I agree with Dean Obeidallah’s point at The Daily Beast that Democrats don’t have an antifa problem. That’s exactly why Democrats should be very careful not to make it into their problem.
There have been editorials in mainstream newspapers in praise of antifa and some Democrats have attempted to make a distinction between antifa and its use of violence. Those are good ways to make it into your problem. Better to denounce it as Nancy Pelosi has done.
Not that the’ll listen to you, but why exactly would you like to help Democratic party politicians?
Because I’m a Democrat and am concerned about the direction in which I see the party headed. Here in Chicago, Cook County, Illinois the Republican Party is something between nonexistent and supine.
It would be nice to have at least one honest, viable political party. Two would be better.
Democrats don’t have an antifa problem. Their problem right now is that the younger Democrats are more likely to believe that the police, in its Philadelphia police union/Joe Arpaio form are authoritarian borderline fascists. And they are more likely to believe that ethnic cleansing is something a significant minority of white Americans would be down with.
For example, a couple days ago was Fred Hampton’s birthday. Willing to bet that if you asked Hillary or Nancy Pelosi, they would be like the Panthers got what was coming to them. But if you asked someone younger, and probably even mainstream, they would be explaining that Hoover wanted Hampton dead because he united different groups, so he had the Chicago drug him and then murder him in his sleep.
This change has been a long time coming, and its because of reality. I don’t believe in violence, but when I see an outraged right-wing complain about antifa violence and then I watch the video of this violence, which shows a nutty kid with a Pinochet t-shirt pepper-spray a couple guys in masks and then get his ass lightly kicked, my take is that conservatives are basically cops. They like to beat people up but they can’t take a punch.
It’s the George Zimmerman lifestyle, and it’s why when antifa guys get busted and face long sentences for smashing a Starbucks window they aren’t weeping like this white idiot who led a rally in which somebody was murdered.
So the problem isn’t antifa. It’s that ordinary Americans are considered willing supporters of state violence, and maybe, just maybe, they will be down to support paramilitary violence as well. Look at all of the dweebs like InstaIdiot who fantasize about running over protestors. That’s far more alarming than somebody not freaking about a fistfight between hotheads.
MM: You’re buying into the notion that antifa are “younger Democrats,” when I think that is conflating a small number of Democrats with various anti-Democratic Party groups of anarchists or vaguely Marxist dispositions. (The Republican Party has the same problem) None of this political violence is likely to make any political difference unless the establishment parties mishandle it and how they mishandle it will determine whose ox is gored.
For my money the key point is that the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend, either. The sooner both parties realize that and its implications the better off they’ll both be.
Antifa is an anarchist group. They neither want nor need the endorsement of any Democrat or politician.
“Those are good ways to make it into your problem.”
That’s correct, in my opinion. And if we set aside the inevitable whackjobs of all stripes, I note that Republicans repeatedly let themselves get trapped in have you stopped beating your wife defensiveness. And Ben is correct in his description of who these people are.
I take an almost daily look at some conservative websites, and other than seeing that Antifa is a threat to our liberties and precious bodily fluids, which Democrats need to get under control IMMEDIATELY, I don’t really understand how Antifa is actually such a danger. It’s not as if there’s some horrendous “Antifa Party Platform” that millions of normal-seeming Americans have signed on to.
Okay, some liberals think ultra-conservatives threatening violence ought to be opposed by people also willing to use violence. How exactly is this a danger in a nation which worships gun ownership, precisely because there is so much insane violence out there? It sounds to me like “Antifa” is the liberal equivalent of NRA membership. Conservatives ought to love them.
Or … Is it that “antifa” is just the name conservatives have decided to apply to younger liberals as a routine thing, just as they decided several years ago to refer to a “Democrat Party” rather than a “Democratic Party”, evidently just because it pissed off Democrats.
Lotta good comments, But no answer to the division in American politics. I think I identify with the “right”, because I’m an unforgivable White. And older, which is a dividing line in itself. I used to be a Democrat, until I realized they meant nothing they said on the campaign trail, only to get votes, so now Trump, you all know he’s no conservative, no right wing extremist, no warmonger. He’s his own man and will act according to his conscience, perhaps not what you want, but I trust his instincts, and pray for him.