I'd say if it makes him happy and gets him to STFU about the whole thing, let him have the win. He may even deserve some credit, fair's fair.
My fear is that this is just gonna send his whole "I deserve a Nobel Peace Prize" thing into overdrive. Obama got one, so he has to have one. Sometimes I think his entire life for the last 15 years has been consumed by trying to out-do Obama.
Anything that black guy can do, I can do better! Just watch!!
And who knows, Kissinger got one, so anything's possible.
I hope this actually turns into some kind of path forward for Israel, and for the Palestinians. I don't trust Netanyahu or the jerks he surrounds himself with further than I can throw him, or them. And it would be good for somebody other than Hamas to be running things.
Actually, it would be good for Hamas to just go the hell away.
If there's a part of the world with a more unsettled history than the eastern Med, I'm not aware of it. Fingers crossed for something like peace for the folks there.
Without wishing to continue to pile on CharlesWT, I want to reach way back to the link he provided to one Brandi Kruse.
Here is Ms. Kruse from Trump's "round table" on antifa today. h/t Atrios (https://www.eschatonblog.com/2025/10/sure-why-not_8.html):
"This is one of the reasons I recovered from it. By the way, it’s much better to not have TDS. I’m happier, healthier, more successful. I even think I got a little more attractive after I got rid of my Trump Derangement System"
I'm happy for Ms. Kruse, and I'm glad she's feeling more attractive these days.
These really are the most trivial people on the planet.
<i>it is about an attempt to avoid demonisation</i>
I affirm this, but as the kids say, "it's complicated".
It's important - essential - to recognize and respect the humanity of your counterparties in any conflict. Otherwise things devolve.
But IMO it's also important to recognize and name people's behavior for what it is. And not just their behavior, but their character, as it is manifest in what they say and do.
For example - Stephen Miller. He's a bad person, full stop. He has an extreme animus towards entire classes of people, and uses his position to do harm to them. Not with regret or out of dire necessity, but happily and with gusto.
A bad person.
A civility that says "you can't say that" is not helpful. In fact, it's harmful, because it keeps us from speaking truthfully about the plain facts in front of us.
And in saying all of that, I'm not demonizing Stephen Miller. Miller has done a thorough job of demonizing himself, no further effort on my part is needed.
I do not wish any ill toward Stephen Miller. I just want him to stop doing what he's doing. Or, be prevented from doing what he's doing.
What I'd really like is, to borrow language from my own spiritual traditions, for him to repent. Turn himself around. Make amends. But that is his hash to settle. I'll be content if he just stops hurting people.
So much of the crap we're dealing with right now seems (to me) to be about people <i>not wanting to honestly look</i> at our own national history. At the darker side of our own national character.
Slavery and the genocide of indigenous people, and the toxic ideology of white supremacy that justified it. The greed and sense of entitlement that makes us think we have a right to consume the natural resources of the planet in ways, and at a rate, that is simply unsustainable. The hubris that makes "we are the best country in the world" an article of faith.
I don't think we are going to get past the mess we're in right now until we can deal with all of that. By "deal with it" I just mean recognize it for what it is, accept it as a reality. We can't go back and change it, but at least we can stop pretending either that it didn't happen, or it didn't matter, or it has no lingering effect on how we all live now.
Denial is a killer. It's undermining out ability to function as a nation. Basically, it's crippling us.
A civility that just means "we don't talk about that" is going to choke us.
Another possibility, from Thomas Geoghegan in the Guardian.
I don't follow it all but basically Geoghegan seems to be proposing / calling for "blue" states to declare an emergency and, under the provisions of US Constitution Article I, Section 10, propose changes to federal law as a counter to Trump's extra-consitutional and illegal actions.
Such a proposal would go to Congress, which in its current form can hardly be expected to do anything with it. But the marker would be laid.
The federal government is, as we speak, broken. Trump and his crew are running roughshod over the Constitution and the law. They are doing whatever the hell the want, and at the federal level nobody is doing anything effective to stop them. Trump is losing some court cases, but that isn't blunting the overall effect of his regime.
Somebody else needs to step up. We have a nominally federal system, states have some limited but real authority. Time for them to act in whatever ways they can.
To speak candidly, I live in MA, and we send not quite $5K per capita more to the feds than we get back. Basically, because people in MA on the whole make more money than people in other states. I don't need that to be evened out, I just figure I'm lucky to live here.
But as a simple, pragmatic matter, I'm sick of paying for this crap.
If you look at the list of complaints enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, it's almost laughable how minor many of them are compared to what we're putting up with every single freaking day.
There's a limit to what people will put up with, and we're approaching it.
The military at this point is the last guardrail. If they flip, it's game over.
And as far as domestic politics go, I generally (and gladly) agree that the level of basic integrity there is high. The oath to the Constitution is pretty deeply ingrained in that culture, especially the higher up you go.
Still, looking at where we were in, say, the early 1800s, I’d say that we’ve made significant progress over the last two centuries.
I'll try again, and will make it short.
We have made progress. But to get back to anything like a pre-Trump normal, we're going to need some kind of national de-MAGA-fication. We will need to root the bastards out, along with their sick ideologies.
Do you see that happening? Do you think we can muster the political will to do it? Do you think a sufficient sector of the population even want it?
I wish I could say I had some confidence that that could happen, but I can't.
