TARGET 3

420 covid

2 22 tag trget

prolly neglected, see links

see weaponization benghazi BS hearings

see laptop and hunter three

see anti-commie

see UN globalist elite

see press suppression MMA 4 24

see poll worker civil soc 5 24

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NO LNX

The first victims of Trump's hit list

Thom Hartmann January 17, 2025

It may seem counter-intuitive, given that most people think of dictators as bad guys themselves, but the simple reality is that without proclaiming enemies — larger than life enemies — dictators have a hard time hanging onto power and accomplishing the things they want to do.

Hitler had Jews. Mussolini had the Italian Socialist Party. For Duterte it was drug dealers. Stalin vilified the “Kulaks” (wealthy peasants) as a threat to the Soviet Union. Mao blamed the bourgeoisie. Pol Pot said intellectuals were the enemy and so ordered everybody who could read killed. Idi Amin blamed Indians and Asians for the problems of Uganda. Robert Mugabe said white farmers were destroying Zimbabwe. Slobodan Milošević pointed to the Kosovo Albanians. Pinochet blamed the trade unions for Chile’s struggles.

Trump has flirted with condemning several different groups over the years, primarily using brown-skinned immigrants as his bogeymen, although the GOP has also vilified queer people, Black people, academics, journalists, teachers, and liberals to motivate the hatred of their base.

I learned about the importance of a good enemy when taking a creative writing class from the late Robert B. Parker in the 1970s. At the time, he was working on his third Spenser novel and hadn’t yet really hit it big, so a few of us who signed up for his weekend seminar were able to sit at his feet and learn from the man who became one of America’s great masters of fiction.

While the hero of the story is important, Parker told us, it’s the antihero — the bad guy or antagonist — who makes real for the reader the goodness of the hero.

He said that Superman, for example, would have just been a boring guy who stopped bank robberies if it weren’t for Lex Luthor. Batman would only be a rich guy with a fancy car and a weird outfit if it weren’t for the Joker. Without Moby Dick, Captain Ahab was merely another whaler. Sherlock Holmes would have been a weird but boring private eye were it not for Professor Moriarty, “the Napoleon of Crime.”

You get the idea. The hero can only be as good as the bad guy is bad. Every superhero requires a super-antihero. A larger-than-life bad guy. Genuine evil.

Even beginning novelists and screenwriters know this. And so does every dictator, including wannabe dictator Trump. It was a lesson George W. Bush learned and used after 9/11 to lie us into two unnecessary wars, make billions for Cheney’s near-bankrupt Halliburton, and destroy our reputation around the world.

Today, it’s why the GOP is making such a big deal about Laken Riley, the white woman killed by an Hispanic “illegal” immigrant, going so far as to name legislation after her. See how terrible these “invaders” are? They try to rape white women and when they don’t get their way, they kill them!

It’s why Trump, when he first announced his candidacy in 2015, characterized Latino immigrants as rapists and murderers. Its why Nancy Mace is constantly talking about “predators with penises” being in women’s restrooms. It’s why rightwingers claim books in our schools are “indoctrinating” our children. It’s why Trump still claims the Central Park Five should have been executed.

When a dictator wants to rally the people — particularly so they’ll support him in doing something dreadful — he must first convince them that the common enemy he’s identified is super evil.

To successfully claim to fight evil, he must first identify that evil in terms everybody understands. And it can’t be ordinary evil; his opponents must be super-evil incarnate: Monstrous. Depraved. Malefic. Diabolical. Satanic.

When Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933 the first group he and his Nazis went after weren’t the Jews or even the communists. There were supporters of both groups across the country at the time, and he needed a genuinely “other” minority group to attack first, one that only a small handful of people would ever rise to defend.

So, he went after trans people. The famous book-burning picture is from in front of the Berlin Institute of Sexology, where Magnus Hirschfield was supporting trans people undergoing the first sexual reassignment surgeries in the modern world.

Fascists always start by declaring themselves the victims of evil “others.” Victimhood is essential to the fascist worldview; it’s at its core. And it’s their excuse for destroying other people’s lives.

They then cast the weakest and least popular minorities in a society as the victimizers of the fascists. Fascism is never directed against the rich or powerful, but always against those least able to defend themselves. It’s bullying turned into a political movement.

Trump has gone after multiple groups during his political career, including trans people, Black Haitian immigrants, Central- and South American immigrants, teachers, librarians, Muslims, Black Lives Matter protestors, the media, and Democrats generally.

To really turn America into a hotbed of violence and retribution, though, he’s going to need to infamize groups one at a time.

Where will he begin? Who will he turn into the first super-villains?

Will it be members of the press, dragged before congressional committees and subject to millions in lawsuits? Will he join Nancy Mace in demonizing queer people? Will he join Putin in calling Ukrainians Nazis? Can he convince enough people that Democrats are a danger to America that elected officials will shut up and hide the way so many did in 1930s Germany?

Trump and his bully boys have big plans for America, and getting people behind more tax cuts for billionaires, mass deportations, killing Obamacare and Medicaid, imprisoning the press, and gutting our civil and human rights will be a big lift. He’s going to have to identify his enemies in terms that are so stark that few Americans will dare speak up.

So, where do you think he’ll begin? Who will be his first victims, justifying his going beyond the law and the Constitution?

Post your thoughts below in our comments section.

