Raffensperger escorted out of Ga. Capitol after it was surrounded by pro-Trump mob by Marquise Francis National Reporter & Producer Thu, January 7, 2021, 3:17 PM PST
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ATLANTA — On Wednesday, while much of the country’s attention was focused on the riots unfolding in Washington, D.C., another standoff was taking place in Georgia.
Militiamen and other far-right Trump supporters in Atlanta surrounded the state’s Capitol building in search of Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
As the group tried to enter the building to hand deliver a list of grievances about the November election, and Raffensperger’s refusal to overturn the results, Georgia Capitol police, fearing for the safety of the secretary of state and his staff, escorted them out of the building, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“We heard reports of threats and left immediately,” spokeswoman Deputy Secretary of State Jordan Fuchs said.
Brad Raffensperger, Georgia's secretary of state. (Dustin Chambers/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Raffensperger is Georgia’s top elections official, who last Saturday was pressured by Trump on a phone call that was recorded and published by the Washington Post. On the call, Trump is heard asking Raffensperger to “find” him enough votes to overturn the results of the general election in the state.
The standoff at Georgia’s Capitol building followed a small “Stop the Steal” protest nearby where roughly two dozen people, some carrying assault-style weapons, had gathered to challenge the legitimacy of the November election. One of the men in attendance was Chester Doles, a longtime white supremacist and member of the Ku Klux Klan, who made headlines last month after posing with a picture with GOP Sen. Kelly Loeffler. Some cars passing the protest honked in support, while others looked on in dismay.
The incident came the same day history was made in the state as Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff were declared the winners of their Senate runoff races against incumbents Sen. Kelly Loeffler and Sen. David Perdue. Those wins will give Democrats control of the U.S. Senate for the first time since 2015. Warnock became the first Black senator from Georgia and Ossoff became the first Jewish senator to represent the state.
The Georgia state Capitol building in Atlanta. (Wang Xiaoheng/Xinhua via Getty)
But the significance of those victories were overshadowed by what took place in D.C.
“Today’s insurrectionist attack on the U.S. Capitol was incited by Trump’s poisonous lies & flagrant assault on our Constitution,” Ossoff tweeted Wednesday. “The GOP must discard and disavow Trump once and for all, end its attacks on the electoral process, & commit fully to the peaceful transfer of power.”
“In this moment of unrest, violence and anger, we must remember the words of Dr. King, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that,” Warnock tweeted. “Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” Let each of us try to be a light to see our country out of this dark moment.”
Atlanta’s demonstration was puny in comparison to the massive “Stop the Steal” rally where 25,000 to 35,000 diehard Trump supporters gathered before hundreds of them stormed the Capitol and occupied it before the National Guard was called to restore order. Four people died as a result of that rally, according to Washington, D.C., police.
Supporters of President Trump at a "Stop the Steal" rally in Georgia. (Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire)
In an interview with Yahoo News on Thursday, Warnock maintained that Wednesday’s riot in D.C. shows that words matter.
“What we saw yesterday is that words have power,” Warnock said. “Unfortunately, the occupant of the White House has been ginning up this bigotry, frustrations and resentments [for] some time. The problem is it’s been aided and abetted by other politicians, including my opponent during this Senate race. So this is what you get.”
Loeffler condemns White supremacist after taking photo with him by Alex Rogers CNN Updated 2:17 PM ET, Mon December 14, 2020
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[x] Loeffler dodges questions on Trump's election fraud claims 01:59
(CNN) Georgia GOP Sen. Kelly Loeffler's campaign disavowed a photo spreading on social media of her smiling next to a White supremacist at a campaign event on Friday, as her Democratic opponent and others criticized her for it ahead of the January 5 runoff elections for control of the Senate.
The photo shows Loeffler posing next to Chester Doles, a former Ku Klux Klan leader and member of the neo-Nazi National Alliance who was sentenced to prison in the 1990s for assaulting a Black man in Maryland. Doles marched in the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, with the Hammerskins, a racist skinhead gang.
The Loeffler campaign condemned the White supremacist on Sunday in a statement to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The Loeffler campaign did not respond to CNN's requests for additional comment. Video from Friday's rally shows Doles attended.
"Kelly had no idea who that was, and if she had she would have kicked him out immediately because we condemn in the most vociferous terms everything that he stands for," Loeffler's spokesman Stephen Lawson told the newspaper.
There is no evidence she recognized Doles or sought his support. In September, Georgia House Republican candidate Marjorie Taylor Greene removed Doles from a rally that also featured the Republican senator. A Loeffler spokesman then told the AJC that she was not aware of Doles or the controversy over his attendance. Doles, who took the photo, posted it this weekend to VK, a Russian social networking site, and it quickly drew criticism from Democrats.
GOP Sen. Kelly Loeffler is pictured next to Chester Doles, a White supremacist and member of the neo-Nazi National Alliance, during a campaign event in Georgia on Friday. Doles posted the photo to VK, a Russian social networking site.
Loeffler and Republican Sen. David Perdue are respectively running against Democrats Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff to protect their party's control of the Senate. If both Warnock and Ossoff win, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will break tie votes in the chamber.
The contests have turned increasingly nasty, with Republicans trying to portray the Democratic candidates as socialists who will ruin the country, while the Democrats have attacked the senators over their multi-million-dollar stock trades earlier this year, charging that they've profited off the pandemic. The candidates have said their opponents are spreading falsehoods.
Warnock spokesman Michael Brewer seized on the photo, saying there was "no acceptable explanation" for Loeffler's photo with Doles. If elected, Warnock would be the first Black person elected to the Senate in Georgia.
"While Kelly Loeffler runs a campaign based on dividing and misleading Georgians, she is once again trying to distance herself from someone who is a known White supremacist and former KKK leader who nearly beat a Black man to death," Brewer said.
CNN's Ryan Nobles, Caroline Kenny, Kyung Lah and Donie O'Sullivan contributed to this report.
Trump Media Empire? Don’t Bet on It.: He may desperately need his own platform now that he’s been exiled from Twitter, but it’s going to cost him more than he’s got. by Jack Shafer Politico Senior Media Writer 01/09/2021 07:18 PM EST
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Alex Brandon/AP Photo
Eighty-sixed permanently from his personal account by Twitter for propelling his mob to attack and occupy the Capitol, President Donald Trump transferred his carping to the official @POTUS account early Friday evening.
His four tweets there, since deleted by Twitter, complained of being gagged by the “Democrats and Radical Left” and pledged he would explore “building out our own platform in the near future.” This vague promise reprised an idea first floated by the Trump camp in the late going of campaign 2016—when he seemed a sure loser—that he might start his own TV network. It makes sense that Trump would want to build his own impregnable forum where nobody can police his speech. He maintains his base by communicating with it at all hours of the day and night. He desperately wants to maintain that continuity to preserve the momentum he has achieved over the past four years. He rightly worries that his pack will ditch him for someone more compelling or entertaining, ergo, he needs to lay plans now or face oblivion.
But then as now, the business challenges to launching a TV channel or other high-profile media property seem beyond the talents, resources and patience of Trump and his crew. This isn’t to predict that Trump won’t enter the media business, only to record that if he does, he won’t get very far.
Let’s say he decides to start a cable channel to vie with CNN, MSNBC and especially with Fox News Channel. Assuming that he can raise the hundreds of millions of dollars to stand up a competitive network—Trump has always preferred using other people’s money in his ventures—what sort of luck might he have in getting AT&T, Comcast, Verizon and other major cable companies to carry his new channel? He has no friends at AT&T, whose merger with Time Warner he fought as president, and which now owns CNN. Comcast doesn’t desire a new entry in the news market to go against its MSNBC property. As The New York Times noted in 2016, not even Oprah Winfrey, the queen of all media, succeeded in turning her personal franchise into a cable powerhouse. Can Trump do something the far-wealthier and much more appealing Winfrey couldn’t?
But let’s say Trump does the unlikely. If you think Fox has been distancing itself from the toddler-in-chief since the Biden victory, you can be assured that it will savage him when he poses a threat to its viewership and revenues. The same goes for the Trump-lovers at NewsMax and OAN. Trump’s better bet would be to buy NewsMax, something Trump allies flirted with in November, or even OAN. But again, doing so would draw the ire of Fox, where the majority of his followers currently park their TV sets. Trump might as well shop for a public access slot.
Rather than starting his own thing, the fastest, grandest way for Trump to get into the media game would be to shop himself to Fox or the Sinclair stations as the host of a nightly show, which given the 74 million votes he garnered in November and his TV talents, could make a splash. But what’s in it for Fox? Its current prime-time roster rakes in excellent ratings, and none of the current hosts pose the personnel problems Trump would immediately present. The Fox dog does not want to be wagged by the tail. What’s more, the Murdoch empire, which owns Fox, seems to have soured on Trump. This week, the Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal editorial page, a consistent pro-Trump venue, urged Trump to resign the morning after the battle for the Capitol. Fleeing to a host job at Sinclair, again, would make him a slow-moving target of his natural allies at Fox, NewsMax and OAN. Does he really want that? He has too many media enemies right now to manufacture new ones.
Trump could try to reconstitute his Twitter brand on a new service of his own creation, but that too would be like pushing a boulder up a hill. Better to go to Parler, the home of many Twitter-rejectees, he might surmise. Yet that’s not going to create media magic for the soon-to-be ex-president, either. Google just banned Parler from its app store, and Apple is threatening to do the same because Parler doesn’t do content moderation or tamp down firebrands like Trump. So even if Trump moves to Parler and Parler smooths relations with the two app stores, Trump will face censorship from Google and Apple that will make his time at Twitter look like a free ride. Trump will never join Parler if it only lets him pour vanilla on his faithful. He wants to dump hot sauce.
What options does that leave Trump? Start an over-the-top streaming channel like Glenn Beck’s the Blaze? Beck, who was a Fox star before creating the Blaze, never succeeded in the linear TV business after eight years of trying, and now exists as a more modest service that produces VOD shows, radio shows, podcasts and a website.
Energizing his minions to rout the Capitol didn’t completely drain Trump of his political and media powers. But the wounds he suffered are deep and hemorrhaging still. The days where he could swagger, defame and incite without suffering crippling repercussions appear to have ended. To pour the foundations for a new media operation he would need lots of capital, something he appears not to possess. He would need a media mastermind like Roger Ailes to guide it—but Ailes is dead.