Russell is a bit more familiar with Leslie than I am, but I have to ask, is his taking issue with Gay on civility related to a book that he is flogging about how much we need civility?
LOL
Full disclosure - my exposure to both Gay and Leslie is 100% the excerpt GFTNC cited. And knowing that Gay is second-generation adds context that clarifies her position on civility.
As Coates says, "welcome to black America".
So thank you for adding that.
Still, looking at where we were in, say, the early 1800s, I’d say that we’ve made significant progress over the last two centuries.
I agree with this.
That said, IMO Trump has exposed seious flaws in our Constitutional order. The guardrails - the courts, Congress, the mostly non-political administrative state - have failed or at least been undermined to the point where I'm not sure what things are gonna look like post Trump.
I don't know if there is a "there" to go back to. I don't think it's going to be the same country.
We've achieved Popper's paradox of tolerance. The intolerant have taken the reins. They will not surrender them willingly or gracefully, and are not interested at all in sharing power with anyone else. Maybe we will squeak out another legitimate election or two, and maybe that will be sufficient to allow a meaningful change of regime. That is far from guaranteed, but it's possible.
But even under that circumstance, some significant changes are going to be needed to make sure the same or similar thing doesn't happen again. And I don't know if the vision and the political will is there to make that happen.
I don't know where all of this goes, but I don't really have any confidence that we are going to return to any kind of pre-Trump normal, once he is somehow off the scene.
Plus, while we in the US are losing our minds and acting out the very worst in our national character, the rest of the world is moving on. So wherever we end up domestically, it's going to have to deal with a very different international context. At a minimum, we're shredding generations of good will. We're proving ourselves to be fickle, unreliable partners, prone to enormous changes in national policy and direction every four years.
I really don't know what comes next, but I don't think it's going to be as simple as regaining and restoring all the stuff that is being rolled back now.
I was glad to see the "outcasts" included because they are almost always part of the mix. A lot of them have serious mental and psychological issues. They include folks like the guy that Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed for the crime of throwing a bag at him.
Geriatrics are much easier (and less negatively) to explain than Kruse's characterization - they (i.e., we) show up because we're retired and don't have jobs and kids to deal with. Which is to say, we have the time.
Kruse describes folks affected by ICE activity as "out for retribution", which strikes me as wrong. I wonder if she actually knows anyone, or has talked with anyone, who has actually been affected - had friends or family members incarcerated or deported. In my experience they just want to bear witness to their own experience, they aren't out to "get" anybody.
Kruse's characterization of antifa seems extreme, even a bit cartoonish. "They all dress in black and will kill to suppress dissenting views" - again, I have to ask if she has ever actually been around real live antifa or antifa-adjacent people. Some fit the strict definition of domestic terrorism as defined in US law, some don't. And "domestic terrorism" is a very dangerous label to toss around in the current climate.
To the degree that I understand it, at its heart antifa are people who believe many hard core right wingers are fascists and are violent and unreasoning people, who will not respect the law and institutions of governance and so must be met with force. It's not an approach I agree with or support - I think they are basically poking the bear and giving Trump et al an excuse to double down. But neither are they completely wrong about their opponents.
Stakes:
I attend two churches pretty regularly. One is an Episcopal church whose congregation is about 60% Latino. They hold two services a week, one in English, one in Spanish, with a bilingual service once a month. The other is a UU church that has a significant population of gays as well as some trans people. We just hired a minister who is a lesbian.
I live in a very white bread town that is adjacent to towns with sizeable immigrant populations. Dominecan Republic, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Haiti, Russia and Eastern Europe, Ireland. When I say "adjacent" I mean these towns are within 2 or 3 miles of my home. The city of Salem is literally around the corner from me. Most of my daily is in and around Salem, which is about 15% Dominican. I contribute to and have volunteered at a local food bank whose clientele is primarily immigrants.
I make a somewhat haphazard but continual effort to follow a spiritual path that is very much centered on concern for less privileged people - the poor, immigrants, outcasts of any type. By "haphazard" I mean I'm not great at it, mostly because I am temperentally irascible, judgemental, impatient, and have a kind of restless and unruly mind. Nonetheless, I cannot escape the overwhelming and consistent message that god, whoever and whatever that personage is, loves everyone but really really really cherishes and champions less fortunate people.
I often wonder what judgement this country is storing up for itself. Not in the sense of some kind of supreme being throwing bolts of lightning at us, but just in the sense of karma. I really do believe we will pay a price for the crap that is going on here right now.
Ultimately, for me it comes down to a really simple thing - we are obliged to treat other people as fellow human beings, deserving of respect and consideration. "Obliged" not necessarily for some religious or spiritual motivation, but just freaking because. Because there they are, a person like yourself. Treat them as you would be treated, at minimum.
So that's where I'm at with all of this. I spend a lot of time spinning my mental and emotional wheels trying to understand how to live in this moment. I really don't know where it's all gonna lead.
I appreciate having ObWi as a place to vent and work through my own thoughts about all of it. And I appreciate all of your forbearance while I think out loud, at length. Mental flailing, but I'm grateful to have a venue for it.
I don't agree with Gay (or at least Gay's point of view as presented here) and generally do agree with Leslie.
Yes, civility is absolutely "inauthentic", as Gay states, in the sense she calls out - it absolutely is a performance. As are many of the basic daily protocols we engage in to avoid pissing each other off and generally making each other's lives unnecessarily difficult.
