1776 Am Revo

1/21 disambig sparked by insurrection rhet

White supremacy and Patriots’ Day

From a sociological perspective, national symbols and events such as the American flag and Patriots’ Day do not have fixed meanings. Rather, any symbol is defined by how people actually use it. Whether one raises an American flag or burns one, the use of the flag is a powerful symbol that is understood to mean different things to different people, depending on the context.

Extremists often take other symbols of American patriotism, such as the bald eagle, the Second Amendment and the phrase “America the beautiful” and try to use them to promote their message. For example, white supremacists believe that America can be beautiful only if white Americans are in positions of authority. The interpretations of these symbols become tools for extremist mobilization.

In the lead-up to Patriots’ Day in 2023, members of the Patriot Front, a white supremacist group, rallied near the Massachusetts State House in Boston. They displayed a banner reading “Reclaim America,” a slogan associated with their ideology.

Several white supremacist groups such as the Patriot Front, National Socialist Club-131 and other neo-Nazis groups position themselves as authentic modern-day “patriots” fighting to preserve society. They claim they are “undermined by a government that represses citizens” and creates an unsafe space for what they call a “white homeland.”

The Patriot Front manifesto, written by group founder Thomas Rousseau, states: “A nation within a nation is our goal. Our people face complete annihilation as our culture and heritage are attacked from all sides.”

The role of extremist narratives

The extremist groups see Patriots’ Day not only as a commemoration of resistance against British colonialism but as a rallying point for a radical vision of American identity that attracts more attention from the public and the media because of the use of the recognized symbol.

Extremists frame their actions as a continuation of the American Revolution and draw upon the myth of an oppressed, virtuous “true American” standing against tyranny. In this view, traditional symbols of American patriotism represent resistance not against an overarching foreign power but against internal threats to their vision of America.

These include perceived threats posed by progressive movements, racial minorities, immigrants and the federal government. In the minds of those on the far right, what’s at stake are their traditional values, gun ownership and individual rights.

The Southern Poverty Law Center has highlighted the significance of April 19 in the anti-government “patriot” movement’s calendar, noting that it has been associated with increased activity from militias and other extremist groups.

A man belonging to the Boogaloo Boi far-right group at an anti-government rally on Aug. 29, 2020, in Columbus, Ohio.Paul Becker/Becker 1999 via Flickr, CC BY

Some of those groups include the sovereign citizens movement, Boogaloo Bois and the Patriot Front. The sovereign citizen movement is a loosely organized group of individuals who believe that they are not subject to government laws, especially federal laws in the United States. The Boogaloo movement is an anti-government extremist group known for advocating for a second American civil war, which they often call the “boogaloo.”

The myth of the ‘true American’

The construction of the “true American” is central to the ideology. For many far-right groups, the “true” or “real” American is defined as someone who believes in the preservation of a specific, often exclusionary version of American values in which white Americans are seen as both moral paragons and under siege.

Some American militia groups, such as the Oath Keepers and Three Percenters, claim that only those willing to resist their idea of “tyranny” are true American patriots and that they should resist the government.

In 2014, the Oath Keepers participated in an armed standoff in Nevada to support rancher Cliven Bundy, who was in a dispute with the Bureau of Land Management over unpaid grazing fees. The group positioned themselves as defenders against federal authority. Two men with ties to the Three Percenters, Barry Croft and Adam Fox, were involved in a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. The plot was foiled by law enforcement, and the individuals were arrested and charged with terrorism-related offenses. Both received lengthy prison sentences.

As Stewart Rhodes, who founded The Oath Keepers in 2009 in Lexington, Massachusetts, has said: “We are the last line of defense against tyranny. Real patriots will stand up.”

Anyone not aligned with their ideology is seen as a traitor or unwilling to confront systemic problems and are derisively labeled “sheep.”

The mobilization of violence

One of the most concerning ways in which American patriotic symbols are co-opted by extremists is the potential to justify violent action.

An example of how extremist flags incorporate the American flag into their design, as seen at a protest on July 21, 2021, in Columbus, Ohio.Paul Becker/Becker 1999 via Flickr, CC BY

The connection between historical acts of violence, such as the battles of Lexington and Concord, and contemporary calls for preparation for violent actions is deliberately emphasized. According to historian Darren Mulloy, extremists use well-known and accepted American symbols to create a sense that violence is a justified and necessary means of defense. Militia groups, in Mulloy’s research, exploit the need for violence in the American Revolution and the settling of the American West to legitimize their contemporary calls.

The Oath Keepers romanticize the role of armed militias in the founding of America as seen at Lexington and Concord. They use this day to promote the idea that their cause is just and that armed resistance is a legitimate form of political expression.

Groups such as The Base and the Oath Keepers have called for training in preparation for armed defense against the government. They recruit current and former military, police and first responders, urging them to uphold an oath to defend the Constitution – as the group interprets it – often against what they see as a tyrannical federal government.

This creates a dangerous feedback loop in which extremism and violence are normalized through the glorification of historical events that celebrate acts of rebellion while strengthening identities that radicalize individuals.

Understanding how patriotic symbols can be exploited offers important insights into how historical narratives may be manipulated, potentially leading to harmful consequences in American society.

Art Jipson, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Dayton

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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an 11 22

The suspect, David Wayne DePape, has been charged with a slew of state and local offenses, including attempted homicide and attempted kidnapping of a family member of an elected official.

DePape allegedly smashed a back window of Pelosi’s San Francisco home early Friday morning, woke up her sleeping husband and demanded to speak with “Nancy.” The Speaker was not at home.

DePape told investigators his plan was to hold “Nancy hostage and talk to her.” He came prepared with flex-cuffs, tape, rope and two hammers, according to police. He said he wanted to interrogate Nancy Pelosi, because she was the “leader of the pack” of the lying Democratic Party, according to the federal criminal complaint.

DePape said he planned to let Pelosi go if she told him “the truth,” but that if she “lied,” he was going to break “her kneecaps,” the complaint said. DePape said he was certain that Pelosi would not have told the “truth.” This was an astute inference on his part seeing as the “truth” he was looking for probably had something to do with a cabal of satanist pedophiles. Pelosi’s wounds, DePape stated, would put Congress on notice that there are “consequences for actions.”

That’s the classic logic of terrorism.

DePape’s plan is reminiscent of another plan to kidnap and interrogate Democratic leaders. It’s what the Wolverine Watchmen militia were accused of plotting to do with Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat. The men schemed and trained to kidnap her and “put her on a show trial” over covid regulations.

DePape’s online footprint shows a man in the tightening grip of radicalization. He registered a domain name in August and began posting feverishly about QAnon, Pizzagate and the pedophile cabal that runs the world. He was an election denier and a proponent of the Big Lie of 2020 voter fraud. He also indulged in Holocaust denial and other forms of antisemitism, anti-Black racism, rants against “groomers” and attacks on Ukrainian democracy. He also found time to defend the honor of rightwing scholar and icon Jordan Peterson.

DePape embraced theRevolutionary War kitschbeloved of J6 insurgents. In an interview, he repeatedly likened himself to the American founding fathers. He claimed to be fighting tyranny without the option of surrender.

Some of the most notorious J6 insurgents specifically targeted Pelosi during the J6 siege.

Guy Reffitt said he wanted to drag Nancy Pelosi out of the building. He brought a semi-automatic handgun onto Capitol grounds. "I just want to see Pelosi's head hitting every fucking stair of the building,” Reffitt said. Reffit also brought flex-cuffs.

Oath Keeper Kelly Meggs, who is on trial for seditious conspiracy, said he wanted to see Pelosi’s head “rolling down the front steps” of the Capitol. Meggs and fellow Oath Keeper Kenneth Harrelson are accused of splitting off from the group to go “hunting” for Pelosi.

Insurgent Mark Mazza, who brought two loaded guns, told investigators that if he’d crossed paths with Pelosi "you'd be here for another reason."

Dawn Bancroft admitted on video that she and her friend broke into the Capitol and that they’d been “looking for Nancy to shoot her in the friggin' brain.”

We now know, in the suspect’s own words, that he was specifically targeting Speaker Pelosi for political violence. In the days following the attack, the political right has tried every bad faith deflection tactic imaginable, blaming DePape’s actions on drugs and mental illness. While DePape is likely mentally ill and may suffer from addiction, these factors are secondary at best.[ knowingly wind them up, then throw under bus]

This was a well-organized, premeditated attack.

DePape allegedly assembled a restraint kit, bought hammers, pinpointed his target’s address, and broke into the home under the cover of darkness. He knew exactly what he was doing.

The roots of this attack lie in toxic conspiracy theories that convince unstable people that their freedom is at risk and an insurrection that has gone largely unpunished.

As President Joe Biden said in Delaware, “[i]t’s one thing to condemn the violence but you can’t condemn the violence unless you condemn those people who continue to argue the election was not real, that it’s being stolen.”

underwear and hammer gay tryst? musk twit consp theory from wacko blog?

