Forum Post: Right-nut funding networks conspiracy thwarts American prosperity
Posted 7 years ago on May 17, 2017, 9:25 a.m. EST by gsw
(3420)
from Woodbridge Township, NJ
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
Additional info.... http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/41206-misinforming-the-majority-a-deliberate-strategy-of-right-wing-libertarians update 7/17 Milton Friedman was a kindred spirit to James McGill Buchanan in terms of a philosophy of deconstruction of the government. (Photo: Wikipedia)
When and how were the seeds sown for the modern far-right's takeover of American politics? Nancy MacLean reveals the deep and troubling roots of this secretive political establishment -- and its decades-long plan to change the rules of democratic governance -- in her new book, Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan for America. Get your copy by making a donation to Truthout now!
Many individuals who follow politics and journalists think that the right-wing playbook began with the Koch brothers. However, in her groundbreaking book, Nancy MacLean traces their political strategy to a Southern economist who created the foundation for today's libertarian oligarchy in the 1950s.
We need an anti oligarch party. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gop-tax-plan-who-matters_us_59fc8ed4e4b0b0c7fa39d222
Shaft us harder please, bastard nutters The GOP Tax Plan Tells Us Everything About Who Matters In American Democracy
There's no honesty or sincerity in them or their neo liberal allies in the Dem party.
The Implosion of Western Liberalism written by Patrick Lee Miller
http://quillette.com/2017/11/05/implosion-western-liberalism/
Recomended reading to all
They need more breaks? https://inequality.org/great-divide/trouble-offshore-paradise/
Thievery at ballot box America https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/08/donald-trump-illegitimate-president-rebecca-solnit
Truth in the Age of Trump ....another good read , excerpt ....."
Is it good to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants? Is it good to freeze the immigration of all Muslims? Is it good for police to return to racial profiling? Trump thinks so. Do you? If not, what response could Protagoras offer here? None. You have your notion of the good, Trump and his followers have theirs. There is nothing else to say. His racism should scare us, as should his sexism. His ruthless business record, which is also a history of bankruptcy, hardly makes us feel more secure at the prospect of such a person occupying the most powerful office on earth. There are many reasons to fear the presidency of someone like that. But above all, we should worry about the tyrannical contempt of truth Trump embodies. For even with his loss and disappearance from the national scene, his damage will endure. His supporters will merely turn to another—surely less clownish—avatar of their tyrannical fantasies. And that's what should really scare us. Trump will fade, but his contempt will remain.
This contempt is like a weed, one that has been growing for years in the corners of our national lot. Trump was not the plant, he was merely its yellow flower. At first he was pleasing to many, people who found him comical in the spring of his candidacy. With time, though, the yellow flower became windborne seeds. Next season is what concerns us now, expecting that these seeds will take root over the rest of the lot. In the meantime, then, let us consider the weed. It toils, it spins, and has many roots: in racism, sexism, and unregulated capitalism to name a few. But if the contempt of truth, allied with tyrannical fantasies, is indeed where it goes deepest, to understand it best we should follow it all the way down to that dark depth. The quickest route is to follow the story of Trump University
.....
From classical philosophy PH.D. http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2016/11/truth-in-the-age-of-trump.html
''Dark Money - by Jane Mayer'' ...
radix omnium malorum est cupiditas ...
''Talent Market: The Libertarian Headhunting Firm Serving the Koch Network and the Bradley Foundation'', by David Armiak:
''How the Koch-Backed Effort to Privatize the Veterans Health Administration Jeopardizes Everyone's Health Care Future'', by Candice Bernd:
caveat emptor ..
Koch conspiracy to privatize k12 schools .... https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/30/kochs-public-schools-shakeup-244259
While the Koch network has long been involved in school choice battles, the push by Libre represents a new front in the fight by targeting Hispanic families — and a recognition that with Congress gridlocked, it’s on the ground at the state level where the network can disrupt the educational status quo. The Koch message on schools is shared by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, a longtime ally.