Don't cut in line. Let folks get off the bus before you try to get on. Make sure everyone at the table has had at least something to eat before you go for second helpings. Say "please" and "thank you".
All of these things require us to consider other folks before, or at least in addition to, asserting our own wishes and interests.
And all of these things make it possible for us to co-exist large and complex societies. Or even small and complex societies, where "complex" is just way of saying different people want and value different things.
So there is tremendous value in civility.
The statement I've been making about civility in current-day social and political discourse in this country is not that it's a fantasy or of no value.
My statement is that it's not *available*. It's not on offer.
If I decline to engage in discussion about where things are at right now with Trumper friends and family members, it's not because I have no interest in their perspective or their experience. It's because my experience has been that the conversation will not be particularly fruitful.
To be perfectly candid, the mindset of most conservatives, and especially of Trump supporters, most reminds me of people I knew (and know) from my days among the Christian fundamentalists. They have a set of beliefs that lets them interpret the world in a way that makes sense of their sense of threat or unease. That provide them with an identity. And to challenge those ideas is to challenge that sense of identity, which changes the conversation from a thoughtful exchange of ideas into something more existential.
It is possible to get through all of that, but it's a huge amount of work, and there really aren't any contexts for doing it.
I first started hanging out on political blogs somewhere around 2001 - just after 9/11, when the whole USA Patriot Act debate was going on and Bush II was ginning up support for invading Iraq. I wanted to understand what people were thinking so I went to conservative blogs. I forget all of them, but the place I spent the most time was RedState, back in the early days before they purged anybody who wasn't on board with the conservative agenda. And I do mean purge, it was explicit and intentional. I used to post there as "amos".
Before I left I spent probably hundreds of hours having what were, to me, some of the strangest conversations I've ever had. The things a lot of folks there believed seemed outlandish to me, almost to the point of parody. But there they were, and for a while at least, they were open to discussing all of it with the likes of me.
That *is no longer available*. I would no longer be welcome there, at all.
I found my way here when there were still a lot of conversative voices here. And over time this place has sorted itself into a by-far-majority liberal to left-ish place.
Which I find congenial, but it doesn't afford conversation across the "great divide".
And to be honest, the actions of the current administration pretty much demand that folks pick a side. What is the reasonable conversation to have about the utter denial of due process to people who happen to speak Spanish?
The conversation I would really like to have would begin with "why are you afraid of Hispanic people?". Or black people, or trans people, or gays. It really seems like folks don't just disapprove or dislike those folks, but instead feel threatened by them.
"It's the end of Western civilization!". Right?
Where the hell does that come from? I'd like to know that. But I don't see an available path to getting to that conversation.
And so here we are.
Long comment, thanks as always for your indulgence.
To be perfectly honest, I am less concerned about violence between folks like the Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer and their ilk, versus "antifa" however that term is construed.
What I am most disturbed by is the violence brought by federal law enforcement, most especially ICE.
You can walk away from a Proud Boy vs. antifa fight. If they really insist on bringing to you, which is only likely to happen in situations you can pretty easily avoid, you can fight back to the best of your ability. Or just run away.
If ICE or the FBI or similar come for you, the options of walking away or fighting back are not really available. They'll get you jailed or shot.
This is explicit, unlawful, and unaccountable state violence - in some cases extreme - toward harmless people. It is utterly unnecessary for purposes of finding and dealing with people who are here without legal status.
It's terrorism, by the government, directed toward peaceful residents, both legal and not. It's not something we have seen here at this level, and as far as I can tell we have no means of curbing it.
Libertarians can become outrage exhausted since they can be continuously outraged regardless of who’s running the government.
And yet, with the exception of Radley Balko, the exhaustion always seems to kick in just before they raise their voices against (R) excesses.
On one hand, some activists yelling at ICE all night long with a bullhorn. Yes, that's a PITA.
On the other hand, federal agents invading an apartment complex, breaking into any apartment they can force their way into without AFAICT presenting warrants of any kind, rousting people out into the street in the middle of the night and making them wait zip-tied in their pajamas (if that) for hours while they "look up their records", tossing the contents of people's apartments into the halls, leaving doors broken open, and throwing many folks into vans to be whisked away... somewhere.
Same / same.
Antifa isn't gonna do anything to you if you're not a declared fascist, white supremacist, Nazi, or similar, or possibly open and vocal supporter of same.
The feds are gonna come after you if you're brown.
I've been listening to libertarians and right wing folks talking for decades - literally, for decades - about how they're gonna rise up against government overreach and abuse of power.
When it actually arrives, nothing. Silence. Or open acquiescence.
What I look for in comments or concerns about antifa is some sense of balance.
First, "antifa" and the related term "radical left" have become so vague as to be almost meaningless. There are people who self-identify as antifa, and who will fight - physically fight - people who they consider fascist. Less commonly, they will engage in acts of vandalism, most often toward state property - cop cars, ICE facilities. Most of what they do is not directly violent, although it can be harmful to people they consider fascist - doxing, outing them to employers so they get fired. A lot of their work is tracking the actions of people they consider fascist, many of whom are themselves violent.
There are also folks who are basically anti-capitalist anarchists. They are less commonly involved in fighting and more commonly involved in acts of vandalism and sabotage, often directed at financial institutions. See also the WTO protests of 1999 in Seattle.