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Shane Vaughn insists that Europeans didn’t steal North America from the Native Americans because the Earth belongs to God and if God wants to send one group of people to slaughter another group of people and drive them off a piece of land, that’s his prerogative. rww

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Limbaugh supported Trump's false claims that the election was stolen and, on Jan. 7, compared rioters at the Capitol to people who sparked the Revolutionary War.

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note victim, always reluctant, 1776, defense, FF did not declare war, just not gonna take it anymore

mma 922 law lic suspend dc chryon]

LARRY KLAYMAN (FOUNDER, JUDICIAL WATCH): Here's what we're talking about right now. It's a full-court press. It's not an insurrection, it's an inquisition by the left to destroy all opposition to their total takeover of this country. And the place they really are most interested in is destroying conservative lawyers who can't fight back in court. So where does that leave us? I don't want to see this. But we're headed into revolution. And that's why we're doing what we're doing. We're trying Biden before citizens' grand juries and citizens' trials for the bribery from communist China, Ukraine, and Russia.

You can see that at our website at FreedomWatchUSA.org. We're trying Fauci, he talked about COVID-19. He's responsible for the death of 6 million people and counting worldwide. He gave the virus to the communist Chinese, the seeds of it, the SARS virus, with $3.7 million of grants from the Obama-Biden administration. So this is where we are. And I relish the fight because we're trying to do it peacefully and legally, but we are not far off. I mean, January 6 will look like a warm-up act. In fact, that wasn't violent. It was peaceful, by and large. A few people on either side, that's it. But next time it's going to be like the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789, in France. That's where, regrettably, wemay be headed. And you, and I, and One America News, and others are trying to prevent that, but it looks inevitable at this point almost.

ADDISON SMITH (HOST):Well, it's just, you know, when we don't have a justice system anymore. When we don't have a justice system in place that's actually impartial and that actually is protecting the civil liberties and the rights of both sides, where else can you turn to, Larry? Conservatives can't turn to the justice system anymore. They can't turn to lawyers like you for help because they're just going to suspend your license. They can't turn to Trump because Trump's getting raided and decimated by the FBI. So conservatives have nowhere to turn to. Our own justice system has betrayed us.

KLAYMAN: Well, it's not true in all the states, by the way. I mean, D.C. and New York are the exceptions, OK? They're highly leftist, they're borderline socialist-communist, I mean, actually they're socialist for sure, borderline communist in their approach. But yes, this is an attempt across the board. And it's not gonna stop me from filing cases, I still can do it even in my own personal capacity. But the country needs to understand that we are at war. Biden declared war on us a few weeks ago. MAGA, you know, Make America Great Again. We are white domestic terrorists. That's what we are, white male domestic terrorists, primarily. Women can be domestic terrorists, too, in his estimation. But he has declared war. And we have not declared war on him. It reminds me of the days leading up and the actual day itself of July 4, 1776. Our Founding Fathers did not declare war on the king. They simply said we're going our own way. We've had it. When in the course of human events, I'm paraphrasing from the Declaration of Independence, the sovereign no longer represents the people. The people have a right under the laws of nature and nature's god, not the law of the state, not the law of the king, to alter or abolish that government and to form a new government by and for the people with equal rights for everyone in pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. That's the Declaration of Independence.

...

Do you think we can survive another two years with Joe Biden? We're already on our knees. We're on our back, gasping for air. This guy has destroyed the country in just two years.So consequently, we need to form a new government. Take immunity away from judges. Take immunity away from federal government officials. Make them accountable to the rule of law. Give the American people more standing to bring lawsuits in honest courts. Elect judges, don't appoint them. Now they're appointed through legalized bribes called campaign contributions. Is it no wonder that even Trump's own judges are throwing the January 6 protesters in prison?

...

It takes a counter-revolution. Wake up America. Wake up America. If you care about your kids, grandkids, future generations as our Founding Fathers did, get up off the couch if you're retired, stop counting your shekels, your money, and [SEND IT TO US AT] join us at FreedomWatchUSA.org. Or if you're middle-aged or young, you're going to have no country left. You almost have no country left right now. So we're trying to do it in the peaceful and legal way. The American people own our legal system, not the political hacks on the federal bench and some bar disciplinary counsels and other places in this country. We will rise up, and with God's divine providence, we will prevail as our Founding Fathers did.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/one-america-news-network/genocide-denial-racist-myths-and-fight-against-canceling-columbus-look-0

no lnx ,ammy

Genocide denial, racist myths, and the fight against canceling Columbus: A look at One America News’ anti-Indigenous coverage

Over the past nine months, OAN has disseminated racist, revisionist content about Indigenous people in Canada and the United States. AT&T is responsible.

WRITTEN BY BEATRICE MOUNT

PUBLISHED 11/24/21

Note: The subjects discussed in this article may be triggering for some readers. If you need immediate care or long-term support, the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition has compiled a culturally sensitive resource kit.

Since February, right-wing cable outlet One America News Network has revived some of its favorite white nationalist conspiracy theories, bigoted lies, and racial epithets in a series of incendiary segments targeting Indigenous people of North America. Hosts, reporters, and guests have thrown fit after fit about small recognitions made in 2020 and 2021 to acknowledge the whitewashed history of colonization, power imbalances, and racist depictions of Indigenous people in North America.

In June, the network turned to full-fledged genocide denialism after ground-penetrating radar uncovered over 1,300 unmarked graves of First Nations, Métis, and Inuit children killed under Canada’s residential school policy. Canada's 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Commission called the residential school system a "cultural genocide" of Indigenous people, and the federal government formally apologized for it in 2008.OAN downplayed this history and dismissed the discovery of the graves as an “excuse” for “an anti-Christian crusade.”

In October, OAN used Indigenous Peoples Day to praise Christopher Columbus and Europeans for “civilizing” the “savages.” And throughout the nine-month period, OAN figures regurgitated right-wing talking points about “social justice warriors” forcing sports teams to change their names from racist slurs and “erasing” Columbus from our calendars.

Meanwhile, a Reuters investigation revealed that telecom giant AT&T had played a key role in creating and funding the far-right network, with 90% of OAN's revenue reportedly coming from its AT&T contract.

Less than a month later, in November, AT&T Vice President Tom Brooks (a member of the Kanien'kehà:ka nation) renewed his company's commitment to “support Indigenous peoples” for Native American Heritage Month. That marked AT&T’s latest commitment to support Indigenous people via nonprofit fundraising, policy research and advocacy, and its Inter-Tribal Council of AT&T employees.

But the company can't have it both ways: AT&T cannot support Indigenous rights in one breath while funding OAN in the next.

As we recognize National Native American Heritage Month, here’s a look at how OAN has attacked Indigenous people so far this year -- all enabled by AT&T’s continued support for the network

Key narratives

OAN denied the history of genocidal policies used to assimilate Indigenous children

In the 1800s, governments in the U.S. and Canada partnered with churches to force Indigenous children into boarding schools under a genocidal assimilation policy with the explicit goal to “kill the Indian, save the man.” An estimated minimum of 6,000 Indigenous children died from injuries, illness, abuse, and neglect sustained in Canada’s system alone. Countless more children disappeared alongside their languages, cultures, and traditional teachings. By the time Canada shuttered the last of these schools in 1996, the residential school system left behind an ongoing, traumatic legacy extending far beyond the immediate survivors of the cultural genocide.

This traumatic legacy made headlines earlier this year after the discovery of over 1,300 bodies on the sites of former residential schools in Canada. In the U.S., the story prompted Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (a member of the Pueblo of Laguna) to order the first comprehensive federal review of American residential schools with an explicit “emphasis on cemeteries or potential burial sites.” While imperfect, this order is a significant first step in America’s own slow reckoning with its genocidal assimilation policies -- one that OAN seems intent to undermine by spreading disinformation to its viewers.

Led by Tipping Point host Kara McKinney, OAN treated the discovery of more than a thousand Indigenous children’s graves as a lie meant to target churches, drawing a tenuous connection between the discoveries and a string of church vandalism and arson across Canada.

On July 12, McKinney called the reporting on mass graves of Indigenous people at former residential schools an “odious lie” used to “excuse” the “desecration of holy grounds.”

On July 23, McKinney asserted that the media had “exaggerated” its coverage of residential schools, stating, “Just like the history of slavery in America gets overexaggerated in some cases in order to be weaponized to reorder society to this day -- they make everything about race -- the same thing is happening with these schools in Canada.”

Days later, OAN irresponsibly blamed Canadian church fires on “activists seeking revenge for Indigenous students,” comparing them to “American churches [that] were burned down or vandalized” by “George Floyd protesters” in 2020. (Though some suspects have since been arrested and charged for the Canadian fires, authorities there have yet to discuss their possible motivations.)

In a Tipping Point segment promoting her deceptive YouTube video “The Canadian Mass Grave Hoax,” alt-right troll Lauren Southern downplayed the discoveries at former residential schools, saying, “If you scratch past the surface, none of it is true.” She later claimed that “it is a far stretch to say a pit of murdered children with thousands of bodies across Canada and a gravesite that the markers have been lost -- a massive stretch, and one that ... led to mass hatred and hate crimes and terrorism, quite frankly, across Canada.”