“Across the [Koch] network, there’s a greater commitment to advancing this because we do see it as critical to advancing a " neoliberal con red state nirvana of stupidity in public policy governed by more money for the 1 percent
''Betsy DeVos's Vision Goes Way Beyond Privatizing Education -- and She Is Alarmingly Close to Realizing It'', by Jennifer Berkshire:
How long can USA's 99% stay in the dark about just WTF is going on around them in Trump's America?!
And btw ''By now you may have heard about how Google launched a new algorithm designed to combat fake news. Then came the shocker .. Google targeted AlterNet as fake news, as well as dozens of other progressive news sites. Almost overnight, we lost roughly 1.2 million readers. A giant conglomerate with no journalists or editors is deciding what you should read, watch and hear. If Not Stopped ... Google will become an ever-tightening “information noose” for independent media and alternative voices.'' Also fyi...
''The Silencing of the Left'', by Chris Hedges and Robert Scheer: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48121.htm (Video) & see:
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/american-oligarchs-plotting-biggest-heist-u-s-history/ by R.Reich
fiat lux ...
OUTRAGEOUS FACTS in this Expose "The Bradley Foundation, organized as a tax-exempt “charitable” foundation under 501(c)(3) of the tax code, appears to be pursuing a highly partisan game plan: funding an “infrastructure” on the right that benefits the Republican Party," They should not only be taxed, but exposed. THE Founders revolted for such .... Not paying taxes, and then ...."American Majority says on its website that it has trained 38,000 people. The Bradley files describe its electoral activities in Wisconsin: “American Majority’s purpose is to train citizens and grassroots activists in the rules and methods necessary to run a successful political campaign.” “American Majority has trained 3,853 pro-freedom individuals at more than 100 training events. 208 trained candidates have run for state or local office, 181 advanced out of their primaries to the general election. 104 went on to win their elections. These include state legislators, 45 county board supervisors, 27 municipal office holders, 22 school board members and 5 judges.” “In the spring 2014 election American Majority trained New Leaders flipped the Menomonee Falls Village Board and the Kenosha School Board” (American Majority, Grant Proposal Record, 8/19/2014).
In its IRS filings, the group identifies itself as “nonpartisan,” but the institute was set up by Republicans to train Republicans.
“The Bradley Foundation’s limitless resources finance the Republican Party of Wisconsin’s shadow campaign operation at all levels,” said Scot Ross, Executive Director of One Wisconsin Now, which has long tracked the activities of the Bradley Foundation, especially in the education area."
''ALEC's Corporate Sponsors Top Nation's Lawbreaker List'', by Don Wiener:
This ^link^ is posted in compliment to your excerpt .. about The Bradley Foundation, immediately above.
e tenebris, lux ...
''Donors Trust''? I ask mainly because your link wouldn't open for me. Ergo fyi:
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/DonorsTrust & also fyi - please see this alarming article:
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/07/the-great-british-brexit-robbery-hijacked-democracy by Carole Cadwalladr
e tenebris ...
Yes,..... " Thirty gigabytes of Bradley Foundation internal documents hacked by a group named Anonymous Poland reveal that after a $200 million influx of cash in late 2012 from the trust of Caroline Bradley, Lynde’s wife, the Bradley Foundation geared up to fund networks of conservative think tanks, legal centers, candidate recruitment organizations, media outlets and advocacy groups in 13 states, based on the foundation’s successful efforts in Wisconsin. The foundation had already laid the groundwork for a welfare-to-work program and a private school voucher system and defended GOP Gov. Scott Walker in a campaign finance probe, helping him survive a recall election prompted by his dismantling of public-sector unions."
With $845 million in assets at the end of 2015, the Bradley Foundation rivals the several Koch family foundations in size and in grants disbursed. That year, the Bradley Foundation gave out nearly $49 million in gifts and grants, while four Koch foundations and the nonprofit Charles Koch Institute donated close to $58 million. Both families give to many of the same national conservative organizations, including the corporate bill mill the American Legislative Exchange Council and right-wing think tanks the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, as well as to several additional think tanks that the Kochs founded such as the libertarian Cato Institute and the George Mason University-based Mercatus Center. From 2011 to 2015, the Bradley Foundation has given $550,000 to the Kochs’ Americans for Prosperity Foundation, the sister group of the brothers’ most well-known political nonprofit, Americans for Prosperity.
