March 4, 2025

Our long local nightmare is over: the Nazi Nest has left Eckington. This was a house of January 6th supporters paid for by the Overstock guy, Patrick Byrne. Their mission was to advocate for a pardon of January 6th rioters through their nightly Freedom Corner vigil outside the DC Jail and by making a nuisance of themselves at court houses, hearing rooms and bars around town.

Calling it the Nazi Nest was not hyperbole. They named the house the Eagle’s Nest, after Hitler’s mountaintop retreat, one of the housemates was married to a prisoner covered in swastikas (we called her Nazi Barbie) and one of their supporters posted videos of how Hitler was right about the Jews. And this was before Elon Musk and other MAGA types began greeting crowds with Nazi salutes.

But with the release of J6 rioters, the grift has ended. You can’t raise money on behalf of prisoners after the jail doors have swung open.

The release of the January 6th prisoners was the worst thing that could’ve ever happened to Freedom Corner.

If the rioters were still locked up, the chuds of Freedom Corner could continue their grifting lifestyle, with their expenses (including the rent on the Nazi Nest in Eckington) paid for by donors. But since Trump pardoned them, their mission disappeared. And with it, their donos.

Even worse, they’ve lost their mission, the thing that gave their cult meaning. Before the pardon, they were key players in a great cause. Now, they’re nobodies headed home to deal with all the mundane aspects of life that they’ve put off for years.

Including getting jobs. The defining feature of Freedom Corner was their unwillingness to work. Despite living in DC for two years, they refused employment, claiming that their two-hour long nightly vigil prevented them from holding down jobs.

Instead, they grifted, garnering donations from big donors like Patrick Byrne and small ones like the “granny squad” who forked over their Social Security checks to Freedom Corner.

Despite the end of the corner, they’re still grifting. The recently released J6 prisoners all have Gift Send Go pages for donations. They also demand reparations. That’s right, the violent men who stormed the Capitol believe that they’re owed a check from the government.

Another J6 prisoner wants money so that he can tour the country in search of a 25-year-old wife. While he’s 39, he will accept a 35-year-old if he has to.

Another J6 advocate, in between her rapid-fire Twitter rants demanding an apology from all you bitches who doubted her, put out the call for $2500 for a three-day water park vacation. Seems a little steep for slip n slide.

So much begging. It’s their defining feature.

All these fierce advocates of freedom now demand free money from the public. They’re not going to get it.

Welcome to the real world, chuds. It’s a helluva hangover for you.

On November 6th, we all lost. Kamala Harris voters realized it that night.

For Trump supporters, the realization will come more slowly, if it comes at all.

And the chuds of Freedom Corner? Their story is rapidly fading away, overwhelmed by the manic pace of news and the country being driven into a deep, catastrophic recession.

They will always have the memories of Freedom Corner, thousands of hours on YouTube, unwatched and forgotten.

February 23, 2025

A bike ride around Washington, DC, illustrates the state of the city, and the nation, in our dystopian year of 2025.

People who bike are close observers. Since we’re not encased in a rolling living room, we notice things that driverists miss.

This is what I saw on a cold Saturday bike ride around DC.

The GW Fence

On my way to get a bagel, I saw that the University Yard at George Washington University now has a black mesh fence around it.

This was the site of protests against the war on Gaza last year. Students occupied the Yard for weeks, sleeping in tents, holding rallies and conducting teach-ins on the conflict.

Until they were expelled by the Metropolitan Police Department in an early-morning action. A temporary fence was put up around the Yard.

Now, there is a very sturdy permanent one with gates that can be locked, to prevent future First Amendment activities by university students.

It is part of a fortification of the city, as access to public spaces gets restricted by the authorities to keep troublesome citizenry away. Anyone who has been around the Capitol or White House recently can register the parks, sidewalks and green spaces taken from us.

Rally for Ukraine

After seeing that, I biked to the Lincoln Memorial, where several thousand people gathered to support Ukraine.

True Americans support our friends in the face of Russian aggression. Never did I imagine that the Republicans would bow before a KGB agent, but that is what has happened as they rush to surrender Ukraine to Putin.

For decades, the GOP warned about the dangers of appeasement, of repeating another Munich, and now they intend to do their own version of the Munich deal, hoping that giving Ukraine to Putin will satisfy him.

And they are operating not out of naïveté, but of deliberate betrayal.

Stabbing our allies in the back, cutting off food aid to starving orphans in Africa, firing government employees devoted to protecting consumers – the cruelty is the point for the MAGA party.

The Chuds are Unhappy

Yet, they are still angry.

A few miles away, Anarchy Princess was at CPAC, the fascist (they’re doing Hitler salutes now) conference in National Harbor. It’s not DC, not matter what they claim, but far down the river in Maryland next to a freeway.

