ROGER KIMBALL: Who’s a vigilante anyway?
But of course, the agreement was only rhetorical, not to say disingenuous. It was a little smoke bomb deployed to make room for a distinction made by Garry Wills that deeply impressed the Bezos Bobblehead.
“American distrust of government” [Wills noted] comes in different forms. At one end of the spectrum are insurrectionists, who “take arms against the government because it is too repressive.” At the opposite end are vigilantes, who “take arms to do the government’s work because the authorities are not repressive enough.” They become “vigilant,” Wills writes, in times when they believe “the government is too slow, indifferent, or lax.”
Translation: we do not circa 2021 have enough government in our lives. We need the state to be bigger, more intrusive, more censorious. We need more police bursting into Arby’s and handcuffing patrons for not being vaccinated. We need more social media censorship against people who dissent from The Narrative, especially if they are now or have ever been supporters of Donald Trump. Do you think that it was right that Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted? Then you are part of the problem.
Inquiring minds might wonder where this chap was in the summer of 2020 when gangs of Black Lives Matter roamed city streets throughout the country, smashing up property, setting the Minneapolis police station ablaze in their “mostly peaceful” protests. Those gangs murdered or maimed scores of people and caused an estimated $2 billion damage. Were they not “vigilantes” protesting the death of career criminal (now Saint) George Floyd? Where was left-wing media then?
Ah, but the Capitol is the sacrosanct citadel of “our democracy,” as Nancy Pelosi kept babbling. It’s one thing to torch a police station or federal building, quite another to intrude about the hallowed halls of the Capitol.
But then where was our scribe and his brethren when the mob, which included Senator Karen (h/t Elon Musk), stormed the Capitol to protest the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court and intimidate some still wavering senators? Where were those defenders of The Narrative then?
That’s different, because reasons.
Related: Actor Jay Johnston Banned From ‘Bob’s Burgers’ Over Capitol Riot. The ‘Mr. Show’ and ‘Anchorman’ actor will no longer be voicing the character of Jimmy Pesto Sr. on Fox’s animated hit after he was allegedly spotted at the Jan. 6 insurrection.