Tag: civil war
J.D. Vance

J.D. Vance Says The Civil War Continues -- And He's With The South

In an interview on a far-right podcast, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) invoked the Civil War, and suggested to the hosts that he's on the side of the Confederacy.

Conservative media outlet The Bulwarkrecently highlighted Vance's appearance in a 2021 episode of the Viva Frei podcast, in which he told hosts David Freiheit and Robert Barnes that in his view, the Civil War never really ended. Rather, the Hillbilly Elegy author posited that the North and the South are still battling for control of the cultural and political narrative. And he made it clear he was on the side battling the "Northern woke people."

"American history is a constant war between Northern Yankees and Southern Bourbons, where whichever side the hillbillies are on, wins," Vance said." And that’s kind of how I think about American politics today, is like, the Northern Yankees are now the hyper-woke, coastal elites. The Southern Bourbons are sort of the same old-school Southern folks that have been around and influential in this country for 200 years. And it’s like the hillbillies have really started to migrate towards the Southern Bourbons instead of the Northern woke people. That’s just a fundamental thing that’s happening in American politics."

The Bulwark's Jonathan V. Last remarked that he agrees with Vance, but was "just kind of shocked that he’s willing to admit that in this parallel, Democrats and liberals are the abolitionists and he’s on the side of the slaveholders."

"Actually, scratch that. I’m not shocked at all," he wrote.

Last contextualized Vance's 2021 remarks by putting them next to a key excerpt from his vice presidential nomination acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention (RNC) in July. In that speech, Vance echoed former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan's nativist rhetoric about immigrants (Buchanan ran for president in 1992 and 1996 on closing the Southern border and calling immigration an "illegal invasion").

"America is not just an idea. It is a group of people with a shared history and a common future. It is, in short, a nation," Vance said. "Now, it is part of that tradition, of course, that we welcome newcomers. But when we allow newcomers into our American family, we allow them on our terms."

As Last noted, Vance's comments on the 2021 podcast episode and at the RNC have a similar theme: Allowing new people into the country is up to the "American family," which naturally establishes a hierarchy between deserving "real Americans" and the undeserving others. And as the eventual 2024 Republican vice presidential nominee suggested to the Viva Frei hosts, the "Southern bourbons" and their "hillbilly" counterparts have more of a claim than the "Northern woke people."

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Proud Boys And Other Extremists Seize On Trump Shooting To Push 'Civil War'

Proud Boys And Other Extremists Seize On Trump Shooting To Push 'Civil War'

After the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday afternoon, July 13, a long list of prominent Democrats — including President Joe Biden, former President Barack Obama and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) — forcefully condemned the attack, emphasizing that such violence has no place in U.S. politics.

Regardless, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) — once a scathing critic of Trump but now a devoted loyalist and possible running mate — blamed Democrats for the assassination attempt. Some other Republicans have pointed the finger at Democrats as well.

During an MSNBC segment on July 14, national security reporter Ken Dilanian warned that the Proud Boys and other far-right extremist groups have responded to the attack by calling for a civil war.

Dilanian told his colleague Kate Snow, "Several Republican members of Congress have directly blamed President Biden, the Democrats and the media for the assassination attempt. They claim it was a result of overheated rhetoric about Trump and part of a campaign to jeopardize his safety. So, for example, Georgia Republican Congressman Mike Collins posted, quote, 'Joe Biden sent the orders.'"

Dilanian continued, "And Trump campaign surrogate Nick Adams posted, on social media, quote, 'Joe Biden's rhetoric is directly responsible. There can be no discussion. This is a fact.'"

The reporter noted that although Democrats have "called Donald Trump an authoritarian and a threat to democracy," they "have never hinted that violence was an appropriate response to that."

Dilanian explained, "After this shooting, Democrats, including President Biden, have condemned it in the strongest possible terms, and they've called this political violence a threat to democracy…. And experts are worried that this kind of rhetoric increases the risk of more violence."

