More on the Charlottesville violence and Trump’s reaction to it
Yes, apparently we’re not done with this topic yet. The MSM certainly isn’t done, nor is the far left or the far right.
I’m going to summarize some of what I’ve observed so far.
(1) There are neo-Nazis among the alt-right, and they are just as vile as Nazis always are. However, they have the right to demonstrate—peacefully. And other people (such as, for example, the nasties of the far left) have the right to counter-demonstrate, peacefully. Neither group has the right to demonstrate violently, and the police should know in advance that when these two groups get together it can be likened to a roomful of oxygen waiting for a match, and that a match will almost surely be provided.
(2) Neo-Nazis tend to support Trump for the most part. They consider him a useful (if temporary) tool, because he endorses some policies that they like, such as limiting immigration. That doesn’t make him a neo-Nazi, a racist, or sympathetic to their cause. But it does put him in a perilous position, because it is a connection of sorts to them and means that he would do well to be crystal clear in his denunciations of them. If that’s virtue-signaling, so be it—although I am certain that, even then, his opponents will say it’s a pretense on his part.
(3) If Trump really were a Neo-Nazi sympathizer or neo-Nazi (or white supremacist) himself, I strongly believe that the last thing he would do would be to openly praise them in any way.
(4) Trump has repeatedly denounced the neo-Nazis and white supremacists. (More about that later.)
(5) Trump also said, in a news conference, that not all the demonstrators on the right on Friday night were neo-Nazis, and that there were also people “there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee” who were “protesting very quietly.” In addition, he said there were “fine people, on both sides.”
Number 5 seems to be the basis of the many accusations that Trump was defending white supremacists. That charge rests on three apparent foundations. The first is that there were no ordinary (“quiet,” “fine”) protesters on Friday and that everyone (or the vast vast majority) were neo-Nazis. The second is that Trump knew that. The third is that his several explicit denunciations of the neo-Nazis and white supremacists at Charlottesville were lies, and this “nice, quiet” characterization of neo-Nazis was the truth of what he believes, even though he took pains to say he was not talking about neo-Nazis when he said that.
In other words, in order to believe that Trump praised Nazis in that press conference and characterized them as fine and quiet people, you’d have to believe that he knew there were only Nazis and no one else on the right demonstrating that night—and that for some reason, although he clearly denounced the neo-Nazis in other statements he made, in this particular statement he wished to praise them (and was stupid enough to do so although he knew it would unleash an enormous amount of wrath towards him).
Sorry, but I just don’t buy it. What makes a lot more sense to me is that Trump was either (a) correct that some demonstrators that night weren’t neo-Nazis or white supremacists, and that the MSM just isn’t reporting on or emphasizing that fact because it serves their purposes not to do so; or that (b) he’s wrong and they were all Nazis but he wasn’t aware of that.
If you’re trying (as I have been) to find out whether Friday night’s demonstration was all Nazis all the time, then good luck. That the MSM might characterize the evening that way is meaningless to me. Clearly, however, there was a crowd [see * NOTE below] of neo-Nazis marching with torches and shouting Nazi-esque slogans of great offensiveness, and there is video of that group. Were there also some peaceful demonstrators that night somewhere in Charlottesville who just wanted to preserve some statues, as Trump said? And if not, was Trump merely mistaken when he said he thought there were? And even if he was mistaken, wasn’t he making it clear he was condemning the neo-Nazis and not saying they were “fine” or “quiet”?
This is what I’m talking about:
And you had people, and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally. But you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists.
There were actually two demonstration in Charlottesville last weekend, as far as I can tell: Friday night and Saturday afternoon. The Saturday one was the main event, but the Friday night demonstrators had the Tiki torches and the offensive slogans The death of Heather Heyer from a car-ramming by one of the neo-Nazis occurred on Saturday, not Friday.
The original plan for the Saturday afternoon gathering was that it would include groups other than the white supremacists and neo-Nazis. Over time, the neo-Nazis came to dominate. It happened this way [emphasis mine]:
Speaking earlier, Spencer Sunshine, who wrote a report for Political Research Associates assessing Saturday’s rally, said: “This is a national gathering that the far right have been planning for months. It’s their big event.”
He said far from being a broad slice of the right as planned, with the reluctance of some “patriot movement” groups to attend, and the commitment of groups such as the National Socialist Movement to the event, “it’s become increasingly Nazified over the last few weeks”.
Vox agrees: “from its original base of right-wing ‘patriot’ groups, the rally started drawing a growing number of neo-Nazis…”
So, the rally morphed, and by the time it occurred it had become (as best I can tell) predominantly white supremacist. But were there any people still attending who were from those other “patriot” groups, as originally planned, and if so what percentage? Darned if I know, but I’m assuming that Trump (rightly or wrongly) thought there were, and that that was the source for his remarks.
I also find it interesting to look at Trump’s tweets as events unfolded, because as best I can figure they might represent his evolving thoughts on the matter, perhaps unedited by anyone else. Here’s the timeline:
First tweet on the subject was on August 12 (Saturday, 10:19 AM): “We ALL must be united & condemn all that hate stands for. There is no place for this kind of violence in America. Lets come together as one!” (Doesn’t sound to me like a neo-Nazi dog whistle.)
The second tweet (Saturday, 11 AM): This one’s about a different topic, but he adds “Charlottesville sad.”
Third tweet (Saturday, 1:23 PM): “What is vital now is a swift restoration of law and order and the protection of innocent lives.”
Fourth tweet (Saturday, 2:19 PM): “We must remember this truth: No matter our color, creed, religion or political party, we are ALL AMERICANS FIRST.” (No dog whistles to the Nazis there, either.)
Fifth tweet (Saturday, 2:49 PM): “We will continue to follow developments in Charlottesville, and will provide whatever assistance is needed. We are ready, willing and able.”
Sixth tweet (Saturday, 3:50 PM): “Deepest condolences to the families & fellow officers of the VA State Police who died today. You’re all among the best this nation produces.”
Seventh tweet (Saturday, 4:25 PM): “Condolences to the family of the young woman killed today, and best regards to all of those injured, in Charlottesville, Virginia. So sad!” (The time stamp is a bit strange there, since this report says that Heather Heyer’s death occurred at 4:49 PM that day. Trump’s tweet comes about 24 minutes before that, but my guess is that the time in the other report is slightly off. At any rate, I conclude that Trump offered condolences for Heyer’s death not long after it occurred.)
Eighth tweet (Sunday, 11 AM; actually, here he’s retweeting another source): “The DOJ is opening a civil rights investigation on the car attack in Charlottesville.”
Ninth tweet (Monday, 3:29 PM): “Made additional remarks on Charlottesville [these were his explicit and unequivocal condemnations of neo-Nazis and white supremacists, which can be found here] and realize once again that the #Fake News Media will never be satisfied…truly bad people!”
On Monday there’s a retweet of someone calling attention to his condemnations of bigotry. Then on August 16 (Wednesday, 7:58 AM) Trump tweets: “Memorial service today for beautiful and incredible Heather Heyer, a truly special young woman. She will be long remembered by all!”
Naturally, Charlottesville isn’t the only subject Trump covers during this time. But he certainly doesn’t ignore it, and there’s nothing he wrote that I find objectionable. Might (and should) he have tweeted more about how dreadful neo-Nazis are? Of course, but he probably thought his Monday remarks covered that territory sufficiently. At any rate, I see no evidence in his tweets for any allegations that he is sympathetic to them or is offering any support for or defense of neo-Nazis or white supremacists.
And I continue to wonder what was wrong with the Charlottesville police this past weekend. Whether or not some of the protesters were “fine” and “quiet,” there was ample evidence and ample warning that a great great many of them—perhaps even the bulk of them—would be neither fine nor quiet nor peaceful. And there was ample evidence that the hard left activists would be out in force as well, and ready to rumble. A powder keg.
