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Today's extremists, including these Proud Boys, tend to be amorphous. Credit: Stanton Sharpe/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty
Since last year’s tumultuous election, the United States has been plagued by endless discussion about how the country should heal its political division. Often this has taken the form of mindless platitudes, as demonstrated by President Biden in his inauguration speech last week. But if there is any hope of bridging today’s tribal political divisions, serious reflection is needed. And what better place is there to start than by assessing why both the Left and the Right seem incapable of reining in their extremes?
In theory, the American political mainstream believes that extremism is not acceptable. The minute that people take up arms or act violently against agents of the state is the point at which all democrats (with a small “d”) unite in condemnation. In practice, too, that theory is borne out: a recent Washington Post-ABC News survey found that 89% of Americans denounced the actions of the Capitol rioters.
In the past year, however, both the Left and Right have seen political violence carried out in their name — and both have floundered in their responses to it. Just as the recent Capitol riot tainted the Right, so the violence of last summer’s protests following the death of George Floyd shamed the Left. Yet while both sides have been at fault, neither seems any closer to facing up to that fact. Instead, both prefer to the blame the other, all the while denouncing the unfairness of their own treatment.
The consequences of this are deeply worrying. Polls show that almost a fifth of Republican voters feel some support for the actions of the Capitol rioters. That is a significant, and concerning, chunk of the Republican base. But it is analogous with those on the Left who continued to support the Black Lives Matter movement, even after weeks of nationwide rioting and looting. Indeed, three months after the protests began, 28% of the American public continued to express “strong support” for the movement — a fall of just under 10% in three months.
So why have both the Left and Right struggled to control their extremes? It seems to me that there are three principal reasons. The first is a by-product of the information age: namely, that today’s fringes are amorphous. In 1964, when then Republican candidate Barry Goldwater sought to draw a clear line between the conservative movement and the far-Right, he was famously urged to excommunicate the extremist John Birch Society. In recent weeks, people have called on Republicans to do the same with the “alt-right” and those associated with the Capitol riots. Last summer, meanwhile, many thought it would be shrewd for the Democrats to disassociate themselves with BLM and Antifa.
The trouble, however, is that today, unlike with the John Birch Society, political groupings on both the Left and the Right rarely meet physically, while their leadership and membership structures are anything but clear. It’s all very well demanding that the Republicans sever ties with the “alt-right” — but how do you decide who is “alt-right” and who is not? On the other side, how — other than referring to the law — do you identify which parts of BLM are acceptable and which are not? The answer may not be impossible, but it is certainly harder than in the past.
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SubscribeThese kinds of articles are starting to make me angry. Is Murray really trying to pretend I have short term memory loss? Almost 10 years ago protesters violently broke into the Wisconsin state capitol to block a vote. It was even praised by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at the time. I remember the Kavanaugh hearings, I remember Maxine Waters telling people to get in Republican’s faces, and I remember the attempted assassination of Republican senators at a baseball field. Anyone remember when Rand Paul was swarmed by people demanding he say Breonna Taylor’s name after he wrote the Justice for Breonna Taylor Act?
Remember earlier last year? There was a successful protest against new Virginia gun laws. The protesters were actually peaceful and picked up their trash. What was the media reaction? “Domestic terrorists who should be shot.” Lockdown protesters? “Evil death cultists!”
Fast forward to the death of George Floyd. There was massive gatherings that were somehow immune to spreading Covid 19. Large scale rioting and violence was written off. I watched many livestreams of the riots. I saw arson, assault, and even attempted murder. Many died and billions of dollars of property was destroyed. The seriousness of it was just ignored. Rioters even took over part of a city and made it their own.
The major networks and newspapers just lied about it. According to them, suburbanites clearing gun store shelves was due to “economic uncertainty related to Covid 19.” The Vox crowd was cheering the entire time. Very few of the “principled” National Review writers even cared. They just wrote jokes about CHAZ and socialism and made fun of the rioters when they tore down another abolitionist statue. Best of all, the riots are still ongoing in places! All the people pretending to care about violence and unrest now, have never cared. It is just a show.
The mayor of Seattle called it a new summer of love.
I guess the two teenagers who got shot dead in that place really felt that “love”.
That’s all we need. Where do they get them from?
Was that Wisconsin event that long ago? What was the issue? I recall reports of teacher’s union members storming the state capital, but was it really in 2011? How time flies…
And although Douglas says ‘Of course, it is clear’ that Harris was supporting protests, not rioting, he omits her support for bail funds which, I’ve read (I’m a Brit so not close to the action), got violent rioters out of jail. So her stance on this isn’t clear at all.
Oh, her stance is very clear. Pushing the bail fund leaves no room for doubt. This woman is a former AG who had no problem warehousing black men for petty drug offenses, and now she’s the champion of a bail fund to benefit looters, arsonists, and other criminals.
She will say and do anything to rise in stature and power. It will be most interesting to see her true thoughts after she becomes President.
I take your point but I still think that Douglas was very much on the right track and is not the enemy you take him for.
I think he also has to engage in some workplace C.Y.A. to keep channels open in order to function in the space he does. I know I offend this site often, and pay the price in being muted.
Matt – kudos – your reply is brilliant! No, we don’t forget Schumer yelling about Kavanaugh and Gorsuch “We’re coming for you!” Zero (nada, keiner) Republican officials called for assault and arguably violence against sitting Justices or disturbing (in yo’ face mo fo) Republican elected officials. So the moral equivalency and “whataboutism” arguments fall flat. And no one who actually read Trump’s speech can find such explicit fomenting of assault. Clearly I think he was deluded to hold the rally that day and to think he could cause a change of outcome in the elector count, but he did not say “get in their faces,” “we’re coming for you” etc.
I don’t think he was deluded. It was the first and last chance to get the case heard, and it was going to be heard in front of the whole world. If the VP had been impressed by the 24 hours of planned debate on the electoral irregularities, and remember a Senator had also proposed an emergency 10 day bipartisan inquiry on same, the scrutiny could have been sent back to the affected legislatures and the complexion of the electors ultimately changed. It was worth a shot. Maybe he was naif about how the left were going to hijack it and control the whole story afterwards. It was imperative for the left that that debate and the inquiry be stopped.
