The weakness of the GOP
Lately we've been hearing a lot about rampaging mobs of violent leftist extremists.
“The Democrats are willing to do anything, to hurt anyone, to get the power they so desperately crave,” Trump said at a rally in Minnesota last week. He added, “They want to destroy.”
Right. The same people that you were calling wimps and snowflakes just days ago, are now people to fear?
Only the fully indoctrinated Republican base will believe both statements.
The fact that the GOP is leading with this nonsense shows how little they have in winning ideas.
They aren't even trying to reach out to independents.
Remember when they were going to run on the success of those tax cuts?
By a 2-to-1 margin -- 61 percent to 30 percent -- respondents said the law benefits “large corporations and rich Americans” over “middle class families,” according to the survey, which was completed on Sept. 2 by the GOP firm Public Opinion Strategies and obtained by Bloomberg News.The result was fueled by self-identified independent voters who said by a 36-point margin that large corporations and rich Americans benefit more from the tax law -- a result that was even more lopsided among Democrats. Republican voters said by a 38-point margin that the middle class benefits more.
Americans aren't stupid. Surveys show that those tax cuts didn't go to increased wages.
They went to stock buybacks.
However, that isn't the Republican's biggest problem.
The biggest problem for the ruling party is that the one issue on the minds of the public, is the one issue that the GOP doesn't want to talk about - health care.
Opinion polling backs that up: a recent CBS News poll found that 70 percent of Americans think health care is a very important issue, a larger share than any other top issue. A similar conclusion has been reached by plenty of other polls conducted over the last few months, which also find that health care is foremost in voters’ minds, even above the economy and headline-grabbing topics like immigration.
Even people who have health insurance are afraid of the high costs.
This has become a huge problem for the right wing.
The public has warmed up to even a conservative half-measure like Obamacare, to the point that suddenly Republicans are claiming that they are defenders of Obamacare.
Thirty-two of the 49 GOP incumbents in races deemed competitive by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report have backed congressional measures on pre-existing conditions in the past six weeks, according to an analysis by The Hill.The moves, coming in the final weeks of the midterm campaign cycle, mark a course reversal for members of a party that for years railed against ObamaCare, also known as the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and called for its repeal.
...
Democrats in June seized on the Trump administration’s announcement in court that it would not defend ObamaCare’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions. The Department of Justice sided in large part with the 20 Republican state attorneys general who filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn ObamaCare.
Just imagine if the public was aware that the GOP wants to cut the Medicare budget and gut Medicaid?
Well, you don't have to imagine. There was a recent poll of Trump voters.
We asked the 37 percent of respondents who said they're planning to vote for Trump in 2020, "How likely is it that President Trump’s actions on health-care policies, specifically his support for increasing the number of uninsured, will keep you from voting for him?”Overall, we found a 39 percent reduction in the number of Trump supporters who'd support him for re-election if the number of uninsured increased.
...
About 90 percent of respondents in our survey said that Medicaid should be extended to all poor adults, and 82 percent don’t want to limit the amount Medicaid pays for a sick patient.
When people really don't like your policies, you lie, demonize, and fear-monger.
If it wasn't for Bernie and grassroots progressive activists fighting their own party leadership, Democrats would be in the same position.
Comments
I wish an actual left-wing would give these assholes
something to cry about.
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.
Somehow carrying signs and
having to raise one's voice to someone who doesn't listen has morphed into a violent mob, but only if you believe in human rights.
At least in the 60s, some leftist burned buildings or spat on cops before they were tear gassed, shot or bludgeoned.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
In the Sixties, we didn't have a huge NSA facility in Utah or
Homeland Security or cameras on the streets or laws relating to "domestic terrorists."
Hurt, crave, destroy...
There's a certain small book, by a certain small Austrian, that uses such terms for 'the other'.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Yes, but violence against one's enemies does not
equal Nazism.
Trump & the GOP have to go.
Here's a (partial) list of all the pre-existing conditions the GOP bill may not cover
By Nicole Chavez, CNN
Updated 11:16 AM ET, Sat May 6, 2017
The new health care bill, the American Health Care Act, could weaken protections for those with pre-existing conditions (aka a "health problem you had before the date that new health coverage starts") That's an estimated 52 million adults under 65. But the term "pre-existing condition" is, itself, vague -- and every insurance company has its own lists of "declinable" or "uninsurable." Here are the health issues they considered 'pre-existing conditions' prior to Obamacare. (This list is not comprehensive.)
