Month: July 2020

Don’t Believe Network News About Portland

One of my daughters lived in Portland, OR for many years.

She keeps in touch with many of her friends in the area, a good number of whom have been out in the streets protesting. Some of them have been arrested. All of them tell the same story.

You can read much of this for yourself on Facebook. Just check out the hashtags #WallOfMoms, #WallOfVets, #WallOfDads.

The story goes like this:

Mixed groups of demonstrators have been in the streets regularly ever since George Floyd’s murder and the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement across the country.

The demonstrations have been overwhelmingly peaceful. When unknown agitators destroyed property, group leaders told them to stop and to go away. They were damaging the cause.

Then Federal troops appeared on the scene and began arresting people for no apparent reason, putting them into unmarked vehicles, and locking them up without charges. Some have been kept jailed in undisclosed locations for several days, while family and friends wondered where they were.

These unconstitutional actions by the Feds energized more citizens to march in the streets. Yes, a small group of agitators ramped up their property destruction. But both black and white organizers regularly tried to stop their activities, and were typically unsuccessful.

It is not surprising that this small minority of agitators garner most of the headlines and nearly all of the time on the TV networks, making it look as if Portland is in chaos. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Feds have escalated the confrontations unnecessarily, with their rubber bullets, tear gas, pepper spray, unnecessary aggression and violence against protesters.

It is totally unnecessary.

This is when the Wall of Moms was created, intentionally putting themselves between the demonstrators and the Feds. At this point, a

This protester-mom, was standing, linking arms with fellow demonstrators, when a Federal agent shot her in the face with a rubber bullet

portion of the protests became focused around the Federal courthouse, because that was were the Federal agents were concentrated.

Now the focus of the demonstrations became bifurcated.

The movement’s leaders worked to maintain their focus on Black Lives Matter and police brutality. You don’t have to watch many Facebook videos and pictures to see and hear large crowds chanting “Black Lives Matter.”

But, with the unsolicited intervention of Federal agents, another section of the movement gave their attention to demonstrating against the “police state” activities of Trump’s anti-demonstration forces. The increase in violence is due entirely to the brutal behavior of these Federal marshals and Border Patrol agents.

Yes, a minority of people get out of hand. After the Feds erected a fence in front of the courthouse, a few people focused their anger there and began to build fires under the fence. Again, the organizers consistently tried to stop this from happening.

But, get real! Have you seen the fires? They hardly pose a real threat to anyone, especially to the courthouse!

As the Feds continued to attack both the BLM demonstrators and the Wall of

The bruises on this mom’s body were made by the many rubber bullets fired at her by Federal “police.” Obviously, the Feds don’t hesitate to shoot a woman at close range when her back is turned

Moms, two additional sectors of society began spontaneously to appear: military veterans and dads.

Many veterans, understandably upset at what they were seeing, began to show up in support of the protesters and the moms. A number of videos show how brutally they too have been treated by the Federal agents, beaten with clubs for simply trying to speak to the officers.

Then dads appeared with leaf blowers to fend off the clouds of tear gas being fired by the Feds at unarmed civilians.

Naturally, conservative outlets such as Fox hate all anti-establishment movements, especially when they call for racial justice and condemn police violence.

By definition, conservatives support the establishment.

That is what conservatism means. It’s who they are. Their reporting is pure propaganda, tailored to anger their like-minded viewers, and to condemn the protesters.

Also, remember the old journalistic motto: “if it bleeds it leads.” All the news networks succumb to this principle. They would rather show us the few violent clashes than the masses protesting peacefully. It’s the way news/journalism has always worked in this country.

So, if you want to get angry, then get angry at our government. Get angry at “law enforcement” run amuck, attacking fellow citizens who are exercising their constitutional rights to free speech and freedom of assembly.

Get angry at our president for intentionally making a difficult situation worse, as he manipulates civil unrest for his own personal, political advantage.

Trump is using the predictable FASCIST strategy of generating violence so that he can run on a “law and order” platform in November. You can count on it. This is how he hopes to win reelection.