I hear you – but it was a desperate last chance – because it was a bizarre reading of the Electoral Count Act of 1887. The only constitutionally valid chance was for the state legislators (controlled by republicans in Penna, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona) to have separately certified alternative electors (which happened in 1887) and we’d have been off to the races. However, they talked big but fiddled while Rome was burning. So after December, the jig was up (alas)
There is no equivalency. Extremists on the right, when they engage in illegal activities, tend to operate alone, or out of the public eye. Extremists on the left organize mobs and incite riots.
Remember inauguration day 2017? Six police officers were injured and 217 rioters were arrested, antifa were breaking windows, a limousine was smashed. Just a taste of the behavior of what was to come in “the Summer of Love” in Seattle and the chaos and violence throughout the country. Portland had 120 days of continuous rioting with federal buildings as their main target. The hate oozing from the left was palpable from the start and continues now after President Trump has left office. The irony of the whole thing is the most corrupt president of all is now sitting in the White House rapidly undoing all the good Trump did and playing to the crowd in Beijing.
DM is being lazy and dishonest in this piece, not for the first time, alas. I suppose it must be difficult being him, continually in the firing line from the left, and always in danger of losing his platform altogether.
Drawing moral equivalence between left and right just won’t do if you observe their behaviour and the way it is covered. It is like saying the “far right” here, whoever they may be, are the equivalent of active jihadists. Which his bete noire Rowley does.
He doesn’t even go into the question of who would have wanted that debate broken up in Congress and who would have wanted it to go ahead, given that it could have changed the complexion of the electors. He doesn’t appear to have listened to the rally speeches either. Nor has he examined the identities of those arrested, and who got released and who didn’t. Did he even take in what the debate was about? How many hours were going to be devoted in each House to each State on the electoral irregularities? Or does he just think it was to rubber stamp the appointment of Biden?
Mr Murray needs to dig deeper, as he did in Greece.
The problem lies for a maybe the greatest part with the media, who cheered the burning of cities for months. As long as the media has a political agenda, instead of covering events unbiased and look at it from more angles then one, nothing wil change.
The article has a Don Lemon quote, another CNN anchor, Chris Cuomo, said about Antifa and BLM rioting ” Please, show me where it says protesters are supposed to be polite and peaceful.”
Capitol Hill rioters had lived through a year in which the media told them it is okay to riot.
The media in the USA and probably the whole western world is rotten to the core. That is the root of the problem.
Ps, Events we are witnessing are also the logical conclusion of The Madness of Crowds, it’s the train who speeded up instead of slowing down before entering it’s final station, and it’s now starting to plunge into it’s end of the line arrival point.
Furthermore, all the lies we have been told over and over about the patriarchy and white supremacy and all the other bullshit bingo, told to make us think negatively about the western world. Who would think that these sort of lies would ever have a positive effect on anything.
These lies are meant to cause destruction, it’s the whole point of them.
I find it extraordinary that news anchors in the US are people paid to share their opinions. All the 24-hour news stations are so biased that they hardly deserve to be called “news channels”.
If I was watching a news channel and its employees started sermonising so blatantly, I would switch off, even if the “news” anchors were saying things I agreed with. I would probably find it a bit embarrassing.
they are not journalists or anchors, they are activists. The ideal response to Lemon was that the KKK founded by and for Democrats. Re Nazis, believe it or not AH got a few of his ideas from the US Democrats (Dinesh D’Souza, “The Big Lie: Exposing the Nazi Roots of the American Left.”)
This. Activism is pervasive in journalism. How could it not be? Impartiality and the pursuit of objectivity are explained away as tools of oppression in Journalism majors.
It is extraordinary, Pete, and it’s deplorable, but it seems to be the new normal, not just in the US, but in Canada as well. Any news anchor here always mentioned allegations of voting fraud by President Trump with the adjective “unfounded” in front, as if it were their job to adjudicate on such things. If the US president is saying something controversial there are surely opposition politicians a news anchor can quote to provide a contrary opinion. They have no business ruling on what is right or wrong, true or false.
It’s those opinions “unfounded”, “baseless”, “big lie” adjectives that reveal the bias in reporting. By not being curious and objective, the press affirms one story and ignores the other story. The press has lead the bifurcation of society beyond the typical liberal-conservative divide. Moderates can hardly be found. Friendships dissolve by forcing people into uncomfortable positions. Not sure how this helps to improve understanding.
Same creepily conformist vocabulary here in the UK from all our broadcasters. Within five minutes of the allegations, they were attaching the words unfounded, baseless, false, without evidence, every time they mentioned them. Not only did they not do that with the Steele Report, Russiagate, or the Kavanaugh case, but they couldn’t have had time to investigate the allegations themselves.
The only exception has been Australian Sky News, which presumably does not yet belong to the Democrat son of the Murdoch house.
… but what if the allegations really are unfounded? Are news organisations bound to take a neutral stance between truth and lies?
I suppose that is what you are saying in your final sentence. And to me, that sounds just a bit mad. News organisations are there *precisely* to distinguish between truth and falsehood.
I agree in principle but that is not what is happening. None of the main news channels investigated the allegations of fraud, and if they did pay lipservice to it they did so with their mind already made up. This was obvious to any neutral person. As someone earlier points out I too noticed the rather creepily conformist language used – like the attachment of the word ‘baseless’ which seem to have been imparted to news outlets like a memo they needed to read out – without question. Journalists that I remember would have been all over the allegations of fraud dying to find out if it were true and keen to share it if it were in any sense. There appear to be no more journalists. The Time article recently showed us that.
Obviously Douglas is absolutely correct with the solution but it would take people examining their motives and coming to a better conclusion as to the way forward. Yes the media is a big problem who have people who want to tell the news in their own image or their own political slant. There is also not much opportunity for open discussion. In better days it was a point of honour for newspapers and media to present honestly the facts as they are. Truth is one of the casualties of this attitude and the reason why many are confused as to what is actually going on. Maybe it is a spiritual revolution that is needed with a return to basic honesty?
We export our culture. I am sure four days (as of this writing) of violent protests in The Netherlands can be laid at our door.
C’mon, man, Anteefa is jest an ideeeah.
