Wednesday 6 January 2021

Time for Muscular Liberalism

Admittedly, an invasion of Congress spearheaded by a Jamiroquai impersonator was not on my 2021 bingo card, and yet here we are. This was never a serious fascist putsch, it was one part an (apparent) spontaneous explosion, and one part opportunity for edgelord selfies. While there were worrying moments when, apparently, the DC National Guard - under Donald Trump's control - refused to respond to requests to intervene and reports FBI special agents had been sent home early. But eventually both mobilised and moved in, which underlines the unplanned, opportunist character of the "uprising". This doesn't make it any less serious. If any of the crowd had got their hands on a leftwing Congresswoman, her safety would have been imperilled. If they had mobbed and caught several Democrats, the headlines would be much worse. Calling it a coup is a bit much, but a violent assault on liberal democracy by the far right this most certainly was.

Clearly, culpability for this lies with Trump. Years of trampling on political convention and stirring up white supremacism for votes, and since losing the election for the pathetic narcissism of ego massage, it doesn't take complex arguments about social causality to join the dots between divisive rhetoric and far right political violence. Even liberals can't ignore it now. And so the announcement by Ilhan Omar that she's drawing up articles of impeachment is the right thing to do. Not just the right but the necessary thing and, as per the historical record, it fell to the left to lead the charge against fascism.

But the left can't do this alone at present. Joe Biden pleaded for everyone to come together and called on Trump to "step up" and tell his supporters to go home. Yet the president-elect must do some stepping up of his own. Going all milquetoast and pretending peace and love might warm the hearts of West Wing fans, but now the liberals and the constitutionalists, even "moderate" Republicans are under threat from the insurrectionist wing of the Trumpist movement. If Biden sits on his hands when he's sworn in, we will see more stormings of state Houses, like we saw in Michigan in May and Kansas today, more collusion between the police and the far right, as per the pathetic policing and the selfies in Congress, a more confident militia movement and, effectively, a battle for the streets between the left and the tooled up right. Biden's going to have to go after the fascists to stop them coming for liberalism, the constitution and, when all is said and done, him.

13 comments:

david walsh said...

The guy in the horns and fur has already been identified by many as Jake Angeli, a well-known QAnon promoter known as the “Q Shaman.”

Dipper said...

Well, funny how the left are now a fan of democracy and against insurrectionist behaviour.

Because when my side won an election by 52% to 48%, your side spent ages saying the election was rigged and trying to overturn it. And then when an insurrectionist mob headed by a 17 year old girl with Aspergers repeatedly attacked parliament and violently prevent the normal functioning of society your lot cheered it on. And when angry people took to the streets burning and looting in the name of a criminal shot by police, your lot took the knee and cheered it on.

So when will you lot be taking the knee for the protestor shot yesterday?

For the record, the behaviour by Trump supporters and Trump itself is shocking and the USA needs to exert democratic control. But you reap what you sow.

Really looking forward to you lot explaining why this is completely different.

Phil said...

Dipper, you must live in a parallel world. Please give us chapter and verse on the occasion a remain mob tear-arsed through the Palace of Westminster with Greta Thunberg at their head.

Dipper said...

@ Phil

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/sep/05/over-600-arrests-made-at-extinction-rebellion-protests-in-london

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/london-protests-far-right-black-lives-matter-police-racism-boris-johnson-met-a9560021.html

the language used by spokespeople here in these movements is contemptuous of democracy.

Parliament spent years trying to undo Brexit.

Dipper said...

@ Phil. I guess now we all live in parallel worlds. Our social media feeds excludes those who disagree. The echo chamber reinforces views, opinions, and actions that become normalised within our groups but remain shocking and unacceptable outside that group. My feed contains a lot of left stuff for various non-political reasons, and the number of Brexit Tories complaining about what a disgrace the BBC pro Remain and BLM position is matches the number of Corbynites complaining about the BBC for being too close to the Tories.

BCFG said...

Dipper is clearly talking out of his backside but even farts have a function.

I do find the liberals full of hysteria when it comes to Trump, they say this was an armed insurrection, get the fuck out of here, they say why did the authorities not come down heavier, 4 people were killed and a woman shot dead!

The Yanks have been promoting armed insurrection in many parts of the world recently and if only this had been them receiving their own medicine. Unfortunately it was much ado about very little indeed.

I wonder if Phil is living in a parallel world too, maybe one where the mueller investigation didn't take place or the numerous attempts to impeach Trump didn't happen etc etc etc. In our universe Trumps response to defeat is perfectly understood, you made it impossible for me, I will make it impossible for you.

More importantly Biden can go after the 'fascists' all he likes but can he change the underlying conditions which make fascism thrive? Personally I doubt it, which means Biden will have to go after the 'fascists' in other ways. Maybe that will prompt a bloody civil war, great!

Phil said...

And so Dipper cannot find any leftists protests that were of an insurrectionist character, nor invaded parliament and so clumsily elides BLM and XR protests with what we saw yesterday. Thanks for proving, as if it needed proving, that Conservatism and Tories are fundamentally and irreducibly dishonest.

Karl Greenall said...

And those are only the good points!

Karl Greenall said...

Hmm....
52% to 48% on a 72.2% turnout.
What a huge mandate.
Yessiree!.,.. It's enough to make one want to chuck one's grand piano out of the window.

Dipper said...

well, apart from finding instances of XR preventing society going about its business and BLM defacing and destroying monuments.

Blissex said...

«protests that were of an insurrectionist character»

Please, the "insurrectionist character" exists only in the hallucinations of those affected by TDS and in the frantic narratives of the regime media. All that I saw from recordings is just a small bunch of disorganised sad characters. No tanks, machine guns, rocket launchers, ground bombers, artillery, and no brigades of infantry and special forces.

There should be some questions as to how a small bunch of disorganised sad characters could create such a commotion in Washington, which is strongly monitored and garrisoned, and in particular at the Capitol, which is pretty much a fortress, and with the security services monitoring the slightest trouble in real-time.

The conceit that all that the President of the USA, who is also a billionaire, can organise for a protest of an "insurrectionist character" is a thin mob of clowns is ridiculous. The question is then who allowed this "spontaneous" event to get that far. Who is going to benefit from the inevitable turn of the screw on civil liberties? :-(

Anonymous said...

Dipper is evidently intensely relaxed about police murdering black men and women.

Dipper said...

@ Anonymous

"Dipper is evidently intensely relaxed about police murdering black men and women."

When have I ever said that? Ridiculous comment.

The main source of murder of young black men in the UK is other black men. But the left don't care as there is no political mileage to be made from it.