Acne
Acromegaly
AIDS or ARC
Alzheimer's Disease
Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
Anemia (Aplastic, Cooley's, Hemolytic, Mediterranean or Sickle Cell)
Anxiety
Aortic or Mitral Valve Stenosis
Arteriosclerosis
Arteritis
Asbestosis
Asthma
Bipolar disease
Cancer
Cardiomyopathy
Cerebral Palsy (infantile)
Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
Cirrhosis of the Liver
Coagulation Defects
Congestive Heart Failure
Cystic Fibrosis
Demyelinating Disease
Depression
Dermatomyositis
Diabetes
Dialysis
Esophageal Varicosities
Friedreich's Ataxia
Hepatitis (Type B, C or Chronic)
Menstrual irregularities
Multiple Sclerosis
Muscular Dystrophy
Myasthenia Gravis
Obesity
Organ transplants
Paraplegia
Parkinson's Disease
Polycythemia Vera
Pregnancy
Psoriatic Arthritis
Pulmonary Fibrosis
Renal Failure
Sarcoidosis
Scleroderma
Sex reassignment
Sjogren's Syndrome
Sleep apnea
Transsexualism
Tuberculosis
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
So I'll never be insured then.
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.
Neither would I
Acne, Sleep Apnea, Asthma.
That first would have included 75% of my High School class. And having attended a 55th Reunion last month, so would the last two! Not to mention that I don't think ANY of us are not taking heart medicine.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Good to know! Thank you for posting that list.
Pregnancy a pre-existing condition?
That is sick and morbid and comes from the minds of sociopaths.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Did you guys catch this thuggery at the Manhattan GOP Club?
Apparently some latest RW media darling asshole named Gavin McInnes was invited by the official Manhattan Republican Club on the Upper East Side to speak there. Apparently he's a "Proud Boy." Where do these losers get their whole lame trip?
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"
- Kurt Vonnegut
Local TV reporting it as both sides....
Far left and far right just can't get along. God how I hate corporate media. I was skeptical for good reason. I am glad to see this here with the facts.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Yeah, as usual RW media went into textbook Orwellian coverage
as is typical of Murdoch's properties. Of course they could be counted on to blame the three victims for getting pummeled by a gang of 30 thugs who attended the Republican Party Club that night.
Fox News attacks liberals after far-right group Proud Boys assaults protesters on the streets of New York
It's all been documented on video.
Here's more coverage from Wonkette.
And where's the NYPD, the other part of the fascist RW tagteam? They stood by and let happen, even as the motherfucker who got paid by the Republican Party to speak brandished a sword at the protesters. And again, what was the subject of his talk (from Crooks & Liars)?
Could it be anymore severe Doublespeak than this?
And, while I'm reminded of it now, Naomi Klein wrote and excellent piece called, "Donald Trump, Brett Kavanaugh, and the Rule of Pampered Princelings," that goes to the heart of explaining many of today's leading RW oligarchs, such as Fox News/WSJ's Rupert Murdoch, another spoiled brat, sociopathic RW zealot heir to a fortune who moves the levers behind today's fascist state by inculcating the masses about, among other things, false theories of their he-man individualistic rise and myths about their own genius and hard work:
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"
- Kurt Vonnegut
They elected Trump, yes they CAN be that stupid.
Especially coming off the bank fiasco and 8 years of Bush lying us into war, etc. Yes, they most definitely CAN be that stupid and even stupider than that.
These people are causing humanity to win a Darwin Award.
Not exactly 'Krystal Nacht' but disturbing.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
These people are patient
The Rs have been trying to stack the court for 40 years, but they persisted until they managed to get it done.
Krystal Nacht in the US is a process, and while progressing slowly and patiently, it is effective. How many unarmed people have been shot in recent years? What is it like to be standing in your own house/apartment and have a cop walk in and shoot you (how did her key fit in the door anyway?)? Then there are the US prisons and judicial system. And the ghettos. And, and, and . . .
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
What Trump is talking about are those f...g idiots in Antifa.
Take a look at them on YouTube and you'll see what he means.
chuck utzman
TULSI 2020
Trump is implying
that a teeny, tiny, insignificant minority somehow represents his political opposition.
This is coming from a guy that offered to pay the legal bills of his supporters that beat up protesters.
Of course he is.
And the violent actions of the Antifa idiots gave him just the pretext he needed to create that molehill mountain.
The left is never going to win elections until they stop blaming the right for taking advantage of the left's own foolishness.
