know?
Hollowed because he requires rigorous application of Getsuga Tenshou
Bank AI
Is it pathetic if it works on his intended audience?
Yes?
Hollowed made me laugh
Funny, I would say the ones dishonoring the men and women buried there were the ones who assaulted a woman so they could take campaign videos in a restricted section.
Whoever this individual is spreading these lies are dishonoring
Yeah, every time I read this to try to understand the grammar, I get a little dumber.
Stop treating these fucks with kid gloves for fucks sake. Press the goddamn charges! Quit being fearful of retaliation because that is exactly what the rapist and his cult want. This is frustrating.
The problem is that as a random cemetery worker who can’t afford bodyguards 24/7, pressing charges stands a significant chance of getting you killed.
And doing nothing only emboldens them.
For sure. But as an individual, it makes a lot of sense to hide instead of fight.
When fascism wins and starts rounding up people to be executed… Will you have the same attitude?
When your family is facing literal death by a fascist party, was it worth saving just your own family to begin with before they took power?
Because backing down emboldened them, then they took power, now they have control of all legal mechanisms, and now you and your family will die horrifically anyway.
Was it worth it?
You’re not the one facing the possibility that somebody will kidnap and torture and murder you, your kids, your spouse, etc. right now, with serious doubt as to whether law enforcement, neighbors, judges, and others will help them or take the side of the absuser.
It’s on the cemetery worker to make that call for themselves, and I don’t blame people who choose to run or hide instead of fight.
I do, because the people who can run or hide are not the most vulnerable in society, who get left behind to deal with the fascists.
Hurrican Katrina all over again. Fuck what happens to the poors, we gotta save ourselves!
with serious doubt as to whether law enforcement, neighbors, judges, and others will help them or take the side of the absuser.
And when Trump takes power, that’s going to get better?
That’s nice to say from the comfort of your own chair, when you’re not the one taking the risk.
But in the case of Hurricane Katrina, if people had all stayed they would’ve all died. There are groups of people all over who only survived genocide by others and total decimation by natural disasters because some fled.
I agree we should confront fascists if we are able. I have a collection of death threats from Nazis, myself. But not everyone has to be like me to be valid. Some people aren’t fighters, they flee. That’s fine. Or should we give pregnant women and 5 year olds guns?
If fascists have no one to hurt but each other, then they consume themselves. Fleeing involves the least amount of harm to innocent non-fascists versus fighting which gives them a common enemy to harm.
Armchair warrior.
Bravery is not a lack of fear, it’s rather the opposite.
Also, the temporary paranoia I’d suffer would pale in comparison to the life-long ass-kicking I would deal myself if I let this slide.
“First they came for the…” You know the rest.
“Yes, but maybe we can just trust The System and this whole fascism thing will just go away on its own without anyone having to do anything uncomfortable”… says/said nearly everyone with any power to influence whether it goes away.
Not that this unnamed employee pressing charges against a Trump underling is going to save Democracy, and really it’s more important that the government enforce the no-politicizing law, but it’s how this problem festers. We shouldn’t need to even be dealing with a third Trump campaign.
Ah yes, because *checks notes… telling people to do things like press charges is being an armchair warrior.
Also yes, because being in poverty and knowing deep in your heart half the people who say they support you would bail on the country entirely if it meant saving their own skins doesn’t make you tired of hearing it. Because if these people cared so much for each other, they might stand up for each other instead of turning tail and saying “save yourself” while doing nothing to help.
It’s like telling a drowning person to save themselves while holding tightly onto the life vest you could throw them.
Telling someone else to risk their life is what an armchair warrior does. It’s what you are doing.
Right with ya. I’d press charges, no hesitation. I’d also be a paranoid fucking mess of a human being, a gun within reach no matter where I was. Same room is not good enough, I mean an arm’s length away, tops. Running around the house, peeking out windows like a meth head on a 3-day binge.
Ironically, I might well decline to press my suit in a local matter. Pissing off the local cops? Now you got a permanent target on your back. These MAGA fuckers though, they seem to require numbers to get their pecker up. They also seem to only aim for governmental people and places.
As does the system of nothing happening to people like Trump, while also allowing him to use his platform to target his cult on his new “enemy”. We need a system that will treat a former president accused of assault the same way the cops would respond to an alleged assault with a minority involved.
Until the system is actually going to work for the victim instead of caring about the optics of the assailant (or their “help”), I don’t blame this woman for not wanting to put a target on herself for just doing her job and protecting the privacy/dignity of fallen soldiers and their families.
president accused of assault
I keep seeing this sort of comment, as if Trump himself was involved. I’m still not clear if he was present at the altercation. Anyone know exactly where he was during all this?