OAN mocked Indigenous Peoples Day

OAN was outraged after President Joe Biden issued a proclamation officially recognizing October 8 as Indigenous Peoples Day. The move neither removed nor replaced Columbus Day, which is still a federally recognized holiday. Instead, it simply shifted focus onto the Indigenous community by creating what the Indigenous Peoples’ Initiative calls a “more powerful, more accurate, and more inspiring narrative about the contemporary Native experience” than the whitewashed history of colonization long perpetuated by Columbus Day.

That didn’t stop OAN from calling the move a leftist attempt to divide America. OAN hosts and guests accused Biden of “trying to erase Italian Americans,” whitewashed and defended genocide, and used derogatory terms to refer to Native Americans.

Host Stephanie Hamill discussed the “divisive” decision with Andre DiMino, executive board member of the Italian American One Voice Coalition, who portrayed the recognition of Indigenous Peoples Day as Democrats “trying to revise history and attack western culture by starting at the foundation, which was the uniting of the continents by Columbus.” DiMino whined that Indigenous people were taking Italian Americans’ holiday even though they already have “August 9, the day after Thanksgiving, and the whole month of November.”

Host Natalie Harp cited Indigenous Peoples Day as proof that “the people running our country, they do hate America at this point.” Her guest, conservative columnist Lee Smith, claimed the new holiday was part of “a campaign of demoralization” by Democrats to tell other Americans “that we will replace you with whoever we can drop into the country at any particular time” -- a direct reference to the white nationalist “great replacement” conspiracy theory.

After accusing Indigenous groups of cannibalism during her October 11 program, McKinney contradicted Columbus’ own accounts of enslaving and brutalizing Indigenous people, asserting that he “actually treated native peoples with great respect for his time" and “actively punished his own crew members when they abused and hurt the native peoples.”

After repeatedly referring to Native Americans as “savages,” host Dan Ball asked, “What if Christopher Columbus had not found and tried to colonize this land? What if European settlers ... did not come to America and civilize the Native Americans? … If this land was left to tribes that were warring for the last 500 years, what would this land look like?” These types of rhetorical questions are predicated on racist myths about Indigenous people that continue to perpetuate systemic health, economic, political, and social inequalities.

OAN attacked Indigenous activism and spread racist misconceptions about Native Americans

OAN regularly derided historic figures and activism and ensuing media coverage, paying particular attention to the Washington Football Team’s decision in July 2020 to stop using its previous racist moniker after decades of Indigenous activism against harmful and racist naming practices in sports. Hosts and guests referred to the team by the defunct name well into 2021.

OAN segments consistently criticized and undermined the historic nomination of Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, claiming the media focused too much on “the fact she’s the first Native American named to a Cabinet position” instead of her supposedly “radical environmentalist agenda” to fight "so-called climate change.”

In an August 5 segment that repeatedly referred to the Washington Football Team by its racist former name, two OAN news hosts mocked Indigenous concerns and suggested that the Pittsburgh Pirates would be the next sports team to cede to “the left” and change its moniker “because a group of pirates are very upset about that.”

On the July 23 edition of The Real Story, American Principles Project President Terry Schilling told Indigenous people to “stop taking everything so personally” as “it’s a total honor to name your team after the Indians, or [the Washington Football Team’s former name], or the Cherokees, or the Chiefs or whatever” because they were “very tough adversaries” who “we had to fight … in America for 400 years.”

Over a graphic stating “No Whites Allowed,” Ball suggested applying to a reparations fund meant for Black and Indigenous Californians “because I have Native American on my dad’s side, with probably more than Pocahontas,” referring to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), “but if I describe myself as an Indigenous person then I could apply to this.” His guest, former Trump adviser Harmeet Dhillon, said that this reparations policy is an example of “the ultimate racial privilege, really.” (Under current Federal enrollment guidelines, tribes do not consider a vague Indigenous ancestor or DNA test as valid proof of Native ancestry. Furthermore, using tenuous claims of Indigenous identity to avoid accountability for racist policies and beliefs is racist.)

On September 29, Tipping Point guest Christopher Check, president of Catholic Answers, downplayed Franciscan monk Junipero Serra’s brutal treatment toward Native American people, calling the colonizer a “saintly man that wanted nothing more than the best thing for natives of California, that eternal salvation." As Bad Indians author Deborah Miranda (Ohlone Costanoan Esselen nation) told KQED, “Serra did not just bring us Christianity. He imposed it, giving us no choice in the matter. He did incalculable damage to a whole culture.”

Sumantra Maitra, a senior contributor to The Federalist, used the October 11 edition of McKinney’s show to call the landback movement “a prelude to violence” and said that “the logical endpoint to that rhetoric is taking that land back, and taking that land back would've mean a reconquest,” explicitly comparing it to the Balkan genocides of the 1990s. Maitra’s comments grossly mischaracterize the landback movement, which is the latest social media-focused iteration of a broad political movement calling for settler governments to return land stewardship to Indigenous peoples.

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1021 an

ingraham and meadows sneer at 1/6 being danger b/c they are patriots and by def good for Am?

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Missouri Republican Senate candidate Eric Schmitt on Monday defended the legacy of Christopher Columbus with a historically illiterate rant that also took a subtle shot at scientists.

"In 1492 the 'consensus' among scientists was that the earth was flat," Schmitt wrote on Twitter. "Christopher Columbus challenged that notion and changed the world forever."

Multiple scholars, however, jumped in to point out that Schmitt has his history completely wrong.

"Nope, absolutely wrong. Any scholar of the Middle Ages knew the earth was round," wrote University of Pittsburgh professor of religion Brock Baher. "The myth that they believed it was flat came from 19th Century when anti-Catholic propagandists like John William Draper & Washington Irving who wanted to claim religion was in conflict thesis with science."

Thomas Lecaque, an associate professor of Medieval history at Grand View University, made similar points about Europeans' general knowledge of the Earth's shape at the end of the 15th century.

"In 1492, almost everyone in Europe knew that the earth was round, and were closer to the accurate size than Columbus was," he wrote. "Columbus followed an incorrect line of reasoning, based on bad exegesis, and only survived due to luck. No one thought the world was flat."

Rebecca Anne Goetz, an associate professor of history at New York University, pointed out that "knowledge of a spherical Earth was widely discussed as early as the 5th century BC" through translated writings of Greek philosopherAristotle.

And Princeton historian Kevin Kruse delivered an even pithier reply to Schmitt by writing, "Congrats on never reading a book after the second grade."

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/08/josh-hawley-love-america/

Sen. Hawley's Orwellian 'Love America Act' is part of the fascist campaign to rewrite history

no lx

Chauncey DeVega and Salon August 06, 2021

Donald Trump may no longer be president, but the American people are still stuck in a state of malignant normality that his presidency brought into being.

Psychologist John Gartner describes such a state of being this way:

Malignant normality is when a malignantly narcissistic leader takes control of society and gradually changes reality for everyone else. So their crazy internal reality becomes enacted in the lived true external reality of that society. This is how a leader can come in and change the mores of their society.

In his role as national cheerleader and secular priest, President Biden is trying to provide moral leadership and healing for a traumatized nation, still shell-shocked by the Trump movement's continuing assault on democracy and society.

Biden's efforts have provided only short-term relief. The neofascist threat is escalating;Biden and the Democrats have shown themselves largely impotent against it. The coronavirus pandemic is now resurgent because of a new variant and Trump's followers' refusal to be vaccinated.

For these and many other reasons — most notably, extreme wealth and income inequality and the global climate crisis — America is becoming a dystopia.

The collective emotional state of many Americans, or at least those who are paying attention and still care, is frustration and unease.

Malignant normality creates a playground for fascism and other forms of right-wing maleficence. The Jim Crow Republicans and other elements of the white right are taking advantage of this broken America to escalate their attacks on free speech, reason, truth, reality, human and civil rights and multiracial democracy by weaponizing the nearly meaningless term "critical race theory." (Yes, the term has a real meaning in academic discourse, but not as bandied about by Republicans in 2021.)

For the likes of Sen. Josh Hawley, the notorious Missouri Republican, such a crisis is a dream opportunity. Last week, Hawley proposed a bill called the Love America Act of 2021, which would deny federal funding to schools that teach the real history of America and the centrality of racism and white supremacy to the country's origins. The key text of this document reads:

RESTRICTION ON FEDERAL FUNDS FOR TEACHING THAT CERTAIN DOCUMENTS ARE PRODUCTS OF WHITE SUPREMACY OR RACISM — … [N]o Federal funds shall be provided to an educational agency or school that teaches that thePledge of Allegiance, the Declaration of Independence, or the Constitution of the United States is a product of white supremacy or racism.

Hawley's "Love America" bill is not a joke. It is a statement of shared principles and loyalty to an anti-democratic, racial-authoritarian movement that is winning victories all over the United States.

For example, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is now mandating thoughtcrime surveys to determine the political beliefs of teachers and students in public colleges and universities.