NOW READ: A new ugly streak in American politics

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Khaya Himmelman @ Talking Points Memo](https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/far-right-group-recruits-followers-to-overwhelm-election-offices-with-voter-roll-challenges): Far-Right Group Recruits Followers To Overwhelm Election Offices With Voter Roll Challenges}:

True the Vote is enlisting private citizens to help it overwhelm under-staffed and under-resourced election offices with voter roll challenges ahead of election day.

mma 4 24

media Matters President and CEO Angelo Carusone issued the following statement after Judge Amit Mehta of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia granted Media Matters a preliminary injunction against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Elon Musk encouraged Republican state attorneys general to use their power to harass their critics and stifle reporting about X. Ken Paxton was one of those AGs that took up the call and he was defeated. Today's decision is a victory for free speech.

Key takeaways from the order:

As Judge Mehta noted, Media Matters’ investigative journalism and reporting “are core First Amendment activities,” and any “loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.”
Judge Mehta prohibited Paxton from taking any steps to enforce his unlawful demand to rifle through Media Matters’ confidential documents.

The same day that X Corp. filed a meritless lawsuit against Media Matters for America for an accurate report on the platform’s extremism, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton opened a similarly specious investigation into MMFA under Texas’ deceptive trade practices act. Paxton subsequently issued an overbroad and invasive civil investigative demand – despite the fact that Media Matters has no relevant connection to Texas. The nonpartisan U.S. Press Freedom Tracker which catalogs press freedom violations in the United States recently recorded an incident report related to the Texas attorney general's investigation in their database.

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mma 224

As right-wing blog The Daily Wire expands its reach, it has also stepped up calls for violence against LGBTQ people and others.

Founded in 2015 by Ben Shapiro and Jeremy Boreing, The Daily Wire has grown beyond its significant Facebook following — recently signing a streaming deal with X (formerly Twitter), pouring $100 million into new children's programming, and producing feature-length movies. But amid all these efforts to expand The Daily Wire into new markets, its hosts have continued pushing bigoted, extreme rhetoric targeting trans people, unhoused people, health care providers, and more.

Daily Wire personalities often use a rhetorical device called stochastic terrorism, a process of associating marginalized groups with vile or disgusting acts in order to incite violence against them.

Hosts Matt Walsh, Ben Shapiro, and Candace Owens frequently uses their programs to attack doctors who provide gender-affirming care, even smearing a children's hospital by claiming children were being tortured and mutilated there while dismissing the potential harm that could result from their words. Then, when the hospital received a bomb threat, Walsh dismissed concerns by suggesting that liberals were responsible.

Stochastic terrorism can result in real harm, and The Daily Wire has become a platform for amplifying these calls for violence. [vid]

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AN 12 23

When special counsel Jack Smith announced 37 federal criminal charges against former President Donald Trump in the Mar-a-Lago documents case in June, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-California) warned that he would be "the subject of relentless attacks" and could expect "death threats."

Schiff definitely called it.

Smith has been inundated with death threats not only because of that case, but also, in response to his election interference case against the former president. Trump and his loyalists have repeatedly used words like "deranged" to attack Smith, who has become a major target of MAGA conspiracy theorists.

In an article published by Mother Jones on December 13, journalists David Corn and Dan Friedman describe an anti-Smith conspiracy theory that is showing up on far-right websites.

"A new conspiracy theory rising on the right is being deployed to help Donald Trump," Corn and Freidman explain. "It claims that Jack Smith, the special counsel who is prosecuting Trump for his attempt to overturn the 2020 election and for his alleged swiping of classified documents, was part of a multimillion- dollar extortion scheme when he was the chief prosecutor investigating and prosecuting war crimes in Kosovo. In the past two weeks, this unsubstantiated narrative has started popping up on fringe right-wing sites and social media posts."

The reporters continue, "Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser and QAnonish MAGA champion, has promoted this tale…. This campaign against Smith is based on documents circulated by John Moynihan, a onetime DEA employee who says he handled money laundering investigations for the agency."

According to Corn and Freidman, MAGA Republican and former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne "has claimed credit for helping to launch Moynihan's allegations against Smith."

The journalists note, "Byrne tweeted a link to a story on the Moynihan charges that appeared on Gateway Pundit, a fringe-right site, and he declared, 'I DID THAT. Well, the extraordinary federal John Moynihan and I.' He added laughing emojis. A website he created called Deep Capture was among the first to post the Moynihan complaint."

mma 12 23

SEAN HANNITY (HOST): It really has nothing to do with the environment when you hear "Green New Deal," does it?

MARC MORANO (GUEST): No, absolutely nothing. And as you mentioned, they freely admit that, whether it's AOC's architect or even the UN. They've actually said, they said, "You thought climate treaties had something to do with environmental policy? This is about redistribution of wealth. This is about empowering the bureaucrats." What they're trying to do, it's all about power. It's about making fewer and fewer decisions by fewer and fewer individuals -- more decisions by fewer individuals.

...

All of this is happening so that you can have a regulatory state that we've never experienced in America -- in our American history -- as they take over more and more swaths. This is the intentional collapse of energy, food, transportation, and as a bonus, our free speech, because remember, the UN last year announced, "We own the science on climate change, and that's why we partnered with Google to make sure only UN-approved results on climate science are returned."

This is a frightening world in which we're entering now. And, you know, we really need to push back hard because they are crushing the middle class, and they are literally doing everything they can with 15 minute cities to keep us locked in, the banning of gas-powered cars -- which, by the way, no one's ever voted to ban.

