Tag: Political Violence

This is Control Of Narrative

After the death of Right wing blowhard the narrative has turned to all out attack on anyone that disagrees with Donny and his band of thugs…..even when a report show that right wing voilence has outpaced any left violence….but sine that did not help Donny’s proclamation then that report had to go….and it did.

The Justice Department has reportedly scrubbed a study that documented the frequency of far-right violence from its website, according to 404 Media.

“The number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism,” the opening paragraph of the study reads. “Since 1990, far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists, including 227 events that took more than 520 lives. In this same period, far-left extremists committed 42 ideologically motivated attacks that took 78 lives.”

The study, entitled “What NIJ Research Tells Us About Domestic Terrorism,” was published in January 2024 and hosted on the Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs website. Per 404 Media, it was still accessible as recently as Sept. 12, but no longer is. Presently, it’s available via the Wayback Machine, which archives old versions of websites.

Daniel Malmer, a graduate student at the University of North Carolina studying online extremism, flagged the development on Saturday.

“It existed yesterday and is gone today,” Malmer wrote in a post on Bluesky.

A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

This reported action has occurred as President Donald Trump has ramped up attacks on “the left,” whom he’s accused of perpetrating political violence in the wake of the assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk. Trump has also alleged that those on “the left” have contributed to “most of the violence,” a point that’s disproven in the reportedly deleted study and other research about extremism.

Authorities have said that Kirk’s suspected shooter adhered to “leftist ideology,” and disclosed text messages which show him allegedly saying he had “enough of [the activist’s] hatred.”No evidence ties larger organizations to the shooting thus far.

Trump has faced criticism for failing to similarly condemn and acknowledge right-wing violence to the same degree that he’s denounced left-wing violence.

The study’s reported disappearance also comes as Trump has imposed executive actions calling on federal agencies to eliminate “diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility … policies,” prompting many to wipe out information from their websites.

(aol.com)

More information can be had here….

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/17/justice-department-study-far-right-extremist-violence

And that is how a dictator will use his power to keep a faulty narrative going.

Do we need to say more?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

On Political Violence

Recent events got me to thinking about political violence….again.  A sitting rep has killed along with you husband and that is just the tip…..years ago another sitting rep was shot but survived….then there have been attacks on campaign offices about 20 years ago a US Congressperson was shot while practicing for a ball game and an insurrection and yet the violence.

It has been a grim couple of weeks in the US, as multiple acts of politically motivated violence have dominated headlines and sparked fears that a worrying new normal has taken hold in America.

Last Saturday, a man disguised as a police officer attacked two Democratic legislators at their homes in Minnesota, killing a state representative and her husband, and wounding another lawmaker and his wife. The alleged murderer was planning further attacks, police said, on local politicians and abortion rights advocates.

The same day, during national “No Kings” demonstrations against the Trump administration, there was a spate of other violence or near-violence across the US. After a man with a rifle allegedly charged at protesters in Utah, an armed “safety volunteer” associated with the protest fired at the man, wounding him and killing a bystander. When protesters in California surrounded a car, the driver sped over a protester’s leg. And a man was arrested in Arizona after brandishing a handgun at protesters.

Later in the week, a Jewish lawmaker in Ohio reported that he was “run off the road” by a man who waved a Palestinian flag at him. Police in New York also said they were investigating anti-Muslim threats to the mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani.

The political temperature is dangerously high – and shows few signs of cooling.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/22/political-violence-extremism-america

Does this sort of political violence work?

…

These campaigns depopulated, demoralized, and disenfranchised entire peoples—and they worked. Political violence was used to maintain power, suppress democracy, and preserve racial hierarchies. Whether through mob rule or official policy, it has long been a tool of dominance in American political life. The results are still visible in the disparities and structural inequalities of today.

Some argue that violence only provides fleeting success. But in politics, a year can reshape a lifetime. A decade can redirect a nation. Even a single act—an assassination, a bombing, a riot—can reconfigure the structures of power so deeply that nothing returns to its previous state.

In democracies, political violence is supposed to be unnecessary. People are taught to believe in elections, deliberation, and law. But when violence succeeds—when it silences opposition or disrupts government—it sends a chilling message: the rule of law is optional. For those willing to kill, threaten, or destroy, the system can be manipulated or broken.

…

Political violence is still a currency of global power. It is not merely the weapon of the weak, but also the preferred instrument of regimes and elites seeking control. The world has not outgrown violence as a political strategy. It has simply become more selective and sophisticated in its application.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/06/19/the-tragedy-of-political-violence-it-works/

Was Mao right when he wrote….’political power goes from the barrel of a gun’?

Is there more to come?

Thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Win Or Lose–Violence Will Ensue

So close to poetic.