Florida has also "banned" the teaching of "critical race theory" in public schools, and will permit — in practice, this may mean encourage — students to record classes without the knowledge or consent of their teachers. This potentialsurveillance is an obvious form of intimidation or threat against intellectual freedom, and specifically targeting teachers and other education professionals who are perceived as "liberal" and therefore "unfair" to conservatives.

The Republican-controlled Texas Senate has passed legislation overturning a requirement that the history of the civil rights movement be taught in public schools. That legislation would also remove a course requirement that the Ku Klux Klan should be condemned. As I wrote recently for Salon:

... the requirements removed from the state's curriculum include two speeches by Martin Luther King Jr., any mention of Latino labor organizers Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, and any mention of Thomas Jefferson's long-term relationship with Sally Hemings, an enslaved teenage child who bore six of his children. The bill bars any use of the New York Times' 1619 Project and "prohibits teaching that slavery was part of the 'true' founding of the United States" and removes the requirement to study the "history of white supremacy, including but not limited to the institution of slavery, the eugenics movement, and the Ku Klux Klan, and the ways in which it is morally wrong."

Tennessee has proposed fining school districts at least $1 million if a teacher "willingly violates" state laws against discussing racism, white privilege or sexism in class. Education Week reports, "Teachers could also be disciplined or lose their licenses for teaching that the United States is inherently racist or sexist or making a student feel 'guilt or anguish' because of past actions committed by their race or sex." Similar forms of censorship will be imposed in Oklahoma, where "educators could have their teaching licenses suspended or revoked and schools could lose accreditation if an investigation finds evidence that they taught about racism and sexism in ways that violated the law." Parents in that state will be allowed "to inspect curriculum, instructional materials, classroom assignments, and lesson plans to 'ensure compliance.'"

These attacks on the teaching of actual history are an Orwellian attempt to control both the present and the future in order to remake America as an apartheid regime. Realpolitik is also in play here: Facing changing demographics and political unpopularity, Republicans seek to use a larger culture-war strategy to win elections and hold onto power by any means possible.

White supremacists and other right-wing ideologues, in the longer view, want to destroy public education and replace it with their own propaganda indoctrination program. One important element is "racial erasure," in which the truth about American history is replaced with fantasies of white innocence, white nobility and white supremacy.

As Clint Smith writes in the Atlantic, for many so-called conservatives, "history isn't the story of what actually happened; it is just the story they want to believe. It is not a public story we all share, but an intimate one, passed down like an heirloom, that shapes their sense of who they are. Confederate history is family history, history as eulogy, in which loyalty takes precedence over truth."

Perhaps most important, the right-wing moral panic over "critical race theory" is a way of to erase from public memory the struggle waged by Black Americans for centuries to defeat white supremacy in its various forms. To that point, chattel slavery and theJim Crow regime were America's native forms of fascism. Black people defeated those forces and in doing so saved American democracy from its own worst impulses. To erase the Black Freedom Struggle is to make the case that American fascism will be victorious and that resistance is futile.

It is also crucial to understand that America's state of malignant normality is not isolated or unique, but is part of a neofascist attack by the global right on multiracial and multiethnic democracy around the world. As de facto spokesman for the American white right, Fox News host Tucker Carlson has taken a pilgrimage to Hungary, now under the one-party rule of Viktor Orbán, who has become a role model for the Jim Crow Republican Party and the American neofascist movement.

Orbán has created a fake democracy in Hungary, where elections still occur and tepid opposition is permitted, but in practice he can remain in power indefinitely. He has silenced the free press, crushed any serious democratic opposition, encouraged political violence against his regime's "enemies" and attacked colleges, universities and other centers of learning. The obvious goal is to silence dissent and produce obedient and compliant citizens who do not seek to exercise critical thinking or speak back to power.

In an essay for Vox this week, Zack Beauchamp discusses the larger significance of Carlson's pilgrimage to Budapest:

In his Monday monologue, Carlson told his listeners that they should pay attention to Hungary "if you care about Western civilization, and democracy, and family — and the ferocious assault on all three of those things by leaders of our global institutions." He tweeted out a friendly photo with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and is confirmed to speak at a government-supported conference in Budapest on Saturday. ...

[R]ight-wing observers, typically social conservatives and nationalists, see Orbán's willingness to use state power against the LGBT community, academics, the press, and immigrants as an example of how conservatives can fight back against left-wing cultural power. They either deny Fidesz's authoritarian streak or, more chillingly, argue that it's necessary to defeat the left — a chilling move at a time when the GOP is waging war on American democracy, using tactics eerily reminiscent of the ones Fidesz successfully deployed against Hungary's democratic institutions.

Beauchamp observes that the "Republican turn against democracy" and the American right's growing interest in Orbán's Hungary, expressed with unusual frankness and eloquence by Rod Dreher of the American Conservative, "is in significant part fueled by the right's sense of leftist ascendancy — heightened by electoral defeats in 2008 and 2020 and strengthened by defeat in culture war battles like same-sex marriage":

This, ultimately, is what makes Carlson's pilgrimage to Budapest so worrying. The Fox host's massive following gives him unusual power to set the terms of the conversation on the right; when he talks, Republicans from Trump on down listen. His bear hug embrace of Orbán could not only bring the Dreher view out into the open but also strengthen its influence over the GOP.

Republicans today aren't directly imitating Orbán; they have their own anti-democratic playbook, drawn from all-American sources. Carlson's active embrace of Hungary's strongman risks making that connection more direct, giving Republicans more ideas for how to seize control and a more powerful sense of justification in doing so.

For those who believed that Biden's election could clear the haze and wake the American people up from the living nightmare of the Trump regime, these last seven months have been increasingly painful. And now the pandemic's third wave arrives as a gut punch to them as well. Biden and other Democratic leaders still appear obsessed with "bipartisanship" and to this point have refused to act with the "urgency of now" to fight back against Republican attacks on Black and brown people's right to vote. Even under Attorney General Merrick Garland, the Department of Justice seems to be protecting Donald Trump instead of investigating and prosecuting him for his crimes against democracy. The overall effect is like being smothered.

Conditions are likely to get worse — perhaps much worse, with Republicans likely to recapture one or both houses of Congress in 2022 and Trump likely to return as a presidential candidate in 2024 — before they get better.

To survive and triumph over American neofascism Americans' well of endless optimism must be fortified with something more durable and realistic, such as the formula suggested by Italian philosopher and activistAntonio Gramsci: "optimism of the will and pessimism of the intellect." In Gramsci's "Prison Notebooks,"he wrote: "The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear."

That is precisely where Americans find themselves now: The waking nightmare of the Age of Trump, from which we have not escaped, is one such "morbid symptom." Recognizing that truth may make it possible to return to full political and social consciousness, and begin the real work of repairing and rebuilding American democracy.

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/texas-history-book/

cdv

In the infamous 1857 Dred Scott decision, Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney proclaimed that Black people have "no rights that the white man is bound to respect." Today's Jim Crow Republican Party, and the white right more broadly, have taken the spirit of those words and updated them for the 21st century, effectively by arguing that "white people are not bound to respect historical truth or established facts — at least not as they pertain to Black and brown people in America".

As the next step in their war against multiracial democracy, the Republican Party and its allies have launched a moral panic about "critical race theory." Of course, their version of "critical race theory" is a type of racial bogeyman or psychological projection, a function of white racial paranoia about the "browning of America" and the threat of "white genocide."

Facts do not matter in the right-wing echo chamber. It is of no importance that the white right's version of "critical race theory" has nothing to do with the scholarly paradigm of the same name.

As the truism holds, history is written by the victors. To that end, in dozens of states across the country, the white right is engaging in an Orwellian campaign of rewriting school curricula to prevent the teaching of "critical race theory" -- which in practice means stopping any serious engagement with America's real and often uncomfortable history of racism and white supremacy.

The white right's campaign against the teaching of real American history involves actual thoughtcrimes.

For example, in Florida, a law was recently passed mandating a survey of students and faculty in public colleges and universities to determine their political beliefs. Of course, Florida has also banned the teaching of "critical race theory."

Fox News personality Tucker Carlson, perhaps the single most influential voice on the white right, recently suggested that cameras should be placed in classrooms to ensure that no teachers will deploy "critical race theory" or other facts and arguments deemed to be "unpatriotic."

The Republican-controlled Texas Senate recently passed a bill eliminating a requirement that the history of the civil rights movement and other human rights struggles be taught in public schools. The bill also removed a condemnation of the Ku Klux Klan from course requirements as well.

As Yahoo News reports, the requirements removed from the state's curriculum include two speeches by Martin Luther King Jr., any mention of Latino labor organizers Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, and any mention of Thomas Jefferson's long-term relationship with Sally Hemings, an enslaved teenage child who bore six of his children. The bill bars any use of the New York Times' 1619 Projectand "prohibits teaching that slavery was part of the 'true' founding of the United States" and removes the requirement to study the "history of white supremacy, including but not limited to the institution of slavery, the eugenics movement, and the Ku Klux Klan, and the ways in which it is morally wrong."

This Republican legislation has been met with widespread outrage. But that reaction should just be the beginning. The next step involves doing the harder work of understanding why so many other (mostly white) Americans actually believe that "critical race theory" and the teaching of America's real history should be banned. Understanding these beliefs and motivations is essential to defeating American neofascism and its white supremacist social and political project.

