State of the Discussion

"(etwas) bis zur Vergasung (tun)" (to do something up to the gassing)
It means to (have to) do something beyond the point where it gets really annoying/cumbersome/intolerable, e.g. having to work overtime constantly or a sports trainer or PE teacher forcing yet another round around the stadium (and then another, and another...)

Originating from WW1 and popular in the inter-war years. Since WW2 there is a taboo because most people assume it is referring to the holocaust. But it is still used, often unthinkingly.

Interesting stuff. My own feeling is that a big problem arises when people take positions that they don't really have a stake in, but use it to fight against the other side. This raises the question of whether an issue is something that a person is really committed to or if it is 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'. So when Charles argues, after a long history of arguing for libertarian principles, how front doors of ICE facilities need National Guard protection, I wonder if he's for real or just trolling or possibly just doesn't know the difference.

It is rather illiberal to argue that someone's opinions doesn't matter, but I can think of a number of examples on both sides of people seemingly taking on opinions that don't really have a lot to do with them but arguing for them vehemently. This goes hand in hand with the larger issue of astroturfing and fake identities. It may be a lost cause, especially for larger platforms, but we can try to do a Candide and cultivate our gardens.

There's something I'm missing here.

There’s no way to structure things in a way that looks even and balanced when the right has decided that they don’t need to listen to, work with, or care about anything and anyone on the other side.

Why do we need to "structure things in a way that looks even and balanced"? Any discussion we have on a blog surely just needs to be argued reasonably civilly, without tricks or ignoring the context - the kinds of things "the right" might argue here will not necessarily change their unwillingness "to listen to, work with or care about anything and anyone on the other side", but if they're commenting here there's presumably some reason for it, and as we have often seen in the past, such discussions can provoke interesting exchanges.

The problem, as nous notes, is that the “two sides” aren’t really comparable at this point.

Alas, this is inarguably so. But surely that is exactly what our discussions highlight? Most of us have already acknowledged that we do not or cannot have these conversations in real life. But isn't there some benefit to continuing to have them here, even if it is only (and I don't think it is) as a way to vent some of our feelings? After all, we still talk to Charles, and he still talks to us, even though his opinion of Ubu has (glacially slowly) somewhat changed?

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 the street, sure. But consider the recent case of ICE busting into an apartment building and effectively taking everyone inside into custody. With getting back out of custody being a matter of having to prove your innocence. Being an old white guy like you or me not being any protection against finding yourself in cuffs (more likely zip ties), lying in the street for a couple of hours wearing whatever you happened to be using for sleep wear.

Granted, being in a single family dwelling would tend to avoid that scenario. But there's no reason that I can see that the same treatment might not be visited on, for example, everybody who happened to be in a particular store or restaurant.

I confess that I have considered the merits of routinely carrying my passport with me. Just to have some sort of proof of citizenship readily to hand.
"Papers, please!". (Except that there's no way these thugs say "please".)

Exactly what russell said.

And Charles, that was what I was getting at by asking if you had read that link: you were arguing in favour of the need for the feds to fight small numbers of "Antifa" protesters outside an ICE facility, in a state which had rejected their "help", while ICE and other DOJ forces are going after often harmless, blameless people because they look brown or speak Spanish, irrespective of any grounds for suspicion of illegality.

This is explicit, unlawful, and unaccountable state violence – in some cases extreme – toward harmless people.
***
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

That is the point.

I appreciate the suggestion, wj, but let's not overlook the larger point. It's not myself I worry about. The circumstances in which I, an aging white guy with no discernible foreignness about me, might need to prove my citizenship to an ICE "agent" on the street are circumstances in which you or anybody else could find themselves.
--TP

Afterword to my earlier comment about "play stupid games, win stupid prizes..."

I'd prefer that the prizes that people won for playing stupid games were the most gentle possible version of the prize that would actually relieve them of the urge to play stupid games and steer them into playing smart games that have prizes we all get to share to our mutual benefit.

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.

I've been not dealing with this because it is less painful to me to be angry than to be sad. There are people whose death really hurts--I mean people I don't know but seem somehow permanent and essential so it's a shock when they die.

CharlesWT - Some journalists who have been beaten to the point of brain injury may wish to quibble.

I assume that this is about Andy Ngo. Important to note that Ngo does not usually wear anything identifying himself as a member of the press, and often follows groups like Patriot Prayer to film confrontations with antifa groups. He also is known for doxxing antifa protesters on his own channel, and selectively editing them.