[* NOTE: How big was the neo-Nazi group on Friday at the University of Virginia, the ones videoed carrying the torches and chanting the offensive slogans? Reports say “dozens” (although some say more) which certainly doesn’t tell you all that much—nor do the photos, because we don’t know if we’re seeing the whole group or not.]
Unlike you, the MSM and Trump’s opponents are not seeking the truth, they are seeking to undermine and destroy him.
Good research, Neo.
I believe the issue has been that Trump’s most direct disavowal of the Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists came from a prepared text (doubtful he wrote it) on Monday. It was sandwiched by his “on all sides” equivalence on Saturday and his angry press conference on Tuesday.
Politics isn’t always fair. Trump makes it worse because when dealing with the alt-right and white supremacists he has, more than once, stated that he has to get “all the facts” first. Which sounds good – until you remember he refused to disavow David Duke’s support in 2016 with the same excuse (until he was forced to). He had to “research” DD and the KKK first.
What makes it even worse is it seems the only time he has to get “all the facts first” is when dealing with the alt-right. Usually he exhibits the subtlety and patience of a tomahawk missile in tweet-skewering his enemies.
Plus he put Bannon in the west wing, who’s website, Breitbart, is, in Bannon’s words, a platform for the alt-right.
Politics isn’t always fair. Because of all these things, his credibility on the subject of the alt-right is shaky. A good politician would know what to say.
Imagine a world in which Trump gave up twitter the day he became President and submitted, as all Presidents have, to his communications people when thinking through responses. I know Twitter is supposed to be Trump’s great populist weapon. I believe he would have been much better off without it as President. We can blame the MSM and leftists all we want, but Trump has given them so, so, so much ammo.
His approval rating would be 15-20 points higher in the alternative, non-twitter reality, imo.
Trump can’t play the “condemnation that ends with a big BUT clause” game Obama was famous for because he doesn’t have the backing of the media like Obama did.
Very nice investigation and analysis.
I’m a bit mystified about this: “And I continue to wonder what was wrong with the Charlottesville police this past weekend.” There’s nothing wrong. The mayor and, probably, the governor wanted violence, so they ordered the police to stand down — just like Berekley.
The old saying goes, “Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence.” They aren’t that stupid. And the Chief of Police and the head of the State police would have said something, too. This was deliberate.
I do not defend Alt-Right, I only question if those were really Alt-Right, or Alt-Left pretending to be Alt-Right to give All right a bad name.
“Alt right” and “alt left” are meaningless terms at this point.
“Alt right” developed during the 2016 campaign wrt pro-Trumpers. The pro-Trumpers did not adequately defend the term against political attacks that it meant “Nazi youth” or was composed of people who are racist. In addition, actual racists appear to have hi-jacked the term for themselves. And, of course, leftists are all too pleased to help them out with that. “Alt left” seems to have been developed more recently, to provide a more accurate definition of the “antifa” fascists and provide balance for the idea that the “alt right” is the bad right (so the “alt left” is the bad left). Ultimately, it assists the establishment left and establishment right to define the people who threaten them, the “alts,” in negative terms. Other than that, the terms have no meaning.
Will this be seen in retrospect as Trump’s Katrina? The abuse GWB took for that wasn’t “fair” but it didn’t matter, and all the reassessments and second thoughts didn’t matter.
Not when you’re aiming at, BANG!, the Low Information Lowest Common Denominator. That first impression sticks.
Bill – Your “doubtful he wrote it” tells me everything I need to know about how fair you are to Trump. And isn’t it at least possible that he was busy with other things and didn’t think he needed to ‘virtue signal’ about such an irrelevant figure as David Duke? In every case you assume the worst motives for Trump, whether he says the right thing or the wrong thing. To criticize everything is to criticize nothing!
Something to keep in mind: to many on the left (from your garden variety Democrat to the most militant Antifa) EVERYONE on the right is a white supremacist and de facto Nazi. At best, the MSM does nothing to discourage this view; are worst, they actively promise it.
Thus, it doesn’t matter who was at which rally when or the percentage of self proclaimed white supremacists. They ALL are crypto Nazis.
Bill, please re-read my last message in the other forum.
Racism isn’t nice, but it isn’t illegal or even actually harmful unless it translates to tangible or physical harm caused because of those beliefs. White nationalists have every legal right to be white nationalists and to organize a legal public protest.
The hard Left is working hard to create a dangerous world which tears down our rights one group at a time. They’re not going to start with beloved groups that everyone loves. They’re starting by isolating people with nationalistic views (which are anathema to the hard Left) and doing so by equating them with something everybody hates, Nazis. Nazis were white Euros with a defining streak of Germanic ethnic pride and nationalism. Therefore, all of the evil we associate with what Nazis did (that is, heinous ACTIONS against certain demographic groups) is being tied to US nationalists, who are nationalists and by chance are almost entirely of Caucasian Euro extraction. Apparently irrelevant is the fact that what actually made Nazis bad was not beliefs, or writings and speech about their beliefs, but a set of actions, and any writings or beliefs that exhorted those actions.
The issue is not the issue. The issue is to isolate a group of people who are problematic to the Leftist cause, and build a step toward isolating the next group of problem people.
Having long since established “white racists” as inherently evil and just as bad as Nazis, the hard Left has accelerated its forward progress. It’s no longer good enough to simply not be a white racist, you now have to constantly publicly prove your goodness by proclamation of how horrible those Nazis are, and how now equally horrible anyone who doesn’t sufficiently preen and posture about the topic is.
A week or so ago, I noticed someone on FB who is someone I knew in high school, a smart, decent enough guy in real life who has seemed to be center-left in my casual observation. He made multiple posts supporting instigating random violent acts against “Nazis.” I toyed with responding to this: what gives you the right to assault a random stranger, walking down the street, based on what you think is in their head? (none of the posts had anything to do with brave intervention against people committing violent crimes against people based on demographics aone, but rather attacking people based on perceived identity) But since that is the real me, with my real name, in a place where real coworkers and real acquaintances see me, I would not dare. This is where we are today: we are on the road to our own pre-WWII Germany, where anyone who has anything to lose stays silent and hopes to be eaten last.
Trump is literally the only politician on the planet with the iron balls necessary to even put up a fight to the hard Left about allowing them to frame every topic.
Kyndall,
“White nationalists have every legal right to be white nationalists and to organize a legal public protest.”
I completely agree. They have every right.
Where we depart is in the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” logical trail.
I believe white supremacy is actual evil. Everyone is created in the image of God and to think that my skin color makes me superior flies in the face of that. It’s as evil as the eugenics popular in some areas of the left. Now I realize that for many of them the concepts of skin color and culture are muddled together. But their message of supremacy is not a message I’m going to align with. Not even a little bit.
Someone carrying a swastika is not my ally, not someone I’m going to have common cause with. Saw an old picture from the early years of the final solution – grainy black and white of a number of Jewish women, many holding small children and babies, all stripped naked and waiting to be gunned down. Evidently the dirt over the shallow graves moved some over the next few days as the single bullet employed for each one wasn’t always instantly deadly.
Anyone who wants to carry the flag those atrocities were committed under has every right to do so. But I don’t care who their enemy is, they will never be my friend.
And for anyone who thinks talk like mine is just “virtue signalling”, fine, have it your way. I would only ask, what is my critic signaling by in any way defending those guys?
Side note:I see Donald “get all the facts first” Trump is regaling his followers on twitter with debunked stories about General Pershing burying Muslims with dead pigs.
So your defense is that Trump was only defending those militia / patriot types who decided it was OK to unite in solidarity with Nazis, Klansmen, Neo-Confederates , and other White Supremacists at the “Unite the Right” rally?
Your defense is that in the beginning these Patriots who Trump praised were only including White Supremacists in their rally. Presumably this is not worthy of condemnation.
