Political Irony

Today there is a story that is pretty much a canonical example of irony.

The story comes from CNN, who note that one of the people charged in the January 6 insurrection and riot was caught on video using a bullhorn to heckle Capitol Police by saying that they were “protecting pedophiles”. This appears to be a reference to bizarre QAnon theories about Democrats.

However, in a true case of “I know you are, but what am I?” it turns out that the protestor with a bullhorn is a convicted pedophile who served jail time for having sex with a 14-year-old girl when he was 23. That’s also known as “statutory rape”. At the time of the Capitol riot, he was also on probation for other crimes and has an extensive criminal record. He is currently charged with 8 crimes during the riot, including spraying police with a chemical irritant, and inciting riot with the bullhorn.

Many of the insurrectionists also have previous criminal records, and some of them were also on parole or probation at the time of the riot. That, of course, has not stopped Republicans from pushing the lie that the participants in Jan 6 were law-abiding citizens who were simply exercising their right to protest.