I agree with everything you say. The Media were responsible for the storming of the Capitol. Simple “Patriots” (not sarcasm, that’s how they saw themselves – and why not?) had suffered a gutful of being ridiculed and despised by CNN,MSNBC etc. and sanctioned and gagged by social media. They’d seen the leader who had shown them respect and admiration constantly pilloried by all the above, plus the wokey-pokey Hollywoodians and now they firmly believed the election had been “stolen”.
So they look a leaf from the BLM playbook and showed their revulsion for all the world to see.
I quite enjoyed the sight – rather like something from Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
Sorry, Douglas, but for once, I don’t agree with you. You’re twisting yourself into a pretzel to find equivalence between the left and right. There isn’t one. The extreme on the right is tiny, almost microscopic; that on the left is now the mainstream on that side of the aisle. It has grown to completely envelop the reasonable majority. It is simply insane, and it cannot live with the continued existence of anything which is not either itself or controlled by itself.
The extreme on the right was the (Republican) President – pretty mainstream.
In fact, Trump was very much in line with the isolationist, strong border, individual liberty tradition of the US. Philosophically, he was not in any sense an extremist. I said above that the extreme had enveloped the left. When that happens, what was mainstream on the left becomes radicalized. From there, the traditional, normal position on the right starts to look extreme, in the same way as somebody standing on a train platform begins to look farther and farther away to the people on the train that’s pulling out, even though those on the platform have not moved.
Extreme in what way? I realize it’s fashionable for the left to use “extreme” when it has all the relevance of “green” but what was extreme?
He was an extreme Nationalist – he vilified the Other, withdrew from international co-operation, disregarded democratic processes and told, literally, thousands of lies.
Yes, literally no other politician does this.
he withdrew from things that had no benefit or value to the country he led. That’s now extreme? And if vilifying the other is an issue, let me introduce you to the left and its campaign to dehumanize anyone even remotely conservative.
The other what?
Lies are the stock in trade of politicians. It is laughable reading the left’s calling out Trump for lies while denying blatant lies told by Obama, Biden, Clinton, Pelosi, Schumer, Schiff, Warren, et al. The left cabal of media, academics, bureaucrats and politicians had to destroy Trump as he tapped into a national disgust with the political establishment and politics as usual.
No, he was not. That was why he was elected. Trump is not extreme – just outspoken. Many people have been so indoctrinated into extreme-left thinking that anything in the center must seem extreme right to them.
President Trump is a New York Democrat, as are all his family. He just happens to have a lot of common sense as well, and to be in touch with the people. The Republican party was the one he chose as a vehicle for his policies, but that does not mean he is right wing, far from it.
Douglas was appealing to people. If he can get through to people things will change. You are falling into the same trap of exhonorating the right and putting down the left. An appeal needs to be made to all people left or right.
I’m not exhortating the right, I’m simply putting the proportionate amount of blame on each side. The right haven’t changed suddenly and all become more violent and oppressive than they ever were, but the left have. It really is doing nobody any good to try to deny obvious facts, and while the storming of Congress WAS wrong, the reason it’s being hauled out repeatedly by left is because it’s the ONLY instance they can point to. That’s not the case on the other side. It’s now become endemic on the left, and it’s being either hushed up or justified by the media. You can’t fix something until you know what’s broken.
Imagine if a black Trump supporter had been shot in the Capitol instead of a white woman.
Ah – the moral conundrem – a black Trump supporter simply would be the wrong type of black.
Guilty of “whiteness.”
Thing is, while Proud Boys is “amorphous” and not in any way aligned with the mainstream Right; BLM and Antifa are rather obviously the street enforcers of the Democratic Party, sent out every election year for a spot of “mostly peaceful protesting.”
One thing is there’s no agreement on what ‘means’ are unacceptable when attempting to achieve an end, with inevitable charges of hypocrisy and double standards. The Left media, for example, noted with disgust how the Capitol Hill rioters were not wearing masks or social distancing, conveniently forgetting the BLM protesters who were given official exemptions and excused, even told that it was okay because more lives were at stake than from the pandemic. For some reason, I can’t think of a good example on the other side. Hmm.
99% of political violence comes from the left. The fact that the MSM is leftist means that they get away with it.
Apparently it was ok to place 25,000 US troops on the streets of the US capital in order to ensure that Biden’s inauguration passed off peacefully in the face of a non-existent threat.
Washington saw over 10,000 more troops on its streets than were eventually deployed during the 6 day long 90s LA riots which saw 63 killed, well over 2,000 injured, 12,000 arrests and an estimated one billion Dollars worth of damage.
Paradoxically, it was also fine for various Democratic governors to refuse to deploy troops on their streets in the face of very real ongoing life threatening acts of destruction during last summer’s BLM riots.
NY mayor Cuomo responded to Trump’s repeated requests for troops to quell continuing BLM-led unrest across the US thus,
‘When was the last time you had the military out against Americans? Is that Americana? Is that making America great? I don’t think so.’
Well, we all know the specific answer to that very question now.
It was 17.00 20th of January, 2021, Mr Cuomo.
Biden is doing rather well. He has had his ‘Reichstag’ moment, and I believe will be introducing a ‘Domestic Terrorism Act’, also know as an Enabling Act, and he had his light show down the Mall, which was all very like the ‘Theatre of Light’ created at Nuremberg. Jolly good, jolly good.
Apparently the sizable ethnic minority there are not in fear of the police. Well, police they are not. They are protecting the white privileged. You know, like private security services are still funded for governors and mayors, but the people need to be protected from people with guns.
Sorry Mr. Murray, but the fact that there are extremists at both ends of the spectrum does not justify the “They’re as bad as each other” apportioning of blame.
It seems clear to me that the progressive revolution is in full swing in the US and other western democracies and many of the tactics have clearly been lifted from the Bolshevik playbook and updated for current conditions.
The ‘enemies of the people’ bourgeoisie are now racists.
The proletariat is now the various and sundry collection of the self-declared aggrieved.
Cancel culture is the new version of show trials and the Gulag
There are true believers but they wouldn’t get anywhere without the direct and indirect support of the admirers, the weak-minded. the appeasers, the abettors, the opportunistic carpet-baggers and the nameless, faceless legions that are just trying to keep their heads down and survive.
