Am I the only one who found it odd that an event entitled “America Uncanceled” ended with a call to cancel anyone who disagreed with the keynote speaker?
It is time to STOP pretending that today’s GOP is anything other than it actually is — a white supremacist movement reacting to demographic changes that are overturning long-standing white dominance of America.
The mainstream media (like the New York Times) lie to Americans when they describe these attempts as efforts to perpetuate a false election narrative. This movement has nothing to do with voter fraud. The nationwide effort to suppress minority votes — and effort that has been going on through several election cycles — has about as much to do with voter fraud as the Jim Crow laws had to do with state’s rights.
It was NOT coincidental that the insurrectionists at the Capitol carried Confederate and Nazi flags side-by-side. Today’s Republicans ARE America’s 21st century Nazi party, and they revere the Confederate nation as a failed 19th century attempt to accomplish the same end as the Nazis in the 20th century.
This movement has as much to do with Adolph Hitler as with George Orwell.
Christophersays
I honestly didn’t know about the Nazi connections to those symbols. Apparently a hand gesture that I have known as indicating A-OK or ASL for the letter F is now a white power symbol too. So hard to keep up!
SomervilleTomsays
There should be no ambiguity or confusion about the Odal Rune. It was used by Waffen SS units alongside the Swastika.
This one is not hard to keep up with, it dates from the 1930s.
Christophersays
I had never heard of it or seen that symbol before as I recall.
The othala rune is part of the runic alphabet system, a system of writing used (with many variations) across pre-Roman Europe. In the 20th century, Nazis in Germany adopted the othal rune, among many other similar symbols, as part of their attempt to reconstruct a mythic “Aryan” past. Nazi uses of the symbol included the divisional insignia of two Waffen SS divisions during World War II. Following World War II, white supremacists in Europe, North America, and elsewhere began using the othala rune. Today, it is commonly seen in tattoo form, on flags or banners, as part of group logos, and elsewhere.
However, because it is part of the runic alphabet, the symbol can also be found in non-extremist contexts as well, especially runic writing and runestones used by non-racist pagans. Consequently, care should be taken to evaluate the symbol in the context in which it appears.
Christophersays
Thanks. I looked it up and it’s not that I didn’t believe you, but that as familiar as I am with history and missing this particular memo I wonder how well known it was among others. I saw the layout of the CPAC stage next to an image of the rune. Do they look alike? Yes. Can I easily imagine that such never occurred to the stage designers? Also yes.
johntmaysays
The Chairman of CPAC said that Sen. Mitt Romney should “be afraid for his physical safety”….you know, the same Mitt Romney that was the Republican Party’s candidate for president back in 2012.
He was not welcome.
I’ve come to accept that this current crop of Republicans (Cruz, Lee, DeSantis, Cotton, Scott, Pompeo, Hawley, Noem) who spoke at CPAC are not “afraid of Trump’s Base….they are the same as Trump. They are openly admitting to their support of White Supremacy.
Steve Consilviosays
Orwell is all around us, and is front and center at any and every political convention. They are all hate hours. My most Orwellian experience was a a libertarian state party convention. But I have found the same accusations of thoughtcrime and celebrations of groupthink at progressive and democratic gatherings.
Orwell is also in churches of different denominations. They all think they are superior to the sinners of other denominations, and of course to the sinners that don’t join them in their self-flattery.
All do a very good job of failing to discuss what is a sin and if they meet or fail that standard. Rather, they just make others guilty by innuendo and preserve their own hypocrisy as a virtue.
The thing that blows my mind the most is the group pledges. When the libertarians did that I was shocked. And, of course, you can’t be a member of the GOP without taking that no tax pledge. Groupthink and brain dead is the criteria of admission.
I was at a t-mobile store yesterday and the clerk started talking about Biden’s attack on Syria and the price of gasoline. This after she tried to convince us how much we needed insurance. The indoctrination of the lemmings by Fox News is going amazingly well. These people are completely clueless, and self-medicating on well crafted and highly produced lies. Hollywood skills in the hands of the Devil.