Many Americans have been propagandized by their schools, news media, the internet, churches and other social institutions to believe in a large set of interlocking lies and myths about the country's past and present. To intervene against these lies often causes emotional pain and/or narcissistic injury to those who hold such beliefs.

This dynamic is especially powerful for those who are emotionally, psychologically, financially and politically invested in defending and protecting white privilege and white people's control over almost every aspect of American life. In that context, the personal truly is political: Whiteness, as a concept and a social force, has become linked at an individual level to the maintenance of white power.

How does this right-wing fantasy machine work? The Root has exhaustively documented how some of America's most widely used history textbooks misrepresent the real history of the color line and distort such topics as chattel slavery, the Civil War, the civil rights movement and social injustice more generally, through the use of what sociologist Joe Feagin has called the "white racial frame."

Michael Harriot offers this analysis:

So when Mitch McConnell and 38 Republican senators sent a letter to the secretary of education decrying the ghastly prospect of white students having to learn actual facts about slavery, it was not unexpected. For centuries, this country's schools have perpetuated a whitewashed version of history that either erases or reduces the story of Black America down to a B-plot in the American script. It's why they hate Critical Race Theory, The 1619 Project and anything factual — because the white-centric interpretation of our national past is so commonly accepted, white people have convinced themselves that anything that varies from the Caucasian interpretation must be a lie. …

This is why they oppose expanding the historiography of our national story. American schools have never taught a version of history that wasn't racialized. But, apparently, it's perfectly fine if the racial narrative skews toward whiteness. They can't be opposed to learning a different historical perspective because they never learned history; they were spoonfed fiction in bite-sized morsels.

To be fair, it's understandable why they are so adamant about what they believe in.

Imagine you are a white man. Now imagine what it's like going through 12 years of school, four years of college, graduate school and an entire career that made you one of the most powerful people on the planet. Now imagine a group of Black journalists, led by a Black woman, told you that you don't know shit.

To that point, the right-wing echo chamber consistently repeats neo-Confederate "Lost Cause" myths, such as the oft-repeated lie that the Civil War was fought over "states' rights" rather than white-on-Black chattel slavery.

The right obsessively depicts the Democrats as "the party of the Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow and slavery". This is a deliberate distortion of history because the pro-slavery, pro-segregation faction of the Democratic Party became solid Republicans after the enactment of civil rights legislation in the 1960s.

Right-wing propagandists also love to claim that Martin Luther King Jr. was a "Republican," or at least espoused Republican values. This is a ludicrous allegation: In contemporary terms King was a democratic socialist or progressive who opposed racism, poverty, military adventurism and injustice of all kinds. King would have viewed the modern-day conservative movement as a great force for evil in American society and the world.

Black conservative propagandists play an important role in the right-wing echo chamber, validating racist fantasies that slavery was a "gift" to Black people because it brought them to America. In this twisted perception of history, chattel slavery is understood as a "necessary evil" because it gave Black people Christianity and taught them the value of "hard work".

These same Black conservatives love to repeat the vicious lie that the Democratic Party is a type of "plantation." In reality, the plantations of the antebellum South were prison camps, charnel houses and places of torture, rape, suffering and death. Black conservative propagandists frequently announce that they are special and uniquely capable of "thinking for themselves," as compared to the vast majority of Black people who support the Democratic Party and are therefore deemed to be ignorant or uninformed.

The campaign against "critical race theory" — and against teaching America's real history — must be understood as part of a larger fascist strategy of attacking public schools and other institutions of learning with the aim of creating compliant followers and a public that is not equipped to participate in democracy — or to defend it.

This plan involves placing white supremacists, QAnon conspiracists, Trump supporters and other right-wing extremists — to the degree those categories of people can be separated — on local school boards and library advisory councils, banning "controversial" books, and the surveillance or intimidation of teachers deemed too "liberal" or suspected of "politicizing" the classroom, i.e., by refusing to teach right-wing dogma and other lies.

The fascist assault on education and critical thinking also involves think tanks, right-wing activists and advocacy groups, along with a network of wealthy funders committed to remaking American society to fit their racist, theocratic and plutocratic vision.

The Texas Republicans' attempt to literally whitewash the Ku Klux Klan out of American history is so ridiculous that it approaches parody. That doesn't make such historical erasure and distortion any less dangerous. Those dangers are further amplified by the crisis of democracy caused by the Jim Crow Republicans and ascendant neofascist movement.

As historian Timothy Snyder warned in a recent essay in the New York Times:

Democracy requires individual responsibility, which is impossible without critical history. It thrives in a spirit of self-awareness and self-correction. Authoritarianism, on the other hand, is infantilizing: We should not have to feel any negative emotions; difficult subjects should be kept from us. Our memory laws amount to therapy, a talking cure. In the laws' portrayal of the world, the words of white people have the magic power to dissolve the historical consequences of slavery, lynchings and voter suppression. Racism is over when white people say so.

We start by saying we are not racists. Yes, that felt nice. And now we should make sure that no one says anything that might upset us. The fight against racism becomes the search for a language that makes white people feel good. The laws themselves model the desired rhetoric. We are just trying to be fair. We behave neutrally. We are innocent.

When viewed in the aggregate, these attacks on "critical race theory" and the teaching of America's real history echo some of the worst aspects of the country's past. In his book "Trouble in Mind", historian Leon Litwack details how history was taught during the Jim Crow reign of terror:

The history to which Black children were exposed in the classroom and the primers made a virtual gospel of the superiority of Anglo-Saxon institutions and ways of thinking and acting…. What little they learned of their own history consisted often of disparaging caricatures of Black people as the least civilized of the races — irresponsible, thoughtless, foolish, childlike people, satisfied with their lowly place in American life, incapable of self-control and self-direction. The history of Black people was a history of submission gladly endured and of services faithfully rendered. Transported from the darkness of heathen Africa to the civilized and Christian New World, grateful slaves found contentment and happiness…. The treatment of emancipation depicted Blacks passively waiting for Massa' Lincoln to strike off their shackles. And Reconstruction saw the enthronement of Black ignorance and inexperience, with the Ku Klux Klan in some account redeeming Anglo-Saxon civilization from alien rule. The history lessons taught in public schools were calculated to produce patriotic citizens, albeit with a distinctive southern bias.

The Jim Crow Republicans and the white right view this approach to American history as admirable, something to be resuscitated from the dustbin of the country's past.

In the self-serving stories told by the Ku Klux Klan, that terrorist organization had noble origins, represented "Christian values," did charity work and helped the poor, served the community by dealing with drunks and other miscreants, and protected "white families" as well as the "good Blacks". This is the fake history that the Jim Crow Republicans want to see taught to America's young people.

The neofascist movement understands that if it wins the battle over the teaching of the past, it can in turn control the future. In total, the right wing's moral panic over "critical race theory" resembles the kind of hearts-and-minds indoctrination favored by the great villains of history. Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Hitler and Goebbels would be proud to see their legacy continued.

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tx long req alamo praise?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/06/greg-abbott-2653567926/

===

Texas’ divisive bill restricting how students learn about current events, history, and racism passed by Senate

Kate McGee The Texas Tribune

May 22, 2021

After hours of passionate debate about how Texas teachers can instruct school children about America's history of subjugating people of color, the state Senate early Saturday morning advanced a new version of a

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/02/stop-the-steal/

no lnx twt

Ali Alexander, the lead organizer of the so-called Stop the Steal campaign, has resurfaced after going into hiding following the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Streaming on Trovo Wednesday night, Alexander claimed that while he has been licking his wounds, he has been plotting to restart rallies in March, abolish the media, and build a separate society for Trump supporters.

As former President Donald Trump faces an impeachment trial this week for inciting an insurrection with his speech at the Stop the Steal rally the morning of Jan. 6, it appears Alexander has yet to face charges for his role. Alexander rebooted the so-called Stop the Steal campaign the day after Election Day, when Trump's lead began to slip as mail-in ballots began to be counted. He pushed voter fraud conspiracy theories, embraced QAnon conspiracy theorists and far-right activists in his campaign, claimed to be doing God's work, and organized three massive rallies in Washington, D.C., that featured the Proud Boys hate group, paramilitary groups like the Oath Keepers, and other extremists.

Following Jan. 6, Alexander was booted off most major social media platforms and, as a result, is now streaming on Trovo, a gaming platform that appears to be growing in popularity among far-right actors kicked off other platforms. On Wednesday night, Alexander lamented the “racist, bigoted, anti-Christian, anti-Southern, anti-Republican, anti-conservative, anti-human smear machine" that he says targeted him, and he promised to create chaos. “We've got to get back in the driver's seat," he added.

“They've done a great number on my life, they've cost me tens of thousands of dollars, they've really destroyed parts of my life, but in a lot of ways, I have no other choice but to announce that I'm building the future, so I'm making strategic investments in tools that fight deplatforming and tocreate chaos on existing platforms," Alexander claimed.