Recently our boy Donnie made the statement that he has every right to interfere in an election….

Donald Trump’s remarks Sunday on the updated election interference indictment contained what sounded to some critics like a confession. The former president told Mark Levin on Fox News’ Life, Liberty and Levin that he had “every right” to interfere in the 2020 election, the Hill reports. “It’s so crazy that my poll numbers go up. Whoever heard you get indicted for interfering with a presidential election where you have every right to do it,” Trump said in the interview, per Reuters. “You get indicted and your poll numbers go up.”

Poll numbers go up?  How pathetic is that?  But sadly apparently true.

2024 will be an election like no other in memory….the outcome could bring upon us a chance for violence. I am not talking about if Trump loses but even if he wins the chance for violence is there…..

There’s an argument to be made that the defining moment of Donald Trump’s presidency, if not the past decade of politics at large, was Jan. 6, 2021, when a violent mob of MAGA protesters stormed the U.S. Capitol building to disrupt Congress’ certification of Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election. The images from that day — lawmakers cowering behind security forces with their guns drawn, a mock gallows erected outside the Capitol rotunda, a braying “QAnon Shaman” stalking the Senate chambers — have become an indelible reminder that America is just as susceptible to political violence as anywhere else. It is perhaps even more so, given Trump’s penchant for actively stoking the flames of resentment and frustration across his already fervent base. 

Now, as the 2024 presidential election kicks into high gear with just three months to go before polls close in November, the specter of violence once again looms large over an electorate still grappling with the legal and political fallout of Jan. 6. In a Reuters/Ipsos poll taken this spring, more than two-thirds of respondents — Democrats and Republicans alike — said they were “concerned that extremists will resort to violence if they are unhappy with the election outcome.” A more recent Deseret News/HarrisX poll saw three-fourths of the country “concerned about more political violence occurring before Election Day.”

https://theweek.com/politics/election-2024-violence-trump-harris-result

When All Else Fails Use Violence

Trump still pretends that he is rightfully the president and with the 2024 election is quickly approaching….the one question is if Trump is the nominee and he loses what will happen (again)….

Would Americans tolerate the chance of violence?

Since the insurrection of 06 January you would think that violence after an election is off the table…..

More than two years after the deadly January 6 insurrection, 12 million people in the United States, or 4.4% of the adult population, believe the use of violence is justified to restore former President Donald Trump to power, The Guardianreported Friday.

This percentage has declined from nearly 10% in 2021, when the Chicago Project on Security & Threats (CPOST) first began conducting its Dangers to Democracy surveys of U.S. adults. But April data the University of Chicago research center shared exclusively with The Guardian reveals that a treacherous amount of support for political violence and conspiracy theories persists nationwide.

In the two and a half years since Trump’s bid to overturn his 2020 loss fell short, Republican state lawmakers have launched a full-fledged assault on the franchise, enacting dozens of voter suppression and election subversion laws meant to increase their control over electoral outcomes. Due to obstruction from Republicans and corporate Democrats, Congress has failed to pass federal voting rights protections and other safeguards designed to prevent another coup attempt ahead of November 2024.

“We’re heading into an extremely tumultuous election season,” Robert Pape, a University of Chicago professor and CPOST director, told The Guardian. “What’s happening in the United States is political violence is going from the fringe to the mainstream.”

Several right-wing candidates who echoed Trump’s relentless lies about President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory lost in last year’s midterms. But more than 210 others—including at least two who participated in the January 6 rally that escalated into an attack on the U.S. Capitol—won congressional seats and races for governor, secretary of state, and attorney general, underscoring the extent to which election denialism is now entrenched in the GOP and jeopardizes U.S. democracy for the foreseeable future.

The CPOST survey conducted in April found that 20% of U.S. adults still believe “the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump and Joe Biden is an illegitimate president,” down only slightly from the 26% who said so in 2021.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/12-million-us-adults-think-violence-justified-to-restore-trump-presidency

I think that as the election gets nearer the chance of violence will expand.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Is Political Violence Possible?

Today is one of our most important days….voting in the 2022 midterms.

There have been many different takes on what we can expect on the outcome of this vote…..some say House and Senate will switch….and some think there is the possibility that the outcome will generate some sort of violence.

Let us look at the later more closely……

Polls in recent months have gauged Americans’ views on political violence in a few different ways, but they almost always capture some segment of the population that deems political violence acceptable. When asked whether the use of force or violence was justified “to advance an important political objective,” 1 in 5 Americans said it was, at least sometimes, according to a survey from researchers at the University of California, Davis, conducted in May and June. And in a Reuters/Ipsos poll from September, 17 percent of Americans somewhat or strongly agreed that political violence against those they disagreed with was acceptable, with slightly more Democrats agreeing with the statement than Republicans or independents. However, just a small fraction of registered voters said taking up arms or a civil war was necessary to fix our democracy in a recent New York Times/Siena poll.

