White supremacists shouting anti-black, anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic slogans had converged to protest the imminent removal of a statue of confederate General Robert E. Lee on the grounds of the Virginia university founded by slave owner Thomas Jefferson. They were confronted by democratic socialists, anarchists and other social justice groups who'd traveled to the quiet college town to show solidarity and bear witness.
There has to be a reason that police stood by and let the two groups battle it out in the streets before they finally intervened. It was to give the TV audience watching at home the opportunity to see that "both sides do it." Lookee here, folks, socialists are the same thuggish thing as fascists! So before one young woman got killed and many others injured by a road-raged young neo-Nazi, the violence was dutifully portrayed as a "clash" between two equally unruly groups. If an alt-right man threw a punch, and a leftist defended him or herself, it was caught on camera so that both could be chided for resorting to violence. Maybe they would just cancel each other out in the eyes of the great moral majority, and go home so that the proper anti-Trump resistance of the Democratic-Neocon alliance could get on with the more seemly outrage and virtue-signalling.
Although centrist criticism of the leftist counter-protesters has now become suitably muted in light of the fact that one of them - a white female Bernie Sanders supporter, no less - was actually killed, the liberal punditocracy had been saying the exact same things which they are now criticizing the shocking Donald Trump for saying: that "many sides" act egregiously.
Right before Saturday's terror attack, corporate Democratic groups were actually goading young leftists, mocking them as probably too cowardly and basement-bound to ever don a pink pussy hat and join the astroturfed Clintonoid "resistance" movement against Trump. Writes Shuja Haider of Jacobin:
The morning before the rally, Mieke Eoyang, vice president of the National Security Program at centrist think tank Third Way, tweeted, “If the Bernie Bros wanted to make a show of force on behalf of progressive values, Saturday in Charlottesville would be a good time.”If it had been Hillary Clinton supporters who were attacked by a Nazi sympathizer with a vehicular weapon, I think it's a good bet that their biographies would be cause celebre for a massive outpouring of corporate news coverage and fundraising appeals. But the New York Times, to name just one, never even mentioned in its bio-piece about the murdered Heather Heyer that she had been a Sanders supporter. It doesn't fit their prescribed identity politics Narrative. As a matter of fact, in a separate Tweet, Times reporter Sheryl Gay Stolberg remarked that "the hard left seem as hate-filled as the alt-right."
Neera Tanden, president of liberal think tank Center for American Progress, turned disdainfully to her left later that day. “We have actual fascists marching with torches. Maybe everyone on the progressive side could focus on the enemies of progress in front of us,” she tweeted. “We’re ready for you to join us Neera,” one young activist responded. Tanden’s response was to ask him to condemn “those on the alt left who want to join with the fascists.”
Meanwhile, down at the more staid Netroots Nation's annual convention, which wound up over the weekend, the agenda was The Russian Infiltration of Our Democracy™️. The prescribed resistance at the Atlanta meeting was not against fascism, but against any and all criticisms of the Democratic Party's Russophobic propaganda. If I were a conspiracy buff, I might even suspect that the NSA and the CIA have infiltrated what used to be an independent group of progressive activists and bloggers. From Politico:
The question of alleged Trump campaign collusion with Russia looms especially large here. In the hallways and on side panels, activists and organizers are resisting the guidance of party leaders who worry about overplaying the Russia issue at the expense of others that may matter more to voters. The message from the grass roots? We’re not going to stop talking about President Donald Trump and Russia.Chamberlain wasted no time, therefore, sending out an email blast in which he used Donald Trump's remarks about Charlottesville as the perfect fund-raising hook. How quickly Russia is forgotten! Now we should give this Democratic veal pen group money to show how united we are in (artificially narrow) righteous indignation against Trump's failure to call out white supremacists. It is absolutely critical for the Democratic Party to co-opt the same events that it deliberately chose to ignore in favor of Russia, Russia, Russia. (Not least because their backfiring pro-Clinton propaganda has seemingly infected so many "grassroots" minds to the point of no return.)