It was his campaign staff doing the assault, but you think their dear leader was just chilling in the car or something while this woman stepped in to shut down the illegal photoshoot happening? It was his campaign staff there illegally, I think that puts him on the hook for this.
In case you’ve forgotten, Trump has been more than accused of sexual assault.
Why the fuck can’t the police place charges anyway? Here in Canada any assault charge is automatic, it doesn’t require the victim to do anything. Is that not true in the US?
The government can press charges on your behalf, but if you’re resistant they will often let the matter drop. It’s really hard to win a case like this if the victim refuses to testify.
Yeah but there’s video evidence in this case
That being said, I don’t think the state should endanger a victim who is afraid for their safety and not consenting by making them go to trial
Depends on the state and sometimes city.
I’m not sure what Arlington Cemetery actually counts as for law enforcement, but it’s in Virginia, a former slave state.
Fun Fact: the property was confiscated from Robert E Lee following a tax dispute (they couldn’t pay the back taxes they owed from the Civil War)
https://www.history.com/news/arlington-national-cemetery-robert-e-lee-estate
You would sacrifice your life or your family to teach Trump a lesson?
Stormy Daniels could have disappeared very quietly. She chose to be a witness instead, and Trump has borne the fallout from that case seeing the light of day.
Look at all the #MeToo abusers who fell from power and public favor - their behavior was “known” publicly in their industry but not widely across the country - and so they remained in positions of power and influence to continue that abuse.
If Trump wins in November do you think he will spare your family that you protected by not teaching him a lesson?
Do you not think its cowardly to not stand up for your fellow citizens and instead stand for only yourself?
It’s like Hurricane Katrina all over again. “Just leave the poors to suffer, fuck em, we are rich and escaped so who cares.”
USA if falling apart because everyone cares about their own skins more than the collective.
SO…you WOULD get your children killed so a Trump staffer gets a slap on the wrist? How does that help the collective again?
The fact that no one even considers organizing in reverse to protect this person against the crazies is really revealing, you know.
Black Panthers started because they knew they couldn’t trust external forces to protect them.
Glad to know none of y’all will stand up for this persons family, and instead think them standing up to this would equal “killing their own kids” instead of you giving an inch and helping protect them.
Sorry, but you forgot to blame us all for Katrina again and therefore your point is invalid.
You’re the one calling her a coward. How is that protecting her? Start organizing and I’ll join you. Keep calling her a coward for refusing to step up with no protection and I’ll know you’re a hypocrite.
When has a MAGA fanatic gone out and attacked an individual that crossed Trump? I’m sure it’s happened, but I can’t think of a single incident. Does Pelosi’s husband count? That felt more like a, “kill libs” thing, and she was a much higher profile target than you and I ever will be.
I’d press charges, be scared shitless and have guns salted around the house like Easter eggs. My kids would be staying inside unless we drove away to get outdoors. And my wife’s pistol training would go from, “how to have fun safely” to “here’s how self-defense works”.
Shitty way to live? You fucking bet, but it would only be temporary, soon forgotten. A Trump Presidency would be permanent.
Man, fuck stochastic terrorism.
This. And if they having been paying any attention, they can see that someone like Nancy Pelosi was even vulnerable to an attack from these demons. They came for her, but got her husband. And that’s someone prominent like Nancy - imagine being a cemetary worker and knowing the kind of hate and vitriol and quite possibly, literal violence that would be aimed at you (and your family - these asshats are cowards to the core, of course).
What a shame the assassin missed.
There would undoubtedly be fallout, but the public really needs to remember that we are the ones allowing democracy to be shit on and destroyed in front of our eyes as Media across the country only cares about engagement.
It turns out letting America be held hostage by Fascists makes for good TV, and the 6 people who own almost every media outlet never forgot how great enslaved populations were for their bottom line.
Probably best that Trump survives to lose, and lose hard. Had be been assassinated, he’d be the perfect martyr and we’d never be free of MAGA. There’s no heir apparent ATM, but given the power vacuum his murder would have opened, bet they would have found one with the quickness. Pre-election, even a natural death would open doors. Plus, imagine the violence that would have erupted.
Right now we’re only seeing low-level stochastic terrorism, but I honestly think his most unhinged followers would have been hunting “enemies of the state” (read liberals) in the streets.
