I was driving through my neighborhood recently when I spotted a political sign for David Paul Blumenshine, who is running for Normal Town Council. The sign had been altered to include a message that read "CAPITOL RIOTS". I wasn't sure at the time how Blumenshine and "CAPITOL RIOTS" were related, but I was determined to find out.
When I got home, I began searching online, and this is what I discovered:
On Tuesday, January 5th, Blumenshine, along with 48 additional local residents, boarded a bus bound for Washington DC. Their destination was a "Stop the Steal" rally hosted by Donald Trump. The rally was being held on Wednesday, January 6th. That date may sound familiar, since that was the date when hundreds of rioting Trump supporters sacked the US Capitol, shortly after attending Donald Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally.
The "Stop the Steal" bus trip, which was organized by Blumenshine, was sponsored by Cities 92.9, a local radio station that happens to be a bastion of misinformation. I've documented some of that misinformation right here on this blog.
Ladies and gentleman, "Stop the Steal" is based on the big lie that the 2020 election was being stolen from Donald Trump. The reality is that "Stop the Steal" was a ruse to distract from what was really going on, which is that Donald Trump himself was trying to steal the election. If you doubt that, then consider these basic facts regarding the 2020 presidential election:
1. The Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), which is part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), released a statement calling the 2020 election the "most secure in American history".
2. William Barr, the US attorney general under Trump, who is a fierce Trump loyalist, told the Associated Press (AP), "we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election".
3. As of this post, at least 63 lawsuits have been filed by the Trump campaign. Nearly all of them were either withdrawn, or thrown out of court due to lack of evidence. Over 80 judges presided over the lawsuits, some of whom were appointed by Donald Trump.
4. The US Supreme Court summarily dismissed lawsuits brought by the Trump campaign. Twice. Three of the nine justices were appointed by Donald Trump.
5. Election officials in each of the 50 states found no evidence of widespread voter fraud or irregularities. Many of those officials are Republicans.
Either all of these people were working together in a vast bi-partisan conspiracy to steal the election from Donald Trump - or - Donald Trump, and a handful of his acolytes, were working together to steal the election for Donald Trump. Only one of those statements can be true.
Not convinced yet? Well, consider for a moment the sheer volume of lies Donald Trump told during his presidency. The Washington Post has documented 30,573 false or misleading claims made by the former president over the last four years. On the first day of his presidency, Donald Trump lied about the crowd size at his inauguration. Trump lied about the contents of the Mueller Report. Trump lied about the seriousness of Covid-19. Trump lied about developing a health care plan that he repeatedly insisted was only two weeks away. Trump even lied about voter fraud in the election he won in 2016. The lies I've listed barely scratch the surface of the flood of lies Donald Trump told over those four years, but they are indicative of the spectrum of Trump's lies. Trump lies about things that are totally inconsequential, and Trump lies about things that end up costing people their lives. Trump has demonstrated that he will lie about anything, and everything.
Why would anyone think Trump would lie about all of those other things, and not lie about voter fraud in the 2020 election? Seriously.
By choosing to believe Trump's evidence-free claims of voter fraud - after Trump demonstrated during his presidency that he will lie about anything and everything - David Paul Blumenshine is signaling that he is willing to put the claims of a pathological liar over the opinions of experts of all political stripes who have no reason to lie. In fact, for some of those experts, taking the position they did, led to death threats against them and their families.
Based on these facts, I believe that Blumenshine's trip to Washington DC in early January disqualifies him from holding public office. The reason is very simple: Anyone who believes the 2020 presidential election was stolen, when no evidence exists that it did, and significant evidence exists that it didn't, is incapable of discerning fact from fiction. If Blumenshine is willing to entertain this conspiracy theory, then one can only wonder what other conspiracy theories are living rent free in his head.
But wait, there's more:
After returning from Washington DC on January 7th, Blumenshine spoke with a reporter from WEEK News, where he provided even more evidence of his inability to think or use basic reasoning skills. Blumenshine described what he saw as the riots unfolded:
"Some of these people started scaling scaffolding, and doing things like that and that's when from afar we're like oh okay this isn't going to turn out so our group actually went back to the bus."
Blumenshine then tried to separate people like himself, who were there for the "Stop the steal" message, from those who were there to riot, saying:
"They weren't truly there for the message of the day which is to stop the steal. We condemn it wholeheartedly, no place for political violence."
My question for David Paul Blumenshine is this: On what planet, does millions of people believing their vote was stolen from them, not lead to some of them engaging in political violence? "Stop the Steal" and political violence go hand in hand. One naturally extends into the other, seamlessly. When millions of people have been convinced - falsely I might add - that their votes don't count, and that the opposition party has stolen an election from them, some in the aggrieved group will resort to violence. That is just a fact of life on planet Earth.
This is what Gabriel Sterling, a Republican, and Georgia's top election official, said on December 1st of 2020, thirty seven days before the capitol riots:
"Mr. president, it looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia. We're investigating, there's always a possibility, I get it. You have the rights to go to the courts. What you don't have the ability to do - and you need to step up and say this - is stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed, and it's not right. It's not right."
Thirty seven days after Gabriel Sterling said out loud what many of us were already thinking to ourselves, violence broke out at the US Capitol. Five people died that day, and more than a hundred and forty police officers were injured. Sterling was able to predict that violence would occur, because violence is an expected consequence of false claims Trump was making. Violence was simply inevitable. Gabriel Sterling knew that Trump's election fraud claims were combustible, and there's no reason to believe that Donald Trump himself wasn't also aware of the inevitable outcome of his false claims. Reasonable people of all stripes saw it coming.
This is how David Paul Blumenshine responded on January 7th to the claim that Donald Trump is responsible for the violence at the capitol on January 6th:
"Absolutely not, that's ludicrous"
What's ludicrous, is believing that accusations of election fraud from the president of the United States won't lead to political violence. Blumenshine is a fool.
"Stop the Steal" triggered political violence at the capitol, and "Stop the Steal" will continue to trigger additional political violence in the future. Fools like Blumenshine will continue to deflect responsibility from where it belongs.
The city of Normal needs leadership from people who embrace reality. I urge my fellow citizens to vote for Blumenshine's opponents. We need sanity in local government, not a conspiracy nut who is enthralled by a pathologically lying sociopath.
UPDATE: April 7, 2021 - I have some really good news! The voting residents of Normal rejected David Paul Blumenshine.
Oddly enough, 2,828 voters felt that putting an ignorant fool like Blumenshine in a decision making position was a good idea, but fortunately for the rest of us, those people were in the minority.
Normal voters, I tip my hat to you, well, most of you.
