kpete

kpete's Journal

August 16, 2017

Las Vegas Sun Editorial Board: "Embraced by neo-fascists, Trump is the 1st un-American president"

As became clear Tuesday at Trump Tower, we now have a president who is loath to fight Nazis.

The unimaginable has happened.

The leader of the nation that sacrificed more than 400,000 of its sons and daughters in a desperate fight to prevent global conquest by white supremacists in World War II once again blamed counterprotesters in Charlottesville, Va., for helping cause the violence there over this past weekend.

Offered an opportunity to heal wounds that he caused by waiting two days to issue a rote condemnation of neo-Nazis for the horrific situation, President Donald Trump instead offered cover for them by echoing sentiments he expressed on Saturday via a statement that the neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer raved about as being “really, really good.”

“OK, what about the alt-left that came charging them?” Trump said. “Excuse me. What about the alt-left that came charging at the, as you say, the alt-right? Do they have any semblance of guilt?”

With that, what might have seemed inconceivable at one time became reality. A U.S. president defended neofascist racists who swarmed into Charlottesville from elsewhere over counterprotesters, many of them residents of the community, who countered them by representing our nation’s cherished values of equality and inclusion.

Yes, the rally did draw members of Antifa, short for anti-fascists, a group that has occasionally used vandalism and acts of violence in opposition to neo-Nazis and other hate groups. And if activists from Antifa or any other group instigated any violence, they should be prosecuted.

However, there’s no question that the torch-bearing neo-Nazis, not counterprotesters from groups such as Antifa and Black Lives Matter, were overwhelmingly responsible for the tragedy, in which 32-year-old Heather Heyer died and 19 other people were injured when a 20-year-old man Nazi sympathizer and was fascinated with Nazi ideology drove his car into a group of counterprotesters. In addition, two state troopers died when the helicopter from which they were monitoring the situation crashed.

With his comments Tuesday, Trump showed clearly that his condemnations from Saturday and Monday — the latter of which he read woodenly from a teleprompter — were hollow. Trump knows that white supremacists are part of his base, and he’s not about to alienate them.

If you think that’s an overstatement, consider the response Trump received from white supremacist David Duke via Twitter: “Thank you President Trump for your honesty & courage to tell the truth about #Charlottesville & condemn the leftist terrorists in BLM/Antifa.”

Disgusting. This is a president who routinely invoked the names of World War II generals on the campaign trail to appeal to pro-military voters, and he now is drawing praise from believers in the ideology that those same generals — along with those 400,000-plus service members who sacrificed their lives and 16 million-plus who served — risked all to oppose.

“Racism is evil,” he said Monday, “and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists and other hate groups that are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.”

Those words were true, and there was no need for Trump to do anything but continue to condemn the thugs who incited chaos and violence in Virginia.

Trump doesn’t get it. Americans fight Nazis and other fascists. Americans revile the existence of those groups’ ideology. Americans will wall off their demonstrations, marginalize them in society, oppose them relentlessly and condemn them unconditionally. Period.

It’s worth repeating: We now have a president who won’t do the same. He’ll attack the media with impunity, will vilify Muslims and will even besmirch members of his own administration and party, but he practically has to be cattle-prodded into putting white supremacists in their place.

There’s no rectifying this with an apology or another statement.

The president of the United States may be American by birth. But he’s clearly too cowardly to fight groups that Americans will not tolerate — neo-Nazis, the KKK and other white supremacists among them. That alone has made him the first un-American president, because this nation stands for fighting those hate groups, not coddling them.

https://lasvegassun.com/news/2017/aug/16/embraced-by-neo-fascists-trump-is-the-1st-un-ameri/

August 16, 2017

Update: Nazi website Daily Stormer resurfaces with a Russian domain. Anybody surprised?

Earlier this week, the infamous hate site the Daily Stormer lost control of the "dailystormer.com" domain after two domain registrars—first GoDaddy, then Google's domain service—refused service to the company. The companies were responding to a social media campaign against the Daily Stormer after a post on the site attacking Heather Heyer, who died in protest-related violence in Charlottesville this weekend.

The decisions of Google and GoDaddy made the site inaccessible on Tuesday. But by Wednesday morning, the Daily Stormer was back online with a new, Russian domain name: "dailystormer.ru." In a post announcing the site's return, editor Andrew Anglin credited Internet troll turned neo-Nazi Andrew "weev" Auernheimer, the Daily Stormer's administrator, for getting the site back up and running.