What successful media wizard can you think of who is dying to throw in with a discredited ex-president? And most of all, to sustain a bruising media battle against the current market incumbents, he would require advertiser support. Beyond the My Pillow guy, the purveyors of herbal remedies and reverse mortgage operators, how many American brands want to associate their products and services with an unindicted (for now) accessory to sedition?
House Democrats Set to Impeach Trump If Mike Pence Refuses to Invoke 25th Amendment by Amy Goodman DemocracyNow.org JAN 11, 2021
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Momentum is building to remove President Trump from office following the violent attempted coup last Wednesday that saw an angry mob of Trump-backed insurrectionists storm the Capitol, resulting in five deaths. House Democrats are introducing a resolution formally calling on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says if Pence does not move to do so, the House will proceed with impeachment — for the second time in Trump’s single term. Pence has reportedly not ruled out using the 25th Amendment. California Congressmember Ted Lieu said an article of impeachment with at least 210 co-sponsors in the House will be introduced today. The draft resolution cites “incitement of insurrection.”
Meanwhile, two Republican senators have joined calls for Trump to resign: Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski and Pennsylvania’s Pat Toomey, who spoke on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday.
Sen. Pat Toomey: “I think the best way for our country, Chuck, is for the president to resign and go away as soon as possible. … The president spiraled down into a kind of madness that was different.”
Republican Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley are also facing increasing pressure to resign over their obstruction of the certification of electoral votes. Over 5,000 lawyers and law students have signed a petition urging their disbarment.
As fear grows of an increasingly unhinged Trump, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told her caucus Friday she had spoken to General Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, about safeguards that are in place should Trump seek to initiate a nuclear attack.
Twitter Permanently Bans Trump’s Account as Big Tech Distances Itself from Trump, Far Right
Twitter permanently removed President Donald Trump from its platform Friday, citing repeated violations of Twitter’s terms of service and the risk he would further incite violence ahead of Joe Biden’s inauguration on January 20. The ban came a day after Trump posted this video message to his Twitter feed.
President Donald Trump: “To all of my wonderful supporters: I know you are disappointed, but I also want you to know that our incredible journey is only just beginning.”
Twitter’s move to permanently ban Trump came amid a wave of suspensions and bans from other social media sites, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Reddit, Snapchat and Shopify.
Meanwhile, Apple, Google and Amazon Web Services ended their support for the social media network Parler over the weekend, which bills itself as Twitter without rules. The companies say Parler’s managers have consistently failed to halt threats of violence and calls for armed insurrection on the site. Parler was co-founded by Republican donor and Trump supporter Rebekah Mercer, daughter of hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer.
And in another move from Big Tech, the payment processing company Stripe cut ties with the Trump campaign, which has continued to fundraise, saying it violated its policies against encouraging violence.
Authorities Make More Arrests Following Domestic Terror Attack at U.S. Capitol
More information is emerging about the domestic terrorists behind the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol. Over the weekend, authorities arrested Eric Munchel and Larry Brock, who were photographed in the Senate chambers wearing tactical gear and carrying plastic handcuffs. Munchel carried a pistol on his hip.
Others arrested include Cleveland Grover Meredith Jr., who threatened to shoot House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the head on live TV; Arkansas pro-gun activist Richard Barnett, who boasted of looting mail from Pelosi’s office; and West Virginia state lawmaker Derrick Evans, who live-streamed himself storming the Capitol. Rioter Robert Keith Packer of Virginia was arrested after he was filmed wearing a shirt emblazoned with the words “Camp Auschwitz” and “Work Makes You Free” — a reference to the Nazi death camp.
Also arrested was Doug Jensen, who was filmed chasing a Black police officer up the stairs of the Capitol, and Trump-supporting QAnon conspiracy theorist Jacob Anthony Chansley, also known as Jake Angeli, who posed for photos on the Senate dais carrying a spear and wearing a headdress made of coyote skin and buffalo horns.
Details have emerged about the death of Rosanne Boyland, a 34-year-old QAnon and Trump supporter from Georgia who was trampled by the mob as it stormed the Capitol. Boyland was photographed Wednesday carrying a Gadsden flag — a Revolutionary War-era emblem of a rattlesnake with the caption “Don’t Tread on Me.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center is demanding an investigation into the Republican Attorney Generals Association, which set up robocalls urging Trump supporters to join the January 6 insurrection in Washington, D.C. The group is headed by Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall.
Brian Sicknick, Capitol Police Officer Killed in Coup Attempt, Was Antiwar Trump Supporter
On Sunday, hundreds of police officers lined the streets of Washington, D.C., in a funeral procession for Brian Sicknick, the Capitol Police officer killed when marauding Trump domestic terrorists hit him in the head with a fire extinguisher. Sicknick was a military veteran who later became an opponent of the Iraq War and George W. Bush, and was an outspoken supporter of President Trump.
A second Capitol Police officer died over the weekend: 15-year veteran Howard Liebengood reportedly took his own life Saturday. On Sunday, President Trump ordered the flag above the White House to be flown at half-staff to honor the Capitol Police officers. He took the step three days after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lowered the flag over the U.S. Capitol.
Meanwhile, the Capitol’s attending physician is warning members of Congress they may have come in contact with someone infected with coronavirus as they spent hours sheltering in a protective isolation room as Trump supporters rampaged through the Capitol. Video shows several Republican lawmakers refusing to wear face masks inside the cramped space.
Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman Tests Positive For COVID After Republicans' The Last Word MSNBC Jan 12, 2021 Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ), who tested positive for Covid-19, tells Lawrence O'Donnell that she's "angry" about "the arrogance and the stupidity" of the Republicans who refused to wear masks while sheltering in a crowded room during the Capitol insurrection.
New Details Emerge of Trump’s Attempts to Overturn Georgia Election Results
The Washington Post is reporting Trump pressured Georgia’s top elections investigator to “find the fraud” in another phone call he made to Georgia officials in an attempt to overturn election results. Experts say the call could constitute obstruction of justice or other criminal violations.
In related news, The Wall Street Journal reported White House officials pushed Atlanta’s top federal prosecutor to step down ahead of Georgia’s Senate runoffs over concerns he wasn’t doing enough to investigate Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud. U.S. Attorney Byung J. Pak, who was appointed by Trump, resigned last Monday.
Fascism Scholar: Strongman Trump Radicalized His Supporters; Turning This Back Will Be Very Hard
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is threatening to begin new impeachment hearings against President Trump if Vice President Mike Pence doesn’t invoke the 25th Amendment of the Constitution to remove Trump from office for inciting his supporters to storm the Capitol. Calls are also growing for Republican Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to be expelled or to resign for supporting Trump’s effort to overturn the election and fanning the flames ahead of last week’s insurrection, and authorities are warning about more right-wing violence ahead of Inauguration Day on January 20. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a New York University historian whose work focuses on fascism, authoritarian leaders and propaganda, says the storming of the Capitol was “a logical result” of Trump’s legitimization and encouragement of right-wing extremism since 2016. “The threat to democracy is not outside our institutions only. It’s coming from inside,” Ben-Ghiat says.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is threatening to quickly impeach President Trump if Vice President Mike Pence does not support invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office. During an interview on 60 Minutes, Pelosi said Trump should be prosecuted for his role inciting last week’s violent insurrection at the Capitol that left five people dead, including a Capitol Hill police officer.
SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI: Well, sadly, the person who’s running the executive branch is a deranged, unhinged, dangerous president of the United States, and only a number of days until we can be protected from him. But he has done something so serious that there should be prosecution against him.
AMY GOODMAN: On Friday, House Speaker Pelosi spoke to the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley, about ways to prevent Trump from launching nuclear weapons in the closing days of his presidency.
This comes as Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania have become the first Republican senators to call for Trump to resign. Murkowski has also suggested she may leave the Republican Party.
Meanwhile, calls are growing for Republican Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to be expelled or to resign for supporting Trump’s effort to overturn the election and fanning the flames ahead of last week’s insurrection.
Authorities are warning about more right-wing violence ahead of Inauguration Day on January 20.
Over the weekend, federal investigators arrested a number of Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol, including two men who were photographed wearing tactical gear, holding plastic zip tie handcuffs — a sign that the domestic terrorists may have been intending to take lawmakers hostage.
Federal agents have also arrested a Georgia man named Cleveland Meredith for sending a text message threatening to kill Nancy Pelosi on live TV. At the time of his arrest, Meredith had a Glock handgun, a pistol, an assault rifle and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.
On Sunday, CNN aired shocking video of Trump supporters grabbing a D.C. Metro police officer, pulling him down the Capitol steps, where he was beaten with American flagpoles. Investigations have also been launched into the role of active-duty soldiers and police officers in Wednesday’s riots.
Even the president of the United States could face criminal charges for inciting the insurrection. Last week, the top prosecutor in Washington, acting U.S. Attorney Michael Sherwin, refused to rule out charging the president.
President Trump made no public remarks over the weekend after being permanently banned on Twitter. On Friday, he announced he would not attend Biden’s inauguration.
To talk more about the insurrection at the Capitol and the Trump presidency, we’re joined by Ruth Ben-Ghiat. She’s a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, author of the new book, Strongmen: How They Rise, Why They Succeed, How They Fall. Her new piece for CNN is headlined “Trump’s end game? Power at all costs.”
Professor Ben-Ghiat, if you can start off by responding to what happened last week, this violent insurrection? Still, the Department of Homeland Security, the president himself, the FBI, the attorney general, none have made comment, even though five people died, another police officer took his own life, and we know the violence that now is becoming increasingly vivid as video after video is released.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: So, the events of January 6 are the product of two long-term objectives that Trump has sought, successfully. One is, like all strongmen who arrive on the scene, they legitimize existing extremism and anti-democratic tendencies. They give validation to the worst criminal elements in society. And in fact, many strongmen, including Trump, either come to power with a criminal record or under investigation, so they are criminal elements themselves. So there’s that. The other thing they do is — and Trump did this with the GOP — is they glamorize and legitimize lawlessness. So lawmakers become lawbreakers. And this has happened.
And what is particularly disturbing — and I think we’ll have more of this — there’s an AP investigation that has come out on, you know, who are these participants of the January 6 events. And though it’s tempting to see them as — which is scary enough — as extremists and militia groups, white power, there were Republican donors. There were Republican officials. There were military. There were law enforcement. So this means the threat to democracy is not outside our institutions only. It’s coming from inside.
And this is a logical result of a policy that Trump has followed very resolutely since he started signaling during his campaign to extremist groups, but also made that statement you played at the top of the show about shooting someone. What he was saying, in January 2016, is that he would be — he was above the law, and he was capable of violence, and he would get away with it.