The MSNBC reporter warned that according to national security experts, "extremists" are "seizing on this incident.

"Telegram channels for branches of the Proud Boys militia group have been calling for civil war and violence," Dilanian told Snow. "According to Advance Democracy — that's an NGO that tracks this stuff — a user on one forum wrote that the Democratic National Committee, RINOs, and the feds, quote, 'should all be hung in the streets of D.C.' And users on a pro-Trump platform, Patriots.Win, are calling for violence and civil war. One user wrote, 'War now. They don't want to live and let live.' Some really dangerous rhetoric coursing around out there, Kate."

Dilanian observed that although some members of Congress are trying to calm the situation down, "flame-throwing politicians" are "not doing that at all."

"As long as there is some group of people who are throwing gasoline on the fire," Dilanian told Snow, "there are sort of a group of deranged individuals out there that are listening to it, paying close attention, and think they are essentially in a civil war."

Watch the full video below or at this link.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Byron Donalds

For Republicans, Turning History Upside Down Is The Point

It turns out Nikki Haley stumbling over the cause of the Civil War was not a one-off.

The topsy-turvy twisting of American history, as it applies to Black Americans — their resilience and contributions despite injustice — is a tactic, a well-planned cynical one. And recent perpetrators don’t even have the decency to make a half-hearted attempt at backtracking, as Haley eventually and reluctantly managed to do after being called out on her amnesia about slavery.

Now politicians are standing proudly as they try to co-opt the language and history of the Civil Rights movement, which fought for equal rights for all and forced America to take a step toward living up to its ideals.

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is a master, presenting himself as a billionaire victim and inviting his supporters to follow. But dishonest is too mild a word for politicians when they do everything but break into a chorus of “We Shall Overcome” to sideline the legacy of Americans who truly had to.

In the Florida of Gov. Ron DeSantis, it was not a surprise when the state’s Transportation Department told cities that if they chose to light up their bridges at night, the only acceptable colors would be red, white and blue. The prohibition, set to last between Memorial Day and Labor Day, was widely seen as using an aura of patriotism to preempt the tradition of displaying rainbow colors during June for Pride Month.

But did DeSantis have to label it a part of the state’s “Freedom Summer,” a name that powerfully resonates in American history?

Freedom Summer, also known as the Mississippi Summer Project, was a 1964 voter registration drive — the brainchild of Bob Moses of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee — that brought hundreds of white volunteers to join with African Americans to register Black voters in the state. The intimidation and violence they faced led to international attention, outrage and the eventual passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

For DeSantis — who has gerrymandered Black voters out of representation, thwarted voters’ efforts to restore voting rights to former felons and fought against having just such history taught in Florida schools — his version of “Freedom Summer” was no doubt intentional.

Staying in Florida, Republican U.S. House member Byron Donalds has been making the rounds defending statements he made at a Philadelphia event designed to attract Black voters to the GOP.

“You see, during Jim Crow, the Black family was together. During Jim Crow, more Black people were not just conservative — Black people have always been conservative-minded — but more Black people voted conservatively,” he said, as reported by The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Rather than explain away his comments, Donalds should travel to Mims, Fla., for a lesson in Jim Crow’s effect on Black families in his own state. A cultural center tells of Harry T. and Harriette Moore, teachers whose Civil Rights activism cost them first their jobs, and then their lives, when a bomb exploded under their bedroom. It was Christmas night 1951 and the couple’s 25th anniversary.

When their daughter Evangeline Moore died in 2015 at the age of 85, her Washington Post obituary recounted a last message. “My mother told me from her deathbed that she never wanted me to ever think about hating white people — or anybody else,” Ms. Moore told the Orlando Sentinel in 2009, “because it would make me ugly, and she didn’t want me to be an ugly woman.”

That Donalds is a Black man doesn’t excuse his message. Considering that he owes the possibility of his rise to activists like the Moores, it might make it worse.