Conservatives loathe failures. Yet another Trump failure, they’re on the turning away. If Harris thoroughly whips his ass, watch a year from now, “Yeah, I never was a big fan of his.” Same as happened to Nixon. Sure, he had die-hard fans, but most of his people got real quiet, real quick.
This campaign is his last ditch, last gasp, chance to stay relevant. If, and I believe when, he loses in a landslide, he’s going to quickly spiral into history’s outhouse. Loss of personal freedom, money, power and influence, loss of followers, and loss of health on the heels of all that? He’s fucked.
Yes, the man has dodged accountability his whole life, but remove his power, money and influence, he’s going to be standing buck naked. The chickens are coming home to roost. I can hear them already.
I wish I could believe that we will ever be free of “MAGA”.
I mean, it doesn’t help when you know the vast majority of police officers, prosecutors, and judges lean to the right. I get what you’re saying though.
And so, the brown shirts are making them think twice. What a sad day for America as domestic terrorism wins.
Makes sense, Trump’s cult will come after you and will literally send you death threats.
Fucking USSR-level shit.
Moral of the story is that terrorism works. Remember this once voting no longer does.
We have to stand up to fascists even when they threaten us with violence otherwise the fascists win. There is no sign up sheet to stop fascism. There is no safe way to stand against fascists. There is no future worth living in under fascist rule. Fascists do not go away if the society that spawned them stays the same.
If threats to someone’s safety is where we decide our resistance to fascism ends that is where our freedoms end. We do not have to shame this woman, but we do have to disagree with her decision. If we allow her decision to be incorrectly labeled as a reasonable strategy for self-preservation then we will all be living in a christo-fascist dictatorship.
It’s liberty or death. That idea is one of the last remaining cornerstones of our democracy. If living is more valuable to use than freedom then we will be incapable of stopping the fascists.
Fascism proceeds one step at a time. One day you wake up and everything is different. Today is that day. The people saying to stand up to fascists got it right. The people calling them armchair warriors and telling people to choose life over liberty lost the plot. The fascists plan is to take power by any means necessary and then kill the people they hate indiscriminately. To stop them we must stand against them even if that means risking death.
Sorry, but some guy threatened another driver with a pipe in front of 10 cars in front of my house, and I was the only one to step in and I’m the only reason the situation didn’t escalate. And the only reason I can think of why I did so, is that I don’t have much to lose in practice.
It’s scary to intervene and despite your pandering, I suspect you’ve never been in a situation where you have to choose to put your life in danger (I’ve also done mountaineering/glacier travel and got a pilot licence which really opened my eyes up too).
It’s easy for you to disrespect her gracefully and talk crap when you’ve never been in a dangerous situation where you can choose to make a difference that might screw you permanently.
There are a million things that will run through your mind when you yourself are (ie, you will likely be advised by people that you could be in danger, etc). When the situation is outside of your control, you think differently.
You might disagree with her, but she has every right to protect herself. And she has every right to make that decision.
If I was in the same situation and my family was in danger, I’d make the same decision too.
It’s not because she wouldn’t want to do it, but, the decision may have been made to protect her family.
You brought up a personal story, which I appreciate. I am going to share my own as well. It is not my intention to compete with you. I have two stories I can share where I did intervene and was prepared to use violence. When presented with new evidence it became clear in both cases that violence was not the answer. Here’s the one that happened the earliest in my life that also happens to involve cars.
When I was in high school, either junior or senior year, I was hanging out with my friend by the school parking lot. We were waiting for the traffic to clear out. There were about ten people left in the area in total. I think while I had my back turned talking to a different friend, my friend spotted a guy trying to jack a car in the school parking lot with what looked like a metal ruler. I couldn’t believe someone would do that in broad daylight. I had to get a closer look. My friend said it wasn’t worth dying over a car. I said it wasn’t about the car and I didn’t want to live in the world where we did nothing. By then the eight guys nearby were walking with us. We surrounded the guy. It turned out the man was trying to break into his daughter’s car because she had locked herself out. Apparently this had happened more than once. I abruptly asked his daughter’s name and he immediately said his daughter’s name. My friend bought the guys story and he seemed to be telling the truth so we backed off.
The other story is more recent. I was alone in my apartment bedroom, a year or two before covid. I heard smashing noises and screaming coming from the apartment on the other side of the wall. I was tired and wasn’t sure if someone was being murdered or just being noisy. I threw on some stuff for going outside. I went to the neighbors’ apartment. The door was open and there was a guy sitting at the top of the stairs. He asked me who I was. I introduced myself. He asked me to be more specific. He then seemed really concerned when I told I was one of his neighbors. It turned out his 18 year old daughter was throwing a temper tantrum and was breaking stuff. He shouted multiple times to his daughter that there was an uber driver to pick her up. I could hear her clearly in the background asking what he meant by that. I said good luck with that and I left.