“America is going to have a choice, and I promise you that, between going onto this dystopian future or fighting in what I'm calling the American sovereignty movement," he said. “And I'm gonna get back, and I'm going to do rallies again starting in March, I'm gonna have indoor gatherings in March, in Michigan, in Arizona, in Georgia, in Texas. I'm going to do a media tour."

Alexander said he had been plotting how to do away with the free press and other “systems that control us": “So I want you guys to know that I've been licking my wounds, but I've been plotting, I've been planning, I've been scheming because we have to do away with this whole system. The free press is not free, and they're not the press, they need to be abolished. The systems that control us have to be abolished."

“I'm going to create a society, and a community, and a culture, and a language for [Trump supporters], and there are tens of millions of us. … Winning can just be 10 million people creating a new megacity," he mused. “Let's build our own city, let's seriously build our own city, let's build a back-up city in South America."

Alexander also didn't miss the opportunity to push the claim that the insurrection was a “premeditated psyop."

“Like everyone is saying the impeachment trial is proving that there was a premeditated psyop against both Trump and Stop the Steal, so how could we incite an insurrection that was premeditated by people we don't know?" he said. “And yet, are there big platforms welcoming me back saying we treated a Black man wrong because we wanted to pretend he was leading a white supremacy movement? No. These people are evil. And we will make lists of them, and they will not be welcome in this new society, they won't be welcomed on new platforms, those people who have tried toforce Marxism and thought control on us."

Alexander said that if the “deep state" charges him with a fake crime, he'd be prepared to fight: “If they want to charge me with a fake crime, if they want to martyr me, then I will meet them on that battlefield. I'm not somebody, I'm not somebody that talks a talk or tweets a tweet."

“I've licked my wounds, I'm pissed off. I'm more pissed off than I was the night of the election I created Stop the Steal. We win. They lose. To God be the glory," he said in closing.

Ahead of the Capitol insurrection, Alexander embraced increasingly violent rhetoric, calling for revolution and rebellion. A short distance away from the White House the day before the insurrection, Alexander started a “Victory or death!" chant at a Stop the Steal rally. “Our government is only our government if it is legitimate," he declared at that rally. “1776 is always an option."

After the violence at the Capitol, Alexander posted a since-deleted video of himself saying “I don't disavow this. I do not denounce this." He encouraged viewers to tune into his Stop the Steal website, which he called “the home of the rebellion against an illegitimate government."

This article was originally published at Right Wing Watch and is republished here by permission.

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recall 80's new right BS we are the true student radicals, revolutionaries; trump is a disrupter which gets morphed into rebellion; 1776 Minute men were white wasp manly yeoman farmers who were going to solve problem with muskets; pseudo-populist US little ppl real 'Mercan vs gubmint/"establishment"

https://www.alternet.org/2021/02/qanon-revolution/

When a mob of far-right extremists violently attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, some of them were invoking the American Revolutionary War of the 1770s and 1780s and equating themselves with the colonies that overthrew British rule long ago. But author John Patrick Leary, in an article published by The New Republic on February 5, explains why that analogy and the far right's obsession with the word "patriot" are deeply flawed.

"The Capitol rioters invaded the Senate, looking for traitors [THOSE PPL WHO ARE MAKING US VICTIMS, TAKING AWAY OUR GOD GIVEN RIGHTS/SOCIAL STATUS/WAY OF LIFE CRISCO-NACHT] and crying out, 'Hold the line, patriots,'" Leary observes. "The right often seems to be reenacting an action movie fantasy of the Revolutionary War, folding a language of "patriotism" into their every leaflet and banner. It's there in the yellow Gadsden flag waved by the Tea Party, and in the names of dozens of militias active in practically every state, from Alabama's American Patriots Three Percent to Wisconsin's III% United Patriots."

Leary goes on to lay out some reasons why the far right badly misunderstands the word "patriot."

"A patriot is a good citizen, lover of order — and an insurgent, an unruly subject," Leary explains. "Given all of these confused loyalties, perhaps the real meaning of 'patriot,' what really fuels the sense of attachment it carries, is not the various positive meanings it is occasionally given, but its opposite: not 'love of country,' in other words, but hatred of the 'traitor.' The Ku Klux Klan, for instance, always pledged its service to civil government, the Constitution and 'pure patriotism,' even when the group waged war on federal and state governments and anyone else who betrayed its notion of 'purity.'"

Leary continues, "Whatever their stated political convictions — open White supremacy, anti-tax zealotry, or QAnon delirium — what appears to nourish Trump fetishists is a boundless sense of betrayal and a bottomless well of self-righteousness. It's a toxic, ridiculous combination."

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think piece

https://www.alternet.org/2021/02/gop-history/

...A few minutes later, President and First Lady Biden arrived at the rotunda to pay their respects. MSNBC and CNN were there. OnFox, Laura Ingraham briefly acknowledged the Bidens' presencebut spent most of her airtime not honoring the slain policeman but trashing Dr. Anthony Fauci and beginning a story about homicides in Chicago with the phrase, "The BLM-fueled crime wave…" Black Lives Matter, you see, is just one more manifestation of the imaginary socialist plot to take over America. No wonder their viewers think the world's aflame, a cynical awful place where progressives plotting evil lurk at every corner pizzeria.

By the way, Officer Sicknick, a 12-year veteran of the force, was a Trump voter in 2016, although *The Washington Post* reports, "Those who encountered Sicknick said his political views did not align neatly with one political party." He was against impeachment but supported gun control.

There hasn't been an official explanation yet as to exactly how Sicknick died but he was attacked and killed while resisting the crazed crowd brainwashed by Trump

...Meanwhile, the rest of us are supposed to buy into the GOP's big con because, you know, unity. Every time truths are spoken that Republicans don't like, they claim that it's for sure dividing the country further.

So brazen are the attempts at manipulation of truth whether present or past, that in the last months of his term, President Trump and his sycophantic crew appointed a Presidential Advisory 1776 Committee, charged with creating "a definitive chronicle of the American founding." The report partly was a response to The New York Times' award-winning 1619 Project, charting the history of slavery in the United States and our continuing record of racial discrimination.

With little regard for the facts and not a single professional historian on the panel (but with plenty of conservative activists and educators), and with time quickly running out for the Trump White House, it was decided to release their findings on the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday, months before the report was supposed to be completed and just two days before the Biden inauguration—timing that was either a stroke of haste, pure ignorance or malign spite—you make the call.

In any case, much of what the commission had to say was lost in the shuffle of last-minute Trump pardons and inauguration news but as per Sarah Ruiz-Grossman at The Huffington Post:

The 45-page report reads in places like a right-wing manifesto: It makes excuses for slavery and the Three-fifths Compromise that declared slaves counted as less than full humans. It decries socialism and "identity politics," celebrates the right to bear arms and calls the anti-abortion movement one of the nation's "great reforms…"

"The Trump commission's report also rails against socialism as leading people down a "dangerous path" of wealth redistribution and cites '"anti-Communism" and "the Pro-Life Movement"— or anti-abortion movement — as some of the "great reforms" of the country's history."

The report compares progressivism to fascism, seeking to "centralize power under the management of so-called experts." There are twice as many references to Christianity as of racism, no footnotes or citations, and not a single mention of Indigenous people, especially not the notion that upon our arrival, ninety percent of them quickly were wiped out by disease, murder, forced relocation, and other assorted territorial encroachments.

Many wondered what President Biden would do with the report. It didn't take long to find out. Within minutes of his swearing-in, an executive order wiped out the 1776 Committee. And shortly after, all evidence of its existence, including the panel's preposterous report, was removed from the White House website.

Via his Department of Education, the new president should lead an effort figuring out how to restore civics classes and revive the history curriculum that once taught young Americans how to be thoughtful, participating citizens by learning their past. This also should help them develop the kind of critical thinking that, when presented with the facts, responds with skepticism and debate but not in the belief of every crackpot version of reality that beckons to them from their televisions, radios and laptops. As we've seen, such an alternative truth—the real fake news as it were—can only lead to the violent end of American democracy.

For a party that used to preach responsibility and reason, the Republicans have devolved into an asylum for the proponents and hangers on of screwball revisionism fraudulent theories and the vicious overthrow of government. Don't know much about history but I do know that if the GOP have their way there will be little room for rational solutions that can help us...

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an 121 salon

On Monday afternoon the White House released an executive order detailing the figures that Trump wants represented in his National Garden of American Heroes.

Trump originally pitched the idea during aJuly 2020 speech at Mount Rushmore, amid nationwide protests that again brought questions of who should be memorialized through monuments into focus; across the country, statues of slave owners and Confederate officers were vandalized and removed.

In his speech, Trump said that these actions constituted a branch of "cancel culture."

"This movement is openly attacking the legacies of every person on Mount Rushmore," he said."They defile the memory of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt."

He continued: "I am announcing the creation of a new monument to the giants of our past. I am signing an executive order to establish the National Garden of American Heroes, a vast outdoor park that will feature the statues of the greatest Americans to ever live."

In the seven months since, there has been no movement on creating the statue park. No Congressional funding was secured for the proposed project and, despite the executive order, it's unlikely to be picked up by the next administration. Regardless, two days before leaving office, Trump released the list of figures he'd like to see memorialized — and it is completely unhinged.