The ability to divert people’s attention from the big picture to small meaningless diversions is quite remarkable. They are like squirrels with the attention span of a gnat. Maybe that is the real cost of our always-on technology. So much incoming data that nothing can stick.
The democrats are just terrible at messaging because they are too conservative and want to preserve the status quo, whereas the other guys have many defined enemies they want to destroy. Offense is always easier than defense. Fascism has no constraints, whereas wisdom can only expose them after the fact. Like a cop, wisdom shows up after the crime.
Christophersays
Can you clarify your second sentence “They are all hate hours.” I suspect a typo or bad autocorrect that I can’t decipher.
Steve Consilviosays
Have you read 1984? Hate hours were a regular thing. The demonization of X ad nauseum. At least until the posters change, and then the enemy becomes an ally, and the old ally the new enemy. Rinse and repeat.
So, depending on which rally you attend, then you get a different enemy.
I remember being at the democratic convention and it droned on and on about Charlie Baker, ignoring how the democrats have a super majority and could pass literally any bill they chose in a matter of days. But, was there any policy discussion? Hardly a peep of substance was allowed to interrupt the vilification stream of consciousness.
It is worse during an election year, when some upstart candidates turn their scorn on the incumbent. The desperation for power reveals how easily power corrupts. One could only imagine what happens if they are successful. Trump is a good example, since he savaged literally everyone on the stage. The GOP debates were a hate hour extravaganza, which are followed by the hate hour conventions.
I must admit that I never knew that 1984 was about me. It was always about “them.” It’s a tough epiphany when you realize that you are your enemy, full of twisted thinking etc. Fortunately, the vomit doesn’t stain your shoes can be cleaned easily enough. In my case, I really hated Nixon. He didn’t know I existed. But somehow I came to realize that my hate was my problem, his hate was his problem. Overcoming myself doesn’t change them, it only changes me. But, I now can see the pride and delusions much easier in others, now that I have seen these failings in myself. That’s the trouble with art. People may miss the deeper message entirely, or maybe the art is itself just a reflection of the author’s hate. Who knows. We are all a moving target, progressing and regressing simultaneously. What is justice today (an eye for an eye) may not be justice tomorrow (turn the other cheek), but fear, hate and pride don’t change. People are very good at fooling themselves. A good indicator is seeing who or what they hate.
Not just Orwellian — the stage set clearly and explicitly invoked a Nazi rune (see https://twitter.com/mjfree/status/1365719354378223616/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1365719354378223616%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fnation%2F2021%2F03%2F01%2Fcpac-stage-nazi-symbol-hyatt%2F).
It is time to STOP pretending that today’s GOP is anything other than it actually is — a white supremacist movement reacting to demographic changes that are overturning long-standing white dominance of America.
The mainstream media (like the New York Times) lie to Americans when they describe these attempts as efforts to perpetuate a false election narrative. This movement has nothing to do with voter fraud. The nationwide effort to suppress minority votes — and effort that has been going on through several election cycles — has about as much to do with voter fraud as the Jim Crow laws had to do with state’s rights.
It was NOT coincidental that the insurrectionists at the Capitol carried Confederate and Nazi flags side-by-side. Today’s Republicans ARE America’s 21st century Nazi party, and they revere the Confederate nation as a failed 19th century attempt to accomplish the same end as the Nazis in the 20th century.
This movement has as much to do with Adolph Hitler as with George Orwell.
I honestly didn’t know about the Nazi connections to those symbols. Apparently a hand gesture that I have known as indicating A-OK or ASL for the letter F is now a white power symbol too. So hard to keep up!
There should be no ambiguity or confusion about the Odal Rune. It was used by Waffen SS units alongside the Swastika.
This one is not hard to keep up with, it dates from the 1930s.
I had never heard of it or seen that symbol before as I recall.