I am not going to analyze our stories. I bring this up to show that I do have the kind of criteria that you seem to think is required to discuss this topic. My point is that it’s not a requirement. We have nothing to do with what we are discussing. This is about how people as a society respond to threats from fascists.
The woman in question is also not relevant to this discussion. Her choice is. That is it. It is not my intention to talk shit about this woman nor do I think any energy should be put towards that end.
Self-defense is when a person defends themselves from an attacker. What society would be doing by agreeing with her choice is saying that when push comes to shove people should trade liberty for life. There can be no resistance to fascism without risking all of our lives, because fascists will threaten everyone and anyone.
If people want a future that is worth living in for future generations then people as a society must uphold the idea of liberty or death. Society must accept the idea that people would be better off dead than in a fascist dictatorship or else people will end up in a fascist dictatorship. Liberty must be held above human life or else liberty will be lost.
This means being willing to risk every child. There is no life worth living under tyranny. Life under fascist rule is hollow and meaningless. If we trade in liberty for life then future generations will have a pointless existence. People should want future generations to have lives worth living.
The good news is that the Army put out a statement backing up the woman and criticizing the behavior of Trump and his campaign staffers. At the very least the Army stood up to Trump in writing.
Snowden and Assange did that and look how that worked out.
Trump and the MAGA movement are the fascists. Snowden and Assange didn’t stand against them. In fact, what happened to them is very likely to happen to lots of people if the fascists take power.
I think the point is, based on how well it went for those two, most people aren’t as inclined to act.
Ethics are all well and good, but it’s your loved ones that often pay the price In some way.
So it’s not illegal then, seeing as there are no consequences for doing it.
It’s illegal for Democrats.
Isn’t having knowledge of a felony enough for a public prosecutor to indict someone independent of the victim?
That’s how it works in Germany at least - if the authorities get information about a criminal offense, they are obliged to start a criminal investigation. A victim not pressing charges only matters in terms of a civil lawsuit.
There were two separate crimes here.
The crime of abusing the ANC for a political photo and the crime of physically assaulting someone who worked for the ANC.
The crime of abusing it for political purposes is currently being ignored and the person assaulted has chosen to not press charges for the assault.
Isn’t this Army jurisdiction? Is pressing charges even relevant?
Oh yeah actually good point. Probably still relevant since it involves a civilian though, it’s not like civilians can be tried through military court afaik
Although I wonder if he could claim he was acting as Trump’s agent. Trump, being a former guy who tried to overthrow the government and technically former Commander in Chief of the military, maybe could be court martialed, right? If this is considered an attack by him, like a coup, on our Armed Forces?
After review by any of these intermediate courts, the next level of appeal is the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF).[17][21] The Supreme Court of the United States has discretion under 28 U.S.C. § 1259 to review cases under the UCMJ on direct appeal where the CAAF has conducted a mandatory review (death penalty and certified cases), granted discretionary review of a petition, or otherwise granted relief.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uniform_Code_of_Military_Justice
Idk. I doubt they will do anything regardless. But interesting thought experiment for sure.
Assuming the only evidence for physical assault isn’t just the victims statements (but even then), I feel that both crimes are currently being ignored.
To go back to the example of Germany: If you accuse someone of a crime (directed against your physical well-being or property) here, towards authorities (e.g. police) and then say “but I don’t want to press charges”, that no longer matters - they are obliged to record a report of a potential criminal offense and leave it to a judge to decide on how to proceed.
In the UK, you can’t decide whether to ‘press charges’ or not, the decision is the CPS’s.
But in practice, saying you aren’t interested in pursuing a conviction often ends it, because:
1 - the prosecution must be ‘in the public good’ which is undermined if the victim isn’t interested
2 - a lot of the time the testimony and cooperation of the victim is key to the prosecution case
3 - the system is horribly underfunded so if they can justify dropping it they will
CPS is? City Prosecutor … ??
as to 1) - that’s judged differently in Germany - in part to protect victims of domestic violence who will often “change their mind and not want to” press charges after filing an initial report.
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in that case, yes - but again, if it’s a criminal offense, the victim has an obligation to testify, even if they have no interest
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I have no idea how the funding of our judicial branch looks like atm
ah right - forgot UK still has one foot in the medieval ;) thanks for the clarification!
One foot? More like five feet ten inches!