Don’t fall for it.

We are already well underway to authoritarianism.

When is a Revival Not a Revival?

John Fea is a professor of American history at Messiah University in Pennsylvania. Professor Fea has an excellent blog called “The Way of Improvement Leads Home” which I follow regularly.

He recently offered a post with this title: “Is a Spiritual Revival Leads to More Christian Trumpism, Is It Really a Spiritual Revival? Or is It Something Else?” I encourage you to read the entire piece, if you haven’t already.

Evangelicals tend to believe that “spiritual revivals” or “Christian awakenings” will provide the ultimate solution to all of society’s problems.

Christian media promotes this story-line regularly:

Protests aren’t the answer. Boycotts aren’t the answer. New laws aren’t the answer. What we need is a spiritual awakening! If everyone will only come to Jesus, then all our problems will begin to solve themselves!

Or so we are told, over and over and over again.

Professor Fea’s important post draws from the story of a great American, Frederick Douglass.

Douglass’ autobiography tells the story of his own conversion to Christianity, and why he did not see “personal conversion” as the cure all for the the sins of slavery.

Douglass was a slave who witnessed his master’s spiritual conversion. And then marveled at how the master’s new-found faith in Christ made him a more abusive master than he had ever been before.

Quoting from a recent biography of Douglass, Fea notes:

“A recent convert himself to Christian faith, although now struggling to

Frederick Douglass

understand whether God intended any justice on earth, Frederick witnessed the spectacle of master Thomas’s wrenching emotional breakdown and confession in that pen. Blacks were not allowed in the pen, nor in front of the preacher’s performances, but Douglass tells us that he imposed his way close enough to hear Auld “groan,” and to see his reddened face, his disheveled hair, and a “stray tear halting on his cheek.” Here festered the dark heart of the moral bankruptcy of slaveholders that the future abolitionist would make his central subject. . . 

“Douglass converted this memory into angry condemnations of the religious hypocrisy of the entire Christian slaveholding universe, especially the little microcosm of Auld’s household, where the young slave now had to listen daily to loud praying and testifying by the white family, and to participate in hospitality extended to local preachers who were sometimes housed at Auld’s home, all the while enduring the good Methodist’s verbal and physical cruelty. For Douglass, the proof of any sincerity in Auld’s ‘tear-drop’ manifested in his actions. In his deeds and his glances, wrote Douglass, it was as if the pathetic master had concluded, ‘I will teach you, young man, that, though I have parted with my sins, I have not parted with my sense. I shall hold slaves, and go to heaven too.’”

I am sorry, but the naive, ignorant belief that “spiritual revival” alone will solve all of society’s problems is merely another symptom of our crippling addiction to American Individualism.

More than that, it reveals an extremely simplistic view of both human nature and the work of the Holy Spirit.

All of these intellectual and theological mistakes serve as chains locked around the ankles of American evangelicalism. They prevent us from genuinely following after Jesus as we should.

When the church ought to be in the lead of the Black Lives Matter movement, talking about the Image of God and His new kingdom come, most evangelical leaders sit on the sidelines calling for more prayer and waiting for revival. The exceptions to this hackneyed response are extremely admirable but very, very few.

Sometimes the best way to pray is to get off your butt and march with those who suffer, publicly condemn the “masters” who want to control us, and work for social revolution — all in the name of Christ.

Ali Velshi on Democracy and Public Protests

Ali Velshi is a reporter/host for MSNBC. Granted, I bash MSNBC quite often because they are the establishment Democratic equivalent of the Republican party franchise called Fox News.

But Velshi recently offered an editorial piece about the importance of public demonstrations in a liberal democracy, something that the Right and Donald Trump never seem to understand.

In the past I have argued that the Department of Homeland Security should never have been created. Its mere existence pushes this country closer to fascism.

The fact that president Trump’s decision to send unrequested federal “forces” to cities such as Portland, Seattle, Philadelphia, and Chicago is unconstitutional should be enough reason for all Americans to object to Trump’s illegal extension of executive power.

