Halloween Armageddon

Okay, the title of today's post is "Halloween Armageddon" which is the title of a Doctor Who episode but this is not a Doctor Who post.

(A Doctor Who post is coming up on Wednesday.) 

But today is Halloween and I want to talk about what is scary.

Halloween is a time to have fun with things that might scare us, ghouls and goblins and things that do bump in the night, that sort of thing. 

I've never really been big on movies, TV shows and stories designed for the explicit purpose of trying to frighten me. 

Especially when there's so much in real life to be scared about.

Take for instance what happened to Paul Pelosi, husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).  Paul was assaulted in his San Francisco home by a maniac with a hammer.  

Paul Pelosi who is like 82 years old or something suffered several injuries but appears he will make a recovery. 

Charged with attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse and burglary is 42-year-old named David DePape. 

Wanna guess who this guy is? C'mon, guess! 

OK, if you guessed, a right wing conspiracy theory spouting QAnon nutcase, well, you guess correctly. 

Mr. DePape reportedly entered the house calling out, “Where is Nancy? Where is Nancy?” Which you many recall was a chanted refrain from the insurrectionists invading the US Capitol on January 6th. 

There has been some considerable concern about the rhetoric of violence from far right fringe groups would result in actual violence. The FBI has been investigating an escalating number of threats of violence against politicians, particularly Democrats. 

With the attack on Paul Pelosi shows how threats of violence can move to actual violence.   

With right wing nut cases spewing hate and vitriol on an around the clock basis, demonizing Democrats and even Republicans who don't hold the party line or subvert themselves to Donald Trump, it is an inevitability that people will be driven to commit violence and coercion under the threat of violence.  

Get a load of this shit going down in Arizona.    

Members of a right-wing activist group calling itself Clean Elections USA are gathering at ballot boxes in Maricopa County. These people are masked, armed and wearing military-style tactical gear. 

A judge ruled these guys were protected by their first amendment rights and nothing going here looks like voter intimidation.

What the hell?  

These assholes are masked, armed and wearing military-style tactical gear. How is this not voter intimidation?  

And the judge making this ruling is Judge Michael Liburdi, who was appointed by Donald Trump. Which fucking tells you all you need to know about that. 

Who needs fictional frights of monsters and creatures of the night when this is the damn world we live in now? 

How can we enjoy Halloween when we're on the precipice  of a very real Armageddon for our American democracy?