His lack of any press identification while traveling with Patriot Prayer is going to get him in the middle of things and mistaken for being a member of that group while they are engaging in their own violent provocation. They may not be "attacking a journalist" so much as they are just trying to hold their own in a clash between violent groups, and they have no indication that Ngo is not a member of Patriot Prayer or associated with them.

But also, more than a few of the antifa people may know who Ngo was, and were going after him because of his having doxxed them or one of their friends. Ngo has given Portland antifa plenty of reasons to hate him personally. He could have been targeted for a beat down, but "journalist" is far too innocent and anodyne a description of his role in context. No one is attacking him for being there and trying to document things while staying out of the confrontation. He's an active participant on one side using his ambiguous position as a journalist to cast himself in a more innocent light.

I'm not defending antifa here. I'm sure that more than a few among them were engaged in felony violence. I'm also sure that many among them were also victims of felony violence and that some of that felony violence was committed by the people who were personal associates of Ngo.

I've lost count of the number of times I've heard or read an alt-right associate say "play stupid games, win stupid prizes" to footage of college students being beaten by police, or by a right-wing activist during an escalation. Ngo is an avid player of stupid games. He's made his name as such, and has hundreds of thousands of subscribers, not all of whom are Russian bots.

A bit about antifa violence and videos, including some of Ngo's work - from Bellingcat:

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/11/18/million-maga-march-unravelling-a-violent-viral-video/

I have a hard time watching any Ngo video and video of neutrally positioned (and clearly identified) journalists being targeted and fired upon with pepper balls and rubber rounds by riot police, and feeling like that's a legitimate comparison for both-siderism.

The big picture is that, at best, Trump and his cronies are a bunch of idiots.

In December, you could have made that argument. Plausibly, if not particularly persuasively. Today? Not so much.

At this point, it's pretty clear that they are not merely a bunch of idiots. At minimum they are a bunch of armed and dangerous psychopaths and sociopaths. Many of them are also idiots. But that is rather beside the point.

How many arguments with the theme of "anti-racists are the real racists" have you read over the years? Perhaps the same goes for anti-fascists, says NOT me.

The federal government has the right to protect the ICE facility.

Wow, the facility really needs it too - that broken door in June is crying out for federal protection. Or, what russell said. Honestly Charles, when you you look at the big picture and make these kinds of arguments, I seriously question what you actually believe and value, if anything.

Tony, it might be worth consulting an immigration attorney. Just to find out what constitutes "lawful authority". The law being how it is, it's possible that you (but nobody else) are lawfully authorized. Worth checking out these days.

I have been known to complain bitterly that US business management has gotten incredibly lazy and cheap, unwilling to be flexible or invest in education and productivity tools.

US business management has gotten utterly short-term focused. Investing, for all too many, is anathema unless it can be done with zero impact on quarterly earnings. I suspect that MBA programs are a significant contributor. But vulture capital asset stripping firms, waiting to attack any form which dates to deviate.

There are exceptions, of course. But they are just that: exceptions. Unfortunately.

So, Charles, is it the Libertarian (or your) position that sending in federal troops, contrary to the wishes of the state authorities, to deal with what respectable news sources show to be an annoying, smallish protest, is the right (or even acceptable) thing to do?

The federal government has the right to protect the ICE facility. Otherwise, it should stay out unless invited in by the state's governor.

Any economic philosophy that is reliant on growth is going to be struggling as it runs up against the reality of climate change. As far as population reduction goes, that's going to take care of itself whether we do anything or not.

Let me add +1 to russell's list of black bloc types - RW accelerationists wanting to turn up the temperature and provoke things like the Guard call-up.

No, I don't think that any of them are in the antifa camp in Portland. The people in the camp are either real antifa types, or are undercover feds (again, I think not, but that has been the case with the RW militias, so I leave open that possibility). The antifa folks would not take kindly to finding a Boogaloo Boy in their midst.

But, for example, in Minneapolis after George Floyd there were RW militia kids who were caught driving in from WI to loot and burn and try to provoke a violent response from the authorities.

If I see a single person in black with a mask wearing visible antifa markers, I automatically assume that they are false flag assholes. The usually get chased off by the activist leaders, but they hang around just far enough away to provoke.

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.