Correction

On January 8, 2021 I wrote a post including this tweet, containing President-elect Biden's comments on the January 6 riot.

Biden: "No one can tell me that if it had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting yesterday, they wouldn't have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol. We all know that's true, and it is unacceptable. Totally unacceptable." pic.twitter.com/TfWa25VzEt

— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 7, 2021

In that post I characterized Biden's remarks this way: "This is as inaccurate, misleading and inflammatory as anything said by Donald Trump."

Recently going back and linking to this post in the course of writing another post, I realized my statement was in error and wanted to acknowledge it on the second anniversary of the post.

Biden's statement was actually accurate.  If it had been a BLM group, or any other group opposing the election of Donald Trump, they would have been treated very, very differently from the mob which stormed the Capitol.  We all do know that is true and it is totally unacceptable.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because if a white Capitol police officer had shot and killed an unarmed black woman attempting to enter the Capitol through a broken window we would have had an immediate national outcry, we would have quickly known the name of the officer, public investigations would have commenced, and drumbeat of media coverage.  Instead a black Capitol police officer shot and killed an unarmed white woman attempting to enter the Capitol (the only person killed that day) and the overall reaction was that she got what she deserved, it took months to identify the officer, and details of the DOJ "investigation" were never revealed.  The New York Times was upset that her body was not left on the Capitol steps as carrion for the crows as an object lesson to others (yes, that is sarcasm, but not far off).  Talk about privilege.(1)

We know Biden's statement was accurate because, unlike what many people seem to believe, only one Capitol police officer died in the line of duty during 2021, and it was not on January 6.  On April 2, 2021, 19 year veteran William (Billy) Evans, who was white, was killed when struck by a vehicle deliberately driven into the barriers surrounding the Capitol.  When the driver emerged wielding a knife he was shot and killed by other police.  If you were on twitter that day or watching the news wire there was a brief moment of palpable excitement in the news media, as they speculated a MAGA type was attempting another assault on the Capitol.  You can sense the disappointment when it turned out the attacker was a black nationalist follower of Louis Farrakhan and the story quickly disappeared because it had the wrong narrative and perpetrator. Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because the story has reappeared and made to fit the desired narrative.  By none other than President Joe Biden!  Two days ago, speaking on the second anniversary of January 6, the President stated that Officer Evans was killed as a result of "threats by these sick insurrectionists".  So, even an officer killed by a black nationalist was really killed by MAGA types!  Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because on May 31 and June 1, 2020 rioters protesting the death of George Floyd tried to storm the grounds of the White House, injuring sixty Secret Service and police, sending eleven of them to the hospital.  The focus of the media and the Democrats was on criticizing the effort to defend the White House grounds and also in taking great glee in pointing out President Trump was "hiding" in the White House command center.  In contrast to January 6, the media and Democrats expressed horror when efforts were made to clear out the "mostly peaceful" protestors and simply paid no attention to the injured law enforcement personnel.  And, if the protestors had been successful in entering the White House, the media and Democrats would have treated it as a "day of reckoning" sparking "needed conversation" about American history.  Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because of the experience of 2020's "Summer of Mostly Peaceful Protests", which left 30 dead and $2 billion in property damages.  When it turned out that cities run by Progressives for decades were cesspools of racism, in which generations of minority children had been condemned to serve time in failing schools, their response was to order police to stand down, while the Progressive paramilitary wing was allowed to run wild, ransacking and destroying the properties of law abiding citizens, mostly minorities, destroying livelihoods, with the longer term consequences of increased crime and violence in these vulnerable communities.  And those who tried to object were threatened with the loss of their jobs and careers and shut down by social media.  Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because, during the summer of 2020, the media went out of its way to pretend it wasn't even happening, claiming the protests were "mostly peaceful" and 93% non-violent (by that standard, I don't know why anyone would be concerned about Covid since the best estimates are more than 99% of those infected will survive).  Here's a report from an honest progressive about what's happened in our cities.  Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because when Antifa spent 50 nights trying to break into the Federal building in Portland (and did the same in other cities though not as persistently) with arson and other violent attacks, outlets like the New York Times studiously avoided reporting, except to blame the Trump administration when it reacted to protect the buildings.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because during the campaign Joe Biden denied that Antifa was a real thing and Biden and Harris staffers contributed to bail funds to allow these thugs to go free while Progressive mayors and judges dropped charges against these creatures. Kamala Harris actually used her twitter feed to encourage followers to contribute to a Minnesota bail fund to spring members of the Democratic Party's paramilitary wing from jail.  Talk about privilege.

We know Biden's statement was accurate because, in contrast to the summer of 2020 rioters and protestors, the January 6 rioters and protestors have been vigorously prosecuted, and often held for long periods without bail, and generally sentenced much more severely than the 2020 lawbreakers.  One example - a January 6 protestor who was not accused of any violent act, entering the Capitol through an open door, who went into the Senate parliamentarian's office and stole a bottle of brandy and a coat rack was sentenced to three years in prison.  Meanwhile, the two people of color who during the Floyd riots in New York City, threw a Molotov cocktail into the back of a police car, were sentenced to only fifteen months, after the Department of Justice took the unusual step of changing their earlier guilty pleas and repleading to lesser charges.  Talk about privilege. (2)

I'm glad my recent post caused me to re-examine the post of January 8, 2021 and realize my characterization of Biden's remarks was inaccurate, prompting this corrective post.  The President-elect was spot on and, as noted above, we have many proof points in support of his claims.

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(1) Regarding January 6, I made my views clear in a post of that date, and, in the January 8 post referenced above, the first part contains additional comments on those events while later in that same post I wrote "The bottom line is you should be shocked by yesterday's events and repulsed by Trump's behavior" and that I "would have supported Capitol police firing on anyone who attempted to enter as part of that mob".

(2) We find further confirmation of Biden's statement in his appointment of Kristen Clarke as chief of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice.  Ms Clarke does not interpret the provisions of the Civil Rights Acts as being applicable to white people.  Talk about privilege.