But then the rally morphed into an explicit White Supremacists one. Are the non-racist Patriots who stay on then worthy of condemnation? No, you tell us. You have no problem with Donald Trump praising those from the original non-racist patriot groups.
Indeed, the ones participating in a torch ceremony reminiscent of Nazi and Klan rallies of yore, in a parade organized by White Supremacists of today….in honor of a General who betrayed our nation in defense of slavery, are worthy of being singled out for praise by our President. Because they are historical preservationists.
I am uncomfortable using the term “Nazi”. To me Nazi’s were a force unto themselves and no one can duplicate them. That is just my opinion. Other’s are free to disagree.
There are two forces at work in the US: the extreme left and the extreme right.
The extreme right can be called white supremacists; they are despicable but they are also a dead end. No sane person subscribes to their philosophy. They could be treated as a police matter without significant difficulty.
The extreme left (or Antifa) are America’s Red Guards. They are extremely dangerous. The can, will try, and possibly succeed in bring about the fall of America. At least America as we know it. They act mostly through fear and happily use violence as required. This morning I was listening to the mother of the girl that was killed and she expressed happiness that if the thing had to happen she was glad her daughter was the victim. A future Horst Wessel?
The President is mostly right; his basic instincts are correct. He is crude and is capable of making statements that make me at times wince. He uses language in a funny way; I think I can more or less understand him because I speak funny also. Sometimes he is his own worst enemy.
He could probably get by but for two reasons: 1) we have become so jaded by our politicians that when they speak we look for the hidden meaning and if a person speaks the straight truth we do not know what to make of it and 2) the maniacal forces arrayed with him are so powerful and full of hatred that the no matter what the man says it will be twisted and turned to the worst possible light come Hell or high water even should the country suffer. (I am convinced that if such forces were aimed at Obama, those who currently worship at his feet would call him an evil SOB.)
From the guy who founded the pro-Trump American Affairs journal.
https://nyti.ms/2vHxWsw
I have had no success with prophesy, but my guess is that Trump is as likely to gain support as to lose it. He may gain support, not because there are a lot of white nationalists, there aren’t, but because the left will overreach, and already have. This will not only drive people who see themselves threatened to the right, but will disgust others who see such things as digging up bodies and desecrating cemeteries as disgusting. Nor do I think many want to refight the Civil War, it is long over despite attempts to revive it. I wake up in the morning and the sounds coming from town are as they always are shortly before the sun rises. People getting breakfast at the truck stop before heading to work aren’t discussing events, it is all distant. The airwaves may be filled with non-stop coverage, but perhaps not that many care. And why should they. City problems are not their problems. In the end, there is likely to be a large preference for stability rather than revolution, and the cities will remain islands of blue in a sea of red.
It’s so easy to accuse a person who stands for a person/group’s right to speak with agreeing with what they say. It’s easy and it’s wrong and it’s done every day by many in the anti-Trump corner.
This whole thing doesn’t really interest me, but as someone said (Lenin?) “You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.” So we’re talking about media wars here, to be clear.
As I said previously, what the heck was the police doing? And the fact that we don’t know every detail of the orders that the police were given makes we wonder whether there exist any genuine investigative reporters in the non-MSM. Certainly not at Fox, with the possible exception of Cath Herridge.
After reading a bit about the police actions or lack thereof, I looked up the mayor of Charlottesville. Yup, he is a self-proclaimed progressive Democrat. We know Gov. McAuliffe is a vicious Dem operative who illegally let tens of thousands of felons vote. Now there is talk (Am-Thinker, Breitbart) of the bio/dossier of the lead organizer of the white-nationalist demonstrators, Jason Kessler, by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Read paras 6 and 7.
So did this guy Kessler make a rather sudden conversion from Occupy Wall Street and Obama supporter to neo-Nazi? Or is someone lying about Kessler? Or is this whole event one giant left-wing plant, manipulation, and swindle?
My prediction is the democrats are playing with fire. If this monument toppling cultural revolution continues it will escalate to extreme violence and public opinion will turn the other side. you give them an inch they take a yard, now they are defacing Abraham Lincoln and George Washington statues too. Sooner or later they will call for taking down the White House for being a monument of racism.
Bill, the story about burying Muslims with dead pigs comes directly from Gen. Pershing’s autobiography. One of these links should work to get you to the relevant page in google books (note: the general suggests that the policy was quite effective):
https://books.google.com/books?id=aNfrnkW2AF4C&lpg=RA1-PT115&vq=%22dead%20pig%22&pg=RA1-PT115#v=snippet&q=%22dead%20pig%22&f=false
http://grimbeorn.blogspot.com/2017/08/pershing-is-worth-studying-but.html
The Weekly Standard tackles this same issue: Where Are Trump’s ‘Very Fine People’? This especially caught my eye:
@Bill – that quote is a significant statement from the man who STARTED the “journal of american greatness” – where the “flight 93” article first appeared.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/the-premier-pro-trump-intellectual-says-he-regrets-voting-for-him/article/2009341
That article you linked (thanks, btw) is titled:
“I Voted for Trump. And I Sorely Regret It.”
Another quote from that article:
“Not only has the president failed to make the course corrections necessary to save his administration, but his increasingly appalling conduct will continue to repel anyone who might once have been inclined to work with him.”
Can this be the catalyst for those in trump’s base to finally give trump feedback that would make him realize he DOES need to change and soon?
Unfortunately there is nothing in this man’s past that suggests he is about to change for the better and conduct himself with the dignity that we expect of a President. His comment today about the beautiful Civil War monuments commemorating the Lost Cause must really please his base, now believed to be 25% of the voting public.
I don’t consider myself part of Trump’s base and I offer all of my prior comments about Trump as proof of that assertion. I certainly think that Trump needs to change, starting with clearing house with McMaster.
I don’t fear his external enemies nearly as much as I do the ones who stand by his side and seek to manipulate him. It’s the “Et tu, Brute?” who do you in not the honest enemy.
I get tired of noting this but when do the worldwide resources of CNN, NYT and WaPo start investigating the Mayor and the Governor regarding orders to the police?
Neo – all by herself and miles away – does a better job.
I just find out the charlottesville driver was diagnosed with Schizophrenia, wondering why I have not heard or read of this important piece of info from the media?
This guy is crazy, grew up without a father and his mom is handicapped, how did he at age 20 afford a brand new Dodge Challenger?
Well, this will probably be just as misunderstood as Trump’s statements, but anyway.
Neo the so-called Neo-Nazis are certainly not just as bad as the actual Nazis. I am surprised that you draw equivalence.
Actions matter, and I assume that by Nazis you mean the people who ran the extermination camps, and initiated a war of conquest on their continent. The so called American neo-Nazis parade around carrying the swastika, and sometimes wearing phony uniforms. Sometimes when confronted, they fight. They are more a subject for ridicule than anything. To the best of my knowledge they have never initiated the sort of riots, and destruction that characterize other groups; e.g. the Antifa, and Black Lives Matter. If they do commit criminal acts, or conspire to insurrection, or to deprive others of rights, they should be prosecuted, simple enough. (We know that the government watches them closely.)
On the subject of extremist groups and heinous displays, it simply baffles me, that waving the hammer and sickle of the Soviet Union, or displaying banners that say “Kill the Pigs” are so much less offensive to normally rational people than carrying a swastika.
I have no use for extremist groups, of any stripe. I also have no respect for people who label those with whom they disagree with pejorative names in order to marginalize them, and use the labels to limit their constitutional rights.
A true conservative does not have to respect what any group stands for to respect that they all have equal rights to demonstrate, parade, or even protest in a peaceful way. They even have the right to dress in costumes, or display symbols that others might find offensive.
