Tag: antifa

Let’s Move to Portland

 

Hear me out on this: let’s move to Portland.

I know, “Let’s move to Portland” are four words you never expect to hear together, sort of like “Let’s move to Chicago” or “Let’s move to San Francisco.” They’re also four words many people don’t want to hear together, like “Antifa’s majority on the city council” or “makeshift penis.”

But they don’t call Portland the Rose City for nothing, just like there’s a reason Philadelphia is called the city of brotherly love.

Member Post

 

(You can read Chapter 1, focused on leading Washington politicians and the media here) Last year started with a couple of big bangs, politically. The January 6th violence at the US Capitol, of course. Buckle up for a cavalcade of first anniversary media this week, even though we’re still learning from and litigating that. Some […]

Join Ricochet!

This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet’s community of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.

Member Post

 

Americans continue to reel at the speed of the Taliban’s largely unmolested march through most of Afghanistan (but not all). We recoil at the beheadings, rapes, murders, child sex trade, and other atrocities committed by Taliban fighters. Americans remain shell-shocked at the sheer incompetence of the Biden Administration’s handling of the entire matter since taking […]

Join Ricochet!

This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet’s community of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.

The Mob and the Banjo Player

 

The banjo player is, of course, Winston Marshall, recently of the hit band Mumford & Sons. The mob is the usual band of angry twits, the censorious harpies of Twitter and Antifa who can’t stand the thought that someone, somewhere, isn’t prostrating himself before the pile of dung that is their hateful and dishonest political ideology.

I don’t care for banjo music, and I’m at best lukewarm about Mumford & Sons. They have a few songs I like, but they’re too folksy for my tastes and so rarely come up in my playlists. Since I’m not particularly interested in music I didn’t realize that the band had become big: I stumbled across them a decade ago, thought they were a little boutique group with a few hits, and never had reason to revise my view until friends, big fans of the group, assured me that they’d achieved mega-band status. Who knew?

Member Post

 

A Hairy-Eyeball Look at Trump’s “Stolen Election” Claim and The “Terrorist Threat” of “White Supremacy.” Accusations of “The Big Lie” – and The Real Thing – are Everywhere. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out when political “talking points” are being parroted on national media outlets to score points, no matter how far […]

Join Ricochet!

This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet’s community of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.

Prediction: The Riots Are Returning to Portland

 

On Tuesday, the Multnomah County Grand Jury, led by the Soros supported DA, handed down an indictment charging a Portland police officer with a misdemeanor assault for striking a “protester” with a baton during a riot. The officer was a member of the Rapid Response Team, which is responsible for crowd control, including demonstrations, protests and riots. The team is made up of volunteers. Yesterday they unanimously resigned.

Antifa pays attention to the news. The next riot will begin in five … four … three … two…

Think Things Are Contentious Now? Learn Some History

 

There is a never-ending contest for “favorite journalist” in the Johnston household, but Salena Zito is always a finalist. And she just rocketed into the pole position.

I’m delighted to be a “friend” of hers on Facebook. I rarely take issue with her reporting. She fills a niche long ignored by corporate media – focusing on real people and real communities that fall between the Hudson River (NY) and LAX. More specifically, lives and communities that border or encompass Greater Appalachia, from western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio to West Virginia and southern Virginia. She stays outside Washington’s beltway and she refuses to traverse interstate highways.

Member Post

 

When it comes to celebrated jury trials, whether the 1996 O.J. Simpson acquittal or Tuesday’s 3-count guilty verdicts of Minneapolis Police Office Derek Chauvin over the death of George Floyd, I pray for impartial justice. I care more about the integrity of the process – like elections – than the actual outcomes. We want to […]

Join Ricochet!

This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet’s community of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.

Member Post

 

Has it occurred to you that is irrelevant whether Officer Derek Chauvin is found guilty or innocent at the end of his trial? At least to those who wish to wreak havoc across this country. There was a time when we felt that unless the “perpetrator” were found guilty, all hell would break loose. Buildings […]

Join Ricochet!

This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet’s community of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.

How Close Are Conservatives to Civil Disobedience?

 

How close are we to experiencing real civil disobedience? Not from the left, since we’ve always had that. Violent protests, including placing bombs in the US Capitol, have long been a feature of the left and almost ubiquitous since the Vietnam War. We saw it last summer during the George Floyd-inspired riots – over 500 violent incidents in more than 200 cities across the United States. The days of the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s exhortations to “non-violence” now look quaint. But this time, from conservatives? What might disobedience from conservative Americans look like?

This is not an academic question. It may be closer to reality than you realize. And it will look nothing like the violent Antifa and BLM protests that have maimed dozens of police officers and destroyed thousands of businesses and a few federal buildings.

The Gaslighting Continues … Pay Attention to the Facts

 

Ever since the tragic events in Charlottesville, VA, that fateful day in August 2017, not even eight months into Donald Trump’s presidency, when real white supremacists showed up for a “Unite the Right” rally, we have been warned repeatedly about the growing threat of “far right” groups.

No question that the Charlottesville rally organized by noted white supremacists Richard Spencer and Jason Kessler – who had obtained a permit from the city – was evil in many ways. Racial supremacy is evil in all its forms. A protester drove his car into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing a young woman. Three tragically died, two from a state police helicopter crash.

The violence was largely preventable.

On this episode of “The Federalist Radio Hour,” The Post Millenial Editor-at-large Andy Ngo joins Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky to offer insight into the rise of the “infamously secret” radical group Antifa and discusses his new book, which documents how the left-wing organization uses violence to “destroy democracy.”

‘War is Peace’: BLM Nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize

 

Well, this is interesting. Black Lives Matter has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. I didn’t see that coming, but again, I’ve not picked up my copy of George Orwell’s 1984 lately. The movie, starring the late John Hurt as Winston Smith, and Richard Burton as the evil antagonist O’Brien, is dark but increasingly relevant today.

I must tread carefully here, in these politically correct times. But I shall do so, factually. Facts are, after all, stubborn things. That’s what John Adams said.

The Black Lives Matter organization and its comrades at Antifa and related anarchist organizations were responsible for over 500 violent “incidents” (read: riots) in over 200 American cities and towns this past summer.

Join Jim and Greg as as they discuss leftist riots in at least three American cities Thursday night. Will the Democrats finally admit this is a problem since these people claim to hate Biden too? They also sigh as President Biden not only rejoins the World Health Organization but does so without one demand for accountability or reform. And they react to MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace and former Obama official Ben Rhodes discussing how to “detox” speech they don’t like and even bar Republicans from stating opinions if they don’t accept the left’s version of the truth.

A Comment About Mob Violence

 

Let me lay out my assumptions right up front, before making the point I want to make.

  1. The President didn’t incite violence. His comments were within the boundaries of appropriate political discourse, whether or not he was correct in the views he expressed about the election. (In fact, I’m sure he was partially, though not wholly, correct.)
  2. I categorically condemn mob violence, and this instance is no exception: everyone who broke the law should be charged, tried, and, if convicted, punished. Whatever the motives of the lawbreakers (and I don’t know who they are or why they did what they did), I reject any claim they might have to legitimacy in their actions. Lock them up.

There. I hope that’s sufficiently clear. Now here’s the point of this post.

On this episode of The Federalist Radio Hour, Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky and Western Correspondent Tristan Justice discuss how the mob that rushed and eventually breached the U.S. Capitol building on Wednesday afternoon will affect the state of our nation moving forward.

The Best Articles I Read in 2020

 

Here at the end of 2020, I’m trying to close up a number of tabs I have open on my browser. Many of them are articles, and of that number I’m certain several were suggested or linked to by fellow Ricochet members, mentioned in podcasts, or discovered through searches prompted by Ricochet discussions. I was originally going to say “The 10 Best Articles…”, but the list is more than ten articles and I’m sure I’m forgetting some additional ones that I read months ago…it’s been a long year.

For this post I loosely define “the best” articles as those that challenged my thinking on an issue, were educational, were unexpected or deservedly scandalous, courageously broke with prevailing current narratives, or discussed an important topic otherwise ignored or forgotten. I’m not going to say which characteristic applies to which article as I’m trying to keep this post relatively brief, and each article could form the foundation of a post and become fertile ground for discussion. Some of the articles were written in years prior to 2020, but I just got around to reading them this year and they were either prophetic or remain pertinent to current events. Grouped with some of the articles I have read, I’m also listing what I’m going to read next in regard to that topic. These will have “to be read” in parentheses next to them.

A California Resident’s Gratitude

 

We have all watched the spectacle of very bad politicians getting re-elected time and time again. Think Marion Barry or Harold Washington. Mayor Ray Nagin got re-elected after refusing to evacuate New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina. I wouldn’t be surprised if Mayor De Blasio got re-elected. Then there is just about every elected official in California.

We see mayors do nothing while their own cities get burned down and wonder just how bad is bad enough. Will they get re-elected?

Join Jim and Greg as they dig into what we witnessed in the first presidential debate on Tuesday. They discuss the constant crosstalk and why Trump would have been smarter to let Biden tangle himself in his own incomprehensible rhetoric. They also detail how both candidates handled the urban violence issue and Biden’s insistence on refusing to have an opinion on adding justices to the U.S. Supreme Court.