Both families also contribute huge amounts to higher education, often donating funds to support libertarian economics professors and academic centers devoted to free market economics. The Charles Koch Foundation is a profound donor to colleges and universities, having dished out hundreds of millions of dollars to higher ed programs that advance the Kochs’ laissez-faire economic ideology. Likewise, the Bradley Foundation has devoted well over $100 million toward like-minded professors, programs and graduate fellowships at universities, including $13.7 million to Marquette University and $9.2 million to Harvard University from 1986 to 2013, according to ConservativeTransparency.org.
Documents reveal a powerful, secretive foundation’s blueprint for spreading right-wing ideology, state by state Meet the Bradley Foundation, giving the Koch brothers a run for their money. ALEX KOTCH, ALTERNET SKIP TO COMMENTS
The Bradleys, Kochs, Waltons, Trumps & a whole bunch of others, prove - as if proof was required, that U$A is no longer a democracy! Thanx for copying that link. It is an important .. if disturbing link. Also fyi:
caveat ...
''A Despot in Disguise: One Man's Mission to Rip Up Democracy'' more on James McGill Buchanan
multum in parvo ...
Seems we have an oligarchy, as evidenced by Trump, being our chief and commander. Ironic sad
New investigations by Daniel Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Mary Bottari of the Center for Media and Democracy analyze hacked internal documents, which reveal that much like the Koch network, the Bradley Foundation has launched a national strategy to help conservatives control the branches of state governments and alter state policy to lower taxes, shrink government and attack labor unions. The Bradley Foundation, which has historically supported taxpayer-funded “school choice” initiatives and work requirements for welfare recipients, is named after Lynde and Harry Bradley, two brothers who founded the profitable factory automation manufacturer Allen Bradley Co. After Lynde’s death in 1942, the Allen-Bradley Foundation was established. When Allen Bradley was sold to Rockwell International in 1985 for $1.7 billion, the foundation’s assets ballooned and it became the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation as it added a focus on promoting the brothers’ conservative ideology on a national scale. Thirty gigabytes of Bradley Foundation internal documents hacked by a group named Anonymous Poland reveal that after a $200 million influx of cash in late 2012 from the trust of Caroline Bradley, Lynde’s wife, the Bradley Foundation geared up to fund networks of conservative think tanks, legal centers, candidate recruitment organizations, media outlets and advocacy groups in 13 states, based on the foundation’s successful efforts in Wisconsin. The foundation had already laid the groundwork for a welfare-to-work program and a private school voucher system and defended GOP Gov. Scott Walker in a campaign finance probe, helping him survive a recall election prompted by his dismantling of public-sector unions.
Maybe always usa was always oligarchy....from article "Through the network of think tanks that Koch and other billionaires have sponsored, through their transformation of the Republican party, and the hundreds of millions they have poured into state congressional and judicial races, through the mass colonisation of Trump's administration by members of this network and lethally effective campaigns against everything from public health to action on climate change, it would be fair to say that Buchanan's vision is maturing in the US.
But not just there. Reading this book felt like a demisting of the window through which I see British politics. The bonfire of regulations highlighted by the Grenfell Tower disaster, the destruction of state architecture through austerity, the budgeting rules, the dismantling of public services, tuition fees and the control of schools: all these measures follow Buchanan's program to the letter. I wonder how many people are aware that David Cameron's free schools project stands in a tradition designed to hamper racial desegregation in the American south.
In one respect, Buchanan was right: there is an inherent conflict between what he called "economic freedom" and political liberty. Complete freedom for billionaires means poverty, insecurity, pollution and collapsing public services for everyone else. Because we will not vote for this, it can be delivered only through deception"
In a country with rampant obesity, the people choose to blindly drink kook aid. Pass the rose colored glasses
It’s not news to most people that the US is no longer a true Democracy. Gilens and Page proved it in 2014, using hard data. More recently, the Economist’s Democracy Index, dropped the US down to a “flawed democracy,” in 2016, and when the firmly neoliberal Economist thinks you have issues with freedom – you’ve got issues.