But no. Conservatives overwhelmingly approve.

We are all in trouble, folks. Please take a few moments to hear Velshi out. He is wise in this clip.

An Important Word from Mehdi Hasan on Fascism

Mehdi Hasa is a British journalist who wears many different hats. I always try to listen to him when I can. Over the years he has done reporting for the British version of the Huffington Post, Al Jazeeera (which I also watch regularly), The Intercept, and MSNBC.

He recently did on editorial on American fascism that I believe is worth watching and digesting.  I hope you will listen to what he has to say:

A Christian Man Who Understands the Civil War

Scott Hancock is a history professor at Gettysburg College. He is also a serious disciple of Jesus Christ.

Hancock regularly goes to the Gettysburg battlefield to talk with visitors, hoping to educate them about the roots of the Civil War and the southern states’ investment in defending slavery.

It is amazing to me how often his critics repeat the Confederate propaganda created by the United Daughters of the Confederacy catechism for southern children. (Check out my post on the UDC here).

(I am indebted to John Fea’s blog for directing me to this video).

Prof. Adolph Reed on Anti-Racism

Adolph Reed is emeritus professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania. He recently appeared with journalists Katie Halper and Matt Taibbi on their pod/video cast Useful Idiots.

Taibbi asks Prof. Reed to discuss the best-selling book White Fragility. Reed then expands his horizons and places the book in the broader context of the “anti-racist” movement currently at work in this country.

Reed discusses ways in which much of the energy invested in liberal anti-racism efforts become a shallow distraction from the far more significant underlying structural issues of class division, neo-liberal economics, and the bi-partisan political hierarchy defending the status quo.

I happen to agree 100% with the professor.

Here is the link to his interview. He begins speaking at about the 57:40 mark. I encourage  you to take a listen.

Caitlin Johnstone: “Liberals Are Crazy Idiots”

Professional political blogger, Ms. Johnstone, is very cheeky, and that’s

Caitlin Johnstone

probably why I read her blog. That and the fact that she, as an Australian, frequently offers insightful political commentary.

Her most recent post “Liberals Are Crazy Idiots” offers an all to brief discussion of how and why so-called liberal news outlets like MSNBC, with pundits like Chris Hays and Rachel Maddow, are nearly as useless as Fox News.

Here is an excerpt:

Liberals are such crazy idiots. They pretend to stand for truth and logic then spend years promoting the fact-free Trump-Russia collusion narrative. They pretend to stand for social justice then drop those values the second it becomes politically convenient, like making homophobic jokes about Trump and Putin, calling Lindsey Graham “Lady G” for being a closeted gay man, and lecturing black political leaders about how black people should think and vote. They pretend to stand for the little guy, then support austerity and war while literally worshipping John McCain.

Just last night on MSNBC Chris Hayes was talking about Trump’s controversial commuting of Roger Stone’s prison sentence and he parroted the completely false and utterly baseless claim that Stone was a “go between” for WikiLeaks and the Trump campaign.

“Roger Stone was what he looked like: a go-between between the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks, and then he lied about it, which is what he was convicted for,” Hayes said.

This is just completely untrue. The only communications between Stone and WikiLeaks prior to the November 2016 presidential election were WikiLeaks telling Stone to stop falsely claiming that he was in communication with the outlet and had been getting information from them. 

You can read the entire post here.

Another Critique of the Book, “White Fragility”

Kyle Kulinski is a smart guy with a youtube video/pod cast that I often check out. He recently offered his own critique of the popular book, White Fragility.

A few days ago, I posted a piece by Matt Taibbi criticizing this book, as well. Tomorrow I will post a critique by the African-American professor, Adolf Reed.

Today Kulinski jumps into the fray with his own analysis, very much in line with Taibbi’s. If you are interested in this book, I encourage you to watch the entire clip.

So, why am I highlighting these various criticisms of a New York Time’s bestseller about anti-racism? Because we all need to confront America’s racist past and present intelligently and productively, in ways that will bring about meaningful change.