Fox News platforms climate denial and the Great Reset conspiracy theory during COP27

:{:{11/14/22}:

### Fox brings on climate denier to downplay landmark IPCC climate report

:{:{08/09/21}:

### Merchant Of Doubt Marc Morano Concerned Google Won't Promote His Website's Climate Change Denial

:{:{03/06/15}:

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mma 11 23

## Wallace and Chutkan are presiding over two Trump cases

- Colorado District Court Judge Sarah Wallace is presiding over a 14th Amendment case against Trump, which will decide whether Trump should be disqualified from having his name on the ballot in the state in 2024 over his alleged role on January 6. Reuters, [10/30/23]
- U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan is overseeing Trump’s litigation in D.C. and recently reinstated a gag order on the former president following a temporary freeze after Trump appealed.CNN, [10/30/23;Axios, 10/20/23]

## Right-wing media have attacked Colorado Judge Wallace
- Michael Knowles of The Daily Wire suggested that Wallace’s decision to allow a lawsuit regarding Trump's eligibility for office under the 14th Amendment to move forward could result in another civil war. Knowles remarked: “Civil wars happen. And the liberals would appear to be cultivating the conditions to make it much more likely.” Media Matters, [10/24/23]

- On X, Fox News host Mark Levin shared an NBC News article about the case, adding, “We have a real problem in America with tyrannical leftwing judges who run their courtrooms like political circuses.”Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- On his show War Room, Steve Bannon called Wallace “radical” while his guest, Mike Davis, a right-wing judicial activist, called on her to recuse herself from the case.Real America’s Voice, *War Room*, [10/30/23]

- Later on, Bannon claimed the case is happening in a kangaroo court that’s “every bit as deadly as the Nazi judges and Stalin show trial.” Real America’s Voice, *War Room*, [10/30/23]

- Davis also made an appearance on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle and called Wallace “biased” and cited a $100 donation to the Colorado Turnout Project she made prior to taking the bench. He went on: “I think she’s going to rule for these Democrat operatives and try to take President Trump off the ballot here in Colorado. And I think that Democrats are going to try to use that precedent to go to other states like Minnesota and Michigan. So, it looks like the Supreme Court of the United States is going to have to step in here and fix this eventually.” Fox News, *The Ingraham Angle*, [10/30/23; Colorado Politics, 10/30/23]

- On X, Mike Davis wrote: “New Denver District Judge Sarah Wallace, a Democrat Donor, Commits Reversible Error By Refusing to Recuse from Trump January 6th Case After Donating to Anti-Trump January 6th PAC.”He went on to ask, “Will the public reasonably believe she can give Trump a fair January 6th-related bench trial after she donated to an anti-Trump January 6th PAC ? The answer is clearly not.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- Davis also posted on X a clip of his appearance on War Room, adding, “Anyone with a brain can see that she can’t objectively be fair to President Trump given her past donation to a leftist cause.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]
- Replying to Davis’ post, bigoted social media personality Mike Cernovich wrote, “Judges are overtly flaunting the law as a show of force. It’s Stalin era tactics.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- On GETTR, Bannon wrote: “Crazed Left Wing Judge and Radical Secretary of State for Colorado Attempt to Remove President Trump from Ballot in 2024.” GETTR, [10/30/23]

- Davis joined Jack Posobiec on his show Human Events Daily and called Wallace “clearly biased,” adding, “No one in their right mind thinks that this judge is going to be fair.” Posobiec described Wallace as a “left-wing judge” and called the case “a bench trial,” referring to a type of trial with no jury. Real America’s Voice, *Human Events Daily*, [10/30/23]

- On X, previously known as Twitter, pro-Trump troll and conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer called Judge Wallace “another political hack” and “a MAJOR Trump-hater.”Loomer also went after Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, calling her “a communist who was funded by George Soros.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- Loomer also took aim at Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) for not attacking Wallace, claiming she’s been “silent” about the case.She asked, “How come you don’t have any condemnation for Judge Sarah Wallace and the efforts to take Trump off the ballot in Colorado, which you supposedly ‘represent’ when you aren’t getting drunk on dates with Democrats?” In a separate post, Loomer said that if “Boebert is too dumb to see how this lawsuit will ultimately impact her race, then she doesn’t deserve to be in Congress.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23, 10/30/23]

- In another post, Loomer described Wallace as “the radical Leftist judge overseeing the anti—Trump trial in Colorado.” She then claimed the case is “direct ELECTION INTERFERENCE” and “pure lawfare, orchestrated by partisan Democrats and their left-wing financiers to cheat the American electoral system and deprive the American voters of their rightful choice for a President.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- The right-wing publication National Pulse ran a headline on an article about the lawsuit reading, “NOW: Soros’s ‘Kick Trump Off Ballot’ Case Begins, With Far-Left, Democrat Donor Judge.” The National Pulse, [10/30/23]

- Breitbart wrote: “Democrat-Appointed Colorado Judge Greenlights Effort to Kick Trump Off 2024 Ballot.”Breitbart, [10/23/23]

- Sean Spicer, former press secretary and communications director for Trump and current host of The Sean Spicer Show, wrote on X, “Talk about election interference.... Colorado judge paves way for trial on whether 14th Amendment disqualifies Trump from office.” Twitter/X, [10/26/23]

