This can't keep happening in Berkeley
Submitted by gjohnsit on Sat, 03/04/2017 - 6:17pm
The first news story is neutral and doesn't tell you much.
Scattered bouts of violence broke out between marchers supporting President Trump and counter protesters at a Saturday afternoon pro-Trump rally in Berkeley.
But when you dig, you'll find the real story.
Trump supporters ask Berkeley police to intervene. Say people are getting hit in the head. #abc7news pic.twitter.com/PKVgKAlorD
— Leslie Brinkley (@lrbrinkley) March 4, 2017
Anti Trump protesters block traffic on MLK & Addison Berkeley. Pepper spray and fists flying in crowd. #abc7news pic.twitter.com/IZxAMLU2E6
— Leslie Brinkley (@lrbrinkley) March 4, 2017
And here.
One pro-Trump supporter was apparently sprayed in the face with Mace, just before 3 p.m. Blood was coming from his nose and friends were cleaning his eyes with a T-shirt. No other injuries have been reported.
Comments
A mainstream Dem, part of la mia famiglia
Suggested blowing up the house of the author of a pro-Trump letter in the local rag.
I'm definitely no fan of Trump, but I thought that was rather an 'odd' reaction.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Hooray For Our Side : We Drew First Blood
And, no I don't use snark tags, because that would be so repetitiously redundant.
I think I would like to exit the human race for a bit of time.
This is not what I meant by fighting back against Republicans,
you idiots!
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
Exactly as I feared.
I feared -- and still fear -- that things will get violent before they get better.
.... the people who finally can't take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone .....
[video:https://youtu.be/j3YcZ233MIs width:500 height:306]
Welcome to the Apocalypse, folks!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
parallels to Gangs of New York
edited for corrections.
I watched Gangs of New York this weekend for the first time and I thought it parallels with today's current events. The wealthy were very comfortable in their lifestyle as long as the rabble was contained. A line in the movie in a wealthy home setting went something like this, "You can always pay one-half of the poor people to kill off the other half." It was a chilling statement and the violence between gangs seemingly obliged this attitude as each fought for their share of the pie. It wasn't until the draft riots did the poor turn on the rich. The rich could buy themselves out of the civil war draft.
Only then, when the riots spread city wide and the wealthy were threatened, were social changes put into place for the swelling poor communities. We seem to be verging on that happening again. People are fed up as the wealthy are taking more and more of the pie. Are we going to oblige the wealthy and kill off the other half? I hope not but something will probably have to blow to get everyone working together to affect change.
Check out this article and the comments.
Apparently the pro trump rally was organized by one guy who is organizing them in other cities also. Some in the comments knew this would happen and exactly who it would happen between.
http://www.berkeleyside.com/2017/03/03/city-prepares-pro-trump-demo-coun...
They'v been clashing in all the cities.
Vote for the Democrats - kabuki squabbles in Washington and elsewhere. Meanwhile, they're voting for the "killer's" cabinet and will vote for his legislation. mimi's link to the TRNN article is really worth the read, as is the Glen Greenwald piece on Russia. What would we do without the internet and access to real news. 24/7 of nothing but bull shit from the establishment media. No wonder Americans are so dumb and about to get dumber thanks to Trump and DeVos.
http://therealnews.com/t2/story:18588:Real-News-Doesn%27t-Side-with-Russ...
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
5 bucks says agent provocateurs are involved.
And no doubt they're playing both sides.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
My thoughts too
What better way to further denigrate the left than to paint them violent. My sense is that much of the violence we see at these pro Trump rallies is being done by agent provocateurs.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I have to disagree with letting the hillbots off this easily.
Agents inciting these events would be a great excuse, but unfortunately for me I have talked to too many of these people, and they are delusional.
They feel like they are fighting the next Hitler, therefore any actions that they take to do so are noble and appropriate no matter how despicable.
These fears were stoked by the DNC and MSM for damn near a year, and far too many uneducated and misinformed "Liberals" bought it hook, line and sinker.
So while I would LIKE to to believe that this is the work of outside forces, my personal experience, including calls for violence against myself for refusing to vote for her lowness, comments in "Progressive" blogs and from known authors prevent me from burying my head in the sand and blaming "Others".
The meme that the Republicans are all violent gun huggers is just as false as the meme that all Democrats are peaceniks and non-violent.
Like all true believers, they are non-violent right up to the point where you call their world view into question...