Here’s what ADL has to say about it (https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/othala-rune):
Thanks. I looked it up and it’s not that I didn’t believe you, but that as familiar as I am with history and missing this particular memo I wonder how well known it was among others. I saw the layout of the CPAC stage next to an image of the rune. Do they look alike? Yes. Can I easily imagine that such never occurred to the stage designers? Also yes.
The Chairman of CPAC said that Sen. Mitt Romney should “be afraid for his physical safety”….you know, the same Mitt Romney that was the Republican Party’s candidate for president back in 2012.
He was not welcome.
I’ve come to accept that this current crop of Republicans (Cruz, Lee, DeSantis, Cotton, Scott, Pompeo, Hawley, Noem) who spoke at CPAC are not “afraid of Trump’s Base….they are the same as Trump. They are openly admitting to their support of White Supremacy.
Orwell is all around us, and is front and center at any and every political convention. They are all hate hours. My most Orwellian experience was a a libertarian state party convention. But I have found the same accusations of thoughtcrime and celebrations of groupthink at progressive and democratic gatherings.
Orwell is also in churches of different denominations. They all think they are superior to the sinners of other denominations, and of course to the sinners that don’t join them in their self-flattery.
All do a very good job of failing to discuss what is a sin and if they meet or fail that standard. Rather, they just make others guilty by innuendo and preserve their own hypocrisy as a virtue.
The thing that blows my mind the most is the group pledges. When the libertarians did that I was shocked. And, of course, you can’t be a member of the GOP without taking that no tax pledge. Groupthink and brain dead is the criteria of admission.
I was at a t-mobile store yesterday and the clerk started talking about Biden’s attack on Syria and the price of gasoline. This after she tried to convince us how much we needed insurance. The indoctrination of the lemmings by Fox News is going amazingly well. These people are completely clueless, and self-medicating on well crafted and highly produced lies. Hollywood skills in the hands of the Devil.
The ability to divert people’s attention from the big picture to small meaningless diversions is quite remarkable. They are like squirrels with the attention span of a gnat. Maybe that is the real cost of our always-on technology. So much incoming data that nothing can stick.
The democrats are just terrible at messaging because they are too conservative and want to preserve the status quo, whereas the other guys have many defined enemies they want to destroy. Offense is always easier than defense. Fascism has no constraints, whereas wisdom can only expose them after the fact. Like a cop, wisdom shows up after the crime.
Can you clarify your second sentence “They are all hate hours.” I suspect a typo or bad autocorrect that I can’t decipher.
Have you read 1984? Hate hours were a regular thing. The demonization of X ad nauseum. At least until the posters change, and then the enemy becomes an ally, and the old ally the new enemy. Rinse and repeat.
So, depending on which rally you attend, then you get a different enemy.
I remember being at the democratic convention and it droned on and on about Charlie Baker, ignoring how the democrats have a super majority and could pass literally any bill they chose in a matter of days. But, was there any policy discussion? Hardly a peep of substance was allowed to interrupt the vilification stream of consciousness.
It is worse during an election year, when some upstart candidates turn their scorn on the incumbent. The desperation for power reveals how easily power corrupts. One could only imagine what happens if they are successful. Trump is a good example, since he savaged literally everyone on the stage. The GOP debates were a hate hour extravaganza, which are followed by the hate hour conventions.
I must admit that I never knew that 1984 was about me. It was always about “them.” It’s a tough epiphany when you realize that you are your enemy, full of twisted thinking etc. Fortunately, the vomit doesn’t stain your shoes can be cleaned easily enough. In my case, I really hated Nixon. He didn’t know I existed. But somehow I came to realize that my hate was my problem, his hate was his problem. Overcoming myself doesn’t change them, it only changes me. But, I now can see the pride and delusions much easier in others, now that I have seen these failings in myself. That’s the trouble with art. People may miss the deeper message entirely, or maybe the art is itself just a reflection of the author’s hate. Who knows. We are all a moving target, progressing and regressing simultaneously. What is justice today (an eye for an eye) may not be justice tomorrow (turn the other cheek), but fear, hate and pride don’t change. People are very good at fooling themselves. A good indicator is seeing who or what they hate.