The Daily Stormer has also set up a .onion address, ensuring that it will be accessible over the censorship-resistant Tor network even if it loses its new domain name.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/08/shunned-by-godaddy-and-google-racist-daily-stormer-moves-to-russian-domain/

August 16, 2017

on a brighter note: The Total Eclipse of the Sun

August 16, 2017

A Photo purportedly showing an Antifa member hitting a police officer -WAS DIGITALLY MANIPULATED.

Photographed Beating Police Officer?

An image purportedly showing an anti-fascist (antifa) protestor hitting a police officer was circulated on social media shortly after a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, left one woman dead and dozens injured on 12 August 2017. The photograph was frequently accompanied by the claim that both sides (white nationalists and counter-protesters) had contributed to the violence, and that while Republicans had denounced racists, Democrats had not denounced antifa protestors:

This is not a genuine photograph of an antifa protestor striking a police officer. This image was digitally manipulated to add the antifa logo to an unrelated photograph.

The real image was taken in Athens, Greece in December 2009 during a demonstration on the one-year anniversary of the death of Alexandros Grigoropoulos, a 15-year-old who was killed by a police officer. Photographer Milos Bicanski took the photograph, which is available on Getty Images with the following caption:

Greek youths clash with riot police during a demonstration commemorating the fatal shooting of 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos’ by police a year ago, on December 6, 2009 in central Athens, Greece. Two police officers will go on trial in the new year for the murder of Grigoropoulos.

The protester’s jacket in the original image was blank.The antifa logo was digitally added to this image, which was then reshared as if it depicted a recent incident in an attempt to show that “both sides” contributed to the violence in Charlottesville:

http://www.snopes.com/antifa-member-photographed-beating-police-officer/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social

August 16, 2017

AP-won't use term "alt-right" anymore "because it is meant as a euphemism to disguise racist aims."

How to describe extremists who rallied in Charlottesville
Aug. 15, 2017, by John Daniszewski

The events in Charlottesville are an opportunity to take another look at our terminology around “alt-right” and the way that we describe the various racist, neo-Nazi, white nationalist and white supremacist groups out there.

At AP, we have taken the position that the term “alt-right” should be avoided because it is meant as a euphemism to disguise racist aims. So use it only when quoting someone or when describing what the movement says about itself. Enclose the term “alt-right” in quotation marks or use phrasing such as the so-called alt-right (no quote marks when using the term so-called) or the self-described “alt-right.”

Another recent area of confusion is the degree of overlap between the terms “white nationalist” and “white supremacist.” For many people the terms can be used almost interchangeably. Both terms describe groups that favor whites and support discrimination by race. There is however a subtle difference, at least in the views of the groups involved.

White nationalists say that white people are a distinct nation deserving of protection, and therefore they demand special political, legal and territorial guarantees for whites. White supremacists believe that whites are superior and therefore should dominate other races. Depending on the group and the context, AP writers are free to determine which description most aptly applies to a group or an individual in a particular situation.

Finally, a new term has emerged recently – an umbrella term for the far-left-leaning militant groups that resist neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations and other events. The movement calls itself “antifa,” short for anti-fascists, and emulates historic anti-fascist actors in Europe. Until the term becomes better known, use it in quotes at first and with a definition included the copy.

For reference, here is the guidance on this topic from the 2017 edition of the AP Stylebook:

“alt-right”
A political grouping or tendency mixing racism, white nationalism and populism; a name currently embraced by some white supremacists and white nationalists to refer to themselves and their ideology, which emphasizes preserving and protecting the white race in the United States.
In AP stories discussing what the movement says about itself, the term “alt-right” (quotation marks, hyphen and lowercase) may be used in quotes or modified as in the self-described “alt-right” or so-called alt-right. Avoid using the term generically and without definition, however, because it is not well-known and the term may exist primarily as a public relations device to make its supporters’ actual beliefs less clear and more acceptable to a broader audience.
Depending on the specifics of the situation, such beliefs might be termed racist, white supremacist or neo-Nazi; be sure to describe the specifics. Whenever “alt-right” is used in a story, include a definition: an offshoot of conservatism mixing racism, white nationalism and populism, or, more simply, a white nationalist movement.
When writing on extreme groups, be precise and provide evidence to support the characterization. Report their actions, associations, history and positions to reveal their actual beliefs and philosophy, as well as how others see them.

https://twitter.com/NatashaBertrand/status/897794646830723072

https://blog.ap.org/behind-the-news/how-to-describe-extremists-who-rallied-in-charlottesville

August 16, 2017