I think the jury is still out on whether the civil unrest in the US will help or hinder Trump’s re-election.
This article is a good summary of the case for the protests hurting his chances.
I think an equally strong argument can unfortunately be made that the President will increase his electability (as they usually do) through a show of force and controlled repression of the disorder and violence so loved by the news media and served up to ‘patriotic’ American households over this time. Domestic conflict, albeit as running street battles for now, has provided a massive distraction from the 100,000+ Covid deaths and 40m+ recently unemployed.
And of course discussion about whether Trump could be re-elected or not provides a massive distraction from the opportunities to imagine ways for communities to organise themselves without the need for a President or federal government…
Manu Caddie is Kaihautu of Innovation & Regulation at Rua Bioscience
I’ll tell you how Trump steam rolls Biden.
Trump: “China is funding the rioters”
America 1 – Communism 0
The only winners are the powerful vested interests of the financial institutions , the billionaires and the anti democratic forces of the American establishment.
The rest is just a distraction.
Change is required…in lots of ways including leadership… Bernie probably kicking himself about now…Bring Back Bern!
“This article is a good summary of the case for the protests hurting his chances.”
No. It isn’t. It’s the Guardian, which hasn’t been a commentator of record for many years. If it ever was….
The author of the Guardian piece appears not to know his history. Civil unrest and violence in the US tends to tip the electorate in favour of voting Republican. We’ve seen this in the past.
“….a virus believed to have come from a market….”
This cannot be right. A virus cannot jump from animals to humans in a market: that’s not how evolution works, even for viruses. It is journalism underpinned by ignorance.
“….nor for four centuries of slavery, segregation, police brutality and racial injustice.”
While I certainly wouldn’t disagree with most of that statement, there weren’t four centuries of slavery, and the author’s embedded link does make that clear. It was a bit under 250 years between the arrival of slavery in Virginia in 1619, and the passing of Amendment 13 in 1865. In fact, the first slaves got there by accident, being originally destined for Mexico, I think.
Remember that at that time, slavery was still widespread in the world; most people thought it unexceptionable. Regrettably, even now, it hasn’t been eradicated.
“….its toxic mix of weak moral leadership, racial divisiveness, crass and vulgar rhetoric and an erosion of norms, institutions and trust in traditional information sources.”
Trust in traditional information sources? What: the msm? Good luck with that! It isn’t just a large chunk of US society which is deeply sceptical of the narrative broadcast by the msm over the years since WW2.
As to Trump himself, he isn’t either a pollie or a diplomat. Arguably, that’s why he was elected: drain the swamp, remember? The voters had seen pollies fail over and over to make substantive changes in Washington. Hence his election. He tried to implement his proposed foreign policies, but the Washington Establishment – which has run US foreign policy for all of my considerable lifetime, and doubtless before that – had other ideas and set about a determined campaign of white-anting him, with the enthusiastic support of the msm. He was simply not equipped to defend himself against the combined forces.
The msm, being liberal, hates Republicans. It has treated similarly all Republican presidents in my lifetime. Yet it has given a free – or at least soft – ride to equally awful Democratic presidents: the odious Bill Clinton and that egregious snake Obama being the two most recent examples. Go look at the history, if you’re sceptical about this.
Think about the Ferguson riots of 2014, along with the mass shootings during Obama’s term. Did the msm blame him for those? Of course not.
“He’s willing to kill democracy. He is willing to kill any sense of real respect or trust in his government. He is willing to kill America’s international and global relationships.”
Killing democracy? How exactly? To be sure, he’s taking the US out of sundry international bodies and entities, as he promised. But really: the rest of us should be relieved at that. The sooner the better, say I and many others. There is nothing the US has touched since WW2, that it hasn’t made worse. And here is the latest effort:
https://mobile.twitter.com/BenjaminNorton/status/1268613578648547328
All one can say to this is: jeezus wept…
“I am interested in a plan from Biden’s team around ending police violence.”
Hahaha…. Expecting a Democrat president to do anything of moment? Good luck with that: I remind everyone of the aforementioned Clinton and Obama. And in Biden’s case, it’s debatable that the dementia won’t scuttle his chances of standing. The word is that he’ll stand aside before the election, to be replaced by Hillary Clinton. And I doubt the electorate would buy her next time round either. But if it does, god help us all…
“….in a state where white nationalists caused deadly violence in Charlottesville two years ago…”
This statement is in the link about slavery. And it’s not true. Oh I know that it’s what the msm told us, but that doesn’t make it so, as I’m sure that everyone realises by now.
I watched Ruptly footage of those events that day – including the incident where the protester was hit by that car. Those of you who have seen RT pieces will know how Ruptly works: it’s without-commentary video footage of events. Their reports can be quite long, as was the case with Charlottesville. The Unite the Right and related groups were rallying, as I recall. And it was peaceful. It doesn’t matter how repulsive people find all that white right stuff: it’s undisputable that it was peaceful. Until Antifa showed up: that’s when the violence started. Antifa came prepared to fight and do battle. And that’s just what they did. The author’s assertion to the contrary bespeaks either ignorance of what happened, because he wasn’t there, or disingenuousness.
“…communities to organise themselves without the need for a President or federal government…”
What are you suggesting? That Americans should act contrary to their Constitution? I’d be wary about advocating anything like that, if I were you.
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