With a hammer
A lot of lies being pushed about the Pelosi attack:
False claims are being spread online about the assailant who broke into the home of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and attacked her husband with a hammer on October 28. Authorities have stated that the suspect, David DePape, broke a glass door of the home and entered with a hammer, zip ties and other supplies, intending to kidnap the Democratic lawmaker, who was not present. DePape instead confronted Paul Pelosi and struck him with a hammer before he was tackled by officers and arrested.
Authorities have indeed stated that. The Department of Justice for instance has stated it:
A California man was charged today with assault and attempted kidnapping in violation of federal law in connection with the break-in at the residence of Nancy and Paul Pelosi in San Francisco on Friday.
According to the complaint, David Wayne DePape, 42, of Richmond, was arrested on Friday inside the Pelosi residence by San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) police officers responding to a 911 call from Paul Pelosi, husband of U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Paul Pelosi later described to police that he had been asleep when DePape, whom he had never seen before, entered his bedroom looking for Nancy Pelosi.
According to the complaint, minutes after the 911 call, two police officers responded to the Pelosi residence where they encountered Paul Pelosi and DePape struggling over a hammer. Officers told the men to drop the hammer, and DePape allegedly gained control of the hammer and swung it, striking Pelosi in the head. Officers immediately restrained DePape, while Pelosi appeared to be unconscious on the ground. As set forth in the complaint, once DePape was restrained, officers secured a roll of tape, white rope, a second hammer, a pair of rubber and cloth gloves, and zip ties from the crime scene, where officers also observed a broken glass door to the back porch.
DePape is charged with one count of assault of an immediate family member of a United States official with the intent to retaliate against the official on account of the performance of official duties, which carries a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison. DePape is also charged with one count of attempted kidnapping of a United States official on account of the performance of official duties, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
U.S. Attorney Stephanie M. Hinds for the Northern District of California, Special Agent in Charge Robert K. Tripp of the FBI San Francisco Field Office, and Chief J. Thomas Manger of the U.S. Capitol Police made the announcement.
But hey, some guy on Twitter said otherwise. Who ya gonna believe?
Twitter said it. I believe it. That settles it.
No debate!
“It must be true, Uncle Jed, I saw it on Twitter!”
Yeah but the king of twitter said it. That means it’s true.
Rev. Brindley: Your phrasing parallels exactly the right wing fundamentalist meme about the Bible.
I’d heard that Mr. Pelosi had to have emergency brain surgery (maybe it was just cranial?) as a result of this… He’s pretty old and this sort of thing could definitely see him off sooner. In that case I assume a murder charge must be in there?
On another note, if you want windows broken and shit set on fire you want to call leftists; if you want people dead rightoids are a more reliable choice.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/01/accused-paul-pelosi-attacker-david-depape-pleads-not-guilty.html
(Attempted) murder is not usually a federal charge, and here it is included among the state charges. The two federal charges are the topic of the text in the OP.
@Brian M, that was the intent.
In one of the tropes that makes me sick of social media in general, the claim that Savior Elon shared that it was a drunken gay lovers’ spat is just a homophobic slur because, you know, San Francisco, and that’s what people do there. That’s bad enough, but in an ensuing Twitter spat thread between liberals and conservatives, people were referring to Lindsey Graham as an example of a conservative closeted gay to counter claims that Mr. Pelosi is a closeted gay. It reminded of the way that Democrats would make fun of Marcus Bachman, Michelle’s husband.
We’re not past that stage of civilization, where even slightly effeminate men are thought to be gay, and then that’s a thing to make fun of. No wonder people are fucked up about gender. I don’t care, honestly, if a man is gay, and it’s not something to make fun of, anyway. That’s why kids bully gender non-conforming kids. They see it from adults. If we want to help kids who think they may be trans because they’re non-conforming, we really need to get at the root of homophobia and try to clear that up rather than talk about how gender identities are a functional facet of being.
Dang closing tags, where did I leave that “? surely not after the name “San Francisco?” Oh, here it is, on my desk. Now I’ve got a spare, which, like an earring, or a sock, is useless.
Michael H, my husband was considered gay for many years; he was single, and he was a librarian. Some of the people in his neighborhood actively crossed the street when they saw him, and pulled their kids the other way – pointedly. Once we got married, they would greet him, and even talked to him at length during the garage sale that was the ultimate result of combining two households of people in their forties.
He isn’t even effeminate, other than being able to match colors and having a much more developed artistic sense than I do, but you only know that if you go inside the house. It was enough to be unmarried in his forties.
For some reason, though I was unmarried for some years, I was never branded lesbian. Go figure. (Just for the record, I am not butch, though I wouldn’t say I’m feminine in the way some people think a woman should be. I guess you could say I’m semi-feminine…long hair.
I’ve been asked if I’m gay just because sometimes I put my hand on my hip in a certain way.
Mike – Sugar bowl or teapot?
Teapot, Sweetie.
my husband was considered gay for many years
Same. Never really knew why, because I am only slightly effeminate, and so was I as a kid or a teenager. Unless I am or was really effeminate and did not realise (still a possibility). That said, now that I’ve learned I’m slightly autistic too, this may actually be part of the reason. Social uneasiness, awkwardness at times probably; which may have been interpreted as an unassumed homosexuality.
I still laugh today at the fact that I am probably among the very few heterosexuals that had to do a coming out, and more than once at that.
The thing is, being born with a marked olive skin, I exemplified exoticism for men attracted to boys, and the fact that I was sweet (slightly effeminate) just amplified the attraction. On the other hand, I really had no success with girls my age.
So to sum up, at the time everyone develops their sexual identity, I was deemed quite unattractive to the opposite sex, and was socially assigned the gay label by my peers as pointed out implicitly through jokes at every occasion, all while regularly getting unsolicited propositions from men twice my age. In the end, this was very confusing, because I feared missteps in my life, and I spent a great amount of time wondering if I was mistaken about myself and everyone else was actually right about me. Instead of internalizing homophobia, I internalized a version of “what if I am mistaken about myself and spoil my whole life on this mistake”.
It was hell.
It eventually ended soon after I had been dismally scared by a near rape situation that I escaped on a short notice. I decided I had to do something about it, because it would end up badly. Since I was still young and lost, the only thing that came to mind was to fix anyone implying I was gay the hard and manly way. It did not last a long time, but I had to punch straight a bunch of guys who did. That’s quite sad, but it did put an end to this rapidly. never understood why neither.
I tend to see it today as a bitter experience –probably the bitterest in my life, because I have discovered ragey violence and being high on aggression –as if under influence, and I now know what I can do. A collateral consequence of this collateral consequence is nevertheless probably why I endorse feminism. Because I hate traditional manliness and what it means, from the inside perspective. I hate how I felt that day. I am truly scared Pandora’s box be open again some day.
God, Laurent, that sounds horrible. I’m sorry you had to go through all that.