It’s one thing to lose our freedoms; it’s quite another to lose them to a collection of anti-science whack jobs straight out of the middle ages.
And of course, with Herr Trump doing his best to neutralize the already eviscerated press, scare the hell out of us, keep us distracted from real issues, and govern by tweets, things have only gotten worse.
"It’s one thing to lose our freedoms; it’s quite another to lose them to a collection of anti-science whack jobs straight out of the middle ages." What’s not as well understood is precisely how a right wing de facto coup caused the US to move from a democracy to an oligarchy, and how the inmates took over the revolt.
Trump, of course, has added a whole new dimension to the coup. No longer are we simply living in an oligarchy, we’ve become a nation suffering from full on psychosis, and Trump is the logical endpoint of the coup’s reliance on fear, distraction, hate, anger and xenophobia. What makes it possible for an abomination like Trump to gain power is that the institutions we used to rely upon to confront the oligarchy have been taken over by it in the last four decades. Two in particular have contributed to the tragedy that is Trump.
A press that fails to hold anyone accountable
Day-after-day, complete insanity is passed off as an “alternative viewpoint” by the mainstream media. Case in point: the Republican’s claim that their tax “reform” is good for the middle class. In reality, it’s simply another reincarnation of the same old tax-cuts-for-the-rich scheme they’ve been pushing since Reagan. And while the MSM quotes institutions like the Tax Policy Center to show that nearly 80 percent of the benefits go to the uber rich, and point out that these cuts are funded by gutting programs that benefit the middle class and working poor, most of the press still acts as if this were some debate between two legitimate perspectives. It’s not. Their assertions about their budget and tax programs are bald-faced lies, knowingly told, and meant to hide the fact that they are paid servants of the oligarchy. And that’s the real story here. But you won’t hear that.
And now Trump. Sure, the entire Party has been lying for decades, but at least it followed a plan (laid out by James Powell in 1971) with a purpose—to serve the oligarchy that provides campaign funds. But now, their leader —our President—is a pathological liar, who lies randomly and with no purpose. Yet still, the press treats his inchoate ramblings as if they were “another perspective.” Not only are his rants not “another perspective” they are idiotic and dangerous and so obviously unhinged that his own people refer to him as a “fucking moron” and try to contain his tsunami of idiocy as the nation drifts into disaster on all fronts.
He has taken us closer to a nuclear confrontation than at any time since the Cuban missile crisis. He has sabotaged the Affordable Care Act, raising health care costs and risking the health of millions. He has taken us out of the Paris Climate Agreement at a time when redord-breaking fires and hurricanes are ripping across our continent and the world, and temperature records are falling like autumn leaves. He has undermined scientific research and belief in the scientific method. He is scuttling the Iran agreement, risking the rise of yet another hostile nuclear power. He has botched the Puerto Rican rescue, leaving millions without power, water, and food. He has demonstrated that he knows nothing about how laws are made … or any other of the skills and knowledge required to run government. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/10/19/how-deranged-took-over-america
Firstly, the Inbreds killed the Defined Benefits retirement plans after the high inflations of the 1970's because the corporations hated to come up with the additional money for their retirees. Secondly, in order to secure the legal passage for Novus Ordo Seclorum, they argued that the unwashed masses should enjoy the benefits of the 401(k)'s Voluntary Defined Contribution retirement plans hitherto reserved for corporate executives. That was a largely "do it on your own" Taxass retirement plan. Thirdly, Much is wiped out for the many non-astute too-busy working stiffs after the 2007-2011 Crash. Everyone was "entitled" to the Same musical chair when the music was stopped. Were you in the stocks?
Fourthly, in order to secure tax relief for the Wealthy and resist the rebuilding of retirement funds, the Inbreds of Zombia are coming for the 401(k) Taxass catchup savers: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/20/us/politics/republicans-tax-401-k.html
Trumpery: White is the new Orange, of Warthoggia. Inbreds: White is the new Black, of Zombia.