I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.
-- Donald Trump
AMY GOODMAN: So, let’s talk about his family’s rally, that was held right before the marauders, the domestic terrorists, the insurrectionists — whatever you want to call them — right before they marched to the Capitol. By the way, Trump, saying he would be with them, of course, got in a car and safely watched this from the White House.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: But let’s turn to the video obtained by CNBC of Trump and his family watching a live stream of the pro-Trump so-called Stop the Steal rally at the Capitol last week. This is Don Trump Jr. and his girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle.
DONALD TRUMP JR.: I think we’re T-minus a couple of seconds here, guys. So, check it out. Tune in. I’m going to live-stream it. It’s going to be — Mark Meadows, an actual fighter, one of the few, a real fighter. Thank you, Mark. Kimberly?
KIMBERLY GUILFOYLE: Yeah. Have the courage to do the right thing! Fight!
KIMBERLY GUILFOYLE: Yeah. Have the courage to do the right thing! Fight!
AMY GOODMAN: And this is President Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, addressing the crowd at Wednesday’s so-called Save America rally in Washington, D.C.
RUDY GIULIANI: Over the next 10 days, we get to see the machines that are crooked, the ballots that are fraudulent. And if we’re wrong, we will be made fools of. But if we’re right, a lot of them will go to jail. So, let’s have trial by combat!
RUDY GIULIANI: So, let’s have trial by combat!
AMY GOODMAN: “Trial by combat.” This is Rudy Giuliani, President Trump’s personal attorney, who apparently will be hired by President Trump, along with Alan Dershowitz, to defend him if there is an impeachment trial. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, if you can talk about what this insurrection looks like in world history, you know, the revving on by not the people outside, but the people on the inside, the leader of a country who refuses to accept a democratic election?
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yeah, this is classic. You know, it’s really interesting because, in my book, it’s the first book to put Trump in context of a hundred years of authoritarian history. And he’s really using tactics from all three eras. He’s got the fascist era, and of course I can’t help but be reminded of the March on Rome, when Mussolini was, you know, trying to take over — trying to get into power, but used these Blackshirts. And he took a train, a first-class train, but all the Blackshirts were there in the streets intimidating the king into inviting him into becoming prime minister. And Mussolini is also important because he was a democratic prime minister for three years, eroding democracy from within. And then, when he thought he was going to lose power, he declared a dictatorship. But he had already had these Blackshirts who were threatening violence.
So, and then we have the age of military coups. And we know that Trump was investigating using the regular armed forces, before General Milley put a stop to that. And so he went with these extremists. But the other thing — which, as we see, are not only extremists, but people inside our institutions.
The other thing that he’s left for the GOP is a roadmap on how to just nullify elections and treat your political opponent as a political enemy. And so, the GOP was already drifting toward being an authoritarian party when Trump came along. And he has legitimized lawlessness. And in a sense, the whole events leading up to, including the quotes you mentioned — you know, “trial by combat” — they distill this kind of macho lawlessness that’s the essence of authoritarian rule and always has been. And it’s our turn, as a country, to reckon with this.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to go to a message posted on Twitter Sunday by the Terminator actor, the former Republican governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, in which he compares last week’s pro-Trump mob at the Capitol to Kristallnacht, when German Nazis launched a wave of violent anti-Jewish pogroms.
Arnold Schwarzenegger: As an immigrant to this country, I would like to say a few words to my fellow Americans and to our friends around the world about the events of recent days. Now, I grew up in Austria. I am very aware of Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass. It was a night of rampage against the Jews carried out in 1938 by the Nazi equivalent of the Proud Boys. Wednesday was the Day of Broken Glass right here in the United States. The broken glass was in the windows of the United States Capitol. But the mob did not just shatter the windows of the Capitol. They shattered the ideas we took for granted. They did not just break down the doors of the building that housed the American democracy. They trampled the very principles on which our country was founded.
Now, I grew up in the ruins of a country that suffered the loss of its democracy. I was born in 1947, two years after the Second World War. Growing up, I was surrounded by broken men drinking away their guilt over their participation in the most evil regime in history. Not all of them were rabid antisemites or Nazis. Many just went along step-by-step down the road. They were the people next door.
Now, I’ve never shared this so publicly because it is a painful memory. But my father would come home drunk once or twice a week and he would scream and hit us and scare my mother. I did not hold him totally responsible because our neighbor was doing the same thing to his family, and so was the next neighbor over. I heard it my own ears and saw it with my own eyes. They were in physical pain from the shrapnel in their bodies and in emotional pain from what they saw or did.
It all started with lies and lies and lies, and intolerance. So being from Europe, I’ve seen firsthand how things can spin out of control. I know there is a fear in this country and all over the world that something like this could happen right here. Now, I do not believe it is, but I do believe that we must be aware of the dire consequences of selfishness and cynicism. President Trump sought to overturn the results of an election and of a fair election. He sought a coup by misleading people with lies. My father and our neighbors were misled also with lies, and I know where such lies lead.
President Trump is a failed leader. He will go down in history as the worst president ever. The good thing is that he soon will be as irrelevant as an old Tweet. But what are we to make of those elected officials who have enabled his lies and his treachery? I will remind them of what Teddy Roosevelt said, “Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president.” And John F. Kennedy wrote a book called Profiles in Courage. A number of members of my own party, because of their own spinelessness, would never see their names in such a book, I guarantee you.
They’re complicit with those who carried the flag of self-righteous insurrection into the Capitol. But it did not work. Our democracy held firm. Within hours, the Senate and the House of Representatives were doing the people’s business and certifying the election of President Elect Biden. What a great display of democracy.
Now, I grew up Catholic. I went to church, went to Catholic school. I learned the bible and my catechism, and all of this. And from those days, I remember a phrase that is relevant today, a servant’s heart. It means serving something larger than yourself. See, what we need right now is from our elected representatives is a public servant’s heart. We need public servants that serve something larger than their own power or their own party. We need public servants who will serve higher ideals, the ideas on which this country was founded, the ideas that other countries look up to.
Now, over the past few days, friends from all over the world have been calling and calling and calling me, calling me distraught and worried about us as a nation. One woman was in tears about America, wonderful tears of idealism about what America should be. Those tears should remind us of what America means to the world. Now, I’ve told everyone who has called that, as heartbreaking as all of this is, America will come back from these dark days and shine our lights once again.
Now, you see this sword? This is the Conan sword. Now, here’s the thing about swords; the more you temper a sword, the stronger it becomes. The more you pound it with a hammer and then heat it in the fire and then thrust it into the cold water, and then pound it again and plunge it into the fire and into the water, the more often you do that, the stronger it becomes. Now, I’m not telling you all this because I want you to become an expert sword maker, but our democracy is like the steel of this sword. The more it is tempered, the stronger it becomes. Our democracy has been tempered by wars, injustices, and insurrections.
I believe, as shaken as we are by the events of recent days, we will come out stronger because we now understand what can be lost. We need reforms, of course, so that this never ever happens again. We need to hold accountable the people that brought us to this unforgivable point. And we need to look past ourselves, our parties, and disagreements, and put our democracy first. And we need to heal, together, from the trauma of what has just happened. We need to heal, not as Republicans or as Democrats, but as Americans.
Now, to begin this process, no matter what your political affiliation is, I ask you to join me in saying to President Elect Biden, “President Elect Biden, we wish you great success as our president. If you succeed, our nation succeeds. We support you with all our hearts as you seek to bring us together. And to those who think they can overturn the United States Constitution, know this: you will never win. President Elect Biden, we stand with you today, tomorrow, and forever in defense of our democracy from those who would threaten it.” May God bless all of you and may God bless America.
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER: I grew up in Austria. I’m very aware of Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass. It was a night of rampage against the Jews carried out in 1938 by the Nazi equivalent of the Proud Boys. Wednesday was the Day of Broken Glass right here in the United States. The broken glass was in the windows of the United States Capitol.
AMY GOODMAN: So, if you can give us the background for this? And then we’re going to play more of Arnold Schwarzenegger apparently for the first time in public talking about the complicity of his father and neighbors in Austria at this time. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, give us the history of Kristallnacht and Austria and the Anschluss.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: So, Kristallnacht was so tragically important because there had already been legal persecution of Jews and plenty of imprisonments of Jews who were leftists and beatings in the street. There was plenty of violence in Germany. And then Hitler annexed Austria and had a plebiscite — Austria had a plebiscite. But Kristallnacht was the first large-scale, coordinated attack on Jewish sites, whether they were stores, they were synagogues. And it was — you know, the Nazis allowed the violence to happen, but actually instigated it.
So, this is — this technique of lighting the match and already not addressing violence and egging on violence, and then letting it roll, is a classic authoritarian maneuver. And, of course, part of the effect was to lead some Jews to get out and emigrate, which is partly what the Nazis wanted. They wanted to get rid of the Jews that way, as well as with violence.
And the reason that Arnold Schwarzenegger —
AMY GOODMAN: Professor Ben-Ghiat, I want to go back —
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: — to Arnold Schwarzenegger now.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yes, that’s what I’m doing. So, Schwarzenegger is —
AMY GOODMAN: No, let me go — we’re going to go back to play a little more of what he had to say.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yeah.
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER: I was born in 1947, two years after the Second World War. Growing up, I was surrounded by broken men drinking away the guilt over their participation in the most evil regime in history. Not all of them were rabid anti-Semites or Nazis. Many just went along, step by step, down the road. They were the people next door. Now, I’ve never shared this so publicly, because it is a painful memory. But my father would come home drunk once or twice a week, and he would scream and hit us and scare my mother. I didn’t hold him totally responsible, because our neighbor was doing the same thing to his family, and so was the next neighbor over. I heard it with my own ears and saw it with my own eyes. They were in physical pain from the shrapnel in their bodies and in emotional pain from what they saw or did. It all started with lies, and lies, and lies, and intolerance.
AMY GOODMAN: So, that’s the former Republican governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat, if you can talk about what he’s referring to, everyday Austrians? And then take it back to the United States, as increasingly people around this country are asking questions about the senators and congressmembers who have aided and abetted what Donald Trump was trying to do — delegitimize democratic elections — people like Cori Bush calling for the expulsion — the new congressmember from Missouri — of congressmembers who supported this. But start back in Austria with the Nazis.