In Charlottesville, the Organizers of the protest, whatever the makeup of their ranks may have been, did go through the legal process for permission to gather and demonstrate. They were actually abiding by restrictions that had been placed on them right up until the time the police pulled the plug on their permit, and drove them into the streets occupied by Antifa. There is every reason to believe that had their permit not been precipitously withdrawn, and not subsequently molested Antifa as they left the designated venue in Charlottesville, their activities would have been peaceful, and probably a bit pathetic.
Initially, I thought I could never vote for Trump and I didn’t, but that was because due to a death in the family, I didn’t get a chance to vote. I’m still not sure whom I would have voted for, but I was overjoyed on election night to see the shock going through the mainstream media and, yes, the shock on faces of all those Hillary supporters (being an atheist, I don’t worry too much about showing Christian charity).
As the days went by, I hoped Trump would stop his boorish, “unpresidential” behavior and would learn to act like a president. Now I’m convinced it wouldn’t matter. Any Republican president would be hounded by the mainstream media, by the liberal echo chamber of social media, with distortions and ignored facts. And acting presidential, he would always be on the defensive.
Trump reminds me of U. S. Grant while the rest of the Republican party reminds me of George McClellan. Trump fights. He attacks. And since I think things would be worse under Hillary, I can watch, enjoy, and hope it’s not the charge of the light brigade.
It’s not surprising that members of the MSM can’t or won’t distinguish between the fact that neo-Nazis, Klansmen, white supremacists, and anti-Semites are vile, disgusting, despicable, morally repugnant creatures, and the fact that both sides came ready, prepared, armed, and spoiling for a fight. It is surprising and distressing that intelligent people like Charles Krauthammer, Steve Hayes, and commenters on this blog can’t make that distinction.
Those are simply two separate issues. Another separate issue is the fact that the KKK & Co. had a perfect right to utter their vile spew, and a permit to do so, and it is obvious that the police were ordered not to separate them from the ANTIFA, and according to some reports, actually pushed the two sides into contact with each other.
By conflating these issues, by saying that you cannot condemn the Nazi wannabes and the fighting between them and ANTIFA’s in the same speech, you are saying that you actually want the Weimar Republic back, with Nazis and Commies fighting in the streets.
The Klan & Co, are a miniscule percentage of the population and a dying breed; ANTIFA is a growing movement. If their violence is forgivable, then they will continue to grow, and the Klan & Co. will probably grow in response. Is that really what you, and the pundits want?
If the cops had done their job, and kept the two sides separate, as they did in San Francisco on Sunday, both sides would have had their demonstrations, gotten in their cars, and gone home, and Heather Heyer would still be alive. That was a separate, intervening cause from the Klan & Co’s vilosity.
As to whether or not there were “nice people” in the neo-Nazi march, I am reminded of this passage:
20 The LORD said, “Because the cry of Sedom and `Amorah is great, and because their sin is very grievous, 21 I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come to me. If not, I will know.” 22 The men turned from there, and went toward Sedom, but Avraham stood yet before the LORD. 23 Avraham drew near, and said, “Will you consume the righteous with the wicked? 24 What if there are fifty righteous within the city? Will you consume and not spare the place for the fifty righteous who are therein? 25 Be it far from you to do things like that, to kill the righteous with the wicked, that so the righteous should be as the wicked. May that be far from you. Should not the Judge of all the earth do right?” 26 The LORD said, “If I find in Sedom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sake.” 27 Avraham answered, “See now, I, who am but dust and ashes, have taken it on myself to speak to the Lord. 28 What if there will lack five of the fifty righteous? Will you destroy all the city for lack of five?” He said, “I will not destroy it, if I find forty-five there.” 29 He spoke to him yet again, and said, “What if there are forty found there?” He said, “I will not do it for the forty’s sake.” 30 He said, “Oh don’t let the Lord be angry, and I will speak. What if there are thirty found there?” He said, “I will not do it, if I find thirty there.” 31 He said, “See now, I have taken it on myself to speak to the Lord. What if there are twenty found there?” He said, “I will not destroy it for the twenty’s sake.” 32 He said, “Oh don’t let the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet but this once. What if ten are found there?” He said, “I will not destroy it for the ten’s sake.” 33 The LORD went his way, as soon as he had finished communing with Avraham, and Avraham returned to his place.
Alt-right is correct. The American center is conservative. The American right is libertarian (i.e. individualistic). Everything else is on the left.
[class] diversitists (i.e. racists, sexists, “=”) and color supremacists and to a lesser extent color blocs all deny individual dignity to varying degrees.
Then there are the elective abortionists or the selective-child factions who deny lives deemed unworthy, inconvenient, or profitable (e.g. Planned Parenthood’s clinical cannibalism operation).
Left vs Left. Hopefully, the Left will lose.
Neo-neocon: doing the job American journalists won’t do.
Thanks for keeping the conversation sane.
Commenter at this post:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/08/who-toppled-that-statue-in-durham.php
Kurtis Fechtmeyer · San Francisco, California
People who were never slaves fighting with people who were never Nazis about removing statues erected by Democrats in order to blame Republicans. How many ways to spell Distraction Theatre ?
I was in college during Viet Nam and remember the demonstrations and riots. The public elected Nixon because of them and despite the absolute hatred the press had for him. Just be patient, unlike 1968 there are lots of other sources of information and the MSM doesn’t have anything close to the monopoly that it had 50 years ago. Don’t despair.
This post is about climate change, but the comment is applicable to any number of subjects, including Charlottesville and Trump’s tweets.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/08/cut-down-the-jungles.php
John Fembup · Faber College AND later
Wyck Holland · Virginia Military Institute
Confucius (551-471 B C) agrees:
A superior man, in regard to what he does not know, shows a cautious reserve. If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. If language be not in accordance with the truth of things, affairs cannot be carried on to success. When affairs cannot be carried on to success, proprieties and music do not flourish. When proprieties and music do not flourish, punishments will not be properly awarded. When punishments are not properly awarded, the people do not know how to move hand or foot. Therefore a superior man considers it necessary that the names he uses may be spoken appropriately, and also that what he speaks may be carried out appropriately. What the superior man requires is just that in his words there may be nothing incorrect.
Analects, Book XIII, Chapter 3, verses 4-7, translated by James Legge
OK, here’s the deal, you used to have the right to fly a Nazi flag but alas, it might make some folks feel bad so now more. Confederate Flag really hurts some black peoples feeling and the Dukes of Hazard was a redneck show so nor more of that.
Well now we don’t feel good about seeing your Christmas lights on your house because we don’t believe in Santa Claus or Jesus so we best not have any more of that.
Since it has been alleged that Jewish folks might not always make the best decisions about our societal needs and they really are a pain with that Israel stuff let’s have no more of those Menorah thingys showing in public because they might make those of some faiths feel like causing violence which of course would be your fault, it you displayed one of those seven candle things so that will no longer be legal.
How about a rainbow flag or a bright red flag with a hammer and sickle because those would make most every one who ever felt left out or under appreciated feel better, at the very worst anyone with common sense would see them as inclusive and neutral helping the different and downtrodden, don’t ya know?
Tis a slippery slope we a sliding down right now and the second amendment might be found to not apply to things that make enlightened people feel bad or good about being upset.
Trump reminds me of U. S. Grant while the rest of the Republican party reminds me of George McClellan.
I’ve heard this same comparison over and over. Grant actually fought the enemy. Trump tweets and continuously shoots himself and, if you haven’t noticed, lots of people on his own side. He’s actively working to have a smaller Republican presence in congress.
It makes no sense to me. Grant won. I don’t think Trump is winning.
To the person who questioned my take about the truth of the Pershing quote, I read good evidence today that it’s not true. But I’ll have to look that up again and if I’m wrong I will post my retraction.
End game revealed?