- Right-wing commentator Rogan O’Handley, or DC_Draino, complained on X that “Democrat” Wallace refused to recuse herself.He added, “FAKE SHOW TRIAL!” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- On X, Catturd wrote, “The reason Democrats are trying to get Trump off the ballot in Colorado is because cheating is the only way they can win elections. It’s really that simple.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]
## MAGA media figures and trolls have renewed attacks against D.C. Judge Chutkan
- Users on 4chan have unleashed a barrage of racist images and antisemitic rhetoric against Judge Chutkan. 4chan, [10/31/23, 10/31/23, 10/30/23]

- In a post on X, pro-Trump troll and conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer called Chutkan “the Obama appointed affirmative action poster child.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- Fox News host Mark Levin posted on X calling Judge Chutkan “a disgrace.”He went on to argue, “The DC courts need to be broken up, its jurisdiction for high profile cases withdrawn, and the judicial seats and subject-matter jurisdictions should be moved to other parts of the country.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- On Fox News, host Laura Ingraham said, “The Democrats are getting a lot of help from federal Judge Tanya Chutkan.” Fox News, *The Ingraham Angle*, [10/30/23]
- Right-wing judicial activist Mike Davis called Chutkan an “obnoxiously partisan DC Obama judge” on X.Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- Conservative commentator Julie Kelly also posted on X that “Chutkan shouldn’t be within 100 miles of this case given her inflammatory, biased, and inaccurate statements in court about Trump and Jan 6. But here we are.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

- Jim Hoft of the Gateway Pundit wrote in a headline, “Obama-Appointed Judge Chutkan Reinstates Gag Order on President Trump.” In the piece, Hoft describes her as the “Jamaican-born Obama- appointed Judge Tanya Chutkan.” The Gateway Pundit, [10/29/23]

- On X, Tom Fitton of the conservative legal organization Judicial Watch reposted an earlier tweet of his in light of the reinstatement, saying, “Judge Chutkan has now effectively taken over Trump's presidential campaign.” Twitter/X, [10/17/23]
- In another post, Fitton called the developments in the case “election interference by the Biden regime and anti-Trump judge.....” Twitter/X, [10/29/23]

- Responding to a piece from Conservative Brief on the gag order, far-right political commentator Sebastian Gorka wrote, “This is no longer Republican vs Democrat. It's The People vs The Establishment. Good vs Evil.” Twitter/X, [10/30/23]

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luna only intro 6 bills total 5 ~ schiff?!

an 6 23

House GOP resolution seeking to censure Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) for supposedly making false statements about former President Donald Trump's association with Russia in 2016 ended in defeat this week as 20 Republican representatives voted with Democrats to sink the measure.

One of the resolution's key proponents, freshman Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL), vowed to try again on Twitter. "20 Republicans voted against the recommended fine, censure, and investigation of Schiff," she wrote. "I don’t think they read the bill in entirety. Next week, we will be filing a motion to censure and investigate Schiff. We are removing fine as that seems to be what made these Republicans uneasy."

Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), however, quickly smacked her down — and pointed out there's no evidence Schiff lied about the Russia affair in the first place.

"A few suggestions for you," tweeted Goldman, an attorney who formerly worked on Trump's second impeachment. "1) Read the Mueller and OIG reports, both of which explain that the Steele dossier was irrelevant to opening the Russia investigation or the convictions of Trump campaign members. 2) do some research about what 'evidence' means. 3) Stop lying."

This is not the first move Republicans have made to single out Schiff, the former chair of the House Intelligence Committee, for punishment since taking a narrow majority last year. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) removed him from the committee after taking the gavel, ostensibly for lying about whether he knew the identity of the whistleblower who triggered Trump's first impeachment — although there's no actual evidence Schiff lied about that.

The 20 House Republicans who voted against censuring and fining Schiff came from all sides of the caucus, from vulnerable swing-district incumbents like Rep. Juan Ciscomani (R-AZ), to far-right Freedom Caucus figures like Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who said, "The Constitution says the House may make its own rules but we can’t violate other (later) provisions of the Constitution. A $16 million fine is a violation of the 27th and 8th amendments."

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

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shame! 2nd time went thru 20 gop defect on 14m$ if ethics comm found guilty?

crime was pt out trump russ collusion?

https://www.alternet.org/you-but-indict-yourselves-censure/

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https://www.rawstory.com/jim-jordan-2661556363/

no lnx raw 6 23

Jim Jordan leads GOP push to cripple 'fight against disinformation': report

Matthew Chapman

June 19, 2023,

Republican lawmakers are joining forces with far-right activists to attack universities and even private businesses that are investigating the spread of disinformation online — claiming that this amounts to an effort to silence conservatives on the internet, according to a report.

The New York Times posted a details of the actions they are taking on Monday.

"The effort has encumbered its targets with expansive requests for information and, in some cases, subpoenas — demanding notes, emails and other information related to social media companies and the government dating back to 2015. Complying has consumed time and resources and already affected the groups’ ability to do research and raise money, according to several people involved," reported Steven Lee Myers and Sheera Frenkel.

"They and others warned that the campaign undermined the fight against disinformation in American society when the problem is, by most accounts, on the rise — and when another presidential election is around the corner. Many of those behind the Republican effort had also joined former President Donald J. Trump in falsely challenging the outcome of the 2020 presidential election."

The House Judiciary Committee, under Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), has been leading the charge. Meanwhile, a group founded by far-right former Trump adviser Stephen Miller has filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court going after the same entities.