There are many people of all skin colors who are doing this work very  well. They need to be heard and their instruction heeded.

Unfortunately, White Fragility appears to be a gross distraction from that cause which, in the end, will only be counter-productive. A lot of white folks may only read one book on this subject. Many will think, Oh, the new bestseller, and choose accordingly.

It will be a shame if America chooses to read this book but nothing else.

Holiday Swimmers Interrupt an Indiana Lynching Midstream

Racism is alive and well in America.

In the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder, the dead bodies of 6 people of color have been discovered hanging from trees in various parts of this country.

In each case, local police are saying the people died by suicide. I don’t buy it.

Below is a video taken by one of several friends who fortunately stumbled upon a lynching in progress and were able to stop it.

No doubt, had these young people not had the good fortune and the fortitude to intervene, we would be hearing the report of yet another black man dying after tying himself to a tree.

Confederate Statues and the United Daughters of the Confederacy

Yes, the Confederate statues (primarily erected by the United Daughters of the Confederacy) need to be removed and placed in American history museums where children will learn about this country’s despicable history of slavery.

No, removing public memorials valorizing those who fought a war in order to maintain slavery will not “rob the nation of its history,” as conservatives are now lamenting.

Has Germany’s prohibition of public memorials to Adolf Hitler and his Nazi comrades robbed the German public of its historical memory about the Holocaust?

Of course not.

The current conservative hand-wringing is reactionary balderdash, pure and simple. But then reactionary balderdash is what gave rise to these statues in the first place. It comes as no surprise, then, that contemporary reactionaries are marching in step with the tradition.

Many (most? all?) of these Confederate statues, memorializing men like Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee, were erected by chapters of a southern women’s organization called the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

Their purpose was to keep the southern flame burning for “the lost cause,” which was regularly translated into the rhetoric anticipating how “the south will rise again.”

The monuments were the first resurrection, so to speak, of the southern states’ reassertion of white supremacy.

These monuments were erected as reactionary displays against Lincoln’s vision for southern Reconstruction.

UDC statues stood (and still stand) as cruel reminders to every former slave, and to all of their descendants (who certainly were never consulted about whether they wanted a memorial in their community to the nobility of white slave owners), that they were still surrounded by the living, white descendants of their former, white slave owners who still believed in White Power.

The United Daughters of the Confederacy even published a children’s catechism (a series of questions and answers for them to memorize; many Protestant churches use catechisms), fusing the racist with the religious dimensions of the confederacy together.

Here is an excerpt of what the children memorized about slavery:

[13] How were the slaves treated?

With great kindness and care in nearly all cases, a cruel master being rare, and

A “loyal slave” monument

lost the respect of his neighbors if he treated his slaves badly. Self interest would have prompted good treatment if a higher feeling of humanity had not.

[14] What was the feeling of the slaves towards their masters?

They were faithful and devoted and were always ready and willing to serve them.

[15] How did they behave during the war?

They nobly protected and cared for the wives of soldiers in the field, and widows without protectors; though often prompted by the enemies of the South to burn and plunder the homes of their masters, they were always true and loyal.

You can read the entire catechism here.

This sort of revisionist defense of slavery remains widespread. I have read it and heard it myself in Christian circles in recent memory.

The UDC is a racist organization, and their statues are a national disgrace. (Please learn more about it here:  “7 Things the UDC Might Not Want You to Know About It,” “Time to Expose the Women Still Celebrating the Confederacy.” You can also find a list of their monuments here.)

These UDC statues are foul effigies silently extolling the depravity of slave ownership.

They are cold, marble sign posts directing us to the outermost boundaries of humanity’s lust for dehumanizing and brutalizing “the other.”

They are demonic fetishes elevated through human sacrifice — not of white lives but of black lives.

They commemorate white supremacy and the sacrifice of African blood, blood shed in the stinking holds of innumerable slave ships; bodies dumped into the Atlantic as shark food; human beings stolen, whipped, beaten, raped, sodomized, and sold to the highest bidder.

These statues need to come down.

They must come down.