Just like the old the leadership of the new Bolshevism isn’t aiming to improve anything, simply destroy and re-invent which turns out to be the hard part that they’ve proven not to be very good at.
To paraphrase, this is “No country for reasonable men”
Well said. I can’t think what’s happened to Mr Murray. Is he a) trying to side step his way back towards today’s “mainstream”, in spite of everything? b) trying to sweet talk them towards at least half a compromise to gain a breathing space? c) seriously deluded as to the relative threat coming from the political extremes? Or d) under some sort of pressure from a circle of friends which thinks in one of the above ways? For there is no other explanation for the false equivalence he offers, with its weak absolution proffered to the likes of Pelosi. In short, I fear he is “cracking”.
It was pretty disturbing that some of the Capitol rioters were displaying blatantly anti-Semitic sentiments, such as the logo 6MNE.
I think Murray is right not to gloss over the potential danger presented by some of those protesters.
That was the entire point of the article – to move away from finger-pointing and shouting “your side’s worse” or “you started it”.
I agree about the hypocrisy and self-righteousness on display on the left, though.
I see your point and Murray’s as well but my fear is that sort of “both sides need to calm down” reasonableness is just not feasible at this point.
IMO, the facts are fairly clear that Trump’s election, Proud Boys and the Capitol Hill fiasco are all forms of pushback against the Leftist agenda.
At this point in the proceedings the “you started it” finger is wagging Left as it should be because they have unilaterally decided to change the rules that have served western democracies quite well for at least a couple of centuries.
They are modern day Bolsheviks in a hurry.
Discussion, debate and consensus-building facilitated by the founding principle of Free Speech are in the way – an impediment.
It isn’t that America is flawed, flaws can be addressed, but rather that the very idea of America is wrong and must be destroyed.
They not only want to throw out the baby with the bathwater they’re after anyone that ever met the baby.
They don’t want discussion, they want submission.
Precisely. And even if Murray’s response is designed to push them into a moral corner, it won’t work; worse, it will demoralise the right into imagining that there are indeed equivalent problems on both sides – when the entrenchment, the reach and the distortions of the far left are far, far more advanced than that of their “opposite numbers”. Besides, it is not the “far right” which the left is seeking to destroy; it is seeking to destroy anything right of “left-liberal” – Social democrats, Classical Liberals, Christian democrats, Conservatives and moderate nationalists. It’s about time people awoke to this danger – and here’s Mr Murray crooning lullabies!
We’re screwed, then. Or at least the US is.
Yes we can all see the potential darkness of the left. The harder thing is to see ourselves as others see us.
The moral turpitude of anti-Semitism is not in doubt; but the threat presented by its last remaining adherents on the right is; for their numbers are small, their agendas non-existent and their influence at zero. Conversely, those anti-Semites of the left, who have broadened the tropes of paranoia to embrace not just the Jewish community but EVERY community of European origin, are hiding in plain sight and influencing policy. I suggest, therefore, it is to the left that we address ourselves and – alas – Murray’s article runs up the white flag.
Odd.
Anyone who might describe Trump’s policy toward Israel during his term in office as ‘anti-semitic’ either seriously hasn’t been paying attention or needs their head testing.
Good thing I didn’t say that, then, isn’t it?
Is it really that difficult to respond to what I actually write without pretending I wrote something else?
‘it was pretty disturbing that some of the Capitol rioters were displaying blatantly anti-Semitic sentiments, such as the logo 6MNE.’
Must have been responding to another Pete Kreff who wrote that, obviously.
You shouldn’t assume the anti-Semitic ones were Trump supporters. There is credible evidence that BLM activists infiltrated the crowds, and may have initiated the “storming” of the Capitol. (Search for “John Sullivan Capitol”.)
I don’t give much credence to claims about agents provocateurs on either side, I’m afraid.
He was also working alongside a CNN reporter, female.
Douglas speaks nothing but good sense to me. I cannot fault him so far. A very fair and humble person, the type we so much need in this country.
Not a very illuminating remark. So you like Murray. So do many of us. And?
Very well put. I have been reading quite a lot about 1917 recently and the similarities are very striking, particularly the lies, the denunciation of all opposition, the false moral equivalence and society’s privileged wetting themselves to get on the bandwagon to perdition
Yes, the similarities are striking and a little scary and go along way to explaining current events.
The Bolsheviks resolutely denounced, jailed, exiled or otherwise eliminated millions of for various transgressions deemed ‘counter-revolutionary’.
When challenged as to their own horrific behaviour Lenin often conceded the point but then quickly maintained that such occurrences were “unfortunate but necessary”
So here we are.
Capitol Hill riot – a monstrous assault on American democracy.
BLM/Antifa riots – protests for justice.
The similarities with Germany 1932/3 are also striking, not least the organized rioting and intimidation by the SA, and the “monitoring” of the election process by the Nazi party. Sounds familiar? And now we’ve had the Reichstag fire moment (the “storming” of the Capitol may have been organized by Antifa activists) serving as a pretext for pulling the challenge to the electoral college votes. We await the Kristallnacht with forboding.
It was worse than that. There were execution quotas to be filled regardless and it did not matter in the least whether the individual had transgressed or not. The sole aim was terror, the objective was terror and Lenin was explicit about this. “It is necessary – secretly and urgently to prepare the terror”. Those charged with implementing the terror had all the incentive they needed to show enthusiasm for the task for failure to do so was likely to result in denunciation and the adding of the names of you and your family to the list.
How do the useful idiots and fellow travellers deal with this. First denial, then they say the reports are exagerated and finally when confronted by the evidence that say that it was necessary.
I don’t think what amounts to appeasement is helpful. The blame each side should shoulder is not the same. And it is about shouldering blame – responsibility. Much as we may not like it and wish ourselves above it, we’re self-righteous, and a lose/lose solution is not attractive to anybody. I’m pretty sure (tho not 100%) it’s never worked. Let’s try instead to give things their true measure. The extreme right in America was a minuscule movement, tiny. Did the Republicans ever support them? The extreme left is a large, growing, belligerent movement supported by not only the Democrats but by the press and institutions. They rioted, unchecked, in Democrat cities across the country, burning looting and killing too for the whole lead up to the elections.A taste of what was to come if they didn’t get their way? To me, that trumps (no pun) the Capitol invasion not only on the time line but also in seriousness.We need a surgical look at all this – and more than anything I think the left/Democrats have to clean up their democracy, get rid of the opportunists they’re shielding, and accept that alternance in power is what works.