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/08/statue-of-lincoln-defaced-in-chicago.php
Greg Chapman
“There is, of course, no coherent theory on which the Left should try to erase Lincoln from our history”
Well he was a republican so it will be necessary to create such a theory once the democratic confederacy has been erased from history. One step at a time…..
* * *
That thought is close to what I am presently conjecturing.
(1) The First Civil War was fought between the North (spearheaded by abolitionist Republicans) and the South (pro-slavery Democrats) — with, as usual, the majority of the population on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line forced by circumstances to choose one side or the other, not necessarily for the same reasons as the firebrands;
(2) the Confederate statues were erected by southern Democrats of the post-WW2 years as actual anti-Civil Rights gestures in opposition to pro-Civil Rights actions of the Republicans (and some Democrats);
(3) Lyndon Johnson cynically co-opted the pro factions in JFK’s name, and the media conveniently forgot to keep track of the Republican contributions;
(4) the media and Democrats managed to establish Nixon and the Republicans of that era as anti-Civil Rights (because the Left craftily equated suppression of lawless mobs with oppression of blacks);
(5) Most people are LIV voters (having been actively mal-educated by the Left) and now believe that the Republicans supported slavery and the Democrats opposed it, therefore, the irony of the Left demolishing statues of their own forebears is lost on them;
(6) Once all the “Confederate Republican” statues are gone, there will be no “evidence” that Democrats ever had a pro-slavery past, because the popular and public-school history books are already corrupted;
(7) Lincoln was a Republican.
QED
BONUS:
(8)White supremacists of today coincidentally support some of the same issues as Republican conservatives (mostly immigration controls); therefore,
(9) All Republicans are Nazis.
If you cut off Google for the Damore debacle, you may have to cut off Apple for the SPLC shout out:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/08/apple-funds-left-wing-hate-group.php
Apple is giving $1 million apiece to Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League. It will also match employee donations to those two groups and other human rights organizations on a two-for-one basis.
* * *
Anybody want to bet that qualifying HROs include Focus on the Family?
I didn’t think so.
Time to go back to books and abaci.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2017/08/dana-milbank-reveals-the-game.php
“In today’s Washington Post, Dana Milbank writes of the events in Charlottesville and/or the issue of monuments for Confederates: “It’s not a tough debate. It’s not a debate at all. There are Nazis and there are the rest of us.”
Milbank is wrong. There are communists, anarchists, terrorists, and black racists. Those answering to any of these descriptions are not fairly characterized as “the rest of us.” There are also, as President Trump said, non Nazis and non racists who oppose having statues of Robert E. Lee removed from the public square.
Left-wing violence is a growing problem in cities and college campuses across the U.S. Folks my age can’t help but be reminded of the late 1960s.
Milbank wants to use Charlottesville to sweep the problem of left-wing violence under the rug. Thus, he places the antifa thugs alongside “the rest of us.”
This tactic shows why it was important for President Trump to insist that violence and thuggery comes from both sides. He could have added that, to date, more violence and thuggery has come from the left than from the right, but under the circumstances I don’t blame him for choosing even-handed words.”
One of the commenters there:
Russ Armstrong · Works at Self-Employed
Voltaire said (more or less), “I abhor what you are saying, but I will defend with my life your right to say it.” Trump, somewhat less eloquently(!), espoused the core of that concept.
The premise of free speech is that all ideas may be aired, even those which some find reprehensible. With free and open discourse, the citizens are able to distinguish the bad ideas from the good. After all, in a democracy, it is the citizens who must decide by whom they shall be ruled; discourse among them is vital. Demagogues progress to tyranny by demanding, by force if necessary, that some words never be spoken. Usually, they do this in the guise of “protecting” the citizens.
* * *
There are always more than two sides; the goal of all extremists is to reduce the multitude of factions to “us or them”; when they succeed, war follows.
Big Maq – Bill
Who cares how you voted or if you are happy or unhappy Trump was elected, he is not Hillary, he has nominated a good Judge to the Supreme Court and a number of other good judges. He has negated a number of Obama regulations, he is annoying, cumbersome and should shut up but all of our votes for him have paid off.
Most anything other he can do is a bonus and good lord, are you so naive that you think government is not messy, always was and always will be. No matter how you voted Trump is your president and as they said in the stupid movie STRIPES – ” THAT’S A FACT JACK ! ”
Our man Trump at times is so annoying and weapons grade, full blown, strange and not anyone I want living next to me but so far he is getting the job done in his own way. Take an indelible marker out and write this on your hand, – ‘TRUMP IS MY PRESIDENT’ – and then thank your lucky stars that Hillary lost. If you indeed feel that she should have been elected than go away and find a new home to share your displeasure with those who share your feelings.
I am tired of reading the same carp form the same people including myself so see you in a month or so after the start of hunting season here in Texas, I have better things to do that making myself upset with a situation way beyond my control.
Be safe, be good and have a good month and see you all later in month or two when things settle down, if they do.
And I think that Trump IS winning and that’s why the media, the establishment and the progressives are screaming so loudly that he’s shooting himself. They constantly berate him for not being a good politician and not being politically correct. It’s hard to find much credence in their opinions of him when he is the president even after everyone said it wasn’t possible.
Stop telling me about how bad his words are and tell me what actual actions of his you find objectionable. If you can do that without talking about what you think his motives are then you might have an argument. Words, thoughts and assumed motives are what people criticize when they can’t criticize actions.
Damn, I typed carp (above) instead of crap again, why don’t I edit a bit with preview? I am not referring to fish but to stuff that comes out of backsides of animals and such.
The white supremacists and the KKK people are fascists in word; the Antifa thugs and the various black power crowd are fascists in deed and have been responsible for almost all of the mob violence in recent years. Since no Democrat to my knowledge has criticized, let alone condemned, them, why not call call them what they are–the paramilitary arm of the Democratic Party, or more accurately the Party’s brownshirts.
Have a great month, from one Old Texan to another 🙂
[Bill takes out a marker and writes “Trump is my president” on his arm]
OldTexan Says:
August 17th, 2017 at 10:59 pm
Damn, I typed carp (above) instead of crap again, why don’t I edit a bit with preview? I am not referring to fish but to stuff that comes out of backsides of animals and such.
* *
It’s carp crap all the way down.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2009/01/the-global-consequences-of-fish-poop/
“We usually think of the ocean’s inorganic carbon cycle being dominated by tiny critters such as foraminifera, but a recent study suggests fish poop may also be an important contributor.”
Old Texan:
Good luck hunting, be safe, and don’t take no carp form anyone! 🙂
Irv Says:
August 17th, 2017 at 10:55 pm
And I think that Trump IS winning and that’s why the media, the establishment and the progressives are screaming so loudly that he’s shooting himself. …
Stop telling me about how bad his words are and tell me what actual actions of his you find objectionable. If you can do that without talking about what you think his motives are then you might have an argument. Words, thoughts and assumed motives are what people criticize when they can’t criticize actions.
* * *
If he was really “losing” aka enacting their own policies and priorities, would they be ignoring him? Admitting he was giving them what they wanted would negate their ego-investment in demonizing him because he wasn’t Hillary (who would certainly be giving them all they desired).
Something to think about, in context of the “Who’s Next?” game of Statues.
http://libertyunyielding.com/2017/08/16/fk-law-lincoln-memorial-vandalized-common-bonds-slipping-away/
If there are any wise people left among us, they will recognize that the prompt defacement of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. tells us how far America is along the dangerous path of spiritual lawlessness.
It didn’t take any time at all, after Monday’s toppling of a memorial to the Civil War dead in Durham, North Carolina. Before the tweets were even posted — “Today Confederate monuments, tomorrow George Washington!” — someone had spray-painted an obscenity on one of the columns at the Lincoln Memorial.
It wasn’t just any obscenity. It read “F**k law.”