Anarchy Princess was there just to observe, not to protest, yet this still earned the ire of the chuds of Freedom Corner. A pair of them tried to get her thrown out of the hotel bar, claiming that she was antifa, one of them with a beer in her hand, cross around her neck and a mouth full of obscenities. Doesn’t get more MAGA than that.

— Anarchy princess (@SatireAP) February 22, 2025

I just wanna say, I spent the last 8 hours roaming round the hotel where CPAC is happening, and even though a few crazy women screamed at me, I still did not get kicked out. pic.twitter.com/T6wccGpyuO

— Anarchy princess (@SatireAP) February 22, 2025

This toxic stew of hate and cruelty can be overwhelming.

The US Botanic Garden

Thank god for the Botanic Garden. Located across from the Capitol, this living plant museum was filled with an exhibit of orchids in every color and variation imaginable.

But I like the Tropics. Located under a 93-foot dome, this is a steamy tropical forest that is green and warm year-around. It even rains in there, with misters spraying water every few minutes. The heat and humidity make it a great place to defrost after biking in the cold.

Things are going to get worse. With layoffs, tariffs and cuts in federal aid for the states, we are heading into a recession. And there’s no guarantee that it will get better – unless we act.

We’re not alone. We outnumber them – Trump didn’t even get 50% of the popular vote. There is no mandate.

Speak Your Fucking Mind

The resistance continues, with new heroes emerging all the time. I lived with Colin Pearsall in college. I’m sure neither one of us imagined that we would one day do anything political, but the times call for it.

Or, as he put it, “What are you bowing down to, speak your fucking mind.”

 

January 25, 2025

What a long, strange grift it has been.

After more than 900 days on a dead-end street next to a cemetery, the so-called Freedom Corner vigil came to an end. This nightly insurrectionist meetup had provided thousands of hours of entertainment to trolls and fans  alike.

With the Trump pardons of J6 rioters, Freedom Corner is no longer necessary. They won.

The doors of Arkham Asylum have been flung open and now these violent men are back home in their communities – or wandering the halls of the Capitol – to terrorize people on behalf of Dear Leader.

Amanda Moore in The Nation wrote about the horror as prisoners celebrated with the J6 insurrectionist fan club, including Nazis and white supremacists. These people are your government now.

Freedom Corner vowed to leave no man behind. In fact, they left several men behind. A handful of these “good men” are being held on other charges like child sexual abuse.

This didn’t matter to Freedom Corner. They were ready to declare victory, have one final dance party and go home. Rioters gyrated on the corner outside the jail, grooving with the “old ladies” (their words) that had advocated for their freedom.

And it wouldn’t be Freedom Corner with one last blast of misinformation, as they claimed that Mayor Bowser delayed the release of prisoners (wrong), that their vigil was the second-longest in history (wrong) and that the corner was on Google Maps (hilariously wrong).

And if you ever wondered which side the police were on, MPD Sgt. Jackson got chummy as he posed for photos with Micki Witthoeft. She’s the mother of Ashli Babbitt and wants to see Nancy Pelosi and Capitol Police Officer Michael Byrd swing from the neck until dead.

 

January 15, 2025

The ice had holes in it where people had fallen through. Big cracks were visible. Even a couple sections of open water.

Despite this, Americans walked on it anyway.

This isn’t a very subtle metaphor, I thought to myself, as I watched families step on the thin ice of the Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial. They gleefully danced around and posed for selfies, heedless the danger.

Americans made another dangerous choice last November when they elected Donald Trump as President.

It wasn’t a landslide; Trump didn’t even crack 50% of the popular vote. But in our skewed electoral system (designed by slaveholders to protect their rights) it was enough to claim a mandate.

DC is now a landscape of fences, from the Washington Monument to the Capitol and up past the White House, even stretching out one rude finger to encompass the Convention Center. It’s a maze, with black fences, vehicle barriers and police officers from numerous jurisdictions all to ensure that the Inauguration happens peacefully.

With the election of a man who sent a mob to sack the Capitol, political violence has been normalized.

What would Martin Luther King, Jr, think? This inauguration occurs on his holiday. He devoted his life both to nonviolence and the better angels of our character, both of which seem like very quaint notions right now.

I grew up in America where the side that used violence lost. It was condemned by Republicans and Democrats who were committed to the peaceful transfer of power.

But, if I was coming of age today, what would I think? America has elected a convicted felon, rapist and mob leader as its President. I’d conclude that if you’re rich and powerful, you can get away with anything in this country.

After watching people walk on the ice, I needed a drink.