The Capital rioters could have trashed a lot, but they didn’t. Videos depict most of them looking at the place with reverence and awe, possibly wondering why they were even there. Watching a few seniors in the crowd suggested they went along with the tour group, swept inside by the crowd. Some younger folk went to the Capital to cause trouble and there seems to have been a few groups to organize the storming because they brought actual equipment – ropes. They started before Trump finished speaking. Perhaps they thought they would be as audacious as the BLM rioters except the masses there wanted no part of their inspired storming activity. Unlike BLM riot leaders, the stormers had not been fully training in crowd motivation techniques. Besides many were there with families, children along for the day. Hardly insurrectionists.
Yes, the whole thing looks suspicious. And the noise since has been so deafening that one wonders what it is we are NOT supposed to hear.
The reputation of the press has been dealt a serious and well deserved blow, None of this would have been possible without them.
‘The rock of democracy founders when we come to see those who disagree with us as the ‘others’
Used this quote before from, I believe, Theodore Roosevelt as it has never seemed so apposite to describe the situation in America at the moment and, as ever, actions speak louder than words.
If Biden and the Democrats seriously believe that they can get away with just spouting vacuous rhetoric about unity whilst pursuing what amounts to an illegitimate impeachment process built around a ‘trumped up’ charge against the now private US citizen, Donald Trump, little more than a show trial without the right to defend himself as he would be afforded under the US Constitution in a judicial court of law and so clearly designed to prevent him from ever running for office again, then it’s difficult to see this ending well anytime soon….the return of the adults to the room indeed.
‘Pull the other one, it’s got bells on it’, as we used to say.
It looks as if they will want their pound of flesh for a long time to come. If nothing else just to prove how virtuous they are in dealing with the enemy of the left.
Their intellectuals really don’t get it. Emily Bazelon, in leafy New Haven, shakes her head, wondering “how can they think like that?,” yet seeks her answers in stories that other journalists have written in magazines and papers she believes have the people with the best insight. She will not ask others outside of her bubble. AND, the left feel the exact same as the right”that the media is owned by the other side! THIS needs some discussion!
When an electoral system is open to political manipulation and untrusted, election results are all the easier to contest. in 2022, when the Democrats as the governing party can historically be expected to lose seats, we’ll see whether they swallow their losses or punt on fraud claims to challenge the results.
The riot at the capitol was disgraceful but in no way equivalent to the arson and looting worth billions dollars that followed Floyd’s death during his arrest. People complain about double standards because there are double standards. Axios in its analysis of the Washington riot said the capitol was sacked. Berlin was sacked in 1945. Congress resumed its business as comfortably as before as soon as the building was cleared.
The activist Left – the Left that controls Big Tech, dominates the media, no platforms free speech and lurches from one boycott to the next – vastly outnumbers the activist Right but the two sides are presented as equivalents. Left wing violence is routine; right wing violence is rare and nowhere near as organised as BLM or Antifa.
The truth is that the basic problems with American democracy come mainly from the Left.
Spot on in every particular.
They won’t lose in 2022. They have the blueprint for success now.
Of course, it is clear that America’s new Vice President was admiring protests, rather than the violence that followed them.
That probably explains why she was hyping a bail fund for the people arrested after the first riots in Minneapolis. It’s a bit amusing that the single Capitol incident is given equal footing – and to hear the media and left (though I repeat myself) tell it, it was worse – to months of mayhem that left more than three dozen dead, billions in damage, and triggered spikes in violence in about every major city.
Now, we have Dems pushing a measure that effectively brands half the country as terrorists, another effort at unpersoning and dehumanizing people, on top of Big Tech’s activity. This is going to end badly and wringing one’s hands while reciting the usual “well, both sides” pabulum is not helpful.
“Of course, it is clear that America’s new Vice President was admiring protests, rather than the violence that followed them.”
It isn’t clear to me. When she did condemn the violence in even the mildest terms? Her words would be interpreted by most people as condoning it.
Exactly, the word “beware” is a bit of a giveaway.
Ha! One must recall the riots of 2011 in the UK, which the BBC insisted on calling “protests” for two days, before they told the truth. I heard one local councillor in an affected place in London, where the local – and newish – community centre had been badly damaged – lose his rag with a BBC reporter when she referred to the protests.
Harris has done exactly the same. I the USA think the last four years was bad, they haven’t seen anything yet.
Exactly. She helped raise bail money for those who had been arrested for various acts of violence.
Even more horrifying is the likelihood that she will be the Chief once Dementia Joe makes too many public blunders.
Poor Douglas, you are usually so sensible. This all reeks of ‘Pearl clutching’. You can’t stand President Trump, but the sad reality is he was reelected and the election was stolen. By refusing to even look at this in an objective manner has created a powder keg of rage. Maybe it is time the Fascist Left had a taste of their own medicine.
I cannot see in his writing anything about not being able to stand Trump. How did you get that out of it?
I watched Douglas and Jordan Peterson the other night. What surprised this Democrat from Portland was how Douglas clearly hated Trump and pretty much laid the Jan 6 riot totally at his feet.
I was waiting for him to acknowledge that the Democrats and the left had it in for Trump the second after he was elected. Pelosi et al were talking of impeachment before Melana brough the last lamp into the White House. The late night comedians and media could have written Don Lemon’s monologue since he said exactly what they had been saying for four years.
I often wondered how Trump survived all of the hatred. I guess in a way it was good that he is so narcissistic he didn’t care .but I expect his supporters cared a lot. I ended up feeling sorry for him at the end. He was the very picture of a broken man.
I of course am glad he is gone never to be on stage again. But I hope he finds peace at Mar-a-Lago. t I also hope that his many detractors also find peace and can move forward. But I fear that will not happen. He makes a bundle of money for the likes of Lemon who would never have gotten a job without him.
And oh yes, I remember that both Oprah and David Letterman asked him years ago when he was young and “charming” if he wouldn’t consider running for President. Surprise, he did.