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yeah. So, you know, what Arnold Schwarzenegger is referring to is that Hitler was supposed to be — and Hitler was the native child, having been born in Austria. He was supposed to be savior of Germany. And instead, he led it to defeat. I have quotes in my book about women in bomb shelters when Hitler abandoned his people and the Allies were bombing and the Soviets were invading, and she said, “Hitler promised us greatness, and he was really out to destroy us.” So, there was this, you know, massive, massive tragedy and guilt that was experienced and caused violence, domestic violence. And this is this kind of terrible atmosphere post-Hitler, who killed himself, of course, because the — I have it in the conclusion to my book — the one constant with all these men is that they despise their people, and they blame their people when things go badly, and they leave them in the ditch. Their only loyalty is to themselves.
And the Republicans in America have seen this happening as Trump has turned on the people who enabled him at the beginning, like Jeff Sessions, who was the first person to bring him to a rally. And Trump said, “Oh, I’m being mainstream now.” And then we know what happened to Jeff Sessions.
And so, Trump has had an enormous success, to a shocking degree, in domesticating and making as a personal tool the GOP, considering he didn’t start his party, like Mussolini or — and Hitler was, you know, a head of the party very early on. Trump came in from the outside. And in only four years, through intimidation, bullying, buyouts — the usual autocratic methods — has completely wrapped the GOP around his finger. And this is how we get this complicity.
And so, those who had to wait for an armed assault with murderous intentions on the Capitol to do the right thing, like McConnell and Pence, I’m not so impressed. They were only reacting to their personal safety being jeopardized. So, any legacy reckoning with the Trump era has to actually focus on how successful he’s been at getting people to be their worst selves.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Professor Ben-Ghiat, you tweeted, “Historian of coups and right-wing authoritarians here. If there are not severe consequences for every lawmaker & Trump govt official who backed this, every member of the Capitol Police who collaborated with them, this 'strategy of disruption' will escalate in 2021.” If you would elaborate further and end by talking about what is deeply concerning to so many people right now, that this was just a first attack?
RUTH BEN-GHIAT: So, when Trump says this, “Our beautiful” — or, “Our journey is just beginning,” I had already been very worried that this would be — that Trump and the GOP — Trump will act as an outside agitator when he leaves. And this would be a strategy of trying to delegitimize the Biden administration — they’ve already been trying to sabotage it with nonaction on coronavirus, economic misery — but to make America so ungovernable and so difficult to govern, so chaotic, so violent, under Biden and Harris, that it creates more desire for law and order, and in come the Trumps back again, or Trump proxies.
So, I’m very worried that this — there’s already a, quote, “armed march” being planned for January 17th around the nation. And once you legitimize and give a presidential imprimatur to extremism, and once you convince — you plant people throughout federal agencies, you know, you radicalize law enforcement, as Bill Barr, who stepped away but has a huge amount of responsibility for this, it’s very hard to turn this back.
AMY GOODMAN: Ruth Ben-Ghiat, I want to thank you for being with us, professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, author of the book Strongmen: How They Rise, Why They Succeed, How They Fall. We will link to her new piece at CNN titled “Trump’s end game? Power at all costs.”
Next up, we look at Big Tech’s response to the Capitol insurrection. Twitter has permanently banned Donald Trump. Parler is offline. We’ll host a debate.
Is Big Tech Too Powerful? Chris Hedges & Ramesh Srinivasan Debate Twitter & Facebook Banning Trump by Amy Goodman DemocracyNow.org January 11, 2021
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GUESTS Ramesh Srinivasan: professor in the Department of Information Studies at UCLA, where he also directs the Digital Cultures Lab. Chris Hedges: Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, award-winning author and activist.
Twitter, Facebook and other social media companies have removed President Trump from their platforms, after years of debate about the disinformation he shared to millions of followers from his accounts. While many are applauding the bans, author Chris Hedges warns they could backfire. “To allow these companies to essentially function as de facto platforms for censorship and manipulation … harkens back to the way civil liberties were eviscerated in the wake of 9/11,” says Hedges. “It’s always, in the end, the left that pays for this kind of censorship.” We also speak with UCLA professor Ramesh Srinivasan, director of the Digital Cultures Lab, who says Big Tech allowed right-wing extremism to flourish for years before acting and that lawmakers need to enact robust regulation. “All of these technology platforms, powered by their hidden algorithms that are indeed opaque, thrive on the amplification of polarization,” says Srinivasan. “It is incredible how much power we have given to a very small number of people who are essentially mediating pretty much every aspect of our lives.”
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
After years of debate, Twitter and Facebook have removed President Trump from their platforms. Today we’ll host our own debate on the moves by Big Tech.
Twitter permanently suspended Trump Friday, cutting off his instant line of communication with 89 million followers, after reviewing two tweets it said could incite violence and contribute to a possible, quote, “secondary attack” on the U.S. Capitol and other government facilities next weekend, ahead of Joe Biden’s inauguration Wednesday. Trump’s tweets were, quote, “The 75,000,000 great American Patriots who voted for me, AMERICA FIRST, and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, will have a GIANT VOICE long into the future. They will not be disrespected or treated unfairly in any way, shape or form!!!” and Trump also tweeted that he, quote, “will not be going to the Inauguration on January 20,” unquote.
“The 75,000,000 great American Patriots who voted for me, AMERICA FIRST, and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, will have a GIANT VOICE long into the future. They will not be disrespected or treated unfairly in any way, shape or form!!!”
-- President Donald Trump, Jan 9, 2021
Meanwhile, Facebook and Instagram, which are the same company, have now suspended Trump at least until Inauguration Day. Twitch, which is owned by Amazon, and Snapchat also disabled Trump’s accounts. Other platforms that have now banned or restricted Trump include TikTok, Reddit, Snapchat and Shopify.
Meanwhile, Apple, Google and Amazon Web Services ended their support for the social media network Parler over the weekend, which bills itself as Twitter without rules. The companies say Parler’s managers have consistently failed to halt threats of violence and calls for armed insurrection on the site. Parler was co-founded by the Republican megadonor Trump supporter Rebekah Mercer, daughter of hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer.
All of this comes as critics argue Facebook, Google and Twitter have peddled extremism for profit for years. Now the payment processing company Stripe has cut ties with the Trump campaign, which continues to fundraise, saying it violated policies against encouraging violence after the pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol last Wednesday.
For more on Big Tech’s response to the Capitol insurrection, we begin with Ramesh Srinivasan. He’s professor of information studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, UCLA, where he also directs the Digital Cultures Lab. Professor Srinivasan is the author of the book Beyond the Valley: How Innovators Around the World Are Overcoming Inequality and Creating the Technologies of Tomorrow. After we speak with him, we’ll host a debate with professor Srinivasan and Chris Hedges.
So, Professor, if you can start off — a lot of people may not even be familiar with some of these sites, but if you can talk about what has happened in the last week with Big Tech?
RAMESH SRINIVASAN: Yeah, absolutely, Amy. It’s great to be back with you.
Yeah, I think it’s really important to note that as we sit through this pandemic, we are more technologically reliant than ever before. Our lives are mediated by private corporations, right? And so, big technology companies have had to take a stand in recent days about their relationships, which, quite frankly, are highly symbiotic with President Trump — and this is something we’ve discussed before — because many big technology companies thrive around the amplification of spectacle, meaning their goal, like pretty much any media network, is to keep you on there as much as possible, to keep your attention glued. And there is no one better at disorienting, polarizing, inflaming and stirring people up than President Trump. So they have been strange bedfellows and, in many cases, on an economic level, allies for many years.
I think, you know, quite belatedly, honestly, there were decisions made, after the horrific events of last week, where there were clear linkages between President Trump’s behavior, both online and offline, and the domestic white supremacist terror incident that we saw last week. I think these companies have realized they needed to cut bait at some point. But, in my opinion, they have never taken a stand in the public interest. And for us to praise them at this point is not really getting at the whole picture.
AMY GOODMAN: And before we go to our debate, explain what Parler is.
RAMESH SRINIVASAN: Yeah, Parler — it’s very important to note the connections, actually, between Parler and Cambridge Analytica, which I know you and many networks have done a lot of reporting on. Rebekah Mercer, as you mentioned earlier, is one of the founders of Parler. Her and her father, Robert Mercer, were the founders, along with Steve Bannon, who was intimately involved with Cambridge Analytica. Parler was set up rhetorically almost and has grown and boomed as a sort of alternative social media platform for the conservative and “alt-right” and, unfortunately, even more kind of right-wing, Neo-Nazi, white supremacist-type movements.
Trump, despite his incredibly positive and symbiotic relationship with Big Tech on every level, has railed against Big Tech over the last several months and has falsely claimed that it is responsible for his election loss and the losses for Republicans in the past. Parler was set up as an alternative for people on the right to flock to. But, very importantly, content that might start or bubble up on Parler tends to translate across different technology platforms by what I call a media ecology. So stuff might start on Parler, just like it started on 4chan or Reddit or other kinds of platforms, but then it becomes the new normal on platforms that are much more mainstream, like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
AMY GOODMAN: So, to debate Big Tech’s response to the Capitol insurrection and whether social media should be banning President Trump for life or until he’s out of office, we’re joined by Chris Hedges, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, award-winning author and activist. He is a regular columnist for Scheerpost. His latest article is headlined “The Empire Is Not Done with Julian Assange.” He’s written numerous books, including, most recently, America: The Farewell Tour. Still with us, Ramesh Srinivasan, professor of information studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, UCLA, where he also directs the Digital Cultures Lab.
Chris, can you start off by responding to Twitter permanently banning Donald Trump?
CHRIS HEDGES: Well, Twitter, all of these digital platforms are not neutral arbiters. In fact, they’re, of course, for-profit corporations with close ties to the security state. And if you look back over the past few years, they have imposed heavy forms of censorship and interference, primarily on the left, and in particularly on WikiLeaks. So, they blocked the ability for WikiLeaks to accept donations on PayPal and every other platform. Every time WikiLeaks would hold a press conference, there would be interference, electronic interference. People couldn’t get in the room. They’ve used algorithms. And then we saw, again, their very partisan activity during the campaign when they locked the New York Post out of its own Twitter account because it had published stories about the revelations found on the discarded or abandoned laptop from Hunter Biden, which, in retrospect, have proven quite serious. Glenn Greenwald took a very heroic stance on this, and The Intercept wouldn’t publish his story.
