The moms are here

There are a couple developments in the situation in Portland where federal police are acting mafia goons. First, various lawsuits are being filed. One by the Oregon Attorney General, another by the ACLU, and likely more.

Second, the fed actions are being protested by the Wall of Moms. Women, most wearing yellow, have linked arms around the federal building in Portland to protect the crowds of protesters behind them. They chant “Feds stay clear, the moms are here.” They were teargassed Saturday night and were back even stronger Sunday night. They’ll be back tonight.

Gassing moms is not a good public relations look. Dangerous, radical, left wing terrorists? Heh.

This is a great way to resist the nasty guy.



The nasty guy has issued an executive order about American monuments and statues. Leah McElrath tweeted that the order says that protests that involve statues or federal property now fall under the definition of terrorism.

The order also has wording that sounds retroactive.

In other words, I would not be surprised if they used this to try to round up people based on past acts.
...
Basically, this order reads to me like Barr’s best effort to give Trump what he really wants:

A prohibition against protesting.

But only applicable to those who are not his supporters.

It’s a very dangerous document—even though I doubt it will ultimately hold up in court.

The problem is that it takes a while to get through the courts. Until it does the nasty guy can do considerable damage.



Greg Dworkin’s pundit roundup on Daily Kos quoted Jim Galloway of AJC:

John Lewis served 33 years in Congress, often serving as its conscience. There is a way to keep him there, even in death.

Remove the figure of Alexander Stephens, the first and only vice president of the Confederacy, from National Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol.

Replace him with Lewis.

Dworkin added:

And restore the Voting Rights Act. That’s more important that statuary or renaming a bridge, excellent ideas though they are.

David Shimer, author of the book Rigged, tweeted a thread about the book saying “Russian hackers had the ability to alter vote data & vote tallies of U.S. citizens on Election Day 2016.” Shimer then describes secret crisis teams run by Obama’s White House and Department of Homeland Security on election day that year offering assistance to states if they needed it. They saw no evidence of tampering of actual votes that year. But that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Did the Russian hack fail? No. Russian hacked emails had dominated news for months and Russian propaganda reached tens of millions of Americans on social media.

And in this year, the Russians will do all they can to keep the nasty guy in office.



The nasty guy said to Chris Wallace that he’s done more than any POTUS in history. While not conceding the point about more than any other president, Will Stancil tweeted:

You know what? I actually think Trump HAS done quite a lot in his 3.5 years. He's politicized the judiciary, shredded our international standing, co-opted the executive agencies, totally stopped immigration, eliminated apolitical federal law enforcement.

He's managed to destroy far, far more than most people in politics predicted in 2016. Lots of you said that Trump would flail and the rest of the government would go on as usual. He's flailed - with 100k dead to prove it - but the rest of the government was thoroughly Trumpified.

With painfully little resistance, Trump has turned the US federal government into a machine for persecuting his enemies, enriching himself, and carrying out his irrational, reactionary whims - everything from "let the deadly disease destroy America" to "purchase Greenland."

Trump also completely pacified Congress in 4 years:
-in 2017, when Trump fired Comey, the GOP Senate held a dramatic hearing watched nationwide
-in 2020, when Trump illegally fired IGs and had DOJ undermine prosecutions of his own accomplices, the Democratic House barely reacted.

Yup, that’s a lot. And none of it benefits the American people.



Bree Newsome Bass tweeted:

Based on what I’ve seen so far— even going back as far as the 2000 election—if Trump refuses to leave office, I’m not convinced that Biden or the Democrats will mount much of an opposition. I really think folks are underestimating the precariousness of this situation.

Like, we need actual anti-fascist resistance leaders right now. I’m not seeing that represented in what Biden or the Democrats are doing. I’m just saying be prepared to be abandoned by them in November & the aftermath because not preparing for that scenario is dangerously unwise.

A.R. Moxon tweeted in response to the federal police in Portland:

2016
Leftist Larry: Trump's a fascist. If he wins, expect secret police
Reasonable Rick: Don't be so hysterical. Our system's strong

2020
Larry: There literally are secret police now
Rick: Oh I assume there's a reasonable explanation

2024

Rick: Larry? I never knew any Larry

Being an aware American means every day interacting with people who are familiar with the famous poem about nobody being left when at last they come for you, but who clearly seem to think that it means, as the last unabducted person, the poet won the game.

First they came for the immigrants, and I did not speak out—Because you don't win hearts by calling people racist

Then they came for Black Lives, and I did not speak out—Because speaking out is "cancel culture."

I don’t speak much anymore. They call it "freedom to agree."

There have been in the past countries with secret police who abduct undesirable elements. In most cases, there came a tipping point, where a great mass of people became aware of the disappearances and made themselves unconcerned.

Stigs tweeted a missing step in Moxon’s timeline:

2022: Yes sir I'd like to call in a loyalty report on one Larry, Leftist.

David Moisan added:

I've hated Neimoller's essay: Not because it isn't true on the face of it, but because there is a corollary: The Nazis didn't come for most people. Such people were "neutral", "polite" and "moderate", and tell you "You're overreacting, why do you need to get so angry?"

Benji Backer tweeted an idea that seems to undergird a great deal of modern news reporting:

The truth always resides somewhere in between where both sides say it does.

Mike Young objected:

This is seldom true, and is known as the Golden Mean Fallacy. In reality, the positions of either side in a political debate has no bearing on what’s true. Some examples include masks vs no masks, early childhood education, or slavery in 1865.