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
I probably should have been clearer
when I said "left." In my post, the "left" I am referring to is comprised of folks like us who despise both sides and could give a rats ass about being involved in their personal pissing and hitting contests. Any violence by Clinton supporters or by persons hired as agents provocateurs (which I still believe there were at these demonstrations) results in the Clintonites getting a twofer (against Trump and against the real left whom they hate even more).
While no one personally threatened me for not voting for Clinton, I was immediately defriended from FB by a high school friend who was a rabid Clinton supporter, but not before she reamed me out about how I personally caused Clinton to lose.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Here comes
the billionaire funded American Spring, right on schedule.
I agree with both gulfgal98 and alphalop above; paid provocateurs, the uniforms are a dead giveaway, AND their hillbot spoiled brat enablers. I would go farther and say that this could not be happening without the hillbots to give cover to the mercenaries.
BTS, would anyone like to explain the difference between white hoods and black bandanas, the purpose of both being to hide the identities of paid agents of chaos? Or maybe I should ask that question at TOP?
Mary Bennett
I've been wondering
why no one pulls the masks off to get an identity or why media doesn't track those people down.
News people sure manage to harass a number of other people when they want to get a story.
dfarrah
I saw it done once
I think it was a G8 protest in Vancouver or Montreal when the crowd turned on one of the agents provocateurs and tackled him. The first thing you notice is the soles of his boots - identical to the police on the other side of the barricades. The next thing is the police move in and surround the guy, then he gets "disappeared" behind police lines.
I noticed at this protest some of the video supplied to Fox News had obviously been recorded by one of the provocateurs in question.
“He may not have gotten the words out but the thoughts were great.”
If that's what you think....
....then you really don't understand Antifa or the Black Bloc. Those folks are real, whether you agree with them or not. Personally I think they're fundamentally messed up (even tho I'm also an anarchist, but of another sort), but I do know where they're coming from.
I never said they weren't real.
Would you care to share with us just whom it is who is paying the bills for the Black Bloc or whatever these "protesters" are calling themselves? Uniforms, plane fare, accommodation etc. don't come for free you know. If is not Soros, then who?? Us enquiring minds want to know and please don't tell me not to bother my pretty head about it.
Mary Bennett
A bit much right-wing talk radio?
Oh come on. George Soros must be paying their air fare (from the same neighborhood) because there aren't actually any real anarchists in Berkeley! And since they don't exist, they can't possibly afford the black clothes they normally wear! Guess you never heard of punk rock? So let's see, you don't like them, so turn them in to the pigs? Phil Ochs wrote a song about that..."Love Me, I'm a Liberal".
http://slingshot.tao.ca/?p=116173
http://www.leftvoice.org/In-Support-of-the-Anti-Milo-Berkeley-Antifa-Action
@gulfgal98
Exactly! We need to call Corporate Dems what they are and refuse to accept the theft and deceptive use of 'left', 'progressive', etc. to conceal what they themselves are from their intended victims or to make real progs look bad. Just as the Greeds are not exceptionally wonderful 'Elites' but The Parasite Class. And self-interests cannot be lumped into groups fighting for the public good by terming them all 'special interests' so that environmentalists and public health specialists trying to protect against predators and poisoners are considered to be 'the same as' the professional lobbyists of corporate polluters seeking to pollute more and knowingly increase their 'cost-cutting' destruction of human and environmental health and life.
Enough is enough of just letting them confuse issues by messing with the established meaning of terms required to identify realities.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Useful idiots
I suppose you have heard the term.
Mary Bennett
But we'll be fighting each other instead of those who
@thanatokephaloides
oppress us. The "divide and conquer" stratagem will win yet again, whipped to a frenzy by the 24/7 anti-Trump noise machine--telling us whom to "resist" without feeling the need to describe (with pesky specifics) what those pushing said "resistance" intend to fight FOR beyond liberal-speak buzzwords.
Modern history: pendulum cycles of lather, rinse, repeat. As a species, are we really doomed to repeat them? It begins to seem so.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." --Jiddu Krishnamurti
I find solace in one concrete fact.
The inherent impossibility of us ever being able to explore much beyond the extent of the Oort Cloud means we will not be able to really screw up the Universe.
I do think however this cyclical modus operandi extends far into the past at least as far back as to our last fertile conjugal encounters with our cousins the Chimpanzees.
