Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCrABvZy8uc

From Facebook, I'm friends with a black man who lives in a small town in NC. The guy is a 20 year army vet. A professor at a small college. He runs a farm. I know him because he is one of the most popular story tellers in the country right now. He has 5 kids.

He drives past lots of homes with Confederate Battle Flags. End of the day, the people at UVA last weekend could stay safe by avoiding the rabble. GGG next week in Boston, I'm betting he'll be okay.

But my friend in Bumfuck NC, and his kids? I'm not sure I can promise him he shouldn't worry about Nazis. And I'm 100% sure he isn't looking at the threat as an opportunity to laugh at the ignorance of the Nazis.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

HBO's Vice News had a remarkable piece last night on Charlottesville. It was mostly from the standpoint of interviewing the pro-Nazi supremacists.

After watching it, I came to the dismal conclusion that the Nazi thugs would view the video and say "Yes! That's who we are!"

And the people who stood up to these pigs would watch the video and say "Yes! That's who they are!"

The video is here:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...1NSdc9lZnJrDdg

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

I think this credits him with thinking deeply enough to have a vision. The description you offer is deadly accurate, but it's the Bannon wing of his administration's view, not his own personal view. I still think, based on what I've seen, his personal views are non-existent. The man cares about nothing beyond winning whatever zero sum game in which he's engaged.

His criticism of the Nazis at Charlottesville was forced not because it's contrary to his personal beliefs, but because it's a capitulation. In that moment, the "Left Wing Media" was forcing him to say something. Forcing Donald Trump to do anything is beating him -- it's him losing. And he hates losing. (Dumb fucker still has no clue that, had he given a strong speech about Charlottesville a few days earlier, properly condemning Nazis, he'd be "winning" in the meta debate with the media.)

Squaring equality and limited govt is a tricky thing when you expand "the promise of the Fourteenth Amendment." Affirmative Action and anti-discrimination laws are fine. But where does that "promise" end? The friction is between those who see it as a limited thing, and those who think it should apply more widely, with a govt not only redressing the effects of slavery and Jim Crow, but also using all sorts of policies to effect desired social behaviors.

The country owes a debt to those it enslaved. Nobody argues that. But under this umbrella, how much license is given for the country to tell businesses how they must act in regard to numerous other minorities who were not enslaved? We've expanded the "promise" you note to a degree a lot of Republicans feel goes far beyond what is prudent.

I don't know where the line ought to be. I don't think anyone does. And I think it changes all the time, making this subject all the more difficult.

Privately, a great many are following a simpler logic: Get as much as you can while you can, and find a way to protect it. A lot of Democrats are following the same plan. This is understandable in an environment where there's so much potential volatility lurking in so many corners. At core, it's always the lizard brain at work. And the lizard brain's only real concern is survival and lifestyle protection (Read: Money).

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

You know that they hate those people regardless, right? Like, who among them is losing in competition with Jews, for example?

Yes, let's substitute one inaccurate scapegoat for another. It will totally work.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

Yes and no. It was forced because he knows what he's trying to communicate. He originally condemned violence "from all sides" because he knew that his Nazi backers would hear it as a condemnation of the antifa. He waited two days to condemn them because he knew they would read it as forced and insincere. He re-tweeted a Nazi and a train running someone over this morning because he knows it will communicate his support to them. They got the message.

I don't know or care whether he does that because he personally agrees with them. He's doing to to keep their support and that's bad enough.

Lots of people do in fact argue that.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

All of us are too quick to see him as a calculating salesman who doesn't have beliefs, when some of his beliefs are right out there. He kept hammering on the birther thing even when it made him a laughingstock. He thinks the Central Park Five should have been put to death and won't accept that they're innocent. His narcissism and insecurity play a bigger role in motivating him in the moment, but still.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

He urged everyone to respect our history. That was a white supremacist dog whistle.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

Yes, that too. I should have included it.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

Hey, we should get together when you're here! Pick a day and place.

You do realize Boston is the next gathering place for the Nazis this Saturday, and that our holocaust memorial was vandalized yesterday, and there have been a couple of harassing incidents around it during the clean up?

These fuckers are feeling their oats, because they feel like they have a friend in the big very white building in DC. That's why I'd love to be around to just show the flag (the real one) when they're here, though I'm going to be out of town on vacation through the next week.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

Look, there may be an element of this, but also remember that, fundamentally, he's a white asshole, a thug-wanna-be, from Queens circa 1960s. There are plenty of racists and even white supremacists in that crowd. He's one of them.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

You are a lawyer and I am a lawyer and this is a lawyer board, so I understand your reaction, but I was trying to make a broader point about themes of equality and hierarchy, not an argument about what the Fourteenth Amendment requires. Assume the Fourteenth Amendment doesn't require that non-citizens get the same rights as citizens. (I know there is a lot of law there and I'm trying not talk about it.) Many lefties are OK treating undocumented immigrants as equal members of the community. Many righties are not. But they don't necessarily want them gone -- I think they would be happy having them around as an underclass with no rights.

And then there's law and order. In context, that phrase means that police -- who are generally white and male -- can do whatever it takes to control the behavior of black men. In context, law doesn't mean that people have rights. It means the state imposes its authority and others submit.

And also, sexual politics. Fox News shows us how that works. Women can have careers but they should wear dresses, look attractive, and remember to be available for men. Donald Trump is the extreme example of how this works.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

Democrats need to understand that there are a lot of people in the country who are not interested in sharing power with people who historically haven't had it, and who are willing to do things like gerrymander and suppress votes and generally do things that seem unprincipled. Not everyone is committed to equality. If you want to take on those interests, you have to persuade the people who don't bother to vote to go out and vote. You can't just think that if you are good in your heart, the existing powers that be will sit back and let you disrupt them. In a lot of respects, it's a zero-sum game and there are going to be winners and losers.

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

"cherish" our history.

Straight from the pen of Stephen Miller (or Bannon).

Re: Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.
 

I knew I wasn't getting it right, but I also knew that going back and looking for it would just piss me off more.

sui generic
 

[/I]I forget he's from the Boroughs. I generally equate that with Staten Island more than Queens, but your point is well taken.

He's a truly bizarre fuck. You'd think a person who's met and worked with so many people from so many backgrounds would find white nationalism embarrassingly provincial.

Then again, the guy buys Brioni suits off the rack and eats his well done steaks with ketchup.