And there is also a general rabble of randos who are attracted to public disruption of whatever type. It's often not clear what their goals are, or if they have any, other than being publicly loud and disruptive. Some people just like riots.
All of these folks get labelled "antifa" but they're a sort of overlapping Venn diagram of communities with perhaps related, but distinct, goals.
Real, honest-to-god antifa folks are not that common, and are really focused specifically on f***ing with fascists. Everybody who shows up at a protest wearing black with "big A" armbands and a balaclava are not antifa. A lot of them are just young kids cosplaying some kind of stick-it-to-the-man drama.
We all go through our phases in life.
The randos are probably the most generally dangerous of the above, because their actions are often not focused. They are the looters, folks who set fire to stuff just to watch it burn, folks who smash windows just because they can.
The black bloc folks generally don't want to physically fight anyone, they mostly want to do expensive damage to big corporations. I don't see them around so much anymore.
The real antifa folks will definiely engage in physical fights. Mostly with obvious hard-core right wingers, who themselves like fighting. Sometimes with folks more on the periphery of the hard-core right wing - supporters, etc. They also often bring trauma medical skills, which have been helpful to folks, and not just to antifa folks. During the Charlottesville "Unite the right" mess they provided a buffer between extremely violent right-wing actors and non-violent counter-protestors, likely sparing them a lot of harm and even saving some lives. A service the police on the scene were unable or unwilling to provide.
FWIW, I do not support or endorse any of the above. I think the occasions when violent action are justified are very, very rare. Occasions when they are constructive, even rarer. I suppose things here could get to the point where some kind of organized forceful resistance would be appropriate, but I do not believe we are there yet, and hope we do not get there. And the violent actions of the broad spectrum of folks referred to as "antifa" only play into the violent fantasies and actions of their counterparties on the right.
On the other side of the fence, we have groups like the Proud Boys and the Three Percenters and the Oathkeepers, who among other things have organized the January 6 violent insurrection attempting to interrupt the peaceful transfer of power. They are part of a broader movement that includes the patchwork of militias, self-appointed homegrown private armies who regularly threaten the rest of us with deadly force. And often go beyond threats.
And now we have Trump's ICE agents, who come into peaceful communities wearing full military kit and violently kidnap anyone they care to with no regard for the law or due process.
So there's all of that.
I'm sorry that some folks in Portland are kept awake at night by black-clad youngsters with bullhorns. I'm also sorry for the folks who have been shot in the face by "less than lethal" ordinance. And I'm sorry for the people who have been kidnapped while going about their daily lives - mowing somebody's lawn, taking their kids to school, going to appointments to fulfill the requirements of trying to immigrate "the right way".
I'm sorry for the people who have been assaulted while engaging in legal peaceful protest. I'm sorry for the people who have been murdered while attending services at synagogues and liberal christian churches. I'm sorry for the people who have been, and continue to be, assaulted or murdered for being brown, Muslim, gay, trans, or whatever other thing is today's conservative bete noire.
I'm sorry for the kid who was killed by cops for being black while holding a toy pistol in a playground. And for the guy who was killed by cops for holding an air gun in a Walmart.
There is a lot to grieve. A lot to be sorry about. This is a violent country, there is no getting around it, and it gets worse when things get tense.
I hope you will forgive me if I just can't get that outraged by somebody yelling at ICE all night in Portland, even if it keeps the neighbors awake. It would piss me off, too, if it was in my neighborhood, but there are things that piss me off a hell of a lot more.
I think it must be a weird time to be Ezra Klein (or similar). His gig is basically to have insightful things to say about where we're at, politically. And I'm not sure anyone can really make sense of it all.
We're dealing with a very strange group of political actors at the moment, people driven by weird and somewhat opaque personal agendas. Or maybe not opaque as much as inexplicable.
They really are a crew of weirdos. I guess that may sound kind of judge-y, but it would take a much better mind than mine to make sense of it all.
Better days, y'all. They will come. We're mostly olds here, so maybe not before we peg out, but they will come. In the meantime, hold fast to what is worthwhile.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “…..”
I'd say if it makes him happy and gets him to STFU about the whole thing, let him have the win. He may even deserve some credit, fair's fair.
My fear is that this is just gonna send his whole "I deserve a Nobel Peace Prize" thing into overdrive. Obama got one, so he has to have one. Sometimes I think his entire life for the last 15 years has been consumed by trying to out-do Obama.
Anything that black guy can do, I can do better! Just watch!!
And who knows, Kissinger got one, so anything's possible.
I hope this actually turns into some kind of path forward for Israel, and for the Palestinians. I don't trust Netanyahu or the jerks he surrounds himself with further than I can throw him, or them. And it would be good for somebody other than Hamas to be running things.
Actually, it would be good for Hamas to just go the hell away.
If there's a part of the world with a more unsettled history than the eastern Med, I'm not aware of it. Fingers crossed for something like peace for the folks there.
On “Where are the 5 words?”
Without wishing to continue to pile on CharlesWT, I want to reach way back to the link he provided to one Brandi Kruse.
Here is Ms. Kruse from Trump's "round table" on antifa today. h/t Atrios (https://www.eschatonblog.com/2025/10/sure-why-not_8.html):
I'm happy for Ms. Kruse, and I'm glad she's feeling more attractive these days.