"we" aren't the ones doing the violence
"We" aren't the ones doing the violence. As several others have pointed out in this thread, the violence has been ultimately sourced in the Hillary Clinton Democratic Party, and the various agents provocateurs working both sides of the conflict, probably for cash money pay.
The genuine American Left -- those who would have been known as "New Deal Democrats" in my childhood and points left of there -- literally have no dog in this fight. But we will be blamed for it nonetheless.
All of which is why I fear the outbreaks of violence, as it cannot end well for us.
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
@thanatokephaloides
I dare hope that this violence between the Trumpistas and Clintonistas will show that the two party system is broken - those parties are fueled by hate, anger and fear - backed by different sides of rich folks. Both sides are itching for a big, violent show down - hoping to profit from it - fascists against freedom fighters (both claiming the others are the fascists) ... despite the fact that 'war' it will destroy most of what they're fighting over.
If we are very lucky, before the powder-keg ignites, the majority of us, we who find both parties repulsive, may get a (short) opportunity to form a new, third party that just wants to prevent normal (non-rich) folks from getting steam-rolled. It would be a good time to build bridges between all demographics of non-rich folks: non-rich Women, non-rich Blacks, non-rich Whites non-rich Latinos, non-rich Asians, non-rich Muslims, non-rich Jews, non-rich Christians, non-rich people of all kinds.
Not Sure I Can Take Much More
confrontation can be educational.
It's not clear to me here who is interested in learning anything.
These morons are going to bring
about marshall law. Trump has all but said to LEO's around this country, take off the gloves, that is remove the veneer of the rule of law. If you're going to engage in violence, direct it where it will actually do some real damage, attack the "corporate" titans, not other people. These people are your neighbors, co-workers etc. Sure they are smug, arrogant, and mostly ignorant fucks, but they are humans as well. You have to live with them, go to work with them, shop at the same stores etc...
It is too easy for agent provocatures to disrupt protests and change the protest dynamic, from what you are protesting about, to how violent protests have become, which won't do anything good, as well as lay the foundation for the justification of implementing marshall law, which would be just fine with them.
If people want to protest, they should be protesting the fucking democrats in the senate that are voting for all of Trump's nominees.
Where the fuck were your protests when Obama let George Bush and his administration of war criminals off the hook for their obvious 'The Emperor has no clothes' crimes?
Where the fuck were your protest when Obama signed the NDAA, which completely eviscerated our constitution?
Where the fuck were your protests when Obama didn't even try to get the public option included in the ACA?
Where were your protests when Obama let the executives of the TBTF banks off the hook for their obvious financial control fraud? (Especially when Obama crushed Occupy Walls Street protests, whom you labeled as a bunch of hippies, worthy of nothing but disdain?)
Unfortunately these protestors have learned nothing from history. If your going to protest, your going to need to engage those people that have LEO and or military experience to establish defense perimeters around your protest, specifically on the look out for agent provocatures, and to keep your own protestors in line.
The "state" has the monopoly on violence. Sure punching a "nazi" is emotionally carthic, but it won't acheive anything good for our country and the millions of people suffering from the failed policies of DEMOCRATS.
Protestors should be protesting the Democrats that have enabled the rise of TRUMPISM. The election of Trump is just a symptom of the underlining problem, the Oligarchy that run this country, and the plutocrats (Democrats) that support them, ie Obama, Hillary, Tom Perez, Nancy Pelosi and their ilk.
Protesting in the streets, crying like a bunch of trophy babies that Trump isn't your president, completely misses the point, imho. Stop crying about the Russians. For fuck sakes, if the Russians did anything, they exposed the total and utter corruption of the Democratic establishment, and their utter failure to properly secure their email accounts.
FUCK, the emails, whether hacked or leaked, prove the democrats, in collusion with their media whores, promoted Trump. Fuck, they wanted to run against Trump, and THEIR strategy failed. But insted of being pissed off at the failed strategies of the establishment democrats, your pissing in the wind, not my president. You have no one, but yourself and the democratic establishment to blame for Trumps election.
Stop fucking protesting Trump and protest those fuckers that put him in office, established democrats! They are the fuckers that help get him elected
Now is not the time to cry NotMyPresident, now is the time to #DissentDisobeyDisrupt the fucking establismnent democrats, they very ones that gave us Trump! We should be out in force at democrat offices nation wide because their failed policies, corruption and protection of the Oligarchy is what gave rise to Trump!
Fuck "party loyalty", humanity is at stake!