ColoComment
Regarding Pershing burying Muslim insurgent with pigs after shooting them with bullets dipped in pigs blood (what Trump tweeted out today as an effective anti-terror tactic): it is mentioned in his autobiography as something another general did that Pershing commented on but there doesn’t appear to be evidence that he ever actually did it or that it had Trump’s 35 year effect
More here: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/aug/17/donald-trump/donald-trump-retells-pants-fire-claim-about-gen-pe/
Kyndall said something about being reminded of Pre WW2.
Communists (Antifa) battling Nazis in the streets reminds me of Weimar.
As usual, the best intel analysis of the violence is by J. E. Dyer, complete with maps that finally put the trial-by-video duels into context for me.
Lots of dots get connected here, but the “money quote” is exactly that.
http://libertyunyielding.com/2017/08/17/police-stand-charlottesville-theres-money-follow/
“This is all pretty cozy, but it gets cozier. The kicker in this Charlottesville saga is that Virginia Organizing doesn’t just get grant money from George Soros, through the Tides Foundation.
Since Kristin Szakos got elected to the Charlottesville City Council, Virginia Organizing has gotten money from the city of Charlottesville.
And not just a fleeting $4,000 in 2014 (link above). As reported by the watchdog Schilling Show, the council voted in 2016 to give Virginia Organizing $250,000 — without providing any notice for public comment.
When there’s been an inexplicable police stand-down during a protest filled with (a) SURJ and (b) violent clashes, in the city where all this is going on, it sure sounds to me like the money and influence situation needs looking into as a civil rights hazard. What in the world is Charlottesville doing here?
…
As recently as July, Charlottesville managed to deploy the police effectively and use them to intervene in violent clashes by all the same people as on 12 August, and arrest the perpetrators. For Heather Heyer’s sake, and the sake of the others who suffered injuries, we need to know why that wasn’t done this past weekend.”
* * *
Dyer mentions early in her post a July protest / counter-protest with essentially the same script but a different choose-your-own-adventure ending:
“One is that the mayor of Charlottesville, Democrat Michael Signer, gained notoriety earlier this year when he proclaimed that Charlottesville would be the “capital of the Resistance” against Donald Trump. In January 2017, he made a dramatic announcement that Charlottesville would be a sanctuary city (although he quietly dropped that plan only days later).
Signer also labors to keep Charlottesville in the forefront of green-energy activism (including Obama’s crony gravy-train; see American Thinker link below) and issues like loosening voting regulations. Basically, he checks most of the blocks for fealty to the community-organizing, Alinsky-socialist politics in which Obama had his roots.
Signer’s city council has been at odds with local activist Jason Kessler for months over the issue of Confederate monuments in Charlottesville — a point that has been thoroughly hashed out in many blog treatments now. This won’t be news to alert readers. Nor will the hostility against Kessler in the council chamber over the exposure of embarrassing (racist, sexist) tweets from several years ago by Democratic Vice Mayor Wes Bellamy, and Kessler’s recall campaign against Bellamy.
Kessler, the chief organizer of the rally on 12 August, has not endeared himself to the city authorities. After a torchlight protest in May against renaming Lee Park, led by white supremacist Richard Spencer, counter-protesters held a candlelight vigil at which Kessler was arrested as a — well, counter-counter-protester, I guess. (He didn’t hit anyone; he failed to put down his bullhorn and stop speaking when the police ordered him to.)
…
Alongside this history is that of a KKK rally in July. The event on 8 July, at which the left-wing counter-protesters reported they vastly outnumbered the KKK group, was heavily policed — even though the law enforcement presence was only one tenth of that reportedly assembled for 12 August. With 100 officers on scene, and over 1,000 combined demonstrators, the police were able control the event and make 22 arrests.
If this is the first time you’re hearing all that, it may occur to you to wonder why (a) you didn’t hear about it before, and (b) the police behaved so differently on 12 August.
The protest groups themselves — the far-left groups and the pro-Confederate and white supremacist groups — were just as energized in the earlier events, and those protests meant just as much to Charlottesville. It does seem to suggest a particular reason why the police backed off last weekend, and why the torchlight Klan-‘n’-Nazis vigil on Friday — not the first one this year — was given so much national coverage this time.
Meanwhile, it’s important to note another council member, Democrat Kristin Szakos, who shares the Obama-left perspective of Mayor Signer and Vice Mayor Bellamy. (Interestingly, those three members of the city government united in endorsing Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ralph Northam earlier this year, becoming some of his first backers. Obama will reportedly reenter the political spotlight by campaigning for Northam this fall, before Virginia’s November election. The other Charlottesville figure who joined the three city officials in endorsing Northam: Sheriff James E. Brown III.)
Kristin Szakos was a local campaign organizer for Obama in 2008, and was elected in Charlottesville herself in 2009. Notably, in 2013, after she’d held her council seat for a few years, a puff-piece squib in a local media outlet recorded her as having a very particular “pet peeve”: Civil War monuments.
Szakos has been on the warpath to rid Charlottesville of its Confederate monuments for a long time. ”
* * *
I know that there is some indication Kessler is a former Leftist (a mole or a traitor?), but also some claims that this is not the same man. Staying neutral on that one right now, but apparently whoever he is, the Charlottesville pols don’t like him.
reminds me very much of Weimar.
Let me ask 1) what is a white nationalist ? Why is that term used interchangeably with white supremacist by Leftists? Is it good to be a white globalist?
And further, when and why did dictatorial communism become preferred by Americans on the Left?
Here’s a personal-witness piece, make of it what you will.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/450454/charlottesville-white-supremacist-rally-first-hand-account-day-deadly-hate
This is his worldview, to start with:
“Shortly after arriving downtown, we learned that Governor Terry McAuliffe was about to declare a state of emergency. I was preparing to give remarks at a counter-programming event organized by the University of Virginia, praising the conservatives who have stood up against the creeping authoritarian and racist tendencies on the right. That event was canceled owing to the state of emergency.”
After asserting that the original protesters were totally at fault, an out-of-state armed militia continually getting “in the face” of the (mostly) peaceful counter-protesters despite the appropriate peace-efforts of the police, the author admits by omission that no guns were fired at anyone, with this caveat bolded:
“In my own observations, I also saw counter-protesters who were in the face of the white supremacists. I can’t help thinking that it could’ve gotten a lot worse if one of the hard-left protesters (bordering on anarchists) provoked the wrong Nazi, who was carrying a semi-automatic.
Those who see what happened in Charlottesville as an example of moral equivalence are committing a moral offense. The alt-right, white supremacists, Nazis, etc., started Saturday’s event. They were both original cause and proximate cause. They were pushing the boundaries most of the day.”
He says at the end:
“But those who want to restore civic peace need to think about the challenge in all its dimensions, and that includes what to do about hard-left provocateurs in moments like this. In Seattle, I saw first-hand how anarchists disturbed otherwise peaceful anti-globalization protests. And I saw the potential for it Saturday. The president is right: The entire nation has a role to play in standing against racial hatred – and in healing the breach. It also matters a great deal how the president responds to calls for him to clearly condemn racism.”
But how are you going to get to that healing when you have people who want to keep picking at the scabs?
Bob Kantor…
Antifa storms the streets while wearing Black… Making them Black Shirts I should say.
Their resemblance to el Duce’s crew of bona fide Facists is astounding… both in thought and deed.
This whole episode is an indictment of the Left and the MSM.
As for Kessler – the boy is a clown – largely pumped up BY the MSM.
Big Maq, Bill and Ann:
Both of you would be slightly more persuasive in your arguments if you would cite sources outside of the MSM and the NeverTrump right (of which Weekly Standard is the gold star). It’s not that such sources can be dismissed ad hoc. But their inherent bias is clear.