Impotent 'how dare he!' raging at Trump simply distracts from the real problem.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
The left doesn't exist, so they can't win in the first place.
And voting for or electing anyone from the 1% or the 9% won't solve anything. 2006 and 2008 proved this beyond any reasonable doubt. If you want to bend over for the far-right, be my guest.
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.
Thanks for the advice...
But I don't put a lot of stock in the opinions of closet Clinton supporters with seriously unresolved sexual issues.
2006 & 2008? You mean the elections where the Clintons weren't running the show?
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
The Clinton were running the show back then, too.
The Democrats took impeachment off the table the moment they got elected. Single Payer, too. They bent over backwards for the Repigs then, just as they're doing now. And from what I can gather, the folks here are still trying to do everything exactly as innefectual liberals would.
Face it, your trolling and accusations don't hold water.
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.
Progressive issues won those elections.
Not black hooded thugs looking to impose their own brand of militant fascism on the rest of us.
But hey, you seem quite happy with Hillary's brand of non-issue advocacy so long as it comes wrapped in a big scumbag of ideological violence.
In that regard, your views about militant socialism and targeted violence in furtherance of your political goals are historically quite similar to Ernst Röhm.
The company you keep....
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Those issues may win elections, but in
terms of actual policy, they never see the light of day. Single Payer? Nope. We got Romneycare on steroids, without a public option and without Medicaid expansion for half the country. Living wage? Nope. That would cut into the pigs' profits, and we can't have that. Roe v. Wade? Come on, for the Clintons, female autonomy has always been a bargaining chip.
The New Deal? Social Security? Medicare? The only reasons those things were allowed to happen was because the pigs had the Soviet Union and American labor movments on their asses, and even then, the pigs were still allowed to stack the courts with far-right hacks. That was the trade-off. When the Soviet Union was sold to capitalists for a slice of pizza, the pigs saw that as carte blanche to do what they wanted wherever they wanted.
You can vote all you want, but your vote doesn't mean dick to the pigs. Case in point: Andrew Gillum wins Florida Democratic Primary for Governor, then he walks back his entire platform that won him said primary in the first place. Same with AOC, Bernie Sanders, Obama, Clinton and so on.
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.
So I guess...
we should all just leave it to Antifa to save Medicare for us then.
I'm sure cracking a few skulls in the street will sort it all out.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Looking for examples of Antifa
violence outside of gatherings of white supremacists or other extreme right-wing groups. Can you supply some? Must be from a credible source. Thank you.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
Well, there was that “bike lock professor” guy . . .
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=antifa+professor+bike+lock
I specified in my request that
the actions be "outside of gatherings of white supremacists or other extreme right-wing groups."
Eric Clanton, charged with rally assaults, criticizes police investigation
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
Why should that matter?
The whole point of the Antifa is to violently confront right wing extremists. Where else would they be violent?
Political violence is wrong regardless of the pretext. People who seek to normalize political violence by promoting 'exceptions' are just as dangerous as the people they seek to counter (perhaps moreso).
First they came for the ....
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
The Proud Boys
and other extreme right-wing groups are officially listed as hate groups, and the police do nothing. So, who should?
First they came for the . . . AND I DID NOTHING. Should the left be handing Fascists polite little notes saying, "Please do not hate. xoxoxox"? The point of that poem was that people stood by instead of fighting to help others.
PS: The US has a long history of bombing right-wing groups. Make of that what you will.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
Your arguments...
are just as fascist as those you claim to oppose.
Downright creepy to see vigilantism promoted with so much vigor.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
The quote is:
Martin Niemöller said, "I did not speak out." He didn't say, "I did not take a tire iron and start swinging it."
Pretty big difference.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
What do you suppose the likely result of speaking
out against the actions of Nazis would have been?
You mean before they consolidated power?
Who knows. Couldn't have been worse than what actually happened. (Which in the end is exactly Pastor Niemöller's point - he ended up in a concentration camp precisely because he did NOT speak out against Nazi violence when it might have made a difference.)
Instead, he and many other Germans, desperate in their economic misery and frustrated by the impotence and corrupt self dealing of their government, embraced the thuggery and vigilantism of the Nazis in a foolish hope that it would improve their lives.
Kind of like some people on this board are doing with Antifa.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Timeframe
By the time Niemöller "spoke out" it was already too late. However, according to Sebastian Haffner, author of Defying Hitler, there was a time when the Nazis might have been stopped. This time was before '37, when Niemöller was first arrested. Haffner is quite sure they could have been stopped and spends some time on this point in the book. It's a book we should all read as we seem to be either repeating history or constructing something quite similar.