Then there’s a North Carolina GOP congressman’s rush to the bottom. Rep. Dan Bishop is making a bid to be his state’s attorney general, running against Jeff Jackson, a Democratic congressman gerrymandered out of any chance to be reelected to his own House seat.

Though he aspires to be the state’s top legal adviser, Bishop has joined fellow Republicans’ disdain for the country’s justice system after it held Donald Trump to account in a New York courtroom, with a jury convicting the former president on 34 felony counts.

Bishop did not stop there, though. “When I say it’s rigged, they don’t go into it as a fair fight,” he said in an interview on Charlotte radio station WBT. “They go into a place where they know the fight is unfair. It’s as bad as it was in Alabama in 1950 if a person happened to be Black in order to get justice. That’s what they did in New York,” he said.

Bishop actually compared a man with a high-priced defense who helped pick a jury in the jurisdiction in which the crimes were charged to a Black man in Alabama in 1950.

There was not much justice for the victim or perpetrator in Alabama in 1950 for Hilliard Brooks Jr.,a 22-year-old Black man murdered on Aug. 13 of that year in Montgomery, after he was accused by a white bus driver of “creating a disturbance” for refusing to enter through the back door. He was shot by a white police officer, though no one was ever charged, and left behind a wife and two children.

His story and thousands of others are told at the Legacy Sites in Montgomery, a museum and memorial complex that’s an essential visit for any American, particularly one who would ask the diverse citizens of a Southern state to trust him to interpret and enforce the law fairly.

Now, laws that prohibit the teaching of African American history make sense. It’s so much easier to sell lies if the next generations don’t know the truth.

Bishop and Donalds, DeSantis and Trump know what they’re doing, as do all the politicians who would erase and replace in their bid to divide and conquer. In fact, Bishop was defiant, saying “the people who attack me for saying so can attack all they want.”

Sadly, those attacks he knew were coming might actually help him ingratiate himself, not only with his party’s leader but also with voters who find comfort in playing victim, too.

Reprinted with permission from Roll Call.

Mike Johnson

'Right-Wing Civil War' Erupts Again As Greene Moves To Oust Speaker

On Friday morning, March 22, the news broke that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) had triggered a "motion to vacate" against House Spear Mike Johnson (R-LA).

Greene and other far-right House Republicans are angry with Johnson over his willingness to negotiate a spending bill with President Joe Biden in order to prevent a partial government shutdown. In 2023, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) triggered a "motion to vacate" against then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) for that same reason, and he was ousted as speaker.

Greene told reporters, "It's time for us to go through the process, take our time, and find a new speaker of the House that will stand with Republicans and our Republican majority instead of standing with the Democrats."

Greene's move is receiving plenty of reactions on X, formerly Twitter.

Writer/blogger Brian Krassenstein tweeted, "Is the GOP really this discombobulated? How can we expect a party to lead the country if they can't even govern themselves? It will be interesting to see what happens next. "

The group Occupy Democrats commented, "A right-wing civil war is breaking out and this one is looking very ugly."

Author Keith Boykin posted, "Marjorie Taylor Greene files a motion to vacate House Speaker Mike Johnson for allowing a bipartisan vote to fund the government. Republicans are in disarray again. They are not a serious governing party. They are a grievance party."

The group Republicans Against Trump wrote, "I'm starting to think this Republican party can't govern."

Democratic activist Victor Shi posted, "Let’s this straight: Democrats just saved Republicans & kept our government open AGAIN. 112 Republicans voted against keeping our government open & Marjorie Taylor Greene threatened to vacate Mike Johnson. They are a joke. Democrats are the real adults & saved the day."

Another Democratic activist, Harry Sisson, tweeted, "HAHAHA: Marjorie Taylor Greene has filed a motion to vacate Speaker Mike Johnson! The Republicans are in utter chaos! When Republicans control any chamber of government NOTHING gets done and you’re seeing that right now. Let’s vote out these clowns in 2024!"

X user Peggy Gabour tweeted, "Bunch of whiners. MTG wants to be the center of attention. She's a traitor. GA needs to get rid of her.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

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