As striking as some of those results are, some research suggests Americans’ true views are much more passive. Some of these responses can be chalked up to respondents not paying close enough attention, vaguely worded questions or both, according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in March. The study’s authors found that, when engaged with the survey and presented with specific examples of political violence, between 89 and 100 percent of respondents wanted a suspect in a politically motivated violent crime charged.

Regardless, the reality is that threats of political violence are on the rise, and it’s making Americans concerned. When asked whether they were “concerned that extremists will commit acts of violence after the election if they are unhappy with the election outcome,” 64 percent of Americans said they somewhat or strongly agreed, in a Reuters/Ipsos poll fielded in October. Similarly, 48 percent of Americans said they were very or somewhat concerned about the possibility of violence associated with the 2022 midterms, according to a UMass/YouGov poll conducted in October. And Black Americans are much more likely than white or Hispanic Americans to expect “displays of violence” related to the midterms, according to a Grid-Harris poll, also from October. When asked whether they thought election results would spark displays of violence in their area, 40 percent of Black Americans said it was very or somewhat likely, compared to 23 percent of white Americans and 36 percent of Hispanic Americans.

What Americans Think About Political Violence

The most recent poll, 04Nov22, shows that the fear of political violence weighs on American minds…..

Some high-profile Republicans have made light of last week’s attack on Paul Pelosi, but roughly 87% of Republicans overall say they are either somewhat concerned or very concerned about politically motivated violence in America, according to a new Washington Post/ABC poll. The poll found that 88% of Americans are concerned about political violence, including 95% of Democrats and 86% of independent voters. But while the concern was bipartisan, people were split on which side is to blame: Some 31% blame the GOP, 25% blame the Democratic Party, and 32% blame both parties equally, per ABC. Only 11% didn’t blame either party.

Women are more likely than men to be concerned about politically motivated violence, and the level of concern tends to go up with a person’s age, the poll found. The Post reports the FBI and other agencies issued an alert last week warning that in the 90 days after the midterm elections, “perceptions of election-related fraud and dissatisfaction with electoral outcomes likely will result in heightened threats of violence against a broad range of targets—such as ideological opponents and election workers.” The poll was taken in the days after the Pelosi attack, which police say was carried out by David DePape, a 42-year-old Canadian citizen. DePape’s online postings included numerous far-right conspiracy theories, the Los Angeles Times reports.

This is not an irrational fear….the chances are real we Americans need to move past this sort of barbaric behavior.

I have not voted for a presidential winner since 1976 and Jimmy Carter….but as Left leaning as I was I never thought about committing violence because my ‘guy’ lost.

Please get out and vote….our country needs your participation if we are to ever heal the divide.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Romancing The War

War re-enactment is a popular way for us Americans to remember our history…..down here where I live it is Civil War re-enactment……every year we have the weekend of reliving the famous battle of the Mississippi Coast….the problem is it is all made up there was NO famous or otherwise battle of the Mississippi Coast…..but yet the locals romanticize the death and destruction of the Civil War.

My question is….WHY?

In his book The Red and the Blue, Steve Kornacki offers an illuminating and concise history of the birth of contemporary political tribalism in the United States, tracing its origins back to the 1990s in the defining political contest between then U.S. President Bill Clinton and the Republican Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich. In retrospect, cast in a Long Edwardian Summer nostalgia, followed by the attacks of September 11 and the ensuing war on terror, the 1990s were indeed a time of political turmoil in the U.S. that periodically discharged into acts of political violence and terrorism, culminating in the Centennial Olympic Park and Oklahoma City bombings. Although political tribalism was not the direct cause of these acts of domestic terrorism, commentators at the time noted the poisoned political climate made such violent manifestations at least more likely.

Curiously, the rise of political tribalism in the 1990s, similar to the 1960s, coincided with a general rise in interest in the U.S. Civil War, America’s bloodiest and most costly political conflict. Since its conclusion in April 1865, the Civil War, cloaked in Lost Cause mythology, has inspired anti-federal government and white supremacist ideology like that of William Luther Pierce, a fierce defender of the antebellum South and the author of the dystopian racist novel The Turner Diaries, which inspired the Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy McVeigh. The depiction of the Civil War in print and film in the late 1980s and early 1990s appealed much more to the broader masses than it had in prior times.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2018/12/07/how_romanticization_of_the_us_civil_war_whitewashes_political_violence_114009.html

I wish I could give a good reason why adults want to play war……but I got nothing.