These really are the most trivial people on the planet.
"
<i>it is about an attempt to avoid demonisation</i>
I affirm this, but as the kids say, "it's complicated".
It's important - essential - to recognize and respect the humanity of your counterparties in any conflict. Otherwise things devolve.
But IMO it's also important to recognize and name people's behavior for what it is. And not just their behavior, but their character, as it is manifest in what they say and do.
For example - Stephen Miller. He's a bad person, full stop. He has an extreme animus towards entire classes of people, and uses his position to do harm to them. Not with regret or out of dire necessity, but happily and with gusto.
A bad person.
A civility that says "you can't say that" is not helpful. In fact, it's harmful, because it keeps us from speaking truthfully about the plain facts in front of us.
And in saying all of that, I'm not demonizing Stephen Miller. Miller has done a thorough job of demonizing himself, no further effort on my part is needed.
I do not wish any ill toward Stephen Miller. I just want him to stop doing what he's doing. Or, be prevented from doing what he's doing.
What I'd really like is, to borrow language from my own spiritual traditions, for him to repent. Turn himself around. Make amends. But that is his hash to settle. I'll be content if he just stops hurting people.
So much of the crap we're dealing with right now seems (to me) to be about people <i>not wanting to honestly look</i> at our own national history. At the darker side of our own national character.
Slavery and the genocide of indigenous people, and the toxic ideology of white supremacy that justified it. The greed and sense of entitlement that makes us think we have a right to consume the natural resources of the planet in ways, and at a rate, that is simply unsustainable. The hubris that makes "we are the best country in the world" an article of faith.
I don't think we are going to get past the mess we're in right now until we can deal with all of that. By "deal with it" I just mean recognize it for what it is, accept it as a reality. We can't go back and change it, but at least we can stop pretending either that it didn't happen, or it didn't matter, or it has no lingering effect on how we all live now.
Denial is a killer. It's undermining out ability to function as a nation. Basically, it's crippling us.
A civility that just means "we don't talk about that" is going to choke us.
"
I"m on a Zoom call right now with the ACLU. They're providing a briefing for folks who are planning to attend the No Kings rallies on 10/18.
There are 11,000 people on the call.
So there's that.
"
Another possibility, from Thomas Geoghegan in the Guardian.
I don't follow it all but basically Geoghegan seems to be proposing / calling for "blue" states to declare an emergency and, under the provisions of US Constitution Article I, Section 10, propose changes to federal law as a counter to Trump's extra-consitutional and illegal actions.
Such a proposal would go to Congress, which in its current form can hardly be expected to do anything with it. But the marker would be laid.
The federal government is, as we speak, broken. Trump and his crew are running roughshod over the Constitution and the law. They are doing whatever the hell the want, and at the federal level nobody is doing anything effective to stop them. Trump is losing some court cases, but that isn't blunting the overall effect of his regime.
Somebody else needs to step up. We have a nominally federal system, states have some limited but real authority. Time for them to act in whatever ways they can.
To speak candidly, I live in MA, and we send not quite $5K per capita more to the feds than we get back. Basically, because people in MA on the whole make more money than people in other states. I don't need that to be evened out, I just figure I'm lucky to live here.
But as a simple, pragmatic matter, I'm sick of paying for this crap.
If you look at the list of complaints enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, it's almost laughable how minor many of them are compared to what we're putting up with every single freaking day.
There's a limit to what people will put up with, and we're approaching it.
"
And the final target audience is the military.
The military at this point is the last guardrail. If they flip, it's game over.
And as far as domestic politics go, I generally (and gladly) agree that the level of basic integrity there is high. The oath to the Constitution is pretty deeply ingrained in that culture, especially the higher up you go.
"
Still, looking at where we were in, say, the early 1800s, I’d say that we’ve made significant progress over the last two centuries.
I'll try again, and will make it short.
We have made progress. But to get back to anything like a pre-Trump normal, we're going to need some kind of national de-MAGA-fication. We will need to root the bastards out, along with their sick ideologies.
Do you see that happening? Do you think we can muster the political will to do it? Do you think a sufficient sector of the population even want it?
I wish I could say I had some confidence that that could happen, but I can't.
"
"Knowing that Gay is second-generation *Haitian*".
I do miss the preview. Now I'll have to start paying attention to what I write!
:)
"
Russell is a bit more familiar with Leslie than I am, but I have to ask, is his taking issue with Gay on civility related to a book that he is flogging about how much we need civility?
LOL
Full disclosure - my exposure to both Gay and Leslie is 100% the excerpt GFTNC cited. And knowing that Gay is second-generation adds context that clarifies her position on civility.
As Coates says, "welcome to black America".
So thank you for adding that.
Still, looking at where we were in, say, the early 1800s, I’d say that we’ve made significant progress over the last two centuries.
I agree with this.
That said, IMO Trump has exposed seious flaws in our Constitutional order. The guardrails - the courts, Congress, the mostly non-political administrative state - have failed or at least been undermined to the point where I'm not sure what things are gonna look like post Trump.
I don't know if there is a "there" to go back to. I don't think it's going to be the same country.
We've achieved Popper's paradox of tolerance. The intolerant have taken the reins. They will not surrender them willingly or gracefully, and are not interested at all in sharing power with anyone else. Maybe we will squeak out another legitimate election or two, and maybe that will be sufficient to allow a meaningful change of regime. That is far from guaranteed, but it's possible.