Haffner's book was written in '39, but not published until 2000 (as I recall). It is a first person account of living in Germany before and during the rise of National Socialism. It's not fiction.
Haffner's accounts of the failures to push back against the Nazis, especially in the early days, sound chillingly similar to what I see today. On all levels of media, only fairly recently have I seen hard-hitting retorts to right-wing bullying. Still, what there is of the push back seems extremely tame considering what would have been said twenty years ago (or even ten) in response to today's racist and authoritarian bullies. As in the early 1930's, we've a short window in which words have the possibility of being sufficient to stem the tide.
After the Reichstag fire in Feb. '33...
all internal opposition was systematically crushed.
Niemöller calls them Socialists but the Nazis actually first came for the Communists, the Antifa of their day who were promoting only a slightly different brand of totalitarianism from that of the Nazis.
After the Communists, they came for everybody else.
Bottom line, if there was a time when words might have helped, it was likely before '33.
By '37, it was already way too late.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
'33 was about it
Yes, as I understand it, originally he used the word Communists. The word Socialists was more for Red-Baited, un-American Activity-ized US sensibilities of the 1950's.
Haffner agrees with you on the '33 date (more or less). After that, only violence could stop it.
The reason
I am in complete agreement with Not Henry Kissinger in this discussion between you is that the illusion that violence on the part of citizens could have stopped the Nazi conquest of Germany, and therefore of continental Europe, is a false premise, I think. First, it implies that no one did stand up to them, which is false. And second, it seems to work with the assumption that the Nazis were a local gang and then, because no one stood up to them, they became powerful enough to take over the countries around them and threaten the peace of the world.
It's a premise that ignores the fact that Germany was armed to the teeth by industrial fascism, by an industrial cartel that had financial, political, and legal immunity and impunity. The Nazi terrorist army was one tool of the industrial onslaught against labor and democracy, and they were well armed. But beyond that was a manifestation of all that was possible under industrial hedonism: battleships, air force, surface-to-surface missiles, surface-to-air missiles, air-to-air missiles, anti-ship missiles, mines, magnetic mines, anti-magnetic mines, submarines, tanks capable of out-maneuvering and out-gunning all other tanks previously thought of as state of the art.
My husband and I saw the film, Anthropoid, about the successful assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, the head of Nazi forces in German–occupied Czechoslovakia, by exile Czechoslovak soldiers in 1942. In response to the success of this assassination, the Nazis slaughtered 5,000 innocent people, just to make the point that they could. It's not a matter of standing up to them. It's about not arming them in the first place.
Not right wing groups in the US.
However, once some right wing groups went anti-US government, rather than unconditionally "patriotic," they got the same kind of treatment left-wing groups have been getting all along-- and the right-wing groups are armed, while most left-wingers are neither armed nor well-organized.
If I understand
your question,
a 2016 riot in Sacramento may illustrate what you are asking for. In the footage of an attack on one demonstrator, beginning at minute 3:18, note the young woman punching him is interviewed at length in the second link. She openly advocates the shutting down of free speech by the use of actions she engaged in knowingly in front of a camera. The photograph in the third link is of two men who were victims of assault for having attempted to exercise their right to free speech, as covered in further video you can find of this event.
at 3:18:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6g-wh2AFaw
interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2dd1YoDULg
photo:
http://www.sfexaminer.com/least-6-stabbed-outside-capitol-sacramento/
Again, this action took place at a
white nationalist gathering. The first person who was interviewed is a self-proclaimed white nationalist (see video) on his way to a white nationalist demonstration. Probably because he was on video and being interviewed, this person decided he would provoke those who were protesting against a Fascist demonstration.
In the second video, quite a number of the counter protesters were knifed (that came from the reporters). That does not indicate that the white supremacists came to the rally with peaceful intentions. In this particular video, it does not appear that the counter protesters were armed (but then not everything was shown, so who knows).
The third piece that you posted states that six counter protesters were stabbed and one white nationalist and also states that it is unclear who was involved in the stabbings. Those numbers are a bit lopsided.
I started with a very specific question, looking for examples of
It has been proven that extreme right-wing groups take violent actions including murder. I am looking to see if there is the same type of behavior on the part of the counter protesters (who are not all Antifa). It also has not been proven that it is Antifa or the other counter protesters are the ones who start the violence at these gatherings.