“Not only is it a false choice, it’s a really limited choice,” said Democracy for America Executive Director Charles Chamberlain of the common refrain that Democratic candidates and groups ought to focus on issues like health care rather than the investigations. “I get it when people are frustrated when they feel like all they’re hearing is, ‘Russia, Russia, Russia…[but] it actually isn’t a distraction: It’s actually critical for our democracy.”
Hate and righteous anger are being falsely equated by far more sources than just the odious Donald Trump. As usual, the establishment is bursting its seams with its own, glibber versions of the same old platitudinous jingoistic boilerplate. (Love Trumps Hate; This Is Not Who America Is; Let the Healing Begin; Thoughts and Prayers; War Is Peace, etc.)
That being said, the emboldened, no-hoods-needed neo-Nazi movement is absolutely being aided and abetted by Trump's dangerous rhetoric, more bullhorn than the usual right-wing dog whistle. He is simply using the resentments of bigoted young white men the same way he is using the plights of the coal miners and the veterans and the fragmented labor unions: to further cement his own power. An administration composed of Wall Street bankers, bloodthirsty generals and fascist ideologues is his dangerous way of triangulating against traditional institutions, not least of which are the United States Congress and the entire federal court system. The courts have thus far balked at his unconstitutional directives and desires, the Congress not so much. So where there's gridlock, there's at least a little hope left for what is still left of our democracy.
Meanwhile, membership in the Democratic Socialists of America is skyrocketing. As a result, there are already worrying signs of infiltration by establishment Democrats, who'd also tried to co-opt the Occupy movement before the camps were torn apart by Democratic mayors, and the solidarity splintered, and the co-optation rendered moot.
While supporting such measures as universal health care and standing up to Trump-inspired fascism, there is, tellingly, nothing on the DSA website about resisting American wars and imperialism.
And what is the American military's aiding and abetting of multinationals high on capitalistic crack but fascism? What are the bombings and occupations of faraway countries and their darker-skinned people anything but racism?
*****
Note to readers: I'll be away, so few to no postings in the next two weeks. I'll still be checking in regularly to moderate and publish your comments.
8 comments:
"And what is the American military's aiding and abetting of multinationals high on capitalistic crack but fascism? What are the bombings and occupations of faraway countries and their darker-skinned people anything but racism?"
Right on, Karen!
Opposition to militarism and imperialism is my litmus test. Without strong, clear, unequivocal positions and concrete plans for opposing those those evils, I'm not buying anything they're selling no matter who it is. Bernie, are you listening?
Last night, in the first 200 or so comments following a Greenwald essay about Charlottesville and the ACLU connection, I read a handful of commenters lowering the decibel count by assuring readers that the anti-fascists were as violent or more so than the white supremacists, who were merely exercising their rights of free speech.
As for the car that did the damage, commenters with a detached air were suggesting that that unfortunate incident must have been an accident, which happened after the fascists had already called it quits and were, along with other drivers, simply trying to weave their way down the street through the anti-fa crowd, which stayed put, kept screaming, blocked the road and damaged passing cars.
(The 200+ comments added to the same Intercept article today, much of them on topic and focused on free speech law, are more instructive.)
https://theintercept.com/2017/08/13/the-misguided-attacks-on-aclu-for-defending-neo-nazis-free-speech-rights-in-charlottesville/?comments=1#comments
Back to the car driven by the white supremacist and whether his foot slipped on the gas peddle, this photo essay and first-hand report from a professional photographer puts the assumed accident scenario to rest. The photos also support the charge that the police chose not to be in the picture until after Heather Heyer was killed and other people smashed and broken.
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/terrorism-charlottesville-seen-lens-eyewitness/
Trump has a gift for provoking people good and bad, at home and abroad. Provocation may be his only gift but, whatever its merits, it's such a nifty way to get attention. He doesn't care to go down in the history books as a creator; nihilism seems much more manly. Some negotiator!
His accession to power is a golden opportunity to reawaken whatever remains of the forces of decency at home and abroad. Hillary doing pretty much the same thing as Trump behind the scenes where money and military force are concerned would never have brought America's pimples and boils to the surface the way Trump is doing all that week after week. Her transition into feudalism and nuclear war would have been much more smooth. As some writers said before the election, a Trump in the White House would do more than a Hillary to excite more good people into reforming American politics.