“gone never to be on stage again” I wouldn’t be so sure about that 🙂
Don’t get me wrong, I like Douglas and always read his stuff and watch him on Youtube etc, but like so many he has ‘bought’ into the fashionable narrative of ‘orange man bad’. I’ve met loads of Queen’s businessmen and they were very much like Donald Trump. Perhaps not quite as crude nor vulgar, but cut from the same cloth. Needless to say I have been surprised – very surprised – by what has happened in America over the last 5 years.
Surprised, and also concerned. You might be a Democrat, but I would hope you would be concerned and troubled at how Obama used the intelligence services to spy on a political opponent – Sleepy Joe was in on it too – and how the Clinton Crime family seemingly dreamt up ‘RussiaGate’ to deflect and defend themselves. Read Lee Smith. Obviously this had the intention of derailing Trump, but when that didn’t work we had ‘Impeachment’. That failed too, so insurance was required in the form of Election Fraud. It must have come as a huge shock on the day when Trump was romping home, so counting was suspended in the swing states and a crude and shameless fraud which would have disgraced the worst Banana Republic was wheeled out. Oh what a sorry state of affairs.
And now, if you Americans couldn’t sink any lower, we have the prospect of a patently illegal so called ‘Impeachment’ before the very worst Kangaroo Court. I hope, as a Democrat, you have telephoned your Senator and written to them to demand in the strongest possible terms why they are doing this and denying President Trump benefit of Law. The Constitution is abundantly clear, and what they are doing is seeking to pass a Bill of Attainder, something specifically forbidden by the Founding Fathers.
I don’t care for President Trump, but I do care for what is right, what is just and what is true, which is why I have defended him. In the film ‘A Man for All Season’ there is a memorable scene often know as the Devil Scenen -:
Alice More: Arrest him!
More: Why, what has he done?
Margaret More: He’s bad!
More: There is no law against that.
Will Roper: There is! God’s law!
More: Then God can arrest him.
Alice: While you talk, he’s gone!
More: And go he should, if he was the Devil himself, until he broke the law!
Roper: So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law!
More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
Roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that!
More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast”“ man’s laws, not God’s”“ and if you cut them down”and you’re just the man to do it”do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law for my own safety’s sake.
And that’s the key – ‘for my own safety’s sake’. The likes of Biden, Harris, Pelosi et all regard Trump as the Devil incarnate. The reality is they are the devil, they are evil because they believe that the end justifies the means. It never does, and there will dawn a day, I hope, when the Law catches up with them.
People have little choice these days it seems. When the establishment uses communism to control the people, the people fall into fascism to combat it, and then the two feed off each other. Basically, we have no choice but to wait until both sides are depleted and then rebuild what’s left. In the meantime the enemies of the West are circling above us like vultures.
I was looking forward to reading this essay by this widely lauded and supposedly erudite man, but what is written is a ,to me, weak attempt at describing the events of the last year as somehow equivalent. Many have opined on this-at the absurdity of it, but I expected more from this “wise” man, and instead, have read just another shamefully obvious appeasement in the name of supposed balance. I was going to say that he was a weasel…but weasels have teeth.
It’s amazing how this ‘both sides’ bit has gained currency, even among people who presumably know better. It’s how big lies start to become articles of faith.
Douglas seems to be going wobbly in his take on American politics, just when it should have become obvious to him that the consequences of a Biden presidency will be worse than even Trump warned about. Biden’s not Bernie Sanders; he’s the Mad Hatter, and things can only get worse as his dementia progresses. So it is disappointing to see Douglas contrast “BLM protests” with “Capitol riots”, talk about Trump as the instigator of the Capitol riots, and so forth, even if it is only in summarizing Democratic Party talking points, since he doesn’t really bother to push back against this narrative.
There is a lot of evidence that Trump would have won the election if only legal votes were counted, and people disenfranchised by persons voting illegally in their name had been allowed to vote. Whether or not that is true is a question that reasonable people should have an open mind about, but it is obvious that there was substantial fraud and that rules have to be changed to tighten things up. The courts have ruled against Trump on all his legal challenges. This does not indicate that the cases didn’t have any legal merit, and one can justifiably wonder if the ferocity of left-wing violence against Republicans has not been such that the judges feared for their lives if they rule in Trump’s favour. It also intimidated Republican state legislators from flipping the results in battleground states where fraud helped Biden win their electoral college votes.
No decent person would defend the Capitol riot or the vehicle ramming that took the life of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville in 2017, but there is no question that left-wing violence by BLM, Antifa and other groups has caused more deaths and created more havoc than right-wing violence. It is difficult to see Biden doing anything to curb this left-wing violence. After all, arguably he wouldn’t be president today without it.
The evidence that Trump won seems to be overwhelming and irrefutable. Take Georgia. Quite how 10300+ people who are dead managed to vote can only be regarded as a miracle. Take them out, the illegal underage voters, the out of state voters, the illegally registered voters etc, etc, etc and Biden did not win the State by 13000 votes but lost it by over 130000.
I have great respect for Douglas Murray, but like almost all conservative commentators in the UK he has bought into the symmetry narrative. The Left/Right divide is not a balanced one. The Left have clearly got their sights on a new revolution, including the overthrow of the Constitution itself. Trump had an unappealing personality, but he never wanted that.
I fear people on our side of the Atlantic don’t realize that this really is an existential crisis for the USA. The 2020 election (and, yes, there is clear evidence of fraud if you actually watched the hearings) may well have been the last election that counts. The Democrats have their blueprint for staying in power. They’ve had a one-party state for a generation in CA, and now they threaten to impose it on the whole country.
Sorry to be a pedant, Douglas, but I think it should be “reining in” not reigning.
There is no comparison between the riot at the Capitol which lasted all of 6 hours and the rioting/burning of buildings by BLM/Antifa which has occurred over a period of months.
The first time i have disagreed with Douglas. The Left in the US holds by far the most dangerous ambitions and has the entire MSM in its pocket. The miracle is that Trump ever got to be elected. They won’t let that happen again, as they have already demonstrated
MSM and social media are cheerleaders for disruptive political events.
In particular, the anonymity allowed by so many social media platforms means that activists can rarely be brought to book for their actions.
Murray’s journey up his own fundament in order to ensure access to lucrative US media gigs by appearing even-handed continues apace.