"Targets include Stanford, Clemson and New York Universities and the University of Washington; the Atlantic Council, the German Marshall Fund and the National Conference on Citizenship, all nonpartisan, nongovernmental organizations in Washington; the Wikimedia Foundation in San Francisco; and Graphika, a company that researches disinformation online," said the report.

"In a related line of inquiry, the committee has also issued a subpoena to the World Federation of Advertisers, a trade association, and the Global Alliance for Responsible Media it created. The committee’s Republican leaders have accused the groups of violating antitrust laws by conspiring to cut off advertising revenue for content researchers and tech companies found to be harmful."

The new push is part of a broader, years-long conspiracy theory among right-wing activists that the government and "big tech" companies are colluding to silence conservative speech on the internet. There is no evidence of any such conspiracy; in fact, research shows conservative content actually spreads more easily on Facebook and Twitter.

:{:{}:

LNX

There is no evidence of any such conspiracy; in fact, research shows conservative content actually spreads more easily on Facebook and Twitter.

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mma 4 23

CARLSON (HOST): Tuesday, two days ago, Twitter slapped a warning label on all tweets from National Public Radio. Going forward, NPR will be identified for users of Elon Musk's social media site as "state-affiliated media." That is the same category as Russia Today or China's Central Television. It means that NPR is not that different from the Tehran Times, with the exception of course, being less accurate and more anti-American.

So, that happened on a Tuesday. Why are we telling you about it? With all the momentous changes underway around the world, why would we open the show with a story about Twitter recategorizing NPR as state media?Well, because it's true. That's the reason. Finally, thankfully, somebody in authority has told the truth about something and that is thrilling to see on its own terms.

In a world defined by lies from our leaders, this seemed like a rare sign of hope and progress.Telling the truth is the most revolutionary act of all -- far more than taking up arms. And yet, you rarely see it. Human beings created language in order to describe the world around them more precisely than they could with say, grunting or sign language. But unfortunately we've been subverting our own creation ever since. But not tonight.

By calling National Public Radio what it is, Elon Musk has used English as it was intended to be used in order to tell the truth. Of course NPR is state media. Have you listened to it? It has all the hallmarks -- repetitive dishonesty, authoritarian politics, unwavering devotion to the party in charge. Of course, that could describe virtually all media in this country. The difference is thestate actually pays for NPR.

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rww post clubQ

rww 11 22

a local chapter of the far-right Proud Boys plans to disrupt a Dec. 3 drag story event in Columbus, Ohio, just two weeks after the killings at a LGBTQ night clubin Colorado Springs.

The Columbus Proud Boys announced their plans to disrupt the kids story time event held at the First Unitarian Universalist Churchof Columbus on Telegram last Tuesday. Advance Democracy, Inc., a non-partisan, non-profit research organization, first flagged the post. The post read:

The Columbus Proud Boys would like to announce that we will be attending the Holi-drag Storytime being held at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus on December 3rd! We look forward to meeting all of the attendees and welcome Americans from all over to join us. It’s gonna be wild! Stand by for details…

The emphasis of a “wild” protest is likely a reference to Jan. 6. Former President Donald Trump had called on his supporters to attend a rally on Jan. 6, 2021, promising that it would “be wild!” Many of attendees of that rally, including members of the Proud Boys, later marched on the U.S. Capitol, attacking police officers and storming the building.

While the Proud Boys is probably best known for its role in the attack on the U.S. Capitol—for which several members face seditious conspiracy charges—the far-right, neo-fascist group is also known for its members’ presence at the 2017 white supremacist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where one counterprotester was murdered. Since the failed insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, Proud Boys members have focused their efforts locally, disrupting school board meetings over mask mandates and LGBTQ-inclusive policies, and harassing attendees of drag story events, fearmongering that trans people are “grooming” children.

[post]

already this year, the Proud Boys have disrupted drag events in Texas, Nevada, North Carolina, and California. In Idaho, the right-wing extremist group Patriot Front took it a step further; 31 people associated with the organization were arrested after they were found in a trailer full of weapons next to a Pride event.

The post by the Columbus Proud Boys announcing its plans to disrupt the Columbus event has been viewed more than 1,600 times. Just 45 minutes after posting, the post was further promoted by the Official Cape Fear Proud Boys, a North Carolina-based chapter that coordinated multiple efforts to disrupt drag events in the past six months. It was also shared by an Ohio Proud Boys channel and “the Infamous Legend Valley Proud Boys” channel, which shared an image the following day promising “Ohio Proud Boys Season Beatings.” On Monday, the Legend Valley Proud Boys shared a meme calling for violence against perceived perpetrators of pedophilia.

A meme posted on the Legend Valley Proud Boys channel. The image depicts a character in the “Walking Dead” who randomly choses a victim and kills him with a baseball bat wrapped in barbed-wire.

The Dec. 3 event is sponsored by Red Oak Community Schools, a school dedicated to fostering “students’ sense of their place and power in the natural world and in their communities.” A Facebook page promoting the event describes “Holi-drag Storytime” as “a new family-friendly, LGBTQ+ holiday tradition” in which local drag queens “will read stories for children of ALL ages and perform a few holiday numbers!”