Charlotte looks like it could replace RussiaGate as the new stick to beat Trump. Writers from all shades of decency, liberals, progressives and conservatives, the tepid and the rabid, have seized upon Charlotte. But will the furor over Charlotte end up helping the DNC alone, or will it power a serious movement to replace the Duopoly, whole and entire? Ridding ourselves of big money's influence, mad dog generals, and the boils of racism––those would be changes we might believe in and fight for.
One of Ralph Nader's recurring tropes is that it only takes a small percentage of committed people to bring reform. Reminds me of that droll, if ugly, section of Genesis 18 and 19 wherein at one point Abraham bargains God all the way down from fifty to a mere ten good people to serve as a shield to save the city.
Then [Abaraham] said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?”
[The Lord] answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy [the city].”
Sure, the US has at least ten good writers to raise the awareness level above what it's been for the past few decades. But awareness is not enough. We are not merely spectators. Does the US have a minimal number of honest leaders, plus a minimal number of committed followers, to save the nation from itself? The answer is always in doubt.
It's interesting that corporate CEOs are now getting into the act of virtue signaling. Let's not be fooled though. It's ultimately about money, not people. Trump is hurting the national brand.
If, I mean when, Trump gets stark raving mad over their disloyalty and criticism, that could actually help slow the Capitalist privatization juggernaut. We can only hope he wages war on the corporate empire that runs this country. He implied that direction during his campaign. I'm sure they haven't forgotten that.
So what on earth could the plutocrats and oligarchs promise Trump to coax him to resign but that will also allow him to save face? I can't think of anything except monuments to his glory, but he's already built those himself. I suspect wannabe Generalissimo Trump would rather fight, just like the Generals he worships.
In reality, the Generals work for the American global corporate empire, if not during their term of service then after. The very people Trump has used to circle the wagons around him will be the ones who throw him into one of those wagons and haul him away.
And guess who's not criticizing Trump publicly or quitting any boards they're on? Lockheed-Martin. They always stand poised to reward cooperating Generals, no matter the administration or the conflict. The fact is, they have their greedy tentacles wrapped in, around, and through nearly every Federal agency, including the Defense Department, dwarfing all other contractors.
It's going to get very ugly now that the CEOs are taking sides on the battle lines, and indeed, now leading the charge.
Since Charlottesville is mentioned in this interview, in the context of what goes around comes around, and as the comments so far note the same connection, this link is worth checking:
https://www.democracynow.org/2017/8/22/state_dept_official_who_quit_in
Another note on Charlottesville:
http://billmoyers.com/story/lest-we-forget/
"Forget hell!" -- So it was proclaimed by a gnarly confederate soldier pictured on a cigarette lighter sold in South Carolina in the 1950s.
White supremacy reigns deep in the heart of Dixie, and as we see, throughout the U.S. of A.
"Our nation was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. Even before there were large numbers of Negroes on our shore, the scar of racial hatred had already disfigured colonial society. From the sixteenth century forward, blood flowed in battles over racial supremacy. We are perhaps the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today we have not permitted ourselves to reject or feel remorse for this shameful episode. Our literature, our films, our drama, our folklore all exalt it. Our children are still taught to respect the violence which reduced a red-skinned people of an earlier culture into a few fragmented groups herded into impoverished reservations."
~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Journalist––and full-fledged academic historian Paul Street––just put out this "lesson on slavery" about the bottom line impetus for the glorious American Revolution.
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/lesson-slavery-white-america/
The Stamp Acts, the Tea Party, Bunker Hill and Enlightenment values coming after a long period of benign neglect weren't the only issues in the mix leading to the revolt of moneyed elites of the colonies against moneyed elites of the motherland.
In school we were regularly fed history by the "consensus school," which sets out refined propaganda on white plates. Risking a chew on revisionist fare can be as eye popping as the unannounced dill pickle.
Erik Roth:
My adopted country, Canada, is suffering from the lasting remnants of how its native people have been treated. Many similarities to those in the U.S. and Justin Trudeau is trying to deal with the results of medical neglect, poor living conditions in restricted areas and resentment of those trying to restructure the culture of the past. Their voices are not going away.
Yea, Martin Luther King still speaks to us loud and clear. He should have been the first black president.
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