Before someone decides to put words that I have not said in my mouth again, I am not advocating violence. I am looking for information. I also asked later (reworded now for clarity) what are the alternatives for stopping the recruitment of and dissemination of hate advocated by white supremacists and other groups of that ilk?
I found this video that some may find interesting:
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
I'm sorry
for not understanding your question. I thought your question might have meant that you haven't seen evidence that Antifa or other such groups have provoked or started violence. So I included the interview with the BAMN leader because she openly advocates violence to stop people from speaking if she determines their speech is dangerous to society. She emphasizes in the interview that this action was planned in response to the fact that the dangerous speakers had scheduled an event in Sacramento and that like-minded anti-fascist activists had come from all over California and even from out of state to prevent them from speaking. She was very proud, and she repeated it, that they had succeeded in preventing the fascists from speaking.
You say about the young man whom she punched that he was,
Yes. He did provoke them. He waved his flag, and taunted them, and he said to the camera guy, "you can be my witness." So he pretty much figured they would run over and physically attack him, which they did.
Later in the melee, the young woman BAMN leader, the person later interviewed explaining the organized and planned action to prevent fascist speech, walked up behind him and started pushing and punching him, ordering him to "get off our street." As he called to the police to stop them, her colleagues pulled him to the ground and started kicking him, at which point the police did break it up.
So you and I could argue all day about who started the violence in this demonstration of stupidity. But when an organization proclaims in its website that it will shut down free speech By Any Means Necessary, and when it's national organizer demonstrates in front of a camera what the Means are, and then openly states her pride in having prevented free speech by the use of those Means, I don't see anything that could be a better recruiter for violent hate groups than that.
The only thing I can object to is the
fact that she did not say that the group(s) advocate starting the violence. I have not seen any videos of the main part of the protest/counter protest. This was only a small part of the groups.
This guy was late to the party. However, the one woman did grab his flag off of his stick (I am guessing those stick banners are brought on purpose to serve as weapons) after he called them to him (I am not familiar with the symbol on the flag, but guess the people their know only too well). When she removed the flag, he began hitting people with his stick.
Cynic: If you are going to start a fight, you do not run to mommy during it and demand she stop it.
I understand her point, I just wish there was another way. That has been my second question: What are the alternatives?
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
I wanted
to respond to your comments and your question last night, but I was on my way to a discussion about bringing the left and right together, which was so connected to what you and I are discussing here.
You said about the young man that he was late to the party. I thought he was early, that the event hadn't happened yet, and as the BAMN leader explained, it never happened, as the anti-fascist forces prevented it, by force, from happening.
You said about the young man, when a person ran up and tore his flag off his pole,
So I looked back at the footage, frame by frame, and I don't see him actually hitting anyone, but I do see him swinging the pole at someone who ran up to him. I see this as self-defense. Immediately, a guy comes up from behind him and hits him on the head with something that I couldn't identify (a pie? A rock?). If you are looking at this slowly, you can see some of the people running toward him with sticks or poles.
I say all of this to admit that we can each see it so differently depending on our viewpoint. I see him as an innocent victim who tells the camera person at the beginning that he basically questions Affirmative Action. I see that as not only his right but also a question we could all benefit from listening to each other about.
My anger is focused entirely on the BAMN leader, who proclaims that preventing such speech, By Any Means Necessary, and who demonstrates her action by punching people, does everything she can to make the case that she has the right to violently prevent people from speaking. I've seen video of her punching people at a similar event in another city. She gets away with it because she is tiny, physically very small, and the people she chooses to assault are big guys, like this young man, and she knows they're not going to hit back. It would be like hitting a child. But as you can see, she is backed up by her thug friends, who move in, pull him to the ground and start kicking him.
This is bad stuff. It's also illegal, and she and others involved in the Sacramento riot have been charged. She has been criminally charged in the other city as well.
But the basic questions you and I are struggling with are over freedom of speech and whether preventing it would have prevented World War II. I don't think the Nazis were anything like these groups, not because of their philosophies, but because the Nazis were armed by an industrial group whose purpose was to destroy democracy and organized labor throughout Europe. Wearing a mask and hitting people with poles is not going to prevent that kind of power from taking over.
Once again, I do not want to be drawn into
an discussion that is beside the point of my original question. Thus far, no one has come up with an incidence of violence from Anitfa outside of confrontations with Fascists groups.