You may disagree with DM but to accuse him of base motives is to completely misunderstand the man.
Murray is turning into an even more pompous version of Matthew Parris by the day.
He’s seen the way the wind is blowing in the states and is making a dash for the lucrative left-of-right-of-centre pundit market before he’s cancelled.
I think he is also feeling the flames licking his behind.
The USA is deteriorating fast. China was always coming anyway but all of the recent shenanigans in Washington will just increase the rate of descent into the chasm. Civil war is inevitable because there is nowhere to go. During my last tour of factories I can confirm that their manufacturing (not including arms of course) is years behind Europe in quality and safety. Boeing was seen as the pinnacle and is now the pits. What is there to be proud of?
Most importantly, the democratic system needs to be changed. Having a president as a figurehead is OK but would you just let an individual have control of the nuclear button? The whole system of Congress vs Senate is so boring that the electorate voted for Trump in 2016 to get a bit of life into things.
The problem for me is that we tend to follow them about 20 years later. They become the fattest country and we become the fattest country. We follow all of their movies and the ‘wit’ of the celebs, we have even got rap music because they have rap music. Their teenagers shrug and say, “Whatever'” and our teenagers follow. Next will be chlorinated chickens followed by Monsanto.
Having a president as a figurehead is OK but would you just let an individual have control of the nuclear button?
The president is a bit more than just a figurehead and firing nukes requires more than a presidential whim. I’m not sure how you change a democratic system, though ours is a republic rather than a pure democracy. It’s why people get crazy about the electoral college or the apportionment of senators.
The USA is deteriorating fast.
Well, yes; we have a party and movement dedicated to that. There is a wing whose reason for living is to denigrate what the country is, going back to its founding and creating the narrative of a mean, unfair, and racist society.
The electoral collage equates to our constituency system in the UK. And the same could happen as in 2016 – the popular vote for Party A might exceed that of Party b, but if B won more constituencies, they are in government. It is a balancing out exercise. If it’s changed in the USA, it will be like China, a one party state; and yes, that may be what’s going to happen regardless, as the Dems control social media and it would seem, the voting system
I think we want to be Mexico, with one party, and perks for the elites. Call it enlightened despotism, but the elites are just having dinner parties, in any scenario.
Our manufacturing ranges from old and dirty to state of the art. We lead in electric cars, fuel cells and micro machining as well as raising good beef and health spending per capita. Plus you can get stoned legally most anywhere now. What’s not to like? 40 years ago US petrol heads were basic, “no replacement for displacement” guys. Now our club and street scene builds porsches, dubs and our own duratec mustangs as well as Germans, Swedes or Brits. As far as politics goes at least Bush/clinton et al realized you’ll not get much done with checked and separated powers. Trump and Obama seemed to think the POTUS can actually do all the things they want and seem miffed to find they only manage a few. As far as MAGA/BLM goes Baader Meinhof they ain’t, if turning the US lawmen over was so easy don’t you think the Crips or Jalisco NJ cartel would’ve done it by now?
So much of the entire war between Left and Right reduces to mere childish finger-pointing. Each side is completely committed to demonizing the other in the most blatant, emotionally-laden terms possible, and there are no reasoned arguments which respect the complexity of the problems we face as a society. This is precisely the Madness of Crowds, and we seem utterly mired in this ethos of groupthink, simplistic blaming and point-scoring. The differences between individuals on “the Left” or “The Right” are actually much less striking than anyone wants to admit.
Spot on. The majority reaction to this article here demonstrates that many don’t want attempts at balanced analysis, but confirmation of their own warped beliefs.
Most here desire “balanced analysis”…this was not it.
Bullsh–. It’s asking too much to expect conservatives in the US to try to use “balance analysis” and “reasoned arguments” while the Leftists in power are publicly calling for and providing for the complete demise of them, and while the laws they are calling for would brand us as “Terrorists”. You two guys live in an imaginary world I think.
The irony. Author encourages everyone to look at their own political side, and most comments are “NO! Look at THEM!”
Precisely. I posted something similar, but your comment is much pithier.
Most comments are like “you are drawing equivalence where none exists.”
It is the job of the police to control the riots and they have failed to do so. It is hardly surprising when the support they get from politicians is confused at best. Who would want to work for the police in a State calling for defunding? Who would want to live in such States? The thought of defunding the police is utter insanity.
Suggesting the cops failed may be technically true, but it is not accurate. Failure would imply a good faith effort at doing the job, but not meeting the mark. That didn’t happen. In city after city, cops were told to stand down. Prosecutors immediately released those who were arrested. Politicians were on board with bail funds for the people apprehended in case any charges followed, and periodically, that happened.
There was a failure, all right, one of leadership and one govt coming up woefully short in its primary duty of protecting public safety and safeguarding individual rights. Govt actively allowed the mayhem to continue; much of the elected class belongs in jail.
Best comment. Murray should add this to his out of balance column to put things in the proper perspective.
I read about Biden saying he wants unity and reconciliation.
But I hear nothing about trying to impeach an ex President. Surely you can only impeach an existing President?
If you can only impeach an existing President, I believe it is a bit early to impeach Biden.
Perhaps the Democrats know more than they are letting on?
Either way, I don’t think it will lead to unity and reconciliation!!
You will have noticed that Chief Justice Roberts has declined to preside. The Constitution is perfectly clear and states that Impeachment is designed to remove ‘the’ President, not ‘a’ President. You cannot be impeached from an office you no longer hold. The articles of Impeachment are now ‘moot’ and the Senate has no legal and Constitutional basis to seek to ‘try’ a private citizen. If I were President Trump I would, like King Charles I, demand to know by what authority they are seeking to place him on trial. And just as with Charles I they wont have an answer.
As others here note, the media (including social networking sites) are the biggest impediment to calming things down, because their business model is based on exciting emotions.
Even worse than promoting extremism among ordinary people, the media incite extremism among the elite by providing them a bubble of sycophancy within which every opponent is a moronic demon and the country needs to be saved by ruthless combination of its wise and virtuous government officials, hedge fund managers, journalists and university faculty. You know, corporate fascism. Surrounded by praise and exaggeration, the elite feel invincible, and implement new repressive and destructive policies as they see fit.