But even under that circumstance, some significant changes are going to be needed to make sure the same or similar thing doesn't happen again. And I don't know if the vision and the political will is there to make that happen.
I don't know where all of this goes, but I don't really have any confidence that we are going to return to any kind of pre-Trump normal, once he is somehow off the scene.
Plus, while we in the US are losing our minds and acting out the very worst in our national character, the rest of the world is moving on. So wherever we end up domestically, it's going to have to deal with a very different international context. At a minimum, we're shredding generations of good will. We're proving ourselves to be fickle, unreliable partners, prone to enormous changes in national policy and direction every four years.
I really don't know what comes next, but I don't think it's going to be as simple as regaining and restoring all the stuff that is being rolled back now.
I'm at a loss, to be honest.
"
Here’s another breakdown of the protestors.
Seems sort of accurate.
I was glad to see the "outcasts" included because they are almost always part of the mix. A lot of them have serious mental and psychological issues. They include folks like the guy that Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed for the crime of throwing a bag at him.
Geriatrics are much easier (and less negatively) to explain than Kruse's characterization - they (i.e., we) show up because we're retired and don't have jobs and kids to deal with. Which is to say, we have the time.
Kruse describes folks affected by ICE activity as "out for retribution", which strikes me as wrong. I wonder if she actually knows anyone, or has talked with anyone, who has actually been affected - had friends or family members incarcerated or deported. In my experience they just want to bear witness to their own experience, they aren't out to "get" anybody.
Kruse's characterization of antifa seems extreme, even a bit cartoonish. "They all dress in black and will kill to suppress dissenting views" - again, I have to ask if she has ever actually been around real live antifa or antifa-adjacent people. Some fit the strict definition of domestic terrorism as defined in US law, some don't. And "domestic terrorism" is a very dangerous label to toss around in the current climate.
To the degree that I understand it, at its heart antifa are people who believe many hard core right wingers are fascists and are violent and unreasoning people, who will not respect the law and institutions of governance and so must be met with force. It's not an approach I agree with or support - I think they are basically poking the bear and giving Trump et al an excuse to double down. But neither are they completely wrong about their opponents.
Stakes:
I attend two churches pretty regularly. One is an Episcopal church whose congregation is about 60% Latino. They hold two services a week, one in English, one in Spanish, with a bilingual service once a month. The other is a UU church that has a significant population of gays as well as some trans people. We just hired a minister who is a lesbian.
I live in a very white bread town that is adjacent to towns with sizeable immigrant populations. Dominecan Republic, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Haiti, Russia and Eastern Europe, Ireland. When I say "adjacent" I mean these towns are within 2 or 3 miles of my home. The city of Salem is literally around the corner from me. Most of my daily is in and around Salem, which is about 15% Dominican. I contribute to and have volunteered at a local food bank whose clientele is primarily immigrants.
I make a somewhat haphazard but continual effort to follow a spiritual path that is very much centered on concern for less privileged people - the poor, immigrants, outcasts of any type. By "haphazard" I mean I'm not great at it, mostly because I am temperentally irascible, judgemental, impatient, and have a kind of restless and unruly mind. Nonetheless, I cannot escape the overwhelming and consistent message that god, whoever and whatever that personage is, loves everyone but really really really cherishes and champions less fortunate people.
I often wonder what judgement this country is storing up for itself. Not in the sense of some kind of supreme being throwing bolts of lightning at us, but just in the sense of karma. I really do believe we will pay a price for the crap that is going on here right now.
Ultimately, for me it comes down to a really simple thing - we are obliged to treat other people as fellow human beings, deserving of respect and consideration. "Obliged" not necessarily for some religious or spiritual motivation, but just freaking because. Because there they are, a person like yourself. Treat them as you would be treated, at minimum.
So that's where I'm at with all of this. I spend a lot of time spinning my mental and emotional wheels trying to understand how to live in this moment. I really don't know where it's all gonna lead.
I appreciate having ObWi as a place to vent and work through my own thoughts about all of it. And I appreciate all of your forbearance while I think out loud, at length. Mental flailing, but I'm grateful to have a venue for it.
"
I haven’t commented much on Trump because I thought everyone here was pretty much in agreement...
Pretty much sums it up. I appreciate your comments about what a sane immigration policy would look like as well.
Common ground, y'all!
And I appreciate your grace in receiving the occasional pile on. It ain't always fun being the minority voice.
On “WTF moments at cultural borders”
"gotta go see a man about a horse"
On “Where are the 5 words?”
I don't agree with Gay (or at least Gay's point of view as presented here) and generally do agree with Leslie.
Yes, civility is absolutely "inauthentic", as Gay states, in the sense she calls out - it absolutely is a performance. As are many of the basic daily protocols we engage in to avoid pissing each other off and generally making each other's lives unnecessarily difficult.
Don't cut in line. Let folks get off the bus before you try to get on. Make sure everyone at the table has had at least something to eat before you go for second helpings. Say "please" and "thank you".
All of these things require us to consider other folks before, or at least in addition to, asserting our own wishes and interests.
And all of these things make it possible for us to co-exist large and complex societies. Or even small and complex societies, where "complex" is just way of saying different people want and value different things.