If you wish to learn more about this particular incident, there is a report that covers a great deal about it and talks to various people from both groups: Multiple people stabbed at Sacramento far-right rally & counter-protest
From a speech given by Hitler in 1933:
Note the last paragraph: If this is not stopped early then later attempts will only strengthen Fascist resolve.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
I agree with you,
in that I don't want to ignore your original question. And I sense, since we're both reading caucus99percent, that we agree on many important issues. But I'm still unsure of your original question. When you say,
are you saying, "outside of confrontations with Fascists groups," meaning other than in confrontations with Fascists groups? And if so, do you mean that any other violence would be unacceptable to you, but that violence against Fascist groups would be something you would support?
I read the quotation from Hitler that you provided. He says that,
So if his adversaries had not offered any resistance, that would have been a danger to his movement. Or, if his adversaries had brutally annihilated the nucleus of his movement, that would have been a danger to it. But by beginning to tyrannise his movement by bourgeois means his adversaries created the perfect conditions for elevating his movement to power. That's what I understand from this quote. And I think that is exactly what this Antifa group is doing, which is why I think it's a CIA work of provocation, personally.
Allen Dulles, founder of the CIA, was the attorney for the industrial concerns that armed Hitler. That was the nucleus of Hitler's movement. The same interests are the nucleus of Fascism today. Young men who question Affirmative Action are not the power behind or even the power within Fascism.
Other than
Correct:
After it was established:
I have offered no opinion on Antifa's activities. All I have done is ask if there are any other activities involving violence than their confrontations with Fascist groups. Fascists (both as individuals or in groups) have a well-documented history of a wide-range of violence other than at rallies. protests or gatherings as well as at the proceeding.
I really do wish people would quit trying to assign motives to my questions. I am purely and simply looking for knowledge. Without facts, comprehension, and therefore, solutions are not possible.
Which is why I have included the question of WHO should be doing What to stop this these actions? Obviously, the police won't do anything. One of the Fascist groups took long-range rifles to the rooftops above a rally. The police let them go. So who does one turn to?
Hate speech is supposedly not covered under the First Amendment. If Fascist groups were not given a platform, then Antifa would have nothing to do.
If there is a preponderance of evidence that the CIA is involved, then those should be included in reports and discussions.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
I don't question
your motives at all. Most of the people I love, both family and friends, sympathize with Antifa. And because I don't, there is some stress between us, but I know their motives are good, and I respect your motives too. We all want to know what would have prevented the rise of Fascism.
The argument about whether violence should be applied to prevent hate speech or in response to hate speech is important. If some speech is illegal, does that make it OK for me to beat the speaker on the head with a bat? I don't think so. If speech is incendiary, inflammatory, or inciting to riot, do I have the right to physically assault the speaker? I don't think so.
The BAMN leader who was interviewed in the video was in fact charged with inciting a riot for one or another of her actions, I think the one in Sacramento. I think she's CIA. I also think she's dangerous. And I understand from her interview that she worked very hard to organize the violent assault on people exercising their right to free speech in order to prevent them from exercising that right. Does that mean I can beat her with a flag pole, force her to the ground and start kicking her? I don't think so. I think it would be better for her to spend some time in the cooler contemplating her future after being convicted of felony assault.
One last time . . .
I am not going to get sucked into a discussion that does not address my questions. I even allowed for widening that to include any proofs that the CIA is behind Antifa.
I did not say you were questioning my motives. I said that you were assigning motives to my questions. This was in response to:
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
You're right
that I am assigning motives to your questions, and I don't have any proof that the CIA is behind Antifa. I just see their actions as consistent with the CIA's agenda. So you're right about me jumping to conclusions.
But where I still struggle to understood you is about BAMN and the prevention of Fascist speech. With respect to the BAMN leader's interview expressing pride in having prevented Fascist speech, you said,
I didn't understand from this whether you agreed with her goal of preventing Fascist speech, but you would have objected to starting violence, or that you were objecting to my judgment that she advocated starting violence in order to prevent Fascist speech, when that isn't exactly what she said. I can understand your position if that's what you're saying.
I am accusing her of advocating the starting of violence in order to prevent Fascist speech, and of proclaiming pride in having done so, based on her words and on her actions in the videos. She is very practiced in responding to the question you are focusing on, and you are completely right:
No. In every interview I've seen her in, and in the lengthy position papers of her website, she and her BAMN organization skillfully evade answering the question whether or not they advocate violence to shut down Fascist speech by repeating the response, By Any Means Necessary. Their actions demonstrate their use of violence. Their words are very lawyerly.