So, to allow these opaque — and remember, these companies know everything about us; we know nothing about them. To allow these companies to essentially function as de facto platforms for censorship and manipulation — I’m not in any way minimizing what happened last week — harkens back to the way civil liberties were eviscerated in the wake of 9/11 — the PATRIOT Act, which the great civil rights attorney Michael Ratner called a coup d’état, the 2002 Authorization to Use Military Force Act. So, responding to a crisis — and I think we do live in a crisis. I have written about this right-wing, nativist fascist. My book, American Fascist, came out in 2006, so I’m very cognizant of the very real threat that we face. But to respond by, in essence, empowering these private corporations to function as censors over billions of people will come back to haunt us. And we see that, because it’s not just Trump they target. It’s always, in the end, the left that pays for this kind of censorship.
AMY GOODMAN: Professor Srinivasan, if you can respond to this? And also, let’s just point out that Twitter’s move didn’t start with the leadership. It started with 300 Twitter employees signing a petition calling for him, Trump, to be permanently banned, saying, “We must examine Twitter’s complicity in what President-Elect Biden has rightly termed insurrection. Those acts jeopardize the wellbeing of the United States, our company, and our employees.”
RAMESH SRINIVASAN: I mean, that itself is a great example of how publicly unaccountable a company like Twitter is. And that is true across the board when it comes to Big Tech companies. Big Tech companies have become — are private corporations, that we’re talking about some of the wealthiest corporations in the history of the world. During this pandemic alone, hundreds of billions of dollars have been made primarily by tech magnates. That is really important to point out. And that’s only going to be the new normal as we head toward, you know, climate crises, possible future pandemics and so on.
But I very much agree with the point that was made by Mr. Hedges. Twitter is self-serving. These Big Tech companies are self-serving. There are many right-wing trolls who are going viral, as we speak, on Twitter right now. All of these technology platforms, powered by their hidden algorithms, that are indeed opaque, thrive on the amplification of polarization, the amplification of attention. They are able to computationally predict what will grab our eyeballs. And the disorienting, propagandist, hateful kinds of content that comes out of President Trump on Twitter makes him an incredible ally.
And that is why it’s extremely important for us to take note of the much larger issue, which is our public lives, our economic lives, our political lives, even our intimate lives, our behavioral lives, are all governed by private technology companies that know far more about us than we will ever know about them. And that’s why I believe we really need to transform and regulate technology companies in the image of justice and balance and compassion.
AMY GOODMAN: But what about Chris Hedges’ concern that, yes, they’re turning on Trump right now, who they have enormously profited from over the years, but next it may well be you?
RAMESH SRINIVASAN: Oh, absolutely. There is no public governance. There is no public accountability. It could be any of us, Amy. It was with WikiLeaks, as Chris Hedges pointed out. Yeah, it is incredible how much power we have given to a very small number of people, who are essentially mediating pretty much every aspect of our lives.
And I really believe that this is why we need true regulatory intervention at this time. And we’re at a very unique moment when it comes to these issues. We have a large-scale agreement across the American population, and actually, in many cases, around the world, to do something about these issues with Big Tech.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Chris Hedges, not all speech in this country is, to say the least, simply allowed. I mean, you’re not supposed to be able to yell “fire” in a crowded theater, for example. As you pointed out, you yourself have been warning for years about American fascism. How does President Trump, the support for this insurrection, not fall into that category for you?
CHRIS HEDGES: Because he doesn’t specifically call for violence.
[Rudy Giuliani] Hello! Hello, everyone! We’re here, just very briefly, to make a very important: two points: No. 1: Every single thing that has been outlined as the plan for today, is perfectly legal....SO LET’S HAVE TRIAL BY COMBAT!...hey picked states where they had crooked Democratic cities, where they could push everybody around, AND IT HAS TO BE VINDICATED TO SAVE OUR REPUBLIC. This is BIGGER THAN DONALD TRUMP! It is BIGGER than you and me....This has been a year in which they have invaded our freedom of speech, our freedom of religion, our freedom to move, our freedom to live, AND I’LL BE DARNED IF THEY’RE GONNA TAKE AWAY OUR FREE AND FAIR VOTE! AND WE’RE GOING TO FIGHT TO THE VERY END TO MAKE SURE THAT DOESN’T HAPPEN!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] HELLO, PATRIOTS! Hey, guys. You actually all did something, I didn’t realize was possible. I’m looking at the crowd here, and the tens of thousands – probably 100,000 plus people here – AND YOU DID IT ALL WITHOUT BURNING DOWN BUILDINGS? YOU DID IT WITHOUT RIPPING DOWN CHURCHES?! WITHOUT LOOTING?! I didn’t know that that was possible! According to the media, when you have a large gathering of peaceful protesters, they are supposed to burn it all down! [Crowd laughs] So guys, we can do it right....
So to those Republicans, many of which may be voting on things in the coming hours: you have an opportunity today. You can be a hero, or you can be a zero! And the choice is yours, but we are all watching! The whole world is watching, folks. Choose wisely, because if you just roll over, if you don’t fight in the face of glaring irregularities, and statistical impossibilities –
[Crowd] FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] That’s right, guys! That’s the message! These guys better fight for Trump, because if they’re not, guess what? I’M GOING TO BE IN YOUR BACK YARD IN A COUPLE OF MONTHS. [Points] Guys like Scott, here. Look at – wow, okay, I can’t go through the whole list, because I don’t have 45 minutes to go through all the patriots that have been fighting, have been on the ground, that have mobilized to put good Republicans in those positions. GUESS WHAT, FOLKS? IF YOU’RE GOING TO BE THE ZERO, AND NOT THE HERO, WE’RE COMING FOR YOU, AND WE’RE GOING TO HAVE A GOOD TIME DOING IT!
WE’VE GOT TO START FIGHTING like the Democrats do. Right? We gotta play their game. We gotta take their fight to them their way...
SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!...SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!
[President Donald Trump] We’re going to have to fight much harder and Mike Pence is going to have to come through for us. If he doesn’t, that will be a sad day for our country because you’re sworn to uphold our constitution. Now it is up to Congress to confront this egregious assault on our democracy. After this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down. We’re going to walk down any one you want, but I think right here. We’re going walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators, and congressmen and women. We’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong...
The Republicans have to get tougher. You’re not going to have a Republican party if you don’t get tougher. They want to play so straight, they want to play so, “Sir, yes, the United States, the constitution doesn’t allow me to send them back to the States.” Well, I say, “Yes, it does because the constitution says you have to protect our country and you have to protect our constitution and you can’t vote on fraud,” and fraud breaks up everything, doesn’t it? When you catch somebody in a fraud, you’re allowed to go by very different rules. So I hope Mike has the courage to do what he has to do...
And we fight. We fight like Hell and if you don’t fight like Hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore...
So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we’re going to the Capitol and we’re going to try and give… The Democrats are hopeless. They’re never voting for anything, not even one vote. But we’re going to try and give our Republicans, the weak ones, because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.
1a: to contend in battle or physical combat, especially: to strive to overcome a person by blows or weapons. The soldiers fought bravely.
-- Fight, by Merriam-Webster
And, you know, this goes back to the attempt on the state of Mississippi to go after the NAACP for violence that had been carried out, trying to blame the NAACP for this violence. And it went all the way up to the Supreme Court, I think, 1982. And they ruled, essentially — it was a unanimous decision — that this kind of speech, the kind of speech that Trump laid out, is actually protected, and even if it results in violence, they can’t go after the person who carried out that speech. So, if you give a strong — that case said that if you give a strong speech against segregation and that there is some kind of violence carried out, you’re not responsible.
So, I think that I would love to see Trump impeached. Ralph Nader and Bruce Fein have drawn up a list of 12 real impeachable offenses, not just a shakedown of the Ukraine. But, of course, I think the Democratic Party has been complicit in this administration. They could have impeached Trump the first week just on the Emoluments Clause alone, the perpetuation of nine wars, if we count Yemen, that were never declared by Congress. But they didn’t do it, because they saw Trump as a fundraising tool. The media has made tons of money off of Trump. Again, as was pointed out, the digital platforms love Trump as essentially keeping people on their platforms — again, profit-driven.
And now we’ve ended up, in the final week of the Trump administration, with people attempting to respond to the deterioration of the American political system and the judiciary and the checks and balances and everything else. But I think that, clearly, if we kind of coldly read what Trump said to his supporters, he didn’t call for people to break into the Capitol and take people hostage.
AMY GOODMAN: Certainly, he and his family, in just the speeches alone at this rally, as he talked about he would be with them, but, of course, then he sneaked back to the White House and was not with them, but they talked about “trial by combat.” They talked about getting Republicans who were not standing up for Trump. And you see all of the responses. As he watched what took place, the massive violence at the Capitol, Trump tweeted, “We love you. You’re special people.”
Ramesh Srinivasan, what do you want to see, as you support Trump being banned permanently from Twitter, to come from this? What do you see happening? Also, Stripe has said they won’t process his credit cards. You’ve got Shopify, which he uses. You know, money matters, to say the least, to Trump. And you’ve got Reddit, you’ve got Snapchat, you’ve got YouTube — all of these taking Trump down.
RAMESH SRINIVASAN: Yeah, absolutely. I don’t think that the solution to this issue and any future issues comes from hoping that Twitter does the right thing. Twitter has decided to ban Trump, and the other tech companies are now cutting bait with Trump, because it’s just gone a step too far, and they all recognize the Biden administration is incoming.
I really think that what we need to do is, long before we get to this point, have public audit, public intervention and public accountability into technology companies. So, you know, this is what I’ve been calling a Digital Bill of Rights. But basically what I’m talking about here is, we need to have full disclosure over what is being collected about us, how that which is being collected about us is influencing what we see. We need to have the ability for third parties to have audit, you know, continuous audit, over these technology platforms. We need to rein in some aspects, not fully, of Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which basically provides online content providers, basically, no liability, just full protection to post and publish whatever they wish to. But long before we get to this point, any pieces of content, for example, that are likely to go viral, or that the tech companies are going to make go viral, should be — there should be some kind of audit kind of process. And these algorithms are thriving, that power all of these systems, thrive on amplification, spectacle and disinformation. And they really need to be reined in and transformed in the interest — in the public interest, in the democratic interest.
But also, to my point earlier, technology companies are not simply about our political lenses into the world, but are also deeply influencing issues of economic justice and social justice. And we have to ensure, because the internet was publicly funded, that all of these tech companies are resting upon publicly funded infrastructure that was based on all of us paying for, that they are publicly accountable. They have to be dedicated to the public interest. And we have to do everything we can, especially at this time when there’s a lot of attention on this issue, to push something that is far more progressive than just, you know, hoping for some good step to be taken here and there when it’s self-serving.