Of course, the Proud Boys have alleged that the event amounts to “grooming”—the rhetoric at the heart of recent political attacks on LGBTQ people. A video posted the Columbus Proud Boys channel last Thursday called on members to “stand against grooming” and provided the address of the church. “All I want for Christmas is an end to child grooming. Help Saint Nicolas scold the Naughty groomers,” text in the video reads, calling on members to arrive before 10 a.m. Another image shows a picture of Santa Claus giving the middle fingers. “Its rally time boys!” a final message reads.

Right Wing Watch reached out to Red Oak Community Schools and the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus. We will update this story should either respond. The church’s website describes it as a place to “come together to grow in religious depth, valuing freedom, reason, tolerance, love.” Shortly after the Proud Boys’ announcement, Red Oak Community Schools said they meet hate with love and invited donations, posting on Facebook, “For every nasty comment, dislike, negative email, phone call, etc. we receive about our upcoming FABULOUS fundraiser, we’re collecting donation pledges for a local LGBTQ+ organization.”

The Proud Boys’ announced plan to disrupt the event came just days before a lone gunman targeted patrons of a gay night club in Colorado, killing five people and injuring 25 others. LGBTQ leaders have noted that this attack follows years of anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and an increasing number of Republican politicians characterizing trans people as “groomers.” Religious-right groups have drafted anti-trans legislation, encouraged lawmakers to sponsor such legislation, and laid the groundwork for their passage through disinformation and pressure campaigns, a Right Wing Watch investigation found last year.

On the Sunday morning following the attack on Club Q, Democratic Colorado state Rep. Brianna Titone said such rhetoric was to blame. “When politicians and pundits keep perpetuating tropes, insults, and misinformation about the trans and LGBTQ+ community, this is a result,” she wrote.

Tags: Anti-LGBTQ Columbus Proud Boys Proud Boys

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YIKES

rww 10 22

vid

Far-right activist and so-called “Stop the Steal” founder Ali Alexander went on a manic rant during his podcast Monday in which openly advocated for Christian fascism and “a violent Christian crusade” against his perceived political opponents.

Buoyed by reports that Elon Musk will purchase Twitter and that Kanye West was photographed wearing a “White Lives Matter” shirt, Alexander expressed his conviction that his far-right worldview is gaining power and popularity, prompting him to lay out his vision for afascist Christian nationalist theocracy.

“I refuse to walk into a future where it is commonplace to have sexual perversion in public,” Alexander. “It’s just not going to be the norm, not where we’re going. OK? You can call that whatever the hell you want. You can call that Americana, you can call that America First, you could call it fascism, you could call it a theocracy, you could call it Christian nationalism. You could call it age appropriate. How about that’s what we call it?I don’t give a crap what you call it.”

“We will not live in a future where violence doesn’t meet widespread perversion. Period,” he continued. “I am aligned with God that we will not march quietly into a future where you got all kinds of things hanging out at public eateries, restaurants, libraries, with or without children. It’s just not acceptable. That’s over. And I will train tens of millions of Americans to not denounce, to not flinch, when they see evil coming upon evil, destruction coming upon evil.”

“All the good faith that we have allowed our oppressorsto be assigned, it’s gone,” Alexander said. “I’m not gonna bomb an abortion clinic, but if somebody did, I’m not denouncing it. I’m not calling for violence. I’m not calling for death. I’m explicitly saying, ‘Don’t do that,’ but if it happens, c’est la [vie]. OK? C’est la [vie]. You know, if they can poll a bunch of moderate Muslims and they don’t feel the urge to denounce radical Islam, guess what? This guy—Ali Alexander and Ali Alexander alone—but guess what? I’m going to be joined by tens of millions, maybe a couple hundred million Americans; we’re done. I’m going to finally teach people what is the moral allowable line that we can walk up to? What does the Bible allow us to get away with? ‘Oh, no. Ali’s going to show them the loopholes.’ You’re damn right I am.”

“I’m not gonna get beatified for this,” Alexander asserted. “I’m not going to reach sainthood, but I am here to say, ‘Fuck them.’ Fuck their nuclear war. Fuck their World War III. Fuck their rejection of peace. And if they don’t deal with the middle—the Elons and the Kanyes—then they should meet—I’m talking about the whole world—they should meet a violent Christian crusade. I mean it,100 percent. … And we’ve got to start conditioning each other for these mental models.”

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recall fox raison d'etre is ATTACK DEMS

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rubber glue: WE GOP didn't steal the election (by gerry and voter suppression of POC] DEMS stole by chicago style dead ppl vote; WE did not have insurrection, the REAL one was election.

aha: bannon is just latest extension of rove's dismissal of reality-based journalism?

alt rt trolls win by owning the libs, often by making outrageous claim they know to be false to provoke an emotional reaction in weak woman-y snowflakes.

recall early graphic of blogs red/blue but red more insular/echo

flood the zone bannon/ troll it is a deliberate strategy to overwhelm correction [by lamestream media, fake news?!] and thus moderation; you cannot trust news nor gubmint thus civil society erodes and --> authoritartian/fascism strong MAN/strict FATHER to fix, maga

:{:{}:

soc media co attempt to tamp down BS evaded by misspell or vol/forced migration to gab etc that prides self on lack of moderation [censorship]

flood the zone with shit/disinfo might originally been troll tactic to deflect accurate critiques/blame and rubber glue inverse crypto bizarro mirror world --> Earth2; but always hype fear about THEM enemy threat to all that's good, grift for $ to fight the evil

amplify/accelerate --> radicalization; enemy // target // tyrant gubmint is tyrant, they deprive us of vote/legit means so all is left is righteous violence--> when do we get to use the guns?

aha echo is the opposite of correction,[WELL THERE'S A SORT OF CORRECTION BUT IN THE WRONG DIRECTION BY A SMALLER AND SMALLER SUBSET OF WACKOS THAT IS IRONICALLY GETTING LARGER AND LARGER AND FINDING/MAKING EACH OTHER [[CRAZIER]]; and algo gives incremental DOSE of crazy that builds on previous slightly less crazy:--> earth2 delusional break from reality is phase shift/level up/ tip pt? doom spiral?