Navigating my way past the fences and checkpoints, I went to Lost and Found, a bar in Shaw which is fortunate to be just outside the security perimeter.

They have Snowpants, an oatmeal stout and a winter tradition for me.

I talked to the bartender about all the fencing, both of us careful not to spell out our political affiliation. Those are the times we live in. She didn’t want to offend me if I was a MAGA chud; the reason that DC needs to be an armed camp now. This city has not forgotten January 6th.

“Blagden Alley is its own destination,” she said, in response to my question about whether the inauguration would impact business.

Lost and Found backs up to Blagden Alley, a historic alley complex that is very photogenic. Once filled with car repair shops and, for a brief moment, art galleries, it is now decidedly upscale.

The people going to the alley for a coffee at La Colombe or ceviche at Amazonia will not be going to the inauguration. They are DC people, who want to avoid all mention of Trump.

The inaugural crowd is not likely to stray from their hotel lobbies, believing Trump’s absurd lies that you’ll be raped if you cross the street for a loaf of bread. They would not dare walk down a dark DC alley, no matter the rumored delights.

America has made its choice. We’re all on the ice with them. In a few days, we’ll find out if it cracks.

January 8, 2025

Members of the Freedom Corner vigil were on their way to DC to celebrate January 6th when they crashed on the highway. “God has cleared the way!” they cried seconds before they spun out.

God isn’t on their side, despite all their Bible-thumping.

Instead, Jesus took the wheel and guided them into the guardrail to the tune of MAGA YMCA.

This is what happens when MAGA tries to do J6 again but in the snow#FreedomCorner #January6th #WashingtonDC pic.twitter.com/ds0Lb4fFi8

— Anarc-y princess (@SatireAP) January 6, 2025

Or, maybe, they were just stupidly driving too fast on icy roads. The chuds are known for their reckless driving. They believe that if you’re in a convoy, or on your way to a J6 rally, that you don’t have to follow the law.

The tweet by Anarchy Princess has two million views – far more than watch CNN on a typical night. Famous for trolling Peter Navarro, she knows a viral video when she sees one. AP was the one who spotted it, clipped it and recognized its potential.

The story of Trump supporters crashing went global, appearing on TMZ, WorldStar, the Daily Dot and elsewhere. It’s the perfect start to the Trump Administration, a visual depiction of his followers entering the “find out” phase.

The chuds of Freedom Corner thought that they would go viral on January 6th. And they did, but for their comical idiocy.

January 6, 2025

Four years too late…

That was my thought seeing the huge fence go up around the Capitol. The seat of our democracy is now surrounded by rings of fencing, scores of police vehicles and hundreds of officers. And that’s just what I saw as I traversed the vast perimeter on a bike.

No longer are there just velvet ropes and officers in windbreakers to protect the counting and certification of Electoral Votes.

January 6th is now a  National Special Security Event, with the powers of the vast American government now mobilized to protect democracy from American citizens.

I hope this is the end of naïveté. As Americans we possess a kind of shared delusion. We’re the indispensable nation. The city on a hill. The good guys.

But if you read American history, and read it carefully, you can see the truth behind the soaring rhetoric: we were a nation founded in blood, born out of a civil war that pitted neighbor against neighbor.

Not that Civil War – but the one we fought in 1776 to escape the rule of a king. The losers got tarred, feathered and shipped off to Canada.

While the Constitution said that all men were created equal, slavery was written in our founding document and Southern slaveholders were our first leaders.

Mobocracy was the rule. Books were banned in the South (like Uncle Tom’s Cabin), slavery could not be mentioned in Congress and publishing an editorial about abolition would get you and your printing press thrown into the river.

Force was used against anyone who stood in the way of white men making a dollar. Native Americans were exterminated by armies, militias and vigilante mobs.

Later, we would develop this fiction that we are different than our violent, lawless ancestors.

January 6th should teach us that we’re not. Hopefully, the Democrats have caught on that we’re not living in an episode of the West Wing.

The best speech doesn’t win. The most powerful force does, whether that’s a shrewd political operator like Bill Clinton or a ruthless general like Sherman (who should’ve razed more of the South).

There is no need for the fence around the Capitol. The rioters won.

December 13, 2024

While it ended very badly indeed, 2024 did have its pleasurable, or at least, memorable, moments. Photos, fuckery and more – this was my best of 2024.

Photos

Early in the year, we had one of those blink and you’ll miss it DC snowstorms, little more than a dusting that rapidly melted but not before I got the dramatic photo of the sunset above. It was one of those lovely off-season moments, too cold for tourists, when it feels like you have the city to yourself. Like most of my photos, it was shot with an iPhone.