Both the Inbreds and Trump are Pubic-Relations CONservationists. Look at how well Puerto Rico (Arapian Golf's "Rich Port" in the middle of the very bigly Spanish Ocean) has been CONserved -- A-10. Spanish Fluß!
The ''Bradley Foundation'' warrants real research ... especially by me, who didn't know about them before your info! Thanx gsw & fyi:
fiat justitia ...
People better prepare for economic collapse if these tax cuts for the rich are instituted. It is so dramatic, and painful karma for our idiocy as Americans, when we let republicans captain the ship.
Here is how the Republican Party has conned America for over 30 years Thom Hartmann, AlterNet THOM HARTMANN, ALTERNET 01 OCT 2017 AT 07:48 ET
https://www.rawstory.com/2017/10/here-is-how-the-republican-party-has-conned-america-for-over-30-years/
PLease pass more evidence for above supposition, http://www.businessinsider.com/imf-makes-unusual-call-for-higher-taxation-on-rich-2017-10
''Cambridge Analytica used data from Facebook and Politico to help Trump'' - by Stephanie Kirchgaessner:
''Speech by company executive contradicts denial by Trump campaign that claimed the company used its own data and Facebook data to help the campaign.'' Also fyi, 10 years after start of GFC, consider...
https://archive.org/details/TheNewKleptocracyMichaelHudson159 & in support of your link, see ...
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/aug/27/should-the-rich-be-taxed-more-a-new-paper-shows-unequivocally-yes by Larry Elliott
fiat lux ...
Thom Hartmann is another warrior for USA's 99%. Thanx for the excellent link. Tho of course I know about Arthur Laffer & b-s ''curve'' - I'd never heard of Jude Wanniski! I recommend your link to all who may read here ... [ https://www.rawstory.com/2017/10/here-is-how-the-republican-party-has-conned-america-for-over-30-years/ ] and in compliment, again link to Dr. Michael Hudson and..
TH in this xcllnt video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3venGfxU10 and then pls consider:
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/42143-let-s-stop-the-gop-s-biggest-grift-of-all and finally see:
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/42172-the-very-rich-will-benefit-trump-s-proposed-tax-plan-makes-it-clear
e tenebris, lux ...
Robert Reich: The Resistance Report https://youtu.be/okDWOmJGEfw
It is nice to have evidence and reason on your side. Now to get enough of the awareness of the facts. PBS News Hour last night 10/10 had segment on right wing control of local news stations throughout the country, interspersed with propaganda and talking points of the owners, exact wordings and political slant common language on local broadcasts throughout the nation. Zombies for Trump and FRiends are really sure of there cause on faith and belief of superior cultural heritage.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/10/11/republican-tax-cut-for-rich-economy-215696
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NGO772ZhuhU PBS minute 41 to view News Hour Info.....
It is REALLY Nice - when you have evidence and offer it up - that people are not too stupid to look at it for themselves. Many in this country have no idea what is what or who is screwing them over (for decades now) - the worst have got to be in the red states where the public keeps putting the assholes that are shoving the general population's face in the mud back into office time after time as those assholes continue to do their best to cut the throats of those in the general population that just think that their representatives could walk on water (I'm pretty sure that that belief is literal for many of those).
One thing I got to say about Drumpf as president (truly insane) - it does seem to have woken many to look at their representatives and what they are trying to push through government and has em saying HELL NO. One hopes this trend continues to grow!
Well, nos need to read or think for themselves, jus pray for rapture, & God will take care of all, and themes 2nd mendment will see it shor will come jus as night follow day, don f with their her-it age, bro, they goin strat to heaven an we be the devil libturd
Now don take offens a la critique a la fe, yo have mucho la familia q le goin to la other side abov a be wit de lord nows soon be, an la life Es muy hard as is, I knows some even dos truly kill self to rive ther a bit early is possible, the time is so hard, ands they so so sad, evens leaves this life an the lil babes they leave, is very sad for young mom, of theirs as to pass on sooner be wit the lord, de times is so sad an hard for many, is dam hard to get the mind to understand wa is not in that good book you preacher be tellin bout...