As an outside observer, I wonder if America’s problems are a mixture of an increasing sense of ‘loss of status as the only true world power’ a’ loss of sense of control of its own destiny as China and the East make massive inroads and steps towards becoming global powers able to control global trade and economics’ plus the absence of any unifying theme to replace that sense of ‘we are the main global power and cultural influencer’. When the centre cannot hold etc etc
The decline began with Obama’s policies, both domestic and international. He projected his idea, opinion that America isn’t the cure all, America isn’t that great. Internationally he gave up the Middle East to Russia, Iran, Turkey. Our Military was depleted and his orders of standing down brought the moral down shamefully. His presidency and his supposed successor, Hillary brought about the much desirable Obama ” Hope and Change”…….Donald Trump.
Now we’re back to the old status quo with a President whose only accomplishment in a 48 yr old political career was a “go along to get along” strategy to survive. A mouthpiece POTUS with his handlers words, ‘go along to get along’ is what is natural for him to do…..if Biden lasts the 4 yrs, he and his handlers will give birth to another Trump……the cycle continues, sadly.
I would say that the decline began with Bush’s groundless and insane invasion of Iraq, and the ongoing quagmire of Afghastlstan. To be sure, Obama made things worse in every way possible. In that respect he was very much like Tony Blair.
I remember when Obama was first elected. I happened to be in California and went to a cocktail party. Being a Brit I was asked what I thought of Obama, and at first I demurred but eventually my hostess (a wonderful lady sadly no longer with us) pressed the point and I said ‘you have elected a black Tony Blair’, meaning he will meddle in everything not fully understanding what he is doing and he will be ‘all things to all men’.
I have lots of American friends on FB and they very rarely mentioned politics and seemed a pretty united bunch until Obama got elected. It was the introduction of Obamacare that really seemed to divide republicans and democrats. By the time Trump got elected, the gloves were really off and people began defriend each other. It’s only FB one may say but it’s more of a mirror of society than the MSM will ever be.
Oh I don’t know, I first noticed it when Bill Clinton got elected. The Republicans truly hated him and had their own jumped up impeachment moment. They were the deranged ones (although I do think Clinton was guilty as sin I don’t think it was necessarily because he boinked an intern), they also blocked almost everything Obama attempted to do, it seemed to me, out of pure spite a lot of the time. And now it’s the Democrats turn to be deranged and taking it to a whole new level. The wheel just turns.
A little harsh, no? While appreciating that it was just a speech and acknowledging it was heavy on platitudes and a surprising amount of traditional American-way mythology, it seems a bit unfair to call it “mindless”.
Pretty standard inauguration fare I thought. With an extra large dollop of fawning celebs and schmaltz.
Violent protests are OK – until they show up at your house and you try to stuff it back into the horse.
I thought America had people working 60 hour weeks without and holiday pay. Where do they get the time for this kind of tomfoolery?
Many weeks and even months into the BLM-linked violence and destruction last summer, BLM still had never called for either calm or peaceful and or non-destructive protest. Never asked for property and buildings to cease being destroyed. And the mega media never asked or even suggested they issue such a statement, even after months of violence and destruction with many people seriously injured. The mega media was simply too busy lauding them and carrying their water.
Dont agree with article. Still article is a near miss. I would say its good to note and be aware of leftist hypocrisy and disingenuousness. Still thats not a reason to nurse grievances or have an axe to grind. None of this is a reason to become unreasonable or unethical. And destruction and violence are unlikely to achieve anything lasting for the left.
I think the nutters at MAGA/BLM don’t pose the same danger as RAF/Baader Meinhof etc. If over-throwing the US lawmen was that easy don’t you think the someone would’ve made at least a start by now? Extremists, Cartels, the United Blood Nation?? Note i don’t say US Govt, they just got overthrown twice: first the outsider Trump siezes the reigns, then the liberal consensus deep state/media/big business cabal siezes them back – even at the cost of an election which did not meet international norms in terms of transparency and traceability. Either way its not going to do much to the price of meat, though might hit the cost of gas. Meanwhile Police still keep the streets safe where they can, National Guard and Army back them up. Only if they fail will we need to raise the militias as permitted and encouraged in our constitution. I expect that’s a long way off. And as far as Biden turning the cops to his will good luck with that at precinct or any other level. Biden may have voted for the 3 strikes law in 1994 but i doubt he can tell officers on the ground what to do or think, especially the black ones who’s communities were hit by the 3 strikes rule. Life in prison for 3 joints – really?
In my view the Baader Meinhof might have had a point. Namely, that members of the Nazi regime were still operating at the highest levels of German business and politics etc. How prominent they were as Nazis I don’t know, offhand. And, of course, it was very difficult for anybody above the level of roadsweepers not to have been a member of the Nazi regime.
Antifa have a point in some areas, such as protesting against US wars etc. And, i suppose, against the financialized, corporatised, economic system. Not that they would be capable of putting in place a viable alternative. BLM don’t really have a point. If they cared about black lives they would be removing guns from the black men who are responsible for over 90% of the killings of black men in US cities.
There is literally no difference between lovely fellows accidentally plotting and coming close to the kidnap and murder of senetors and the armed invasion of the seat of US democracy and evil brigands maliciously being tear gassed and beaten during shameful protests about police [who never hurt a fly] violence against black Americans. No difference. Both sides. Very good people on both sides. What does false equivalence mean? I keep hearing it but don’t understand the phrase.
This is a pretty sorry attempt at sarcasm-if that is what it is…
M Ash – i think you prove thr point that writer is making
What does false equivalence mean?
it means using melodramatic language like you did regarding the fantasy of murders and invasions. It means clinging to a lie re: cops, who kill far more non-blacks than blacks. This is either bad trolling or bad sarcasm.
? s a r c a s m ?
LOL…”Armed invasion”?…armed with what? Cell phones and selfie sticks…jeez.
The commentary of forum readers demonstrates the problem: no one is willing to accept fault, and everyone is happy to assign blame. It is remarkable how few of us have the ability to even admit the possibility of error – much less, its actuality.
He said-commenting in this forum…”no one is willing to accept fault”? You equivalence-mongers posing as moderate, thoughtful disinterested observers are one source of error that seems to never admit fault.