I was thinking figuratively of the UK as a person, and of persons as bipeds…
Ah, I was referring to the current owner of the crown.
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The CPS only does this for England and Wales not the whole of the UK. In Scotland the procurator fiscal prosecutes crimes and in Northern Ireland it is the Public Prosecution Service
Trump is a cunt and anybody who ever voted for him is a cunt.
I know it’s obvious and everybody already knows it but I saw his abortion of a face on my feed so now you have to hear it again.
Don’t disservice abortions by comparing them to Trump. Abortions save lives, Trump doesn’t.
He also lacks the depth and warmth to be a cunt.
I would press charges. This just shows bullying works.
Isn’t it up to the local district attorney to press charges? Usually they won’t go ahead if the victim won’t cooperate, but that doesn’t mean they can’t.
IANAL, but I believe that is only a thing in Commonwealth states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Virginia. In normal states, I don’t believe it is standard practice for the state to pick up the charge if the victim refused to prosecute.
Good thing Arlington is in Virginia then… Oh wait, fucking youngkin
This is how fascists win, by being free from consequences.
This is why it works
They really can ruin your life; ask Michael Cohen or Gabby Giffords
Paul Pelosi or Gretchen Whitmer likely have something to say on the matter as well.
I still don’t understand why any human but the worst would even consider voting for this maggot.
Bullies and thier wannabes.
Only the worst humans vote for him. The issue is that American society is full of shitheads.
Donald Trump just threatened Mark Zuckerberg with jail for life because he THINKS Facebook could be used against him.
Zuckerberg is in Trump’s fucking pocket already.
Trying to save yourself by not pressing charges won’t make Trump forget your face, your name, or the fact that you told him “No,” once in his life, which is enough for him to want to destroy your life entirely.
Everyone who said this person is protecting themselves and their family is missing the point that if Trump takes power in November he will absolutely go out of his way to ruin this person’s fucking life (and their families lives) even though they didn’t press charges.
Is that fucking worth it? To save your family for a short time just for fascists to never forget you told them no and ruin your fucking life anyway?
He is willing to attack people who are literally in his fucking pocket and threaten to jail them for life. He has worse in mind for this person. I guarantee it.
Spoken with the easy courage of someone whose family isn’t in the crosshairs
I agree with you that this should be a HUGE deal, but if the institutions who are the ones actually responsible for going after Trump are not going to act, why should this one guy be responsible to take a purely futile stand about it that might get him killed? I agree that he is not safe whatever he does, but amping up the conflict will make him less safe.
If you don’t think these asshats will dox and harass this person anyway without even pressing charges, I’ve got a bridge to fucking sell you.
They told Trump “no,” that’s enough of a crime in the eyes of these right wing freaks.
Further, no one is saying they need to do it alone. If asshats can organize to harass them, can’t we organize to protect them? This is literally what I mean by nobody will back each other up. Instead of organizing as a group to protect that person, we act like it’s their personal responsibility to fight it and then go “oh shucks” when they don’t. Jeeze, maybe it’s because we didn’t back them up.
Isn’t that why the Black Panthers fucking existed, because they knew they couldn’t trust the cops?
But I guess organizing and protecting people like that is too much to ask.
We could organize to get Trump some consequences for any number of the explicitly treasonous things he has done, without involving some third party in the potentially deadly consequences if they don’t want to become further involved than they are. Nothing was ever preventing that.
Nothing was ever preventing that.
Gotcha, so this is a tacit admission everyone in the USA is just a giant pussy out to save themselves, with no concern for the collective. Because we’ve been turning our tails and letting Trump get away with what-the-fuck-ever for literally over a decade now.
No wonder this country is falling to fascism.
Our communities were sold, literally, to capitalism and marketing. Free community spaces and events are encroached on every day. That’s why they want to defend libraries, for instance - too much free shit being given out. You can’t even organize at a library because you’re supposed to be quiet there. It’s just that capitalism seeks capital in everything including free services. So it takes little bites off everything until we don’t have benches or bathrooms or trash in parks anymore because we can instead force people to pay to use those services at the nearby gas station or whatever.
This country is falling to fascism because we literally do not have things like free spaghetti socials anymore. We have no community. If the cemetery worker had neighbors who cared about her and were part of her community, they’d look out for her and she’d be safe.
What have you done?
Bruh, you weren’t even willing to risk your bank account to set up a gofundme for the lady, but here you are telling her to risk her life? Aren’t you also in the same group, then?
Courage isn’t easy. Fear is the very definition.
All it takes for evil men to triumph…