Trump's end game? Power at all costs by Ruth Ben-Ghiat CNN Opinion Updated 6:16 AM ET, Thu January 7, 2021
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Ruth Ben-Ghiat (@ruthbenghiat), a frequent contributor to CNN Opinion, is professor of history at New York University and the author of "Strongmen: From Mussolini to the Present." The views expressed here are her own. Read more opinion on CNN.
Ruth Ben-Ghiat
It's a scene that has repeated itself for over a century: A man appears on the political landscape who seems to stand for something new and grand. Skilled in the arts of self-presentation and emotional manipulation, he captures the hearts and minds of millions, telling them he will clean up the country. Soon, a personality cult forms around him. Religious figures embrace him as a savior who will bring order to a disordered world. And yet, day after day, he courts the most extremist elements in society, encouraging them to see him as a victim of his many enemies. When his power is threatened, he summons them to defend him, throwing his country into chaos -- or even dragging it into civil war.
This is the authoritarian playbook, a mode of governance and set of tactics that President Donald Trump has followed since he ran for office and has been relying on more than ever since he was defeated in the November 3rd election. The events of January 6th, when armed Trump supporters stormed Congress, fit this pattern perfectly.
Leaving office quietly is not a hallmark of leaders like Trump, who live in fear of the loss of adulation and power that defeat brings -- and the prospect of prosecution for their misdeeds once they no longer have presidential immunity. Trump had reportedly explored a variety of options to pull off a "self-coup" and stay in office illegally. He was reportedly advised to consider martial law -- though General Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had previously disavowed military involvement in politics -- and electoral manipulation (pressuring state officials to "find votes," as Trump did with Georgia's Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and trying to get Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify the Electoral College results). Nothing worked -- stealing an election proved to be hard to pull off.
So the President played his last hand, one he'd prepared carefully: activating the far-right groups and militias he'd long supported. His comment during a September presidential debate to the Proud Boys to "Stand back and stand by" let them and groups like them think that he'd likely call on them one day. He had already tweeted an invitation to his followers to convene in Washington DC on Wednesday, and at a rally stoked their anger and played the victim, telling them the election had been rigged and they should not "take it anymore" -- an implicit invitation to action.
As for his followers, the history of authoritarianism tells us that those who feel their leader is endangered can become extremely volatile. Here the highly effective propaganda war waged by Trump and his allies matters: Although Trump lost the election two months ago, for his followers, he was the winner who had unjustly been deprived of what was rightfully his. Add in the culture of armed insurgency and the anti-democratic, extremist beliefs many of these groups espouse, and the solution of "direct action" -- namely, an armed takeover of the halls of power to save the leader -- becomes compelling. Thus did men and women, some armed, breach the Capitol building, forcing the evacuation of lawmakers and staff.
Kyle Chapman, a California activist arrested earlier this month in a clash in Berkeley between anti-fascist protesters and pro-Trump demonstrators, announced this week he is forming the Fraternal Order of Alt Knights (cleverly called “FOAK").
Chapman, who uses the Internet meme “Based Stick Man,” says his new militant, highly-masculine group will be the “tactical defensive arm” of the Proud Boys, another group that shows up at pro-Trump rallies looking to rumble with counter-protesters.
“We don’t fear the fight. We are the fight,” Chapman said in a recent social media post announcing FOAK’s formation....
Although there initially aren’t any overt racist themes, the new group of street fighters sounds quite similar to a neo-Nazi “fight club” called the “DIY Division.” Members of that white supremacist group showed up last month in Huntington Beach, California, mingling with an estimated 2,000 Trump supporters.
The Proud Boys reportedly have a four-step initiation process. It starts with a prospect declaring himself a “Proud Boy,” suiting up in Fred Perry polo shirts with yellow stripes—similar to those worn by skinheads.
The second degree is a “cereal beat-in” during which the new member is punched and beaten by current members until the plebe can rattle off the names of five cereals (you know, Corn Flakes, Rice Krispies, Cheerios!)
The third degree reported involves “adhering to the masturbation regimen and getting a tattoo,” blogger Will Sommer wrote in a recent post.
Since then, a fourth-degree has been added to the initiation ritual – brawling with antifascists at public rallies.
Chapman said his Proud Boys’ affiliate, Alt-Knights, are ready to take it to the streets.
“Our emphasis will be on street activism, preparation, defense and confrontation,” he said. “We will protect and defend our right wing brethren when the police and government fail to do so.”
Chapman says his organization “is for those that possess the Warrior Spirit. The weak or timid need not apply.”
Trump, of course, was not in the building. He set the fire, but was careful not to be in a position to get burned by it or control it. Only hours after the Capitol was stormed did Trump issue a statement telling his supporters to "Go home now," but doubling down on his claim of a fraudulent election "that was stolen from us." This is not a statement meant to bring peace, but rather to continue his politics of resentment and keep his followers angry -- and tied to him.
I will not easily forget the sights -- the Capitol building filled with armed extremists, or a man occupying Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's office, triumphantly sitting in her chair. Nor should any America who cares about our republic. Trump promised "law and order" but delivered lawlessness. His extremist rhetoric and attempts to undo the voice and will of American voters were aided and abetted by the Republican Party, an organization that, thanks to Trump, has left democracy behind. Today the mask is finally off and Americans can see the true ideology of Trump and his allies: power, to be held onto any at cost.
New "Fight Club" Ready for Street Violence: A new fight club “fraternity” of young white, pro-Trump men is being formed, its organizers claim, to defend free-speech rights by “Alt-Right” leaders and engage in street fighting. by Bill Morlin Southern Poverty Law Center April 25, 2017
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[Rudy Giuliani] Hello! Hello, everyone! We’re here, just very briefly, to make a very important: two points: No. 1: Every single thing that has been outlined as the plan for today, is perfectly legal....SO LET’S HAVE TRIAL BY COMBAT!...hey picked states where they had crooked Democratic cities, where they could push everybody around, AND IT HAS TO BE VINDICATED TO SAVE OUR REPUBLIC. This is BIGGER THAN DONALD TRUMP! It is BIGGER than you and me....This has been a year in which they have invaded our freedom of speech, our freedom of religion, our freedom to move, our freedom to live, AND I’LL BE DARNED IF THEY’RE GONNA TAKE AWAY OUR FREE AND FAIR VOTE! AND WE’RE GOING TO FIGHT TO THE VERY END TO MAKE SURE THAT DOESN’T HAPPEN!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] HELLO, PATRIOTS! Hey, guys. You actually all did something, I didn’t realize was possible. I’m looking at the crowd here, and the tens of thousands – probably 100,000 plus people here – AND YOU DID IT ALL WITHOUT BURNING DOWN BUILDINGS? YOU DID IT WITHOUT RIPPING DOWN CHURCHES?! WITHOUT LOOTING?! I didn’t know that that was possible! According to the media, when you have a large gathering of peaceful protesters, they are supposed to burn it all down! [Crowd laughs] So guys, we can do it right....
So to those Republicans, many of which may be voting on things in the coming hours: you have an opportunity today. You can be a hero, or you can be a zero! And the choice is yours, but we are all watching! The whole world is watching, folks. Choose wisely, because if you just roll over, if you don’t fight in the face of glaring irregularities, and statistical impossibilities –
[Crowd] FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] That’s right, guys! That’s the message! These guys better fight for Trump, because if they’re not, guess what? I’M GOING TO BE IN YOUR BACK YARD IN A COUPLE OF MONTHS. [Points] Guys like Scott, here. Look at – wow, okay, I can’t go through the whole list, because I don’t have 45 minutes to go through all the patriots that have been fighting, have been on the ground, that have mobilized to put good Republicans in those positions. GUESS WHAT, FOLKS? IF YOU’RE GOING TO BE THE ZERO, AND NOT THE HERO, WE’RE COMING FOR YOU, AND WE’RE GOING TO HAVE A GOOD TIME DOING IT!
WE’VE GOT TO START FIGHTING like the Democrats do. Right? We gotta play their game. We gotta take their fight to them their way...
SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!...SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!
[President Donald Trump] We’re going to have to fight much harder and Mike Pence is going to have to come through for us. If he doesn’t, that will be a sad day for our country because you’re sworn to uphold our constitution. Now it is up to Congress to confront this egregious assault on our democracy. After this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down. We’re going to walk down any one you want, but I think right here. We’re going walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators, and congressmen and women. We’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong...
The Republicans have to get tougher. You’re not going to have a Republican party if you don’t get tougher. They want to play so straight, they want to play so, “Sir, yes, the United States, the constitution doesn’t allow me to send them back to the States.” Well, I say, “Yes, it does because the constitution says you have to protect our country and you have to protect our constitution and you can’t vote on fraud,” and fraud breaks up everything, doesn’t it? When you catch somebody in a fraud, you’re allowed to go by very different rules. So I hope Mike has the courage to do what he has to do...
And we fight. We fight like Hell and if you don’t fight like Hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore...
So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we’re going to the Capitol and we’re going to try and give… The Democrats are hopeless. They’re never voting for anything, not even one vote. But we’re going to try and give our Republicans, the weak ones, because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.
Kyle Chapman, a California activist arrested earlier this month in a clash in Berkeley between anti-fascist protesters and pro-Trump demonstrators, announced this week he is forming the Fraternal Order of Alt Knights (cleverly called “FOAK").
During the years of the Third Reich, the term Volk became heavily used in nationalistic political slogans, particularly in slogans such as Volk ohne Raum – "(a) people or race without space" or Völkischer Beobachter ("popular or racial observer"), an NSDAP party newspaper. Also the political slogan Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer ("One nation or race, one realm, one leader"); the compound word Herrenvolk, translated as "master race"; the "Volksjäger" jet fighter, translated as "people's fighter"; and the term Volksgemeinschaft, translated as "people's community".
The term Volk, in the vision of Nazis, had a broad set of meanings, and referred sometimes to the entirety of German nation and other times to the Nordic race. In the writings of leading Nazi thinkers, such as Alfred Rosenberg and Hans Günther several Völker or "peoples" made up a Rasse or "race", so these two terms did not always denote the same concept.
-- Volk, by Wikipedia
Chapman, who uses the Internet meme “Based Stick Man,” says his new militant, highly-masculine group will be the “tactical defensive arm” of the Proud Boys, another group that shows up at pro-Trump rallies looking to rumble with counter-protesters.