It's not you I am angry with. I think your questions and your statements about this are completely logical and supportable. It's the knife edge we are on between the loss of free speech and the acceptance of violence that concern me. And I apologize for taking up your time with my attempts to answer your questions. I mean that sincerely.
Based on history, it's a good bet that at least some of the
ostensible "antifa" are right wingers and/or government officials seeking to discredit the left. Much as was the case with Occupy, anti-war demonstrators, etc.
Yes, I feel that too.
Without having any direct knowledge, I definitely feel the violence on both sides is supported and amplified by CIA and its mainstream media. I know it's irresponsible to make such an assertion without clear evidence, and I know there are people on both sides who openly advocate violence, but I think the production of such events is coordinated by the worst elements controlling the narrative, and this narrative discredits both the left and the right.
Is this why they wear masks?
Buncha spooks ya ask me.
question everything
IMO, it's not irresponsible to suggest the possibility if
a historic pattern exists. IMO, it would be irresponsible not to mention the existence of a historic pattern. Posters here have a lot of knowledge, but we don't know if lurkers do.
For example, on other boards, I've seen people say that plutocrats have been ruling the US for the past ten years, or the past twenty or the past thirty, when in fact, that has been the case since the East India Company and Governors appointed by the King, then people John Hancock. It's not anything that just happened a decade or two ago. The differences in that respect are of degree and of pervasiveness. And it's gotten worse over time, which, IMO, means it's more likely to keep getting worse. Not pointing out that kind of historical pattern, if one has the time and energy, is what is irresponsible, IMO.
We also know that we have a government that overclassifies. For example, we learned from wikileaks that Gaddafi was often seen in public with a blond! Why in hell was that classified? Libyans with eyes knew it, why couldn't we know it? We did we need a whistleblower for that kind of information?
At the same time, the punishment of whistleblowers has amped up. Look at the treatment of Assange, Snowden, Drake, et al. Obama promised the most transparent administration in US history, but gave us the least transparent, up to and including tapping phones of US citizen journalists to learn their sources. And, more and more, we cannot rely on media for investigative reporting, or for much of anything.
We had government--and this we do know--providing TV stations with videos that those stations ran as part of their broadcasts. We have product positioning in TV shows and the flicks. I suspect we also have it in at least local news. Either that, or producers at my local news station get very excited when a fast food chain introduces a new product or revives one.
If we wait for proof before even mentioning possibilities, we, as a people, will become more and more ignorant. The same is true if we just make up something with no evidence at all and state it as fact; e.g., "LBJ had JFK killed." But, that is not what you or I did on this thread, nor is it characteristic of either of us.
Why wouldn't oligarchs pay for provocateurs
I've certainly seen it done here during various peaceful demonstrations. Why do these guys who shatter shop windows always wear hoods? I saw a video of UC Berkeley police trying to take the hood off one of these guys with a camera rolling and he started to panic at the thought of people seeing his face.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Wimps and snowlfakes are
driven by their feelings, hence their mobs.
As to salaries:
https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/07/03/us-wage-growth-in-june-was-201...
dfarrah
The "I support the ACA" is exactly what I predicted
of course the Rs would never repeal the ACA, it's a giveaway to the insurance companies. (they just want to allow insurance companies to charge extra for covering "preexisting conditions") But if you think that they'll vote for Democrats just because this public fear is somehow new you're in for a rude awakening. Scams like the ACA have cost the Democrats a thousand elections in the last decade (and before that Hillarycare cost the Democrats 15% of the vote)and people are not going to just forget that.
Now, if 150 Democratic candidates in competitive districts came out for MFA things would change quickly and dramatically, but I doubt that those candidates the Democrats have allowed to run and how they have been ignored or sabotaged will be enough.
On to Biden since 1973
The pre-existing conditions coverage at no extra cost and
the ability of parents to cover their kids until age 26 were. obviously, the quid pro quos for the individual mandate, aka, the giveaway to insurance companies.
o=
Bad enough was the bargain struck by the Obama White House. as further mucked up by Nelson in concert with an agent of the insurers' lobby and, bless her little (very little) heart, Senator and perennial fake out artist, Collins.
Remember how we were supposed to imagine that this was just a start, that future Senateq consisting of sixty in the Democratic Caucus who were not conservadems--so maybe eighty Democratic Senators in all--would amend Obamacare over time to make it better? Like, you know, an entirely different kind of Democratic Party, including the populist, but segregationist
Southern Senators, improved OASDI over time? (This faux "plan" for gradual improvement over the years from the same Obama administration that tried repeatedly to get enough political cover to "reform" "entitlements" and from the same Democratic Party that backs only conservadems).