(End of Rant)
RR
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
^^^This!^^^
Excellent rant!
This is exactly what I have said here a number of times.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
And THIS!!11!!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Exallent rant Rooster
and one I 'identify' with as everyday when I go to my fb. page to see what up with my liberal 'friends' I hear all about the latest outrageous thing The Hairball has tweeted and then get a barrage of total insanity from my many Democratic so called liberal friends about how we need to resist via the Demorat's. These people are as delusional as the Trump people are.
Yer right where were they when Obomber was bombs away every 20 minutes for 8 freaking years? How about the fact that since 2006 the Demorat's in congress blew of their majority and Obama and Co. cut dirty deals with the lobbyists from hell and told us all not to be sanctimonious? Hey folks those torturers are patriotic so give them a break you far lefty extremists.
I'm losing sympathy/empathy by the day for the pink hat Hil Brigade as well as the Bernie brigade and all these fake resistance movement that lead back to the Domorat's as a solution. How fucking stupid can people be? Sure Trumps beyond the pale and a mouthy loose cannon to boot but come on people the Demo'rat'ic establishment love this shit.
They are so arrogant that Donna Brazile keeps sending me DNC mailers telling me that Trump is the Devil incarnate and would I please send some money and take their bogus 'survey. I re-registered in 2012 and am not a Demorat neither is Shah. Do I not believe anything I read about what, who or why the establishment mouthpieces tell me is happening.
My biggest freak out is how and why people who are not knuckle dragging morons believe that this is a battle between the blue and red. Holy Moly. They are all in cahoots. If not why would Ben Carson pass with 16 Demorats voting for his approval. Why would they be pumping the Russians did it bs? Such a farce that I cannot see why anyone would believe anything that any of these complicit player's tell you is real.
Like The Mad Bomber is somehow saner then The Hairball? So where were the Demorat's when the goon squad was sicced on Standing Rock. Why didn't Obama don his comfortable shoes or use his 'executive power' to do something about Scott Walker in Wisconsin? Holder with sauvey businessmen who broke no law? The Patriot Act hey it's a tool we Dems. need to keep you safe. We added some secret sauce to keep you double safe The Bush tax cuts, don't be hasty and I forget why the Demorat's re-upped them. Or for that matter why they dealt away the PO in their Heritage Foundation Healthcare plan way before the bogus town hall by the Repugs hit the floor.
Face it they are not a lesser evil. Their lame messaging is the only thing that's different. They found the perfect hateful nut ball to quell the public's disillusionment with their mutual agenda and are now free to let it rip. I could go on and on which I seem to have done. None of what is happening now could have happened without the Democratic party's blessing. So get real you so called liberals and stop reading the Fake News emanating from every mainstream corporate publication online and off.
As for these skirmishes in Berkley and elsewhere featuring God knows who against even worse they seem to me to be part of an overall agenda to stir some shit. I'm not going to get worked up about delusional Demorat's facing off with delusional Trump lovers. I've had about 16 years of this kabuki show and that's enough. I also am not that tweaked about destroying property. Let the revolution begin, non violent, and please remember it has nothing to do with this partisan shit. Maybe letting go of the great hoax of the red vs blue divide and the cooked up culure war would allow a real political revolution to begin.
Right across the street from Berkeley High School
It's a park where a lot of high school students hang out, who have a lot of reason to be pissed at Trump, considering the stupidity he is showing about their civil rights and their future. I suspect there were some rambunctious teenagers involved.
Beware the bullshit factories.
A missed opportunity. They should've formed an ad hoc group to
celebrate peace and environmentalism and obtained a permit for the time and place that the Trumpistas were going to be there. They could've set up tables and otherwise obstructed the hell out of the Trumpistas with the law on their side, policed the black bloc themselves and let the Trumpsters either leave (unlikely) or misbehave and get busted (probable).
Somebody wasn't thinking, or, more likely, nobody was thinking.
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
enhydra lutris, dear, that is NOT the plan.
All us peaceniks and greenies setting up our little tables is NOT going to topple Trump and get the war with Russia and Iran started. Not to mention, that quite a number of the Trumpists might even agree with us on at least parts of a peace and green agenda.
I vote for paint spraying the black clad provacateurs. Tell the real cops ahead of time so they don't shoot when they see your "weapon".
Mary Bennett
@Nastarana Freaking brilliant!
Freaking brilliant!
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.