“We don’t fear the fight. We are the fight,” Chapman said in a recent social media post announcing FOAK’s formation.
A fan's photoshop edit of an image of Chapman.
“I’m proud to announce that my newly created Fraternal Order of Alt-Knights will be partnering with Proud Boys,” Chapman said, with the “full-approval” of its founder, Gavin McInnes.
McInnes is a co-founder of Vice (although he and the magazine severed ties 10 years ago) and more recently has been a frequent guest on FOX News and a contributor for the racist site VDARE where he denigrated Muslims and called Asian Americans “slopes” and “riceballs.”
Now described as a “neo-masculine reactionary,” McInnes calls his Proud Boys a “pro-West fraternal organization.”
Others describe it as the military arm of the Alt-Right.
And now there’s “FOAK,” which Chapman proudly describes as a “fraternal organization,” a Proud Boys affiliate chapter, “with its own bylaws, constitution, rituals and vetting processes.”
Although there initially aren’t any overt racist themes, the new group of street fighters sounds quite similar to a neo-Nazi “fight club” called the “DIY Division.” Members of that white supremacist group showed up last month in Huntington Beach, California, mingling with an estimated 2,000 Trump supporters.
The Proud Boys reportedly have a four-step initiation process. It starts with a prospect declaring himself a “Proud Boy,” suiting up in Fred Perry polo shirts with yellow stripes—similar to those worn by skinheads.
The second degree is a “cereal beat-in” during which the new member is punched and beaten by current members until the plebe can rattle off the names of five cereals (you know, Corn Flakes, Rice Krispies, Cheerios!)
The third degree reported involves “adhering to the masturbation regimen and getting a tattoo,” blogger Will Sommer wrote in a recent post.
Since then, a fourth-degree has been added to the initiation ritual – brawling with antifascists at public rallies.
Chapman said his Proud Boys’ affiliate, Alt-Knights, are ready to take it to the streets.
“Our emphasis will be on street activism, preparation, defense and confrontation,” he said. “We will protect and defend our right wing brethren when the police and government fail to do so.”
Chapman says his organization “is for those that possess the Warrior Spirit. The weak or timid need not apply.”
Fight Club at 20: A vision of Trump’s United States: David Fincher’s film, starring Brad Pitt and Edward Norton, was eerily prescient by Scott Tobias Guardian Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 06:00
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Fight Club: Brad Pitt and Edward Norton in David Fincher’s 1999 film
When Fight Club was released, 20 years ago, it was a crystal ball that was mistaken for a cultural crisis, much like Do the Right Thing had been a decade earlier and perhaps Joker is now.
Film-makers who were trying to identify a violence nesting in American culture were accused of trying to incite it – or at least clumsily juggling lit sticks of dynamite. No less an authority than Roger Ebert opened his review of David Fincher’s film by calling it “the most frankly and cheerfully fascist big-star movie since Death Wish”, echoing widespread concern that impressionable men would lock into the empowering brutality of Tyler Durden and the army that gathers around him. Viewed from a certain angle, it looked like a recruitment film.
What Fight Club missed in 1999 – and comes oh so close to getting – is how much the rage it identifies is connected to white supremacy
What cannot be predicted, however, is how items like Fight Club will shift during flight. It becomes easier to appreciate the ambiguities of the film when it no longer feels like a clear and present danger. That doesn’t necessarily mean that Fincher’s point of view isn’t confusing or contradictory all these years later, but the culture tends to move quickly from threat to threat, and it’s helpful to have enough distance to see the world it’s depicting more clearly. Whatever you think about Fight Club in 2019, it’s probably not exactly what you thought about it in 1999, if only because so much of what it describes has manifested itself in the real world or been distorted beyond recognition.
Let’s begin at the end, as the film does, when a series of detonations leads to the collapse of downtown office buildings. It wouldn’t even be two years later that a terrorist cell would bring down the World Trade Center towers, those symbols of American financial might, and the motives of al-Qaeda and the film’s Project Mayhem are not that dissimilar. Both were attacking the soft centre of the United States as they understood it, except in Fight Club the idea was to raze the country and start over, because consumerism had anaesthetised it and hollowed out its soul.
Fight Club: Edward Norton in David Fincher’s 1999 film
The final image of two people holding hands as the Pixies’ Where Is My Mind? blares on the soundtrack could be seen as nihilistic, but it’s secretly thrilling to imagine the possibilities of starting over after a hard reboot. (It also helps to know that the explosions are about taking down institutions, not people, more The Weather Underground than Osama bin Laden.)
It all begins, as many terrible things do, with the pissy aggrievement of a young white male. Much like Ron Livingston in Office Space, another cult classic from the same year, Edward Norton’s unnamed narrator has tired of the deadening routines that define his life. The difference is that what’s bothering Norton isn’t cubicle culture alone but also his realisation that he’s a cog in a terrible corporate machine.
His day job is to calculate the necessity of automobile recalls under a formula: “Take the number of vehicles in the field A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don’t do one.”
Many of his later actions are explained by the emptiness of being defined by the things he buys – most famously, the Ikea catalogue that accounts for the interior of his apartment – but his work matters, too. He knows first-hand that capitalism will let people die if it’s better for the bottom line.
What are the Proud Boys if not a roving gang of Project Mayhem thugs? Or the tiki-torch-bearers of Charlottesville? Fight Club saw it coming
The Narrator’s need to feel something at all draws him first to terminal-disease support groups at the local Episcopal church and later to the anarchist philosophy of Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), who makes him feel the old-fashioned way – by punching him hard in the gut. The twist of Tyler’s true identity – fully earned, incidentally, by the many times Fincher hints at it – says a lot about the conversation the Narrator has with himself about what he thinks he needs and how it develops into a messianic vision that completely gets away from him. But those first punches are an expression of brute masculinity that hit him like a cold splash of water to the face. Men are simple creatures in that way.
As the fight clubs metastasise around the United States, Tyler’s prebrawl speeches shift from stating the rules to spouting off about his generation being “the middle children of history”, without a World War or a Great Depression to give it purpose. (“Our Great War is a spiritual war,” he says. “Our Great Depression is our lives.”) The implication is that all that masculine energy needs an outlet, and as Generation X hasn’t been provided with one, it will have to find some other way to channel its inchoate rage. And it’s here where the film’s meaning can get a little slippery: how much of what Tyler is saying is to be understood as nonsense? And if it’s not nonsense, then how much does the film implicitly endorse?
What we may be witnessing in not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of post-war history, but the end of history as such: that is, the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government. This is not to say that there will no longer be events to fill the pages of Foreign Affairs's yearly summaries of international relations, for the victory of liberalism has occurred primarily in the realm of ideas or consciousness and is as yet incomplete in the real or material world. But there are powerful reasons for believing that it is the ideal that will govern the material world in the long run...
Kojève sought to resurrect the Hegel of the Phenomenology of Mind, the Hegel who proclaimed history to be at an end in 1806. For as early as this Hegel saw in Napoleon's defeat of the Prussian monarchy at the Battle of Jena the victory of the ideals of the French Revolution, and the imminent universalization of the state incorporating the principles of liberty and equality. Kojève, far from rejecting Hegel in light of the turbulent events of the next century and a half, insisted that the latter had been essentially correct. The Battle of Jena marked the end of history because it was at that point that the vanguard of humanity (a term quite familiar to Marxists) actualized the principles of the French Revolution. While there was considerable work to be done after 1806 -- abolishing slavery and the slave trade, extending the franchise to workers, women, blacks, and other racial minorities, etc. -- the basic principles of the liberal democratic state could not be improved upon...
The state that emerges at the end of history is liberal insofar as it recognize and protects through a system of law man's universal right to freedom, and democratic insofar as it exists only with the consent of the governed. For Kojève, this so-called "universal homogenous state" found real-life embodiment in the countries of postwar Western Europe -- precisely those flabby, prosperous, self-satisfied, inward-looking, weak-willed states whose grandest project was nothing more heroic than the creation of the Common Market. But this was only to be expected. For human history and the conflict that characterized it was based on the existence of "contradictions": primitive man's quest for mutual recognition, the dialectic of the master and slave, the transformation and mastery of nature, the struggle for the universal recognition of rights, and the dichotomy between proletarian and capitalist. But in the universal homogenous state, all prior contradictions are resolved and all human needs are satisfied.
Fight Club: Brad Pitt in David Fincher’s 1999 film
The fact that the fight clubs lead into Project Mayhem, a full-on terrorist organisation, should lay the second question to rest. In his efforts to satisfy a personal need, the Narrator/Tyler has set off a bush fire that rages out of control, and he’s powerless to keep it from consuming the world. Working from Chuck Palahniuk’s novel, Fincher and his screenwriter, Jim Uhls, only identify with their hero(es) up to the point when the Narrator/Tyler still has some control over the situation.
The film does recognise a phenomenon where men are waking in anger from a culture intended to numb or emasculate them, but it also sees in that the presence of sickening misogyny and the potential for fascism. And, contrary to Ebert’s review, it panics right alongside the Narrator, who goes so far as to shoot himself in the head to stop it.
What Fight Club missed in 1999 – and comes oh so close to getting – is how much the rage it identifies is connected to white supremacy. But the world it anticipated is now upon us, with a host of Tyler Durdens marshalling attacks on perceived enemies and twisting the meaning of “snowflake”, a term used in Palahniuk’s book and popularised in the movie (“You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake”), to taunt the vulnerable. What are the Proud Boys if not a roving gang of Project Mayhem thugs? Or the tiki-torch-bearers of Charlottesville? Fight Club saw it coming, with thrilling vividness and wit and technical panache. Just don’t shoot the messenger.
Facebook's fight club: how the Proud Boys use the social media platform to vet their fighters: Want to join the far-right group the Proud Boys? Simply apply to your nearest regional vetting page on the world’s largest social network, Facebook. by Southern Poverty Law Center August 02, 2018
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[Rudy Giuliani] Hello! Hello, everyone! We’re here, just very briefly, to make a very important: two points: No. 1: Every single thing that has been outlined as the plan for today, is perfectly legal....SO LET’S HAVE TRIAL BY COMBAT!...hey picked states where they had crooked Democratic cities, where they could push everybody around, AND IT HAS TO BE VINDICATED TO SAVE OUR REPUBLIC. This is BIGGER THAN DONALD TRUMP! It is BIGGER than you and me....This has been a year in which they have invaded our freedom of speech, our freedom of religion, our freedom to move, our freedom to live, AND I’LL BE DARNED IF THEY’RE GONNA TAKE AWAY OUR FREE AND FAIR VOTE! AND WE’RE GOING TO FIGHT TO THE VERY END TO MAKE SURE THAT DOESN’T HAPPEN!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] HELLO, PATRIOTS! Hey, guys. You actually all did something, I didn’t realize was possible. I’m looking at the crowd here, and the tens of thousands – probably 100,000 plus people here – AND YOU DID IT ALL WITHOUT BURNING DOWN BUILDINGS? YOU DID IT WITHOUT RIPPING DOWN CHURCHES?! WITHOUT LOOTING?! I didn’t know that that was possible! According to the media, when you have a large gathering of peaceful protesters, they are supposed to burn it all down! [Crowd laughs] So guys, we can do it right....
