Seems that some of the “suspects,” to use the safe, sanitary and official term, who participated in the January 6th Washington, DC, insurrection are having second thoughts about the consequences of that act. According to the AP, via Yahoo! News, two of the more easily recognizable characters, Josiah Colt, the guy who dangled from the front of the Senate building while in battle gear, and Jacob Chansley, the self-styled “QAnon Shaman,” have both asked forgiveness from … the public? the Congress people whose lives they threatened ? The Judicial System they were all too eager to ignore and overthrow? The Federal Government, the disdain for which they clearly exhibited? All of the above?
According to the article, Colt recorded a video while being driven to a Boise, Idaho jail, apologizing for his actions. Chansley wrote his mea culpa from jail itself. They’re not alone. Seems they and others have come to the realization that their actions might just have consequences not good for their welfare, such as
Confronted with compelling video and photographic evidence in court, dozens of rioters have apologized and expressed regret as the consequences of their actions have started to sink in. The ramifications include potential job losses, financial ruin and possible time behind bars.
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Another possible consequence for Colt and others captured in photographs that went viral before they even left the Capitol building: ignominy beyond their lifetimes as those images make their way into history books.
But what about the children?
Dominic Pezzola, for instance, who broke a Capitol window with a police shield, now cries that his wife and kids are “in dire financial straits” from his loss of income while being incarcerated. Even more, employees of the flooring installation business Pezzola manages are no longer working either. And he, too, swears he’s sorry. Pezzola’s attorney states:
Pezzola, ... was sorry for his actions, which included posting a video giving a triumphant speech inside the Capitol while smoking a “victory” cigar.
Apparently these angry, violent people believe, perhaps like their mothers taught them, that when you do something wrong, you say “I’m sorry” and you’re forgiven. And that if you hold up your wife, children and employees as shields, you can’t be punished for your illegal acts.
Or perhaps they’re pleading to the apparent Christian principle that forgiveness must be given when asked for by the truly penitent. (It helps greatly if they’re White and also Christian.)
I have to wonder what these insurrectionists thought would have happened after they took the Capitol. The Federal Government would have just folded and the rioters gone home to victory parades? The Democratic Party would have been outlawed, under penalty of death, by a Trump executive order, because obviously he would remain in power.
Or that there might be push back by the armed forces in which some of them could have been killed, leaving their families and employees in even a worse situation. Maybe they were just too intoxicated, figuratively and/or literally, to even consider such an outcome to be possible.