The list is abizarro grab bag of 244 individuals, defined simultaneously by its randomness and tone-deafness. Logistics aside (How large would the park be? How close will the insane amount of statuary be to each other? Will it be like a Madame Tussauds cast in stone?), Trump's definition of "hero" is muddled.

You'd have Grover Cleveland, Walt Disney, Whitney Houston and Dolley Madison all next to each other, flanked by Kobe Bryant, Louis Armstrong, Neil Armstrong and Theodor Geisel aka "Dr. Seuss." There are civil rights champions and abolitionists like Martin Luther King, Jr., Harriet Tubman and Harriet Beecher Stowe, alongside slave-owning presidents such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. More members of Buffalo Bill's Wild West show are present on the list than Asian Americans.

In many ways, however, Trump's list of "American Heroes" —which can be viewed in its entirety here— is emblematic of his presidency. It's riddled with choices that will make readers pause due to their obvious lack of research, regard for the truth and sensitivity. Here are some of the most weirdest missteps on the list (there are many more), starting with the demographic breakdown:

Demographic Breakdown

While the list is overwhelmingly random, it's also overwhelmingly male. AsAxios' Danielle Alberti reported, Trump's "American Heroes" are 73% men. Additionally, 86 of the nominees, nearly a third, were born between 1900 and 1950.

When asked in that same article by Axios about his views on the list, historian Michael Beschloss, who specializes in the United States presidency, said, "Any American who loves democracy should make sure there is never some official, totalitarian-sounding 'National Garden of American Heroes,' with names forced upon us by the federal government."

"The glory of American democracy is that every one of our citizens decides who his or her personal heroes are," Beschloss said. "That is not the prerogative of any president, especially one rejected by American voters and who is on his way out the door. Many of the people on this list of 'heroes' would be embarrassed to be singled out by someone like Donald Trump."

Additionally, as theAssociated Press reported, when Trump first proposed the list in 2020, there were no Native American, Hispanic or Asian American individuals. The list has been diversified some, but it's obviously an afterthought.

Christopher Columbus

One of the most incendiary names on the list was Christopher Columbus — who was neither American, nor did he ever actually set foot in North America. He did, however, initiate the Atlantic slave trade and the genocide of thousands of indigenous people. His cruelties are difficult to fully quantify, ranging from allowing the settlers under him to sell 9- and 10-year-old girls into sexual slavery, to forcing indigenous people to collect gold for him.

In June 2020, three statues of Columbus were damaged or pulled down in as many days.

"In St. Paul, demonstrators toppled a ten-foot-tall statue that stood in front of the Minnesota state capitol," wrote Theresa Machemer for Smithsonian Magazine. "In Richmond, protesters pulled down an eight-foot-tall statue in Byrd Park, carrying it about 200 yards before setting it on fire and throwing it into the nearby Fountain Lake. And, around 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, police in Boston received a report that a marble statue of the Italian explorer and colonizer had lost its head."

Andrew Jackson

This choice is very much in the same vein as Columbus. Jackson, who was the seventh president of the United States, was one of the primary supporters of the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which authorized the government to extinguish any Indian title to land claims in the Southeast.

"The result was the Trail of Tears, in which Cherokee and other native peoples of the Southeast were forced at gunpoint to march 1,200 miles to 'Indian territory,'" Billy J. Stratton wrote for Salon in 2017. "Thousands of Cherokee died during the passage, while many who survived the trek lost their homes and most of their property. Ironically, much of the land on which the Cherokee and other removed tribes were settled was opened to homesteading and became the state of Oklahoma some 60 years later."

Because of this, it seems deeply tone-deaf to include Jackson next to Native American icons like Chief Joseph, Sitting Bull and Tecumseh.

Muhammad Ali

So, admittedly, this name stuck out to me because I live in Louisville, Kentucky, Ali's hometown, and have reported previously on why there are no full-body statues of the boxing legend. According to Jeannie Kahnke of the Muhammad Ali Center — whom I interviewed in 2018 — they receive a lot of requests to use Ali's likeness.

"Over the years, I cannot tell you how many times people have come to us, saying 'I want to do a Muhammad Ali statue,'" she said. "It has probably been at least 15."

However, Ali was a devout Muslim, and he felt his faith would prohibit full-body statues being erected of him — which, Kahnke said, would prevent Ali's family from giving their blessing for a life-size statue of him. Some sculptors have done so without his family's permission, but many have found other, more creative, ways to honor the boxer.

Including his name on the list demonstrates either an obvious lack of research or a willingness to dishonor Ali's wishes and religious beliefs.

Ingrid Bergman

In Trump's executive order, he stated that the park's goal is to honor those believed to be "historically significant," and "individual[s] who made substantive contributions to America's public life or otherwise had a substantive effect on America's history."

To that end, one of the defining characteristics of Trump's list is the mishmash of political and pop culture, but Swedish actress Ingrid Bergan stands out because she . . . wasn't American. And unlike Alfred Hitchcock and Alex Trebek (who were born in the U.K. and Canada, respectively), she never became an American citizen.

It really raises the question of what qualifies as a "substantive contribution to America's public life" in Trump's mind. Was he just a big "Casablanca" fan? Perhaps, because Humphrey Bogart is on the list, too.

Woody Guthrie and Hannah Arendt

As New York Daily News reporter Chris Sommerfield tweeted yesterday, there are several "incredible self-owns" found on Trump's list, like the inclusion of Woody Guthrie, "who wrotea blistering 1950s tune about the Trump family's racist housing practices in Brooklyn."

Additionally, Trump included the German-born American political theorist Hannah Arendt, who was perhaps best known for her book "The Origins of Totalitarianism." Her writings on "the banality of evil" have been repeatedly invoked to describe Trump's apparent and growing desire for autocratic rule.

"I think she would be appalled," Roger Berkowitz, who directs the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College — on whose campus Arendt is buried and where she taught for many years — told Jewish Insideron Monday evening. "I think Arendt would find it ridiculous that Trump nominated her. I think she would find Trump ridiculous, and I think she'd find him dangerous insofar as he undermines the basic idea of truthfulness and truth in the country. His attack on the election she would have found abhorrent and dangerous."

Edward R. Murrow

Finally, Trump's disdain for legitimate, objective reporting is no secret. He has called the media the "enemy of the people,"and as such, it was no surprise to see the phrase "Murder the media" scrawled on a door of the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 insurrection.

That's why it was kind of a shock to see Edward R. Murrow, the broadcaster and war correspondent who had a deep impact on journalistic ethics, included on Trump's list. If Murrow were still alive and writing, I have no doubt that he would have reported truthfully on Trump — just as he reported critically on Senator Joseph McCarthy — and been decried as another "enemy of the people."

For what it's worth, Trump's executive order directed the secretary of the interior to identify a site and provide funding and said a taskforce would "publish an annual public report describing progress on establishing the National Garden and on building statues."

Joe Biden hasnominated Deb Haaland for the position, and neither she nor Biden's transition team have issued a comment on the garden, making it unlikely that it will ever actually take root.

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/01/historian-push-back-with-a-brutal-takedown-of-1776-commission-report/

After the Trump administration released its report on the "1776 Commission," historians wasted no time firing back with brutal criticism of the 45-page document, purported to be authored by "some of America's most distinguished scholars and historians." But one historian, Torsten Kathke is noting that the committee responsible for developing the report consisted of mostly conservatives and Trump loyalists.

"Many others are already parsing the report of the 1776 Commission," Kathke tweeted. "This much here: It's a propagandist hack job. What interested me were the people involved with it. (They're pretty much who you would expect them to be.)"

Many others are already parsing the report of the 1776 Commission. This much here: It's a propagandist hack job. W… https://t.co/lYcZIjnkQG

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611013264.0

Kathke noted that the top three individuals listed on the committee list are not even historians. He tweeted, "The three above-the-line people leading the commission. Not one who is primarily a historian. Considering the commission states "the facts of our founding are not partisan. They are a matter of history" it feels not out of bounds to ask: Why not let a historian chair it?"

The three above-the-line people leading the commission. Not one who is primarily a historian. Considering the co… https://t.co/QXurPAuKvh

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611013271.0

He went on to highlight the problem with former Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant (R) being part of the commission. Although Bryant supported replacing the state flag (which paid homage to the Confederate flag), he had previously insisted on honoring the legacy of the Confederacy.

A few more names: Phil Bryant. MA in Political Science. Former Mississippi Governor. Came out in favor of replac… https://t.co/YNZ3UA2gCh

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611013969.0

Kathke went on to highlight issues with other members of the committee:

Charles Kesler. Political scientist whom @politico called "the intellectual avatar of Trumpism."… https://t.co/s1JaNp76gm

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611018897.0

Victor Davis Hanson. Ph.D. in classics. That qualifies him, I suppose, as the first historian on the list. Though*n… https://t.co/Gisi450mr3*

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611018552.0

Mike Gonzalez. MBA. Journalist and speechwriter. https://t.co/eUflFV361f https://t.co/6YOTsqdH04

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611017459.0

John Gibbs. Master of Public Administration. Who "has a history of making inflammatory remarks and spreading false… https://t.co/idnFX4igKT

— Torsten Kathke (@Torsten Kathke)1611016820.0

Kathke's criticism came shortly after the Trump administration released the "1776 Commission Report" on Martin Luther King Day. According toThe New York Times, the report "denounces the charge that the American founders were hypocrites who preached equality even as they codified slavery in the Constitution and held slaves themselves."