So to those Republicans, many of which may be voting on things in the coming hours: you have an opportunity today. You can be a hero, or you can be a zero! And the choice is yours, but we are all watching! The whole world is watching, folks. Choose wisely, because if you just roll over, if you don’t fight in the face of glaring irregularities, and statistical impossibilities –
[Crowd] FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP! FIGHT FOR TRUMP!
[Donald Trump, Jr.] That’s right, guys! That’s the message! These guys better fight for Trump, because if they’re not, guess what? I’M GOING TO BE IN YOUR BACK YARD IN A COUPLE OF MONTHS. [Points] Guys like Scott, here. Look at – wow, okay, I can’t go through the whole list, because I don’t have 45 minutes to go through all the patriots that have been fighting, have been on the ground, that have mobilized to put good Republicans in those positions. GUESS WHAT, FOLKS? IF YOU’RE GOING TO BE THE ZERO, AND NOT THE HERO, WE’RE COMING FOR YOU, AND WE’RE GOING TO HAVE A GOOD TIME DOING IT!
WE’VE GOT TO START FIGHTING like the Democrats do. Right? We gotta play their game. We gotta take their fight to them their way...
SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!...SO STAY IN THIS FIGHT! STAY LOUD! DON’T BE SUPPRESSED! DON’T BE PUT IN YOUR CORNER! DON’T LET THEM CANCEL YOU!
[President Donald Trump] We’re going to have to fight much harder and Mike Pence is going to have to come through for us. If he doesn’t, that will be a sad day for our country because you’re sworn to uphold our constitution. Now it is up to Congress to confront this egregious assault on our democracy. After this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down. We’re going to walk down any one you want, but I think right here. We’re going walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators, and congressmen and women. We’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong...
The Republicans have to get tougher. You’re not going to have a Republican party if you don’t get tougher. They want to play so straight, they want to play so, “Sir, yes, the United States, the constitution doesn’t allow me to send them back to the States.” Well, I say, “Yes, it does because the constitution says you have to protect our country and you have to protect our constitution and you can’t vote on fraud,” and fraud breaks up everything, doesn’t it? When you catch somebody in a fraud, you’re allowed to go by very different rules. So I hope Mike has the courage to do what he has to do...
And we fight. We fight like Hell and if you don’t fight like Hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore...
So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we’re going to the Capitol and we’re going to try and give… The Democrats are hopeless. They’re never voting for anything, not even one vote. But we’re going to try and give our Republicans, the weak ones, because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.
The fraternal order of “Western chauvinists” received one of its biggest promotional boosts since its founding when Ethan Nordean — who goes by the nickname “Rufio Panman” — delivered a knockout blow to an antifascist protester in the streets of Portland, Oregon, at a rally on June 30.
Six of the Proud Boys’ largest private “vetting pages” on Facebook — groups where administrators review applicants for approval into a private chatroom where local chapters are organized — have experienced an explosion in recruits in the last 30 days since the melee in Portland, jumping nearly 70 percent according to the metrics Facebook makes public. This represents 823 potential new members (including international members).
These private vetting pages serve as ideological echo chambers and as spaces for planning and putting out calls for action, helping place Proud Boys on the ground. The Proud Boys once attempted to set up their own private web forum called the “Proud Boards” but it failed.
“Seeing that soy boy antifa scum get knocked the f--- out has been the highlight of my year. Ive [sic] watched it over and over,” wrote one new member in a vetting page on Facebook. “[If] you want to find out about the Proud Boys, looks [sic] at the dozens of videos of the Portland Rally when antifa attached the March and got streamrolled and some of them put in the hospital," wrote another member. "Here's a slogan for you, f--- around and find out."
“Our vetting page has 100 plus guys being vetted atm,” wrote a page administrator last week.
Nordean’s now viral punch was not the only violence that occurred during the rally that descended into a riot. Multiple gang beatings were caught on video and one person reportedly suffered a cranial hemorrhage.
Nor was Nordean’s brawling the first time a member of the Proud Boys publicly engaged in violence or made serious threats of violence to political enemies.
• In May, a Proud Boy appeared at the home of a video editor in an effort to intimidate him. The video editor had published videos lampooning the group and its founder, Gavin McInnes. • On June 3, Donovan Flippo, a Proud Boy, and Allen Puckett of the rabidly anti-LGBT Hells Shaking Street Preachers, were filmed attacking a man outside of a parking garage. • On June 8, Tusitala “Tiny” Toese, a Proud Boy and muscle for U.S. Senate candidate Joey Gibson of another far-right group Patriot Prayer, emerged from a group of men in a truck who were shouting “support Trump build the wall!” and punched a man in the face, according to the victim. • After the Portland riot on June 30, a freelance journalist was threatened on Twitter by a Proud Boys who wrote “We aren’t going to let you lie about us anymore and we are going to beat the ever living shit out of every single one of your douche-bag comrades who assaults us from now on.”
Fighting is part of the group’s DNA, which reserves the “fourth degree” of its membership to those who engage in street brawls with antifascists. McInnes, no stranger to physical altercations, uses his podcast to gin up rage about “antifa” and muse about violence.
“[O]ur adversaries want to not silence speech, [but] kill the person talking," McInnes said in a recent episode discussing the far-right free speech martyr Tommy Robinson. "And that will be a huge victory for them. So the reaction has been very good on our side of things. We’ve said ‘no you’re not going to kill Tommy - we’re going to kill you! We’re going to fight back!’"
Recruiting, planning on Facebook
This escalating rhetoric should be a concern for Facebook. While Twitter has received significant criticism for verifying Proud Boys accounts, it’s Facebook that appears to provide the recruitment machinery for the group. Nordean, for example, is a member of the “Northwest PB Vetting Page and Trans Positive Safe Space” private group on Facebook. In the past 30 days Nordean’s group has posted 603 times and added 190 new members.
In April, Facebook released its formerly internal Community Standards in an effort to reassure its users and the public that the company was committed to creating a safe social media platform.
In a section titled “Credible Violence” the company outlines its goal to “prevent potential real-world harm that may be related to content on Facebook.” There are subsections on “Promoting or Publicizing Crime,” and “Coordinating Harm,” which state that Facebook “prohibits people from facilitating or coordinating future criminal activity that is intended or likely to cause harm to people, businesses, or animals.”
In a recent interview with Recode, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg reiterated the company’s hard line on content and users that promote violence.
The principles that we have on what we remove from the service are: If it’s going to result in real harm, real physical harm, or if you’re attacking individuals, then that content shouldn’t be on the platform.
Asked for comment, Facebook responded that Nordean's private vetting group did not violate its community standards. "In evaluating content, we look closely at context. In deciding whether to remove or leave up references to violence, we look at numerous factors, such as the source, the specific speech in question, the target, and other considerations." The company added:
We are always thinking about how we can improve our policies and be more nuanced with our enforcement. When it comes to enforcement of our Community Standards against Pages, for example, we hold both Pages and Page admins responsible for the content they post. Similarly, we recently introduced nuance into our Groups enforcement policies – now, in determining whether a Group violates, we don’t just look at the content posted to the Group; we take additional signals into account when determining if an entire Group violates. For example, if a group admin is involved in the violating behavior, that will serve as a strong signal that the group's motivation is hateful/incendiary.
More violence in Portland?
In the view of the Proud Boys, the violence they inflict is a defensive measure against violent counter protesters and without a doubt, counter protestors have also engaged in violence.
But reporters who’ve covered their rallies have documented how weak this argument is. It is clear that the Proud Boys show up to fight. As Hatewatch correspondent David Neiwert wrote recently for The Baffler:
Listening to them bait the counter-protesters with ugly speech, and talk among themselves about fighting tactics, it was clear the “free speech” they wanted to defend was bigoted and threatening. The lofty constitutional principles were little more than a pretext: they were there mostly to bash some “leftist” heads. That was plain enough in the Facebook posts promoting the latest Patriot Prayer rally, which warned in faux-biblical cadences that “the liberal-occupied streets of Portland will be CLEANSED. “Recourse will be swift,” it went on to intone, “for those who wish to oppress our freedoms . . . And the hands of Justice shall smite them with a vengeance heretofore to these ne’er-do-wells.” And if this were somehow less than clear, another post advertised a $25 T-shirt bearing the legend “Better Dead Than Red,” with a headstone reading “RIP Rose City Antifa,” above a #LetthePatriotGamesBegin hashtag.
The Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer are planning another rally for Saturday, August 4 in Portland and the groups are again ramping up their violent rhetoric on Facebook. “WE’RE READY FOR COMBAT AND ANYBODY WHO CHALLENGES US IS GONNA GET IT,” reads a comment on Patriot Prayer’s private Facebook page. “Wear Kevlar and conceal carry for those licensed to do so,” reads another.
All the details for the rally can also be found on Facebook, the same company whose new mission it is “to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together.”
Why Arrest Warrants Should Issue for Trump, Don Jr., Rudy & Others for the Jan. 6 US Capitol Riot by Glenn Kirschner Jan 11, 2021
Donald Trump and others encouraged, instigated and incited the riot at the US Capitol on January 6. Worse yet, Trump made sure there were no executive branch law enforcement resources deployed to protect those in the Capitol building (given that the US Capitol Police are an agency controlled by Congress, not the executive branch). Trump, Don Jr., Rudy Giuliani and others incited the crowd to march on and, in a very real sense, attack, the US Capitol, putting EVERYONE in the building - janitorial staff, administrative staff, members of Congress and even Vice President Pence - at imminent risk of serious injury or worse.
There generally are three ways to initiate a criminal case: a probable cause arrest, an arrest warrant and/or a grand jury indictment. Here's an explanation of the difference among the three and why an arrest warrant is the best approach at this moment in time for Trump and the others.
