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Anybody spot the Leftwing Bias......?

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Gunner Asch

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Apr 18, 2017, 11:06:11 PM4/18/17
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http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3545166/posts
Pro-Trump rioters got away with beating anti-fascists in Berkeley
(sweet tears from Salon)
Salon | 04/18/2017 | Amanda Marcotte
http://www.salon.com/2017/04/18/pro-trump-rioters-got-away-with-beating-anti-fascists-in-berkeley-and-they-likely-wont-stop-there/

Posted on 4/18/2017, 12:52:33 PM by Drew68

The Berkeley street violence was a great marketing event for alt-right
types eager to attack anti-Trump protesters

Most of the demonstrations held on April 15, which was set aside by
progressives for marches to demand that Donald Trump reveal his tax
returns, were peaceful. The notable exception was the city of
Berkeley, California — often described as the most liberal community
in the nation — where things rapidly descended into a street fight
between radical right-wingers and more left-leaning counterprotesters.

A group of hard-right extremists came to Berkeley to hold a rally in
support of Trump. While they are, of course, claiming that they only
resorted to violence in self-defense, it’s clear from the social-media
organizing done ahead of time that their intention was to start a
riot.

David Neiwert of the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote in a blog post:

On social media, the organizers and supporters called it “the Next
Battle of Berkeley,” a chance to gain revenge for an earlier event on
the University of California campus that they believed had infringed
on conservatives’ free speech rights: In February, a scheduled
appearance by alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos was shut down by
rock-throwing “antifascist” protesters.

One Twitter user also documented the way that alt-right folks were
instructing one another in how to smuggle weapons past the police.

They wanted a fight and a fight they got. Eleven people were injured,
and six were hospitalized. One white supremacist identified as Nathan
Damigo was filmed sucker punching a young woman.

It’s tempting to write off this event as something unique to the
Berkeley area. The area has a robust “antifa” presence, which is the
name given to a small group of youthful anarchist-leftist sorts who
tend to reject nonviolent approaches in favor of aggressive
confrontation. The white nationalists and fascists knew full well that
going to Berkeley meant they would be met with an aggressive response.
If they had tried the same stunt in, say, New York, it probably
wouldn’t have devolved into a violent melee like it did in Berkeley.

But while this particular situation might not have happened anywhere
else, now that it has, there’s good reason to worry that the violence
could spread. By staging this street fight in Berkeley, the alt-right
sent a message to its sympathizers across the country, encouraging
them to start organizing brownshirt efforts of their very own.

For one thing, while there were 21 arrests at this particular street
fight, most of the right-wing fighters — including, apparently, Damigo
— walked away scot-free and full of pride about this supposed victory,
as Mother Jones reporter Shane Bauer recorded on Twitter.

Bauer also obtained video footage of his confronting Berkeley police
about not doing more and finding that these cops were largely
uninterested in a conversation about their responsibility to shut down
political violence.

The message that alt-right sympathizers across the country are likely
hearing is that this means they can kick the crap out of anti-Trump
protesters — even ones who are demonstrating peacefully — and not
worry too much about being held accountable by police for their
behavior. The fact that Jeff Sessions, Trump’s attorney general, has
made a showy display out of his utter lack of interest in police
accountability only makes this situation more worrisome.

Beyond that, the whole debacle is a marketing coup for wannabe
brownshirts. White nationalists and other far-right types have been
crowing about their “victory” on social media, with many portraying
themselves as tough and manly for their behavior. That message will
have resonance for the alt-right crowd, which primarily consists of
youngish men who have a lot of anxiety about manliness and an intense
desire to prove their manhood. To drive home the gendered nature of
this message, one female militant right-winger was theatrically
“protected” by a group of men, helping drive home the message to
anxious young men that the best way to prove their manhood is to use
violence against Trump’s political opponents.

As historian Rick Perlstein has pointed out in The Washington
Spectator, the amount of online chatter demanding violence against
progressives seems to have increased dramatically in the past few
months. As has been the case with fascist violence in the past, the
hard right excuses its calls for violence by citing “self-defense.”

As Perlstein noted, the story that these hard-right forces are telling
themselves is that “the left has escalated its resistance to Trump
into literal war, so Trump supporters must be prepared to resort to
violence to oppose it.”

The images from Saturday’s melee demonstrate the paper-thin nature of
this excuse, especially the video of Damigo punching an unarmed woman.
(One of his supporters, conservative commentator Gavin McInnes,
defended him by saying the victim’s clothing disqualified her as a
woman.) But this is the “alternative facts” era, so the laughable
transparence of the self-defense excuse hardly matters to those who
spout it. All that matters is that they have some pretext, no matter
how thin, for their violent urges.

All of which is why there’s reason to worry about this violence
spreading. This event in Berkeley showed that violence is possible,
that most right-wingers who enact it won’t face any consequences, and
that beating up progressives is a quick and easy way for young
alt-right types to gain praise from their fellows. These fledgling
brownshirts may have gotten started by beating up antifas, who are an
unsympathetic target. Now that they’ve tasted blood, there’s reason to
fear they will feel empowered to spread the violence around.

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rbowman

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Apr 18, 2017, 11:38:59 PM4/18/17
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On 04/18/2017 09:06 PM, Gunner Asch wrote:
> Most of the demonstrations held on April 15, which was set aside by
> progressives for marches to demand that Donald Trump reveal his tax
> returns, were peaceful. The notable exception was the city of
> Berkeley, California — often described as the most liberal community
> in the nation — where things rapidly descended into a street fight
> between radical right-wingers and more left-leaning counterprotesters.

Salon? Left bias? Impossible.

Gunner Asch

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Apr 19, 2017, 3:28:39 AM4/19/17
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On Tue, 18 Apr 2017 21:40:49 -0600, rbowman <bow...@montana.com>
wrote:
(VBG)

edhun...@gmail.com

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Apr 19, 2017, 8:51:05 AM4/19/17
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Oh, look. Bowman just recognized that Salon is a left-wing publication!

The next thing you know, he'll realize that Fox News is not a Democrat organization...

'Sharp as a tack there, Robert.

--
Ed Huntress
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