So there is tremendous value in civility.
The statement I've been making about civility in current-day social and political discourse in this country is not that it's a fantasy or of no value.
My statement is that it's not *available*. It's not on offer.
If I decline to engage in discussion about where things are at right now with Trumper friends and family members, it's not because I have no interest in their perspective or their experience. It's because my experience has been that the conversation will not be particularly fruitful.
To be perfectly candid, the mindset of most conservatives, and especially of Trump supporters, most reminds me of people I knew (and know) from my days among the Christian fundamentalists. They have a set of beliefs that lets them interpret the world in a way that makes sense of their sense of threat or unease. That provide them with an identity. And to challenge those ideas is to challenge that sense of identity, which changes the conversation from a thoughtful exchange of ideas into something more existential.
It is possible to get through all of that, but it's a huge amount of work, and there really aren't any contexts for doing it.
I first started hanging out on political blogs somewhere around 2001 - just after 9/11, when the whole USA Patriot Act debate was going on and Bush II was ginning up support for invading Iraq. I wanted to understand what people were thinking so I went to conservative blogs. I forget all of them, but the place I spent the most time was RedState, back in the early days before they purged anybody who wasn't on board with the conservative agenda. And I do mean purge, it was explicit and intentional. I used to post there as "amos".
Before I left I spent probably hundreds of hours having what were, to me, some of the strangest conversations I've ever had. The things a lot of folks there believed seemed outlandish to me, almost to the point of parody. But there they were, and for a while at least, they were open to discussing all of it with the likes of me.
That *is no longer available*. I would no longer be welcome there, at all.
I found my way here when there were still a lot of conversative voices here. And over time this place has sorted itself into a by-far-majority liberal to left-ish place.
Which I find congenial, but it doesn't afford conversation across the "great divide".
And to be honest, the actions of the current administration pretty much demand that folks pick a side. What is the reasonable conversation to have about the utter denial of due process to people who happen to speak Spanish?
The conversation I would really like to have would begin with "why are you afraid of Hispanic people?". Or black people, or trans people, or gays. It really seems like folks don't just disapprove or dislike those folks, but instead feel threatened by them.
"It's the end of Western civilization!". Right?
Where the hell does that come from? I'd like to know that. But I don't see an available path to getting to that conversation.
And so here we are.
Long comment, thanks as always for your indulgence.
"
I'm not a mind reader and I don't wish to speak for Charles.
All of that said, his comments here strike me as an attempt to be even-handed. And to the degree that is so, I appreciate it.
The problem, as nous notes, is that the "two sides" aren't really comparable at this point.
On “Citizenship”
Because, of course, everybody (even Steven Miller) has ancestors at some remove who were immigrants.
Stephen MIller.
tl;dr - Miller's great-grandfather came to the US in 1903.
On “Where are the 5 words?”
To be perfectly honest, I am less concerned about violence between folks like the Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer and their ilk, versus "antifa" however that term is construed.
What I am most disturbed by is the violence brought by federal law enforcement, most especially ICE.
You can walk away from a Proud Boy vs. antifa fight. If they really insist on bringing to you, which is only likely to happen in situations you can pretty easily avoid, you can fight back to the best of your ability. Or just run away.
If ICE or the FBI or similar come for you, the options of walking away or fighting back are not really available. They'll get you jailed or shot.
This is explicit, unlawful, and unaccountable state violence - in some cases extreme - toward harmless people. It is utterly unnecessary for purposes of finding and dealing with people who are here without legal status.
It's terrorism, by the government, directed toward peaceful residents, both legal and not. It's not something we have seen here at this level, and as far as I can tell we have no means of curbing it.
It's out of control.
"
Not so different from previous administrations
With all due respect, this is utter nonsense. Full stop.
A profile of Andy Ngo
Andy Ngo waded into a riot and got beaten up. I'm not justifying the violence, I'm just pointing out the obvious.
"
Libertarians can become outrage exhausted since they can be continuously outraged regardless of who’s running the government.
And yet, with the exception of Radley Balko, the exhaustion always seems to kick in just before they raise their voices against (R) excesses.
On one hand, some activists yelling at ICE all night long with a bullhorn. Yes, that's a PITA.
On the other hand, federal agents invading an apartment complex, breaking into any apartment they can force their way into without AFAICT presenting warrants of any kind, rousting people out into the street in the middle of the night and making them wait zip-tied in their pajamas (if that) for hours while they "look up their records", tossing the contents of people's apartments into the halls, leaving doors broken open, and throwing many folks into vans to be whisked away... somewhere.
Same / same.
Antifa isn't gonna do anything to you if you're not a declared fascist, white supremacist, Nazi, or similar, or possibly open and vocal supporter of same.
The feds are gonna come after you if you're brown.
I've been listening to libertarians and right wing folks talking for decades - literally, for decades - about how they're gonna rise up against government overreach and abuse of power.
When it actually arrives, nothing. Silence. Or open acquiescence.
So I don't believe you. Any of you.
Over and out.
On “Japan unleashed”
immigration, which seems like a rather temporary solution
This is a bit puzzling to me. Why temporary? Don't immigrants stay (if they can)?
On “Jane Goodall RIP”
R.I.P. Jane Goodall. A life well spent.
And apparently she had a better sense of humor, and took herself less seriously, than either her Institute or that hothead chimp Frodo.