Here’s what I’ll predict. This imbroglio will have little to no impact on Trump’s standing with anyone outside of the media-dc-entertainment axis. I’ll go further: Republicans will lose no more than five seats in the House next year and will gain two to four in the Senate (due to the lopsided number of Democrat held seats). This is not because Trump is especially popular (although I do think his actual numbers are probably 5-10 points higher than in most polls). It certainly won’t be due to GOPe! Rather, the Democrats are irrepressible bourbons; they still have nothing to offer to much of flyover America…but smug contempt. They have learned nothing from 2016. Their tepid Better Deal is hardly evidence to the contrary.
I agree, Democrats are playing with fire here. I highly doubt most independent and non partisan viters really care all that much about Charlottesville, the Alt Right, a handful of ridiculous ersatz Nazis, etc. Nor are they all that concerned with an ill stated response from the President or the chorus of hand wringing, breast beating and virtue signalling we have been inundated with. Nothing, absolutely nothing, can besmirch Trump further at this point. But voters can be alienated even further. And Democrats seem dedicated to doing just that.
“This morning I was listening to the mother of the girl that was killed and she expressed happiness that if the thing had to happen she was glad her daughter was the victim.”
I don’t believe you.
It has always been. They just repeatedly failed to make it work on a landmass and in a polity where there were so many options and avenues of escape.
We could start with with the first Non-Conformist settler leaders who tried and failed to institute a communistic farming regime for a season or two, and then gave it up for practical, not moral reasons. And then trace it right to the present through the crack-pot communitarian and utopian religious movements which westward migrating New England genetics seemed to spawn generation after generation, till the German revolutionist refugees of 1848 and the late 19th century Central and Eastern European atheists replaced their haphazard efforts with a supposedly more “scientific”, and perhaps murderous, socialism.
It’s apparently just a fact that some organisms have a taste for totalitarian collectivism, or see it as their main or best life chance.
As an historical accident, we happen to call them leftists.
Though who knows, there may be something to the notion of a distinctly sinister mindset, that forces itself out in the form of human language.
If you ask one of the Neo Nazi participants from Charlottesville episode are they for American first nationalism, they will say yes. Against Affirmative action yes. Stop illegal immigration yes.
If you ask the typical Trump supporter or even the typical conservative they would probably also answer yes to all three questions. That has allowed the media to conflate them and other conservatives (deliberately in my opinion).
The difference is in goals and motivations. The neo Nazi wants to discriminate against minorities whereas Trump and most conservatives want to stop discrimination.
As many have noted above groups on the far left and BLM for example have more in common with the Neo Nazis than the moderate middle (however they would answer such questions). And that is why even though the media on the left has won this spin cycle (or two) on this eventually there will be a reaction to trying to push through genuinely racist goals – e.g. going after Lincoln statues, changing streets named after Washington.
“Frog Says:
August 17th, 2017 at 11:51 pm …”
Say, you said, I believe, that you were at Duke; apparently during the railroading of the lacrosse team.
One of the signers of that infamous document indicting them, by some 88 of the faculty, was Alex Rosenberg, the famous values nihilist philosopher.
http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2016/03/misreading-a-social-disaster-group-of-88-members-look-back
Did you ever cross his path?
People act like Trum’s reaction actually matters.
It’s not going to save your dead Republic for one thing. And no, outsourcing all power to the President in evil DC, the capital, is not going to save you either.
If Trum isn’t reacting by fighting, then he is of no use. All your Executive Order stuff can be reversed, either with a coup or with another Demoncrat President. It is meaningless. A temporary reprieve, one which American patriots have already wasted
If there are any wise people left among us, they will recognize that the prompt defacement of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. tells us how far America is along the dangerous path of spiritual lawlessness.
America still hasn’t used the power they have to DC to stop abortion and other violations of divine law. The Divine Counsel looks down on these mortals and starts to ask “how long do they need before we bring down the hammer, because Moses had 40 years”.
Liberals Slammed America for torturing convicted terrorists to obtain life saving intel but now are completely okay with punching someone who allegedly is a nazi doing perfect legal things.
Dave, I’m going to steal that observation.
Dave Says:
August 18th, 2017 at 12:35 pm
Liberals Slammed America for torturing convicted terrorists to obtain life saving intel but now are completely okay with punching someone who allegedly is a nazi doing perfect legal things.
* * *
Projection?
And don’t fall into the Left’s trap of using their media-pushed definitions: the intel gathering from Islamic jihadis was not “torture”; what happened to McCain and many others in Vietnam was torture: the gratuitous infliction of severe, crippling pain for reasons unrelated to preventing future attacks.
Real Nazis and Communists use torture. South American and Middle East and African and Asian governments and anti-govs use torture.
The “alleged” part is also important.
DNW Says:
August 18th, 2017 at 10:30 am
” … when and why did dictatorial communism become preferred by Americans on the Left? “
It has always been. They just repeatedly failed to make it work on a landmass and in a polity where there were so many options and avenues of escape.
* * *
Good history lesson.
The problem now is that there is no more frontier to escape to.
And, of course, they always follow along with the escapees.
DNW:
I had no truck with the “Arts and Sciences” faculty, most fortunately. I was at the School of Medicine, where all pain hurts and all blood is red. Before that I was a trivial but devoted cog in the move to integrate the UVA medical center. I followed the lacrosse affair very closely but had left the institution long before, seeing the emerging Leftist arrogance even in Duke Hospital, with the importation of lots of Yankees, especially from Yale.
We see now how sadly false Godwin’s Law is. We are told “neo”-Nazis are all around us, that white “supremacism” or “nationalism” (as if the two are equal) are inherently evil despite the worldwide advances that developed from and characterized white “dominance” for the last 500 years.
Ask yourselves, “What great and universal good has originated in Latin America, non-Western Europe, Asia or Africa in the last 500 years?” The penicillins (Fleming, in Britain, found the first) alone have probably saved as many lives as Stalin and Mao took.
Where did the thought of God-given rights originate? How are the former European colonies doing with their freedom from oppression? Why, they oppress and are corrupt, India excepted, but remember that Alexander the Great and his Greek soldiers injected some Greek DNA into that Indian gene pool many centuries ago.
Inside the Beltway has the same urge to self-destruct as does Europe, apparently. Cowards and bullshitters. I fear we are headed toward a 2nd civil war. parker, I and others who post here will not go silently into that good night.
In other news, Bannon just got fired.
change my wordings from torture to waterboarding then. Waterboarding is a relatively harmless uncomfortability inducing method that leaves behind no permanent damages and the Left still were against that. compare to waterboarding punching a nazi is much more damaging method to punish anyone. punching someone can knock them out, and potentially cause serious injury if head hitting hard a hard surface after the fall. I was just trying to point out the hypocrisy of the left.
Not before they show their true colors. You know, the “rainbow”, which divides white and excludes black from the color spectrum.
One of the questions that there seems to be among commenters is if there were “good” people involved in the protests on either side. Most of the disagreement seems to be if there were these unicorns on “right” side of the protests. Here is something to consider.
During the demonstration (I cant remember which day, Friday or Saturday, it’s all one big mess to me) I remember a news interview with an individual. This individual was executing his right in Virginia to open carry and was carrying a long gun (probably why the news person interviewed him). The thing that comes to mind is that if this individual was a white supremacist idiot, then why didn’t he use his weapon when the violence started? In fact, not only was there no reports (that I have heard) of gunshot wounds but no reports of any firearm discharge. This could be because the antifa folks decided that discretion was the better part of valor, or it could be because this person (people?) was not involved in the violence.
To me, it seems that this very well could have been a person that truly was only interested in the status of the monument; not there for some other cause.
For me though the bottom line is that we can come to conclusions only from the information that we have. Until I remembered this, I was in agreement with those that thought there were probably people on both sides that didn’t desire violent confrontation based just on common sense. I believe that this confirms my belief.