Good times.
No extra cost?
Since the ACA became law, my premiums have almost tripled.
We all continue paying through the nose for Obama's insurance cartel bailout.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
I'm sorryabout your situation and appreciate
the correction, NHK.
I, too, have a low opinon of Democrats.
According to Democrats, that means there's "not a dime's worth of difference" between me and a right winger, even though I want the country to go further left than Democrats, while a right winger claims falsely that Democrats are socialists and wants the country to go further right than Democrats. IOW, Democrats have resorted to pretending nonsensically that people with diametrically opposed ideologies and goals have identical ideologies. Apparently, according to Democrats, everything depends upon whether or not someone supports Democrats unconditionally. Just as self-centered and self-absorbed as any human infant. (Horseshoe this.)
So, do I care that Republicans defame Democrats? Well, yes. I believe that truth is valuable for its own sake. Am I going to get emotionally or intellectually exercised about
the right's defaming Democrats? Not as long as Democrats keep defaming the left and punching left.
As far as Republicans wanting to cut social programs, so did Clinton and his deputy chief of staff, Erskine Bowles. Obama named Bowles as co-head of the Cat Food Commission, no random coincidence, that. And Clinton ran on, and bragged about, ending welfare "as we know it." And did.
Unfortunately for Obama's goals, even with Bowles and Simpson as its co-chairs, the Cat Food Commission did not give Obama the political cover he wanted. I guess neither Bowles nor Simpson wanted that as their legacy. Boehner and Cantor, on whose table Obama put OASDI and Medicare, did not give Obama political cover, either. Neither did the Grand Bargain Commission (or was it Committee?). (Bubba got caught on a hot mike, offering to help Commission member Ryan persuade Demmocrats to vote for cuts.) However, the Obama White House fail-safed the Grand Bargain Commission with the Sequester. Partial "success" at last, for President Empty Suit. Oh, and, with whom did 2016 Democratic candidate Hillary consult about OASDI? None other than the late, infamous Pete Peterson, who, amid luxury, seem to live for eliminating OASDI.
Yeah, so Republicans also want to cut "entitlements," much like Obama and both Clintons? No surprise. Republicans' desire to "reform" "entitlements" is not more surprising nor more outrageous than the desire of New Democrats to do the same. At least Bernie's run, whether or not sheep dogging, got Democrats talking out of the other side of their mouths somewhat. What they will actually do, though, remains to be seen, to say the least.
There's old democrats and new democrats
The new keeps the mantle of the old, claims it's heritage and successes, but resembles moderate republicans in reality. The new d's preside over a collection of special interests. Once a special interest has it's need met(wins its cause) there is no reason for that interest to stay with the democrats. Once they got theirs, hey why not vote for Trump. Happened with the more powerful unions and Reagan. So every win for the new d's is a chance of losing the support of a constituency. The only remedy is to find some new special interest, because anything else is too far "left".
I see them all as Democrats doing whatever they think best for
themselves, first, and their party, second. Yes, even FDR and JFK. That is a paradigm shift I could come to only after I could no longer bear to be a Democrat. I may do an OP on it, if I get time.
Yep
The one difference between FDR types and later types is FDR threw out some bones to get votes, mainly SS and the same protections unions won. Post FDR It was pretty much going after the moneyed class for donations and to hell with the bones. They hoped we were with HER, because, ummm....FDR!!!
I have a different take.
One tends to forget FDR was forced into a minority,
and a relatively despised and ignored minority, at that. He became disabled in his prime, which poked a hole in his bubble of privilege. POP!
How much it changed his world-view, that's arguable. But would a physically sound FDR even have thought of throwing out some bones?
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
I don't know
Mostly I think FDR was trying to preserve the status quo. All the programs seem to to either create a base that wouldn't move to radically change the government or to save the investor class from the mobs, and from themselves. The age of prosperity after WW2 was just an accident that started reversing itself in the 70's to what we have today.
Oh by the way.
Pelosi praises the man who would essentially destroy social security.
Peter Peterson Spent Nearly Half A Billion In Washington Targeting Social Security, Medicare
Pelosi Floor Speech in Honor of the Late Peter G. Peterson
Was just doing some research while keeping one eye on the babies
and had to drop this quote here:
Perfect. He could really nail something, couldn't he?
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"
- Kurt Vonnegut