Is very sad tru life of young famili
My heart truly breaks for the evil that has come to earth and allowed to thrive in name of religion, and justified by faith in old cultural historical heritage, and the people are just so befuddled they will tolerate a tyrant
Example of red state education as spoken by a valedictorian (sorry I meant VailDickToreyAnn) of ol mis?
Maybe ows needs to establish a religious nonprofit church with some economic justice and universal income and healthcare as spoke in the true gospels, that can make the messages more clear for the modern age
Would be funny to see someone posting on Evangelical web sites - biblical quotes and how the evangelicals are dead set against God's wishes - by showing real life examples of how they operate in direct opposition.
2nd!
''It's Time to Restore and Strengthen the Voting Rights Act'', by Tamara Power-Drutis:
respice, adspice, prospice ...
''The Corruption of the Law'', by Chris Hedges:
''Our constitutional rights have steadily been stripped from us by judicial fiat. The Fourth Amendment reads: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” Yet our telephone calls and texts, emails and financial, judicial and medical records, along with every website we visit and our physical travels, can be and commonly are tracked, recorded, photographed and stored in government computer banks.
''The executive branch can order the assassination of U.S. citizens without trial. It can deploy the military into the streets to quell civil unrest under Section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and seize citizens—seizures that are in essence acts of extraordinary rendition—and hold them indefinitely in military detention centers while denying them due process.
''Corporate campaign contributions, which largely determine who gets elected, are viewed by the courts as protected forms of free speech under the First Amendment. Corporate lobbying, which determines most of our legislation, is interpreted as the people’s right to petition the government. Corporations are legally treated as persons except when they carry out fraud and other crimes; the heads of corporations routinely avoid being charged and going to prison by paying fines, usually symbolic and pulled from corporate accounts, while not being forced to admit wrongdoing. And corporations have rewritten the law to orchestrate a massive tax boycott.''
fiat justitia ruat caelum ...
Tho' for OWS, Chris Hedges can get it .. VERY wrong some times!
Resisting any Alt Right, Nazi, KKK types is NEVER...ever - wrong!
verb. sat. sap. ...
ok true but the violence of any antifa resistance does not help would you agree
Faced with AltRight, KKK, Nazis ... there is NO option but to confront and resist them .. by ANY means necessary! These people must NEVER be allowed to assemble & organize in the streets, without active resistance!! Adolph Hitler knew this very well and said - that IF the early Nazis & SA had been beaten in The Streets .. the Nazis would not have succeeded!!! I see NO moral or any kind of equivalence between AltRight Nazi Scum and the people standing up to them.A few angry anarchist balaclava'ed Black Block types up for a ruck, are peripheral and I have little criticism of them either because I fkn hate Nazis! Mitt Romney was right on this matter too btw. Finally fyi - I'll spare you any of the videos of RWNJs violently attacking those out to protest their hate b-s & simply limit myself to the article by Jason Wilson, below:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/16/charlottesville-violence-right-left-trump &
re.Mitt Romney, consider: http://time.com/4906768/read-mitt-romneys-trump-charlottesville/
& his full statement here: https://www.facebook.com/mittromney/posts/10154652303536121
He's a RW Billionaire Oligarch for sure but even broken clocks get to be correct twice a day. No body is either perfect or infallible but sadly Chris Hedges got it spectacularly wrong on this one but won't retract!
AltRight, KKK Nazi scum went to Charlottesville with violent intent & with a TikiTorch Parade redolent of Nuremburg 1938 & any number of KKK rallies & lynchings.I've ZERO tolerance for such people.Their 1A ''Right'' also comes with Responsibilities but they'll never understand that & there's NO duty to give them either succour or platform. Do not ever fall for US MSM's utterly false and self-serving ''AltLeft'' horseshit!