I was brought back to reality by January 6th. A dozen insurrectionist supporters from the J6 vigil outside the DC Jail (the Chuds of Freedom Corner) marched in the freezing rain, shouting their demands for freedom for the men who attacked the Capitol.

With my Canon Rebel SL2 (an ancient by digital standards camera), I captured Patricia Eguino aka “The Commish” in full death metal rage. “Traitors!” she yelled as the J6 supporters rallied on Pennsylvania Avenue. Eguino followed the insurrectionist losers as they trudged around the Capitol, heckling them all the way.

Later in the year, I got a photo of another powerful woman who has been a scourge of the right: Anarchy Princess.

After becoming famous for trolling Trump advisor Peter Navarro, she combined activism and reporting as she covered the J6 trials, the Presidential campaign and other events in DC and elsewhere.

I like this portrait of her because she’s set up to livestream and is sitting next to a really interesting work of public art: the Golden Spike by HYBYCOZO in Dupont Circle.

Bad weather makes dramatic photos. After a thunderstorm in July, I rushed down to catch the surreal golden light at the Washington Monument. This was taken with a Canon EOS RP, a mirrorless camera.

There were lots of student-led protests against the war on Gaza this year, including the occupation of the University Yard at George Washington University. One of the most dramatic moments I witnessed was outside the White House Correspondents Dinner, where people protesting genocide confronted members of the media.

DC isn’t all politics. One of the most interesting things I saw all year was Dvorak Dreams at the Kennedy Center, an outdoor video display on massive screens that paired music and flowing imagery,

My ability to quickly get around the city and take photos is only possible due to the bike.  I am Red Bike Guy so I used Capital Bikeshare a lot but also spent a lot of time on my Brilliant Cooper, which I like because it uses a belt instead of a chain (no maintenance required).

Fuckery

We love fuckery.
– Anarchy Princess

Trump cultists love to dox people. It’s what the right does.

Doxxing means that they will flood your social channels with threats and try to get you fired from your job. They target not just you, but anyone connected to you, including your family.

The chuds of Freedom Corner threatened to dox my friend Biketifa, an “agitator” who angered them with his mocking posters on a dumpster outside their vigil.

With my help of myself and Anarchy Princess, we decided to get ahead of the story. She interviewed him on YouTube and I wrote a profile in Biketifa Exposed.

Now it can be told: not everything in my article is true. I planted half-truths and lies to send the chuds off-course as they tried to find out his employer and spouse. And it worked! We watched them conspiring on Twitter as they went down rabbit holes in the wrong direction.

As AP stated: We love fuckery. It was not the only bit of misinformation I created to disrupt the insurrectionists. Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet.

And Biketifa turned his trolling into an art exhibit at Artomatic, the massive temporary art show in downtown DC.  His posters mocking the chuds went from the side of a dumpster to being framed and sold to collectors.

Early in the year, I wrote a lot about the Take Our Border Back Convoy because it was so much damn fun.

This was quite a con, a convoy that raised money with the aim of putting bodies on the border to stop immigration. Instead, it was a live-streamed farce as a parade of personal vehicles broke traffic laws in multiple states before reaching a compound that was near the Texas border, but not on it. Participants were fleeced of their money and baptized in a horse trough.

And I continued to cover the ongoing failure of Freedom Corner, including how they inadvertently ensure that J6ers get longer sentences, lie about their violent activities, are unable to attract a crowd and continue to get even weirder in their cult-like devotion to Trump.

There was also a moment of justice, as Freedom Corner attendee Steven Girard was found guilty for assaulting Anarchy Princess. This was a fascinating lesson on the use and abuse of the legal system, as Girard delayed proceedings for a year before ultimately being forced into a court room.

How I Became Red Bike Guy

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.
– Steve Jobs

In 2024, I published How I Became Red Bike Guy, a memoir of the Trump years in DC and my fifteen minutes of fame for mocking the Patriot Front.

It was a book that I tried writing multiple ways. During our chaotic times, I had written blog posts, articles and much more – how could I put them together into a book?

Becoming Red Bike Guy gave me the ability to bring these disparate experiences into a coherent narrative. It was what gave those moments meaning.

The experience of watching a Trump mob march down your street on the way to sack the Capitol – that changes you. As does photographing years of demonstrations in the nation’s capital.

My rage at seeing DC attacked on January 6th and the experience of watching the trolling and fuckery of the Freedom Corner chuds made me the person to mock the Patriot Front. Biking, photography, humor – the dots connected. I am Red Bike Guy.

What Is Next?

I won’t make any predictions because I’ve been consistently wrong about well, everything, since 2016. Sadly, I overestimated my country’s commitment to democracy and basic sanity.

Anything is possible.

Contemplating 2025, all I can think is: