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The American Left is looking increasingly extreme How would Joe Biden's radicalised supporters react to a Trump victory in November?

Some mostly peaceful protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images


September 7, 2020   5 mins

The other day in an interview, Donald Trump began talking about a plane “almost completely loaded with thugs, wearing these dark uniforms” travelling across America to organise anti-police protests. Noting this rather alarming line of thought from the commander-in-chief, the historian Simon Schama pointed out that such “fantasies” can have real world effects.

Trump, Schama claimed, was occupying the same territory as the French peasants did in 1789: in the summer of that year a Great Fear descended, including a terror of “brigands” working for the aristocracy. The brigands did not actually exist but the fear caused the peasants to organise themselves and become the armed guard of the revolution.

Trump’s brigands — the imaginary men in dark clothes — could be hugely useful, for as Schama put it: “In this case they could be the phalanxes of American counter-revolution — or fascism.” Might this be true?

There has been much chatter about what Donald Trump might do if he were to lose in November. Or, more to the point, what might he do if he wins — or seems to be winning — on the night of the election only to lose when postal votes are counted over the days (or weeks) afterwards? Who knows what his supporters might be capable of?

But there is another question, asked less often but certainly looming in the background this autumn. What would the Democrats and their supporters do if they lost?

Not Joe Biden — we know he’d go quietly. But what about the anti-Trump protesters on the streets of Portland, Oregon, of Seattle, of Chicago, of Washington DC itself. The bandana wearers. The stone throwers. The corner store looters.

Donald Trump’s disinclination to accept defeat is rather well known, but his opponents on the Left are assumed to be hewn from more democratic timber. For all the complaints about Russian interference and other criminality, they sucked it up in 2016.Would they, again?

It has to be an open question. It may become — if Trump hauls himself out of the electoral mess he is in — a central question, on which the future of America hinges, and polling does not lead to optimism: already 28% of Biden supporters say they will not accept a Trump victory as fair and accurate, compared to 19% of Trump voters.

The forces of the American Left are not controlled by shadowy figures in dark clothes, but they are organised and angry in a way that they have not been in recent history. So what do they believe is acceptable in the effort to resist Donald Trump, and how far will they go?

If you are searching for a view of the intellectual and moral slack the American far-Left is cutting itself, look no further than gentle old National Public Radio. More than a decade ago, when I lived in the US, NPR was genially Left-of-centre, but not aggressively so. Last week it revealed itself to be — in the eyes of many Americans — quite unhinged, publishing an interview with Vicky Osterweil, the author of a book called In Defense of Looting.

Osterweil made two assertions, the first being that looting is justified because it attacks the idea of private property and the world of work: “So you get to the heart of that property relation, and demonstrate that without police and without state oppression, we can have things for free.”

The second is that stealing from shops is part of the wider movement for change in America: “Looting strikes at the heart of property, of whiteness and of the police,” she said: “It gets to the very root of the way those three things are interconnected. And also it provides people with an imaginative sense of freedom and pleasure and helps them imagine a world that could be. And I think that’s a part of it that doesn’t really get talked about — that riots and looting are experienced as sort of joyous and liberatory.”

None of this is robustly challenged, and this was not some sociology professor playing with edgy thoughts on campus — it was an interview conducted and disseminated by one of the most important mainstream broadcasters in the USA, a non-profit devoted to ideals of impartiality and truth.

It is fair to consider at least the possibility that the interview is evidence that something has snapped. In NPR, as in other places where Left-wing thought is explored (and used to be challenged), it has become acceptable to treat looting with respect. In fact it has become necessary, part of the struggle for racial justice. So, in the event of a Trump victory, what actions would be seen as proportionate and reasonable on the Left?

We do not really know any more; what we do know is that Joe Biden’s denunciation of violence — unequivocal and heartfelt and sympathetically reported by most of the media — is not regarded as wise or just by large segments of his supporters.

The writer Elie Mystal — the Harvard-educated Justice Correspondent for the The Nation, the oldest weekly magazine in America and home to the thoughtful centre-Left — had this to say about calls for restraint and non-violence: “Now comes the part where white people abandon us. Now comes the part where the white majority impatiently demands a return to normalcy. Now comes the part where white people say, ‘I believe that Black Lives Matter, but…’”

Mystal concludes: “I knew a majority of white people would revert to form and regress to their mean, because a majority of white people were always going to value their own comfort over justice for Black people.”

Again: never mind whether Biden is right or wrong. What does he do, what does he say, what is the deal on the streets, if Trump gets four more years? Will they accept Biden-style calls for restraint? Or is the wider movement too far gone, too hooked on the idea that oppression justifies radical change?

The conservative author Rod Dreher last week tweeted a screen-shot of an online town hall meeting organised by the Northwestern University Law faculty. At the meeting each white faculty member at this hugely prestigious centre of American intellectual excellence begins with a self-denunciation. “I’m Jim Speta. And I am a racist,” the interim dean of the School says in the meeting chat thread leaked to Dreher. “My name is Emily Mullin. I am a racist and a gatekeeper of white supremacy. I will work to be better,” wrote another distinguished legal scholar. What might Emily Mullin’s work look like in the aftermath of a Trump victory?

When a political movement has gone so far as to instigate self-denouncing sessions, how could it accept victory by an opponent whose win can only be evidence of white supremacy? And will it be acceptable for white people who regard themselves as progressive to keep off the streets or to support the police as they try to protect the mainly poor people whose livelihoods go up in smoke when rioters come to town?

In 2016, plenty of people who hated his guts and feared greatly for the future of America, and believed that Hillary Clinton had been traduced and that the Russians had helped the Republicans, nonetheless said words to the effect of “Trump won the electoral college but not the popular vote but that is our system and I am sticking to it.”

That could be a “problematic” view in the event of a Trump victory this year. The word resistance, used loosely during the last four years, may take on a sharper and more dangerous meaning.


Justin Webb presents the Americast podcast and Today on Radio Four. His Panorama documentary “Trump the Sequel”, is available now on  Iplayer

JustinOnWeb

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rtsprenger2
rtsprenger2
4 years ago

I follow US events from Brazil and it is unbelievable that you are giving platform to such weird kind of “social theory”. So, yeah, loot everything and then…? This is so stupid that it is difficult to believe that a first world country could really debate such ideas. Seriously. Just stop.

Stephen Murray
Stephen Murray
4 years ago
Reply to  rtsprenger2

It would seem that there is another virus infecting the US, one that makes clever people insane.

Fraser Bailey
Fraser Bailey
4 years ago
Reply to  Stephen Murray

These people are not ‘clever’.

Stephen Murray
Stephen Murray
4 years ago
Reply to  Fraser Bailey

Anyone who can write a book like Vicky Osterweils and expect people to pay $28 for it has to has some kind of twisted talent, I’m sure you would agre?

Cho Jinn
Cho Jinn
4 years ago

“For all the complaints about Russian interference and other criminality, they sucked it up in 2016.”

Um, are you joking?

Fraser Bailey
Fraser Bailey
4 years ago
Reply to  Cho Jinn

Exactly. They didn’t suck it up at all. Instead, they pursued a paranoid, multi-year Russia collusion conspiracy theory, followed by a demented, unfounded and wicked attempt at impeachment.

They could have spent that time going away, being honest about why they lost, and coming back with a decent candidate such as Tulsi Gabbard, and policies that address the needs of the American people.

But they didn’t do that because they are bought and sold by the military-healthcare-pharma-surveillance-complex, and happy to keep on selling the US to China.

As Jimmy Dore and so many others have said, there is just one party: The War Party, comprised of the traditional Republicans and the vast majority of the Democrats. Trump has upset their evil cartel and they don’t like it. Just recently both Democrats and Republicans voted overwhelmingly against Trump’s plans to bring back 5,000 troops from Afghanistan. The MSM never tells you this.

Mark Corby
Mark Corby
4 years ago
Reply to  Fraser Bailey

Thanks to this C-19 nonsense most of the US force in Afghanistan has been worse than useless for the last six months.
A a ‘live firing’ training area, its days are over and Mr Trump is quite correct in leaving the place to its own murderous devices.
I trust he is preparing for the inevitable Great Chinese War, that we are all so much looking forward to?

Andrew Best
Andrew Best
4 years ago

It’s not trump supporters who have been rioting for months its the nice people on the left in the Democratic Party who are burning down America. 10 minutes on YouTube and you can see a more rounded picture than the media shows you in this country.
Trump will win biggly maybe even a Reagan 49 states win.
Then things get interesting

Fraser Bailey
Fraser Bailey
4 years ago
Reply to  Andrew Best

I don’t think Trump will win 49 states. But all the police unions are coming out for him, and many Democrat sheriffs etc are switching to Trump. Then you have the fact that people are literally scared to say that they will vote for Trump when asked. As such, you can’t believe any of the polls except perhaps Rasmusen. At the moment he looks likely to win by a larger margin than in 2016, but not 49 states.

And yes, as you say, to get the real picture you have to watch various people on YouTube. (If I list them, my post will be removed). Even so, it’s always nice to see people like Justin Webb wake up to some form reality, albeit some months after the rest of us. Really, has there ever been a more useless and deceitful entity than today MSM?

Andrew Best
Andrew Best
4 years ago
Reply to  Fraser Bailey

Justin Webb works for the BBC and he therefore can not be trusted.
The bias of the BBC towards trump has blinded them to any reality apart from orange man bad.
Even today there was an article on the BBC news website about republicans leaving to go to the democrats! What about the walk away movement? (Subjected to anti gay insults and physical attacks by BLM) what about blexit? Black democrats leaving the party?
November will follow our election path, put down and insult your country = lose
Slightly optimistic and be positive about your country = win

Clive Mitchell
Clive Mitchell
4 years ago
Reply to  Andrew Best

” Justin Webb works for the BBC and he therefore can not be trusted.”

Now that’s just silly. Instead of a baseless ad hominem, how about identifying actual miss reports in the article.

Miro Mitov
Miro Mitov
4 years ago
Reply to  Clive Mitchell

Ad institutinem, rather. I also share the opinion that the BBC has changed a lot since the times Justin was a North American editor, and not for the better. So much so that I now use the BBC only for the weather forecast, and even that is often wrong.

Fraser Bailey
Fraser Bailey
4 years ago
Reply to  Clive Mitchell

This is not a silly or unfounded statement. One should not trust a single word the BBC says.

chrisjwmartin
chrisjwmartin
4 years ago
Reply to  Andrew Best

It’s not trump supporters who have been rioting for months its the nice people on the left in the Democratic Party who are burning down America.

This is the key point, isn’t it. There is hysterical fulmination in the media about whether Trump will instigate riots if he loses. But only one side has shown any propensity for rioting in pursuit of its political ends.

My personal gut instinct is that like in the 1850s this has gone too far, and will have to end in a showdown. One side will survive, and the other will be decimated. The only question remaining, then, is: will you and those you love be the side that survives?

Alex Mitchell
Alex Mitchell
4 years ago

I fear that rioting is inevitable. I hope not. But if Trump wins there will be rioting. If Biden wins, the recent rioters will be emboldened by the ‘peaceful protest’ rhetoric of the Dems over the last few months, notwithstanding Biden’s recent condemnation. So they will continue to riot wih impunity. It is going to be very painful, whatever happens.

Matthew Powell
Matthew Powell
4 years ago

Isn’t the whole, Trump won’t accept the result, narrative been pushed by the Democrats, really just evidence that they have no intention of accepting the result?

Nigel Clarke
Nigel Clarke
4 years ago
Reply to  Matthew Powell

Yes.

Martin Price
Martin Price
4 years ago

Justin Webb highlights an issue that we should talk about more. At what point do we say the far Left has gone too far? There seems to be a consensus in the West when the far Right pushes the boundaries and the alarm bells sound. Not so with the Left. Perhaps this situation provides the opportunity for such debate preventing the need for the apocalyptic reactions Webb hints at.

David Bell
David Bell
4 years ago

A very frightening prospect, but I think it’s worse. I don’t think Biden will go quietly (he has already recruited 600 attorneys to challenge local results which will throw the election and inauguration process into total chaos and could result in neither Trump or Biden becoming president) and there is no way you can say the democrats sucked it up in 2016. The “Stop Trump” campaign stated by Democrats is the seed bed from which a lot of this trouble has grown.

What is really frightening is the implication of the idea that looting and rioting is some how “liberating” and makes things “free”. You only have to look at what happened to the woman in a restaurant who refused to give the salute demanding by the mob or how we have people denouncing themselves like the accused in one of Stalin’s show trials after being tortured until they break mentally to realise that it is a small step to supporting violence against those who don’t conform and an even small step to accepting people who oppose the “mob” will end up dying as a result of that violence.

What is worse is the XR and BLM movements in this country follow the same writers!

Alan Girling
Alan Girling
4 years ago

What is this talk of Trump inciting violence? The left has been doing that for quite some time now. This Vicky Osterweil first published her idiocy in essay form in The New Inquiry back in 2014 after Ferguson. That to me means she bears significant responsibility for everything happening today.

Neil Papadeli
Neil Papadeli
4 years ago

It’s a simple equation, the longer the Left eats itself, the more likely Trump is to return.

corustar
corustar
4 years ago

It’s interesting that the journalists on the ground filming for their YouTube channels, Twitter, Facebook etc are saying they are seeing the same faces around the country. People arrested in Kenosha came from around 44 different cities. Andy Ngo used to have booking pictures stating where people had travelled to Portland from but this doesn’t appear on the latest ones no idea why. The out of town protestors does seem to be a developing story.

Alan Girling
Alan Girling
4 years ago

“Donald Trump’s disinclination to accept defeat is rather well known”- I”m not so sure about that. Perhaps that’s how he talks, because he is pretty much all talk, but he does have a long history of business ‘defeats’, ie. bankruptcies, his casinos, hotels, university, steaks etc.. I think he’s pretty well used to it. I don’t think we have much to fear from him (famous last words).

David Barnett
David Barnett
4 years ago

A lot of the “what Trump would do if he loses…” stuff sounds like projection from the left. It has a lot in common with anti-semitism, which lacks the imagination to do anything but project fantasies based on what they themselves were doing. For example, the medieval blood libels (the ones about sacrificing Christian children) began within a few years of the first crusade’s sadistic rampage through Jewish communities in Europe on its way to liberate the Holy Land.

Albert Kensington
Albert Kensington
4 years ago

Following James Lindsay @ConceptualJames gives great insight into the roots of this insanity

I wrote a Guest Post for the excellent blogger Farenheit 211(who has himself been subject to persecution by the forces of woke) on this theme which posters may care to peruse

Farenheit 211 Guest Post

‘Woke’ folk can be deeply unpleasant”

18/5/2020

Mark Corby
Mark Corby
4 years ago

This is no more than a minor disturbance compared to the antics of the late 60’s.
The National Guard should be easily able to sweep ‘them’ away with a “whiff of grapeshot”.

Drahcir Nevarc
Drahcir Nevarc
3 years ago

“Mystal concludes: “I knew a majority of white people would revert to form and regress to their mean, because a majority of white people were always going to value their own comfort over justice for Black people.”
Yet another racist who capitalises “black” while not capitalising “white”. It is disgusting that this passes unchallenged.

David Barnett
David Barnett
4 years ago

On the point of counter-American Revolution, that already happened 150 years ago, when Lincoln fought a war for the right of the Feds to impose arbitrary taxation and spend it on special interest projects. Imperial Washington DC took the role once occupied by Imperial London.

The progression of the last 150 years has been ever greater usurpations of power and disregard of constitutional protections. In short, the Imperial power is way too important to reside in another team’s hands under any circumstances…

Frederick Foster
Frederick Foster
4 years ago

Meanwhile I much prefer the Counterpunch essay by Paul Street titled Trump Knows What He Is Doing. An essay which connects all of the dots re what Trump does, with the help of the ultra obnoxious toady William Barr.
The Counterpunch website provides a refreshing alternative to the now everywhere right-wing propaganda machine. Or what Paul Brock described in his 2004 book The Republican Noise Machine which is now stronger than ever

David Bell
David Bell
4 years ago

Do you thin the New York Times is part of this “right-wing propaganda machine” you range about?