The real, activist ''Left'' in U$A is tiny but sadly - there are far more KKK mthrfkrs than you'd believe, tbh! Finally,"the violence of any antifa resistance" is tiny & reactive. Amplifying it is RW MSM's job.To resist these Nazis & RW MSM; is our job. Fence sitting will only give us Nazi ''Alt-Piles"; NOT an option, imo!
ad iudicium ...
yes yes yes i am not a pacifist but using violence doesn't help our cause seems to me. no disagreement about the alt right and the fake alt left - that is not my point. mlk was right in letting the world see the dogs and hoses of bull connor without fighting back. the question is how the whole thing is being viewed by those who we must reach. showing the violence of the right will do that - not showing violence on both sides. the picture of the black women leading the poor frightened kkk man out of harms way is what we need to show.
Faced with KKK, Nazi, AltRight, Fascist Goons; those who are "using violence"; mostly in self-defence, will always be vilified and misrepresented by a Corporate MSM, wholly owned by a militaristic Oligarchy that fears AntiFa much more than it condemns Fascists! We can't help how it looks or "is being viewed" by conservative viewers but I get what U say.Further to my links above, please consider this excellent 2 part video report from DemocracyNow! ...
P1/2: https://www.democracynow.org/2017/8/16/antifa_a_look_at_the_antifascist
& then P2/2 - https://www.democracynow.org/2017/8/16/part_2_antifa_a_look_at
Finally,this rare OWS groove: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d90SOX1Yb9A and...
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/17/fascism-history-united-states
ipsa scientia potestas est ...
i watch amy every morning 8-9 so i saw those live. she is very good. as i said i am mainly concerned with how it looks to those we need to reach. those who are on our side but don't always know it or speak out. we have the majority for sure on almost every issue but have to create the public pressure that makes the political system react. i saw it first hand in the early 60's on tv and through the reaction of the adults around me. they were not racists at all - far from it but seemed to accept the status quo for black people. but not when they were getting beaten for marching peacefully. that was too much to see on tv.
as an aside mayda is a russian jew - had a single grandmother who agitated for unions and more. saw her picture in a pbs doc about the movement for unions in the 20's and 30's. a number of her mother's friends fought in spain against franco. those people knew about nazis. very interesting to hear their stories and what they think now
When U refer to The Optics ... of course it has value but sometimes .. as mayda's clearly indomitable Grandmother & her mom's friends knew, U have break a few eggs IF omelettes are ever to be on the menu!
http://occupywallst.org/forum/occupy-wall-street-hall-of-famehonor-roll-thus-far/#comment-1073784
and consider "The Trump Tax Hoax" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3venGfxU10
e tenebris, lux ...
''Kansas' .. Kris Kobach Confirms He is a Paid Columnist For Breitbart'' - by Joe DePaolo:
https://www.mediaite.com/online/kansas-secretary-of-state-kris-kobach-confirms-he-is-a-paid-columnist-for-breitbart/ &..
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/sep/1/kris-kobach-donald-trump-needs-to-end-daca-now-or-/ by Sally Persons
Kansas' Kris KKKobach is a very dangerous Xtrm-RW, GOP p-o-s! Also fyi: http://convergence2017.org/
caveat ...
''Bannon's Ouster Welcomed but Much Bigger Problem Remains in White House: Trump!'', by Jake Johnson:
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/08/18/bannons-ouster-welcomed-much-bigger-problem-remains-white-house-trump &
as https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/08/20/trump-fires-bannon-who-are-winners-and-losers-globally ? by Juan Cole
spero meliora ...
You know what is frighteningly interesting about that? Red states have been fucking with the education system for decades - result = southern companies have been hiring from non-red-states for decades - because of the educational gap = red state population raised to be idiots to support those with their feet on their necks = astonishingly successful program of raising idiots who will believe anything republicans tell them even though if reality were checked (simple as looking at who introduced legislation and then voted for it) it would show those republicans in office as blatant liars and the cause of the working class's ills - most especially in red states ! But - insanity still rules the republican supporters - they still think that Drumpf is draining the swamp instead of expanding it - How Delusional Is THAT ?
Racism, sexism, xenophobia and homophobia win the hearts and "minds" of the imbeciles of the conservative base.
The cannival will go on. Young people, old people, even babies are all eating 'dog meat'. It's tradition.