The report, created by an 18-member commission chaired by Trump ally and conservative Larry Arnn, reads, "this charge is untrue, and has done enormous damage, especially in recent years, with a devastating effect on our civic unity and social fabric."

The "1776 Commission Report" also argues that the "'distorted histories' of the country "labor under the illusion that slavery was somehow a uniquely American evil.'" It also presented a defense of slavery insisting that it should "be seen in a much broader perspective" as it noted the "unfortunate fact" that slavery "has been more the rule than the exception throughout human history."

According to the Trump White House, the civil rights movement became a case of "identity politics" which "teaches that America itself is to blame for oppression."

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insurrection was done in the name of saving america, the constituton, freedumb (chanted):

aha rhet morph from civil war (proslavery) to 1776, no one says so, but builds on Tea Party tobacco koch BS

https://www.mediamatters.org/alex-jones/infowars-alex-jones-funded-and-fomented-mob

no vid

great banner pix saved jnzmegaphone

Far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones says he spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and coordinated with the White House in the organizing of a January 6 event that culminated in a failed insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. In comments made on Infowars broadcasts and during speeches delivered in Washington, D.C., in the days before January 6, Jones and his fellow Infowars host Owen Shroyer frequently used violent and revolutionary rhetoric in calling for the overturning of legitimate election results.

Five people lost their lives during the violent incursion in the Capitol that immediately followed an inciting speech given by the president on January 6. Trump supporter Ashli Babbitt was fatally shot by a U.S. Capitol Police officer as she attempted to breach the Speaker’s Lobby, which is close to the U.S. House of Representatives floor. U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick was beaten to death with a fire extinguisher by Trump supporters. Three other Trump supporters died after experiencing medical emergencies, including one who was trampled to death by the mob.

Some Trump supporters made it clear their purpose in the Capitol was to hunt down and kill lawmakers. The quick thinking of [AA] Capitol Police officer Eugene Goodman, who faced down the mob alone, diverted rioters away from the Senate floor, as captured in a stunning video taken by HuffPo reporter Igor Bobic.

Jones’ Infowars outlet was promoting a January 6 event as early as December 31. In a video posted to Infowars’ streaming platform Banned.video, a man ranted about the false claim that Trump won the 2020 election, saying, “These liberals think they can just do whatever the fuck they want. You know why that is? It’s because we sit there and we say we want to talk it out.” The video transitioned to promotional material for Infowars’ January 6 event and included a voiceover of Jones saying “It’s 1776 time,” a reference to the Revolutionary War. vid]

on January 2, Jones said during a broadcast that “it takes money to put my crew and security in D.C., and it takes money to organize this, and we put a lot of money -- myself -- into paying for the event Trump is going to be at and the other event.” He then encouraged viewers tobuy nutritional supplements from the Infowars Store and told them they “are funding the second American Revolution.” AHA ITS TEA PARTY DERIVATIVE]

The next day, Jones again discussed his involvement in planning and paying for the event. During his broadcast, he excoriated Trump supporters who were hesitant to travel to Washington, D.C., claiming, “I’ve seen people making a lot of excuses. ‘Oh, antifa is dangerous.’ It’s a lot more dangerous walking across the street.There’s hardly no antifa. They are a bunch of cowards.” (After mayhem unfolded at the Capitol, Jones and his outlet falsely blamed antifa supporters for the violence that took place.) He added, “It’s not about Infowars getting the credit for this, it’s about the fact that no one would step up and put the money in. ... I stepped up and put the money in for the 5th and for the 6th and then a donor came along, a great patriot, and paid $400,000-plus for the rest of it. I’m in over $130,000, and I'm not complaining about that. I had to do it when no one else was two weeks ago.”

Jones, Infowars host Owen Shroyer, and other Infowars employees then traveled to Washington, D.C. During a January 5 speech in downtown Washington, Shroyer said, “Americans are ready to fight. We’re not exactly sure what that is going to look like, perhaps, in a couple of weeks if we can’t stop this certification of the fraudulent election of Joe Biden.” He went on to “salute” Sens. Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) for their efforts to overturn the election and said of the people gathered there, “We are the new revolution.”

Meanwhile, Jones was at an event outside the Supreme Court, where he told a crowd, “We are facing Satan, and the answer to Satan’s 1984 is George Washington’s 1776.”

That evening, Jones and Shroyer regrouped to give more speeches in downtown Washington. Shroyer told a crowd, “Thomas Jefferson once said when the government fears the people, there is freedom. But for too long now the people have feared the government. … I can tell you that thecrooked politicians that occupy our Capitol are in fear right now. Do you know how I know this? Because they are scurrying around in secret tunnels to avoid ‘we the people.’ Right now as we speak they’re scurrying around like the little rats that they are to try to avoid you.”

When Jones took over the lectern, he told a cheering crowd that“we have only begun to resist the globalists” and that “they have tried to steal this election in front of everyone.” Jones also said,“I don’t know how all this is going to end, but if they want a fight, they better believe they’ve got one.”

He went on to say, “This will be their Waterloo. This will be their destruction.” (Waterloo refers to the pivotal battlefield defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte that ended the Seventh Coalition.) Jones also said that Winston Churchill “gave a famous speech where he said all I can promise you is blood, and pain, and war, and suffering. But the alternative is even worse:total slavery.” He then led the crowd in a “1776” chant.

The violent rhetoric continued the next day at Infowars’ event, which immediately preceded the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. During a January 6 speech in downtown Washington, Jones again told a crowd, “We declare 1776 against the New World Order.” Shroyer spoke from his own bullhorn while standing beside Jones, saying, “They said you lost this election in a landslide to [Joe] Biden. We said, ‘No, we don’t buy your bullshit.’ But, guess what? You want to feed us bullshit? We’re going to bring it right to your front door and you can eat it yourselves.” (Some Trump insurrectionists at the Capitol did in fact smear their own feces throughout the building’s hallways during the attack.)

At one point, Jones told the crowd to head to the Capitol “peacefully,” in contradiction to much of what he had said about what should happen on January 6. He also attempted to rile up the crowd by falsely telling them that Biden’s win in Arizona had been reversed and that “we have only begun to fight. This is 1776.” As people began to make their way to the Capitol, Shroyer yelled from a bullhorn that Democrats are “tyrants” and led the crowd in a “death to tyrants” chant. Jones then can be then heard attempting to privately confer with his crew, saying, “Let’s take it to the Capitol.”

While Jones and Shroyer did not enter the Capitol building and instead retreated to a “secure location” during the insurrection, an Infowars cameraperson, who identified himself only as “your boy Sam with Infowars.com,” did go inside as both a mob participant and a recorder of the events. Shortly before entering the building, he said, “We have had enough,” and “I got to be honest, this is not a peaceful protest.” Once he crossed the threshold, he yelled, “Guess what? We are in the Capitol, baby!” From a video uploaded to Banned.video with the title “Patriots Storm Congress Raw Footage Includes Execution of Ashli Babbitt,” it is apparent that “Sam” was just feet away from Babbitt when she was fatally shot near the Speaker’s Lobby. Although recent Infowars videos identify him only as “Sam,” older videos posted to Banned.video reveal that he appears to go by the name Sam Montoya.

As the attempted insurrection unfolded, Infowars’ Harrison Smith, who was guest-hosting The Alex Jones Show because Jones and Shroyer were in Washington, praised the “patriots” who were storming the Capitol, at least one of whom participated in beating officer Sicknick to death. The following day, Jones again claimed to have spent “close to a half a million dollars” organizing the gathering in Washington and also said that he organized the event in coordination with the White House.

Following the 2020 presidential election, Jones called on his supporters to “surround” the Georgia governor’s mansion and “rise up” because officials in that state refused to overturn Biden’s legitimate victory. In December, Shroyer praised the efforts of Trump supporters to violently disrupt the Oregon state legislature’s consideration of a COVID-19 relief bill.

Throughout the Trump presidency, Jones has often hyped the prospect of a second American Civil War that would pit conservatives against liberals, including saying that he would personally participate in violence and help execute supposed traitors. In recent months, Jones has hosted Oath Keepers militia founder Stewart Rhodes, who said during his Infowars appearances that his followers were on alert for a command from Trump to start carrying out mass violence against Democrats in Washington, D.C., and at other locations.

For his part, Shroyer said during a November 18 broadcast that prominent Democrats and members of the mainstream media “deserve” to be the victims of mass violence if Trump is not allowed to continue to be president, despite his defeat. He added, “I know I won’t have to be the one to get my hands dirty. I can sit right here in studio and just broadcast the whole thing.”

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