12 21 an salon https://www.alternet.org/2021/12/tucker-carlson/

the TV was talking to me. I was in the midst of a delusion that the news anchors on CNN were operatives of a shadow government run by the Clintons. Every time I crossed the living room of my father's dingy basement apartment, their heads followed me and the news anchors interrogated me about my role in the Russia investigation. I believed "Russia investigation" was really code for a global conspiracy to enslave humanity through mind control. President Donald Trump and the Republicans were secretly working to overturn this shadow government and end the deep state programs. Targets of torture like me would be set free.

I turned the channel to FOX News. They repeated over and over that Hilary Clinton was a criminal. Even though I was a Democrat and had voted for Bill Clinton twice, I mailed in the form to join the Republican Party. Then I faxed evidence to the Russian consulate and sent a letter to the CIA offering to cooperate in the investigation.

What I didn't know I was that I was in the advanced stages of untreated paranoid schizophrenia. I was experiencing a psychotic break from reality.

It all seemed so real.

When I was eventually treated, my psychiatrist explained to me, "With paranoid schizophrenia it's just like "The Bourne Identity" — there are people for you, people against you, and somebody always has to be the villain."

I know what you're thinking — thank God they have medication for these people.Now, I wonder, is the average American so different from me? Are we all susceptible to paranoid thoughts, conspiratorial thinking and bias when executive function in the frontal lobes and our ability to reason are disabled by fear?

Terrified by a global pandemic, there are people who believe Bill Gates is an evil mastermind who engineered the coronavirus, with plans to depopulate and microchip the world's population, while profiting in the process. Antivaxxers refuse to take a vaccine they think will alter the structure of human DNA. Our brains seek to impose order. Conspiracy theories can provide answers to people who feel overwhelmed. But ideally the frontal lobes should step in to challenge strange thoughts by asking the question: Is what I am perceiving based in reality?

Dr. Oliver Freudenreich, Co-Director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Psychosis Program, states that there is no generally agreed-upon definition on what constitutes a delusion. From a psychiatric or biological perspective, delusions are driven by excessive amounts of the neurotransmitter dopamine. There is a biological basis to them, and treatment can correct this abnormality. A person with such delusions (e.g., somebody with schizophrenia) is expected to respond to being treated with an antipsychotic medication which blocks dopamine. In other words, one can take a pill and think rationally.

However, many people can't do that if their delusional thinking is part of a worldview that is more an ideology. According to Dr. Freudenreich, when people create their own insular groups — where delusional ideas are never corrected, but simply bounce around in an echo chamber — it is much harder to fight those types of delusions.

Policy divides are now often framed as a battle between good and evil.The most obvious consequence of overheated partisan rhetoric is that someone with an untreated psychiatric illness can go on to commit an act of violence against a person or group that they believe is a perpetrator of their suffering. This is rare. More common is the normal person who goes down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole and finds a world that makes sense to them.

On January 6th, 2021, incited by President Trump and believing the election had been stolen, a mob attacked the Capital building. Some in the crowd showed up for the "Storm," which is a QAnon conspiracy theory that posits that Trump was planning mass arrests of a secret cabal of satanic pedophiles and coup plotters, headed by Hilary Clinton and George Soros. Capitol police described the scene as being like fighting a medieval battle.

Social dynamics can propagate conspiracy-based thinking that mimics biologically triggered delusions. But there is no medication that will stop mass violence fueled by conspiracies.

I was a forty-six-year-old filmmaker when I suddenly began to have paranoid thoughts that people were following me. When I lost my day job due to bizarre behavior, I lost my excellent health insurance. I was dumped into America's broken mental health care system that offers substandard psychiatric care to patients on Medicaid, while spending vast amounts of taxpayer money. Misdiagnosed and neglected at the county hospital, I got sicker and sicker … until the TV started talking to me.

Years of my life are now gone. I try not to be bitter that I ended up unemployed, bankrupt and almost homeless, when all I needed was proper medical care. Every day I am grateful that I didn't wind up living on the streets or locked up in prison, like so many people with schizophrenia.

It's easy to mock people who think Bill Gates wants to put a microchip in them with the coronavirus vaccine. But it's much harder to separate conspiracy theorists' larger existential fears from our own. We're approaching the second year of a global pandemic, which is causing mass anxiety and depression. The internet routinely displays images of future roads in major cities as gushing rivers due to climate change. Billions of fish were boiled in the American Northwest and Canada during an unprecedented heatwave this summer. If someone's mind starts spinning with their wildest fears and finds solace in a conspiracy theory, can you really blame them?

Television is a powerful medium. CNN and FOX News repeat the same headlines, the same phrases, over and over in the same news day. Back then, these read to my unhinged mind as coded speech; to the unsuspecting public, it is more akin to propaganda. When I was psychotic, I thought a shadow government had a ministry of propaganda and they colluded across networks. I worry about living in a country where the two major political parties are always at war, unable to get anything done, and the public is fed a delusional world by networks and social media companies competing for viewers.

