Minnesota U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar’s guest for the State of the Union address was removed from the chamber during President Trump’s speech and later arrested.
“My guest, Aliya Rahman, stood up silently in the gallery during the president’s speech for a short period of time, part of which other guests were also standing. For that, she was forcibly removed, despite warning officers about her injured shoulders and ultimately charged with ‘Unlawful Conduct,’" Omar said in a statement.
Rahman, a Bangladeshi American, was dragged out of her vehicle by federal agents in Minneapolis last month on the way to a medical appointment. Rahman testified at a Congressional forum that she was dragged through the street and suffered severe injuries to her shoulders, leaving her unable to lift her arms normally.
Omar claims Rahman was treated aggressively again last night.
“Reports indicate she was aggressively handled until someone intervened to secure medical attention. She was taken to George Washington University Hospital for treatment and later booked at the United States Capitol Police headquarters,” Omar said. "The heavy-handed response to a peaceful guest sends a chilling message about the state of our democracy. I am calling for a full explanation of why this arrest occurred.”
While it feels deeply satisfying to say that and even applaud you, I’ll do a hot take:
Your country probably has almost or exactly as many deranged morons as we do here with MAGA, per capita. The difference is we’ve weaponized voter disenfranchisement and bipartisan hackery (crucially including gerrymandering), largely abandoned ethical journalism standards, and never really properly dealt with the aftermath of our civil war, what with shaming our traitors and educating and rebuilding the nation. We were able to get away with all of that because we toot our own horn so hard for so long about being the bastion of democracy, and the world largely agreed with us.
So we still have backwoods y’allQaeda training grounds who vote Trump because anyone with a (D) is the (D)evil, and their vote counts more than someone in an educated area due to the electoral college system.
TL;DR: MAGA isn’t special - other countries have AfD, FdI, etc., which are all rising in popularity despite you turning your nose up at us for us being uniquely ridiculous.
Not really. All democratic countries understood the fragility and flaws of their systems. Only the US went around tooting their own horn and dared call themselves a “bastion of democracy”. “End of history”, “Leader of the Free World” and all similar bullshit. Pride before the fall. At best, the rest of the world tolerated it as aspirational. Like when a low IQ child says they want to be an astronaut when they grow up. The adults don’t want to crush a kid’s dreams. We hope you guys would believe it enough to make it mostly true.
To Mark Carney’s Davos speech - The rest of the world pretended it was sorta true, even when we knew it wasn’t. We hoped maybe your shit would get better but it was just apathy, convenience and momentum on our parts. A great many around the world were calling the US out as psychotically fucked and terminally corrupt long before Trump.
You make an excellent point about all the neofascist groups and maga type morons around the world. But everyone has long acknowledged these risks and your point has been in the public debate since forever. Most other western democracies have held them back to date, and they deserve credit for that. Even when right wing parties win, they are still largely constrained in what they can do. The US doesn’t anymore.
I turn my nose up at you, because you let the patients take over the insane asylum. The US is now the premiere threat to my country. I don’t take vacations or jobs in Russia, Israel, China, North Korea, Iran and the like either. I talk shit about all of them at every opportunity too and none of them want to annex us. That you feel singled out like you are being treated as “uniquely ridiculous” just smacks of american hubris.
Is that why pretty much every Western country but France went virtually all-in on investing in our armament without developing their own? Sounds like Trump 4D Chess to me.
Mocking hindsight. You say that because the dream turned out to be a fiction. If it had done better, you’d never have said this.
TL;DR: “I knew those were going to be the winning lottery numbers. Ignore that I bought another ticket number entirely.”
No? Again, AfD, FdI, The Tories in the UK, etc. etc. are all gaining on rational, liberal democratic forms of government. They haven’t won yet, but they’re closing alarmingly fast.
TL;DR: You’re in a house with a fire in the kitchen laughing at your neighbor for being so utterly stupid to let their entire house catch on fire. Give it ten minutes and we’ll be in the same situation.
The irony, of course, is that you mock the American Exceptionalism that led to our imminent demise while implying we are unique in our failure, which makes you especially vulnerable to the same arrogant fall that we’re undergoing. As is the case in scams, the best marks are the ones that think they’re above getting taken advantage of.
No one is laughing.
Edit: Your country is no longer a joke, its a tragedy.
Okay, if you can’t handle that part of the metaphor, I’ll fix it for you:
You’re in a house with a fire in the kitchen
laughingturning your nose up at your neighbor for being so utterly stupid to let their entire house catch on fire.That better? Please don’t say your country is not technically on fire. I’m not tailoring the metaphor for you again.
You didn’t read or understand anything I said. Every country is well fucking aware of the risks. It’s always been on the public debate record. My point is that only the US has terms like “American Exceptionalism.” Methinks thou dost protest too much.
My point is that we’re not so different.
Your point is that (Americans all think) we’re so different, despite me saying we aren’t and showing we aren’t.
Your version of the truth is much more convenient for you because it means you have nothing to worry about in your own back yard, so we’re not likely to see eye to eye on this any time soon.
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