When you give government absolute power to right your wrongs，how are you going to take back its power when it stops righting wrongs？
how are you going to take back its power when it stops righting wrongs？
Too late to worry about that ,Americans already fell for the Trum/Hussein trap of opposed opposites.
The Leftist alliance’s leadership may not be smart enough put Trum into power so as to radicalize both factions so that they can seize Power. Lucifer, however, definitely is smart enough.
“I’ve heard this same comparison over and over. Grant actually fought the enemy. Trump tweets and continuously shoots himself and, if you haven’t noticed, lots of people on his own side. He’s actively working to have a smaller Republican presence in congress.”
I would have said the same thing prior to the election. What a mess Trump seemed to be in. How could should a disorganized campaign win? And history seems to be repeating itself. How can such a disorganized White House be effective? But he’s got 3 more years which is less time than he had during the election so I’ll withhold judgment and look forward to seeing what happens in first, 2018, then 2020.
As for shooting his allies, I think many of them were not really so and his tweets and speeches are aimed at a different audience, the audience which helped him win. I can only guess at how effective they are from my own reaction when I heard he blamed not only the neo-nazis, but placed blame on both sides. FINALLY, I thought.
As for decreasing the Republican presence in congress, the Republicans themselves have to take much of the blame. No one is else is attacking. Rubio, whom I once thought one of the more attractive candidates, didn’t even mention antifa in his blame. Or maybe he did, but it wasn’t covered by the MSM (which would point out how ineffective a “normal” politician would be in getting his message across). As a note, I closed my Twitter account a while back so I there are many things I’m not up to date on.
It may not have been clear, but I’m still agnostic towards Trump. If there was any politician who aggressively defended many of the principles I believe in, I’d be anti-Trump.
If all Trum is good for is using the Presidential bully pulpit to make Amis feel better. why not just grab a random Youtube celebrity and put him into the White House.
Same efficiency.
Dave Says:
August 18th, 2017 at 7:32 pm
When you give government absolute power to right your wrongs，how are you going to take back its power when it stops righting wrongs？
* * *
It takes a lot of work, and recognition of the problem.
That’s what President Trump is (to some degree) attempting to do with the EPA, DOJ, etc — which not only stopped righting wrongs, but started committing them.
Just when you think… (accessed via links at LibertyUnyielding today)
http://libertyunyielding.com/2017/08/18/just-thought-hunt-vestiges-confederacy-couldnt-get-dumber/
“Just when you thought the hunt for vestiges of the Confederacy couldn’t get any dumber”
The Antifas think an they have found a stealth-flag that’s 100 years old and not related to the Civil War in any way.
“It’s a section of a mosaic tile frieze found in the Times Square subway station in New York City. ”
http://www.dailywire.com/news/19861/oops-antifa-protesters-vandalized-peace-monument-emily-zanotti#
“Unfortunately for Antifa, who were clearly to busy opposing fascism to read a plaque at the base of the monument (which is printed with the words, “Cease firing, peace is priceless,”) or do any basic Google research, what they thought was a pro-Confederate memorial turned out to be a monument to peace.
The statue, which depicts an angel guiding a Confederate soldier to lay down his arms, was erected in 1911, well after the Civil War, and a part of an organized effort in Atlanta to encourage peace and healing in the wake of a bloody and destructive era in the state’s history.”
And not everyone is buying the MediaLeft’s Kool-Aid:
http://conservativefiringline.com/eyewitness-confirms-left-wing-protesters-used-acid-rocks-police-charlottesville-nothing-video/
“In an exclusive interview with the Conservative Firing Line on Thursday, Denise Freeman, a former registered nurse (RN) from North Carolina who was literally in the middle of the melee that took place in Charlottesville, Virginia, confirmed that leftist protesters were extremely violent, hurling rocks, eggs, frozen water bottles, urine, feces and what she believes to be battery acid.
Freeman went to Charlottesville as part of a contingent from the APV (American Pit Vipers) III Percenter organization. According to Freeman, the group was there after having contacted local law enforcement and did not take sides in the protest.
Freeman, who said she has a Puerto Rican son, was up-front in saying that she disavows the alt-right groups, including the KKK and the white nationalists who participated in the “Unite the Right” rally. She also expressed similar sentiments about the far-left Antifa counter-protesters.
She chose to go, she said, because of her belief in the First Amendment right to free speech and free assembly, saying that it extends to both sides, even if she disagrees with their point of view.
“We’re not affiliated with either side,” she said.
Her job was to provide assistance to anyone who might need medical attention.
And, it turns out, her services were needed – by both sides in the the fight.
Freeman told me she and her colleagues pulled and treated injured protesters from both sides, sometimes working in the middle of the street as combatants clashed around her. In all, she said, they treated well over two dozen people. At one point, they attended over 5 people at one time in the street.
Meanwhile, she added, “my boys were holding people off.”
…
Freeman explained that she and her comrades feared being attacked by both sides, and had to maintain “situational awareness,” but it turned out that they had much more to fear from the liberal protesters who, she said, were far more violent than the white nationalists.
“I don’t know of anyone attacked by the alt-right,” she said “All of the violence was from the Antifa side.”
That’s not to say the alt-right didn’t start fights. Freeman said both sides initiated conflict with the other at times, but the leftists were far more violent.
And, she recalled, the level of respect shown to her and her group was quite different between the two sides, with the alt-right being far more respectful than the Antifa counter-protesters.”
(A curious observation about Right v Left even when both are alt-ed; compare Tea Party to OWS)
http://libertyunyielding.com/2017/08/18/black-christian-leaders-come-together-defend-trump-charlottesville-violence/
“While some, like Charlottesville Mayor Mike Signer, have claimed that there is a “direct line” between the events in Charlottesville and the choices Trump made in his 2016 presidential campaign, conservative African-American clergy members, scholars and political activists decried such an argument in a Monday press conference at the National Press Club.”
The selective indignation over Charlottesville in this last news cycle: Trump undertakes an even-handed denunciation of all bad on any side perpetrating violence and a mob frenzy takes hold stoked by people like Mr. Lemon and CNN above. However, all throughout Obama’s eight years not once did he ever denounce La Raza and not once did CNN ever call him on it and they certainly never focused on this racist organization in our midst. To the contrary, he and they welcomed La Raza into their coalition either ignoring their KKK like hard core racist elements or covering for them.
La Raza’s slogan or motto:
Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada. Translated: For the Race everything. Outside the Race nothing.
We should denounce all of these groups – KKK, La Raza, Nazi’s, Antifa. Selectively doing so for political gain is deplorable, and that’s been going on for some time.
For months now hard core nut jobs on the Left, Antifa, have been organizing violent attacks on peaceful lawful gatherings by conservatives. These have been far beyond anything the KKK or Nazi groups have even attempted. The Antifa people are far more numerous than the KKK/Nazi’s. When the KKK/Nazi’s come out of the dark and show themselves they don’t gain support. And if Antifa had the same attention focused on them this assault from the Left on the civil rights of the Amercian people would be snuffed out as quickly.
Just to give info on your point #5, and to show that Trump was right, that there were patriots (i.e. good people) duped into attending the Charlottesville Riot: (a call into the Chris Salcedo show, the “Liberty Lovin’ Latino”)
https://audioboom.com/posts/6210585-8-16-morning-news-lee?t=63
Noone should call this guy Lee and the mixed-race group of friends he went with racist.
(wanted to comment earlier, but it took me time to remember where I had heard the call, and also to find and post it)
Thanks for your wisdom over the years, Neo.
Trum is so not tired of winning yet that people online are talking about Civil War 2, half a decade too late as it so happens.
It’s all part of the planned opposition plan.
La Raza’s slogan or motto:
Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada. Translated: For the Race everything. Outside the Race nothing.
Are you serious? F*ckin’ lol. And here even I thought I was being hyperbolic when I said these people were just brown-skinned Nazis.