People with paranoid schizophrenia see patterns that don't actually exist. Just like conspiracy theorists, they are constantly scanning the news for pieces of information to connect the dots about unseen forces controlling events. Both groups believe they are being persecuted by others. I had grandiose beliefs that I was at the center of every news story on TV. My mind was looking to cast a villain to account for the symptoms of a brain disease. The media handed me a culprit to blame. [q or trump sent me]

Dr. Anthony Fauci has complained about the extraordinary divisiveness surrounding the public health crisis created by the pandemic. The current battle is over masks and vaccines. FOX News paints the Democratic Party as a threat to democracy that has invented domestic enemies, such as the unvaccinated, to desperately cling to power. News anchors across CNN repeat the phrase "viral blizzard" to warn the public and scare the unvaccinated about the new variant. Fear mongering is psychologically destabilizing to the most normal person. But this media environment can be toxic to someone with an untreated psychiatric illness. I wish politicians and their media allies would stop contributing to the collective unraveling of the American mind.

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gov whitmer mich now blm WOMEN

https://www.alternet.org/2020/11/marines/

Three Marine Corps veterans and their porn-star neo-Nazi guru, arrested last month on charges that they engaged in an interstate gun-running scheme, comprised a band of violent fascists who had recently moved to Idaho with the intent of making it a base of operations for their plans to engage in acts of domestic terrorism, federal prosecutors revealed this week.

According to the grand-jury indictment filed this week by prosecutors in North Carolina, the men's schemes went well beyond those with which they have been charged—namely, buying semiautomatic rifles, altering them into automatics, then shipping them from Idaho to North Carolina. The foursome not only engaged in paramilitary training in the Idaho desert, they surveilled two separate Black Lives Matters marches in Boise this summer and discussed killing participants. They also plotted to assassinate BLM founder Alicia Garza.

Three of the four men—Justin Hermanson, 21, who used the code name "Sandman"; Liam Collins, 21, aka "Disciple"; and Jordan Duncan, 25, aka "Soldier"—had met while serving in the U.S. Marine Corps. The fourth—Paul Kryscuk, 35, whose nom de plume was "Deacon"—was a porn star (under the stage name "Pauly Harker") who had lived most of his life on Long Island, New York. He met the other men online in the now-defunct neo-Nazi message board Iron March, and was the group's general leader, though all they identified as members of the terrorist organization Atomwaffen Division....

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db antifa also target portland

Several recent violent plots associated with the anti-government Boogaloo movement have also allegedly been carried out by veterans or active service members. In May, two veterans and a current Army Reserve soldier were arrested in an alleged plot to throw explosives at a Black Lives Matter rally. That same month, a current Air Force staff sergeant was arrested for allegedly killing a federal security officer and attempting to kill another, in an apparent plot to kick off a new civil war that Boogaloo adherents believe is imminent.

https://www.alternet.org/2020/04/trump-spent-easter-weekend-calling-friends-about-dr-fauci-as-white-house-allies-begin-smear-campaign-report

no lnx

Trump spent Easter weekend calling friends about Dr. Fauci as White House allies begin smear campaign: report

Written by Tom Boggioni / Raw Story April 13, 2020

The Daily Beast is reporting that Donald Trump hunkered down in the White House over the Easter weekend, watching cable news programs and calling friends and allies asking what they think of Dr. Anthony Fauci who has become, for many, the only reliable face on the White House coronavirus task force.

According to the report, the president thinks he made the infectious disease expert a “star” by featuring him prominently during his almost daily press conferences and is reportedly looking for feedback.

“’What do you think of Fauci?’ the president repeatedly worked into his phone conversations over the past few days, the three sources said, as he pulsed his broader network of informal advisers, industry allies, and current staff on their opinions on the news of the day,” the Beast’s Asawein Suebsaeng reports. “At one point this weekend, Trump remarked that he’s made Fauci a ‘star’ and that barely anybody would have known who the doctor was were it not for the president putting him front and center in the administration’s coronavirus response, televised press briefings, and media strategy.”

According to one source, the president, “.. did not sound bitter about it, I wouldn’t say that. It just sounded like he thought it was worth a reminder.”

What may have set off the president was an appearance by the Fauci on CNN’s “State of the Union,” where, in a roundabout way,the doctor admitted that the White House dropped the ball on getting ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic that has already led to over 22,000 deaths in the U.S.

“Fauci’s comments did not go over well with certain officials working in the White House or on the president’s campaign, according to multiple aides, or with Trump supporters who are publicly protective of the president and his image,” the report states. “‘ Dr. Fauci needs to be more careful choosing his words on #Coronavirus, & if he’s going to be critical, make clear what he personally could’ve done better,’ Jason Miller, a former senior Trump adviser, posted to Twitter on Sunday.”

According to the report, Miller was not the only critic of the doctor who is close to Trump and the White House, with Suebsaeng writing, “By Sunday afternoon, prominent Trump allies and surrogates were circulating links and documents showing how Fauci had been inconsistent or made faulty predictions about the virus in recent months, encouraging each other to share them or use them as talking points.”

Of note, late Sunday the president retweeted a Twitter post that contained the hashtag: #Fire Fauci.

You can read more here.