On “Where are the 5 words?”
While "antifa" is annoying the neighbors in Portland, the feds are doing this.
I look forward to the expressions of libertarian outrage about the abuse and overreach of government power.
"
What I look for in comments or concerns about antifa is some sense of balance.
First, "antifa" and the related term "radical left" have become so vague as to be almost meaningless. There are people who self-identify as antifa, and who will fight - physically fight - people who they consider fascist. Less commonly, they will engage in acts of vandalism, most often toward state property - cop cars, ICE facilities. Most of what they do is not directly violent, although it can be harmful to people they consider fascist - doxing, outing them to employers so they get fired. A lot of their work is tracking the actions of people they consider fascist, many of whom are themselves violent.
There are also folks who are basically anti-capitalist anarchists. They are less commonly involved in fighting and more commonly involved in acts of vandalism and sabotage, often directed at financial institutions. See also the WTO protests of 1999 in Seattle.
And there is also a general rabble of randos who are attracted to public disruption of whatever type. It's often not clear what their goals are, or if they have any, other than being publicly loud and disruptive. Some people just like riots.
All of these folks get labelled "antifa" but they're a sort of overlapping Venn diagram of communities with perhaps related, but distinct, goals.
Real, honest-to-god antifa folks are not that common, and are really focused specifically on f***ing with fascists. Everybody who shows up at a protest wearing black with "big A" armbands and a balaclava are not antifa. A lot of them are just young kids cosplaying some kind of stick-it-to-the-man drama.
We all go through our phases in life.
The randos are probably the most generally dangerous of the above, because their actions are often not focused. They are the looters, folks who set fire to stuff just to watch it burn, folks who smash windows just because they can.
The black bloc folks generally don't want to physically fight anyone, they mostly want to do expensive damage to big corporations. I don't see them around so much anymore.
The real antifa folks will definiely engage in physical fights. Mostly with obvious hard-core right wingers, who themselves like fighting. Sometimes with folks more on the periphery of the hard-core right wing - supporters, etc. They also often bring trauma medical skills, which have been helpful to folks, and not just to antifa folks. During the Charlottesville "Unite the right" mess they provided a buffer between extremely violent right-wing actors and non-violent counter-protestors, likely sparing them a lot of harm and even saving some lives. A service the police on the scene were unable or unwilling to provide.
FWIW, I do not support or endorse any of the above. I think the occasions when violent action are justified are very, very rare. Occasions when they are constructive, even rarer. I suppose things here could get to the point where some kind of organized forceful resistance would be appropriate, but I do not believe we are there yet, and hope we do not get there. And the violent actions of the broad spectrum of folks referred to as "antifa" only play into the violent fantasies and actions of their counterparties on the right.
On the other side of the fence, we have groups like the Proud Boys and the Three Percenters and the Oathkeepers, who among other things have organized the January 6 violent insurrection attempting to interrupt the peaceful transfer of power. They are part of a broader movement that includes the patchwork of militias, self-appointed homegrown private armies who regularly threaten the rest of us with deadly force. And often go beyond threats.
And now we have Trump's ICE agents, who come into peaceful communities wearing full military kit and violently kidnap anyone they care to with no regard for the law or due process.
So there's all of that.
I'm sorry that some folks in Portland are kept awake at night by black-clad youngsters with bullhorns. I'm also sorry for the folks who have been shot in the face by "less than lethal" ordinance. And I'm sorry for the people who have been kidnapped while going about their daily lives - mowing somebody's lawn, taking their kids to school, going to appointments to fulfill the requirements of trying to immigrate "the right way".
I'm sorry for the people who have been assaulted while engaging in legal peaceful protest. I'm sorry for the people who have been murdered while attending services at synagogues and liberal christian churches. I'm sorry for the people who have been, and continue to be, assaulted or murdered for being brown, Muslim, gay, trans, or whatever other thing is today's conservative bete noire.
I'm sorry for the kid who was killed by cops for being black while holding a toy pistol in a playground. And for the guy who was killed by cops for holding an air gun in a Walmart.
There is a lot to grieve. A lot to be sorry about. This is a violent country, there is no getting around it, and it gets worse when things get tense.
I hope you will forgive me if I just can't get that outraged by somebody yelling at ICE all night in Portland, even if it keeps the neighbors awake. It would piss me off, too, if it was in my neighborhood, but there are things that piss me off a hell of a lot more.
Let's look at the bigger picture, please.
"
Also, too: honey badger mom hates antifa, but loves her some Ethan Nordean.
So her concern does not appear to be violence and public disruption per se.
"
At times, there have been several hundred protestors at the ICE facility.
Looked like about five in the video.
On “Ezra Coates DESTROYS Ta-Nehisi Klein!!!”
Apropos of nothing in particular:
I think it must be a weird time to be Ezra Klein (or similar). His gig is basically to have insightful things to say about where we're at, politically. And I'm not sure anyone can really make sense of it all.
We're dealing with a very strange group of political actors at the moment, people driven by weird and somewhat opaque personal agendas. Or maybe not opaque as much as inexplicable.
They really are a crew of weirdos. I guess that may sound kind of judge-y, but it would take a much better mind than mine to make sense of it all.
Better days, y'all. They will come. We're mostly olds here, so maybe not before we peg out, but they will come. In the meantime, hold fast to what is worthwhile.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.