[Peace-discuss] [Peace] YES!!! Patrick Martin nails it.

[Karen Aram]

  *   HOME<https://www.liberationnews.org/>

  *   SECTIONS »<https://www.liberationnews.org/washington-dc-multinational-solidarity-15k-nazis-klan-20/#>

  *   PUBLICATIONS »<http://store.pslweb.org/>

  *   PSL »<https://www.liberationnews.org/home-page/about/>

  *   DONATE »<http://nb.pslweb.org/donate>
  *


Navigate to...

 Home

 Sections »

   – Militant Journalism

   – Analysis

   – Video

   – Archives

   – Español

 Publications »

   – Breaking the Chains Magazine

   – PSL Books

 PSL »

   – About

   – Join the PSL

   – Become a Sustainer

   – Sign Up for Emails

   – Contact

   – Party Statements

   – Upcoming Events

   – Liberation School

   – Int’l Bulletin

 Donate »

   – Join the Sustainers
MILITANT JOURNALISM<https://www.liberationnews.org/category/militant-journalism/>
Download PDF flyer<https://flyer-generator.herokuapp.com/?article_url=https://flyer-components.herokuapp.com/flyers/73949/data>
Washington, DC: Multinational solidarity-15K, Nazis/Klan-20
By Paul Wilcox and Morgan Artyukhina
Aug 14, 2018
6820
[Liberation photo: Paul Wilcox]<http://www.liberationnews.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/ANSWER-photo-.jpg>

Liberation photo: Paul Wilcox

They just kept coming, and coming … and coming. First many hundreds, than many thousands of people of every race and gender. They came together here in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 12 to protest the second “Unite the Right” rally, held by neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan to commemorate last year’s march that resulted in the murder of antifascist activist Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, Va.

The turnout was overwhelming and inspiring to everyone. Eventually, up to 15,000 people came to say no to racism and denounce the Nazis and Klan.

It was a rout: 15,000 anti-racists confronted 20 Nazis and Klan members. It was clear that the successful organizing efforts of the ANSWER Coalition and other organizations had a serious dampening effect on the right-wing racists. No amount of free coverage in the corporate media, no amount of encouragement from the Trump administration, and no amount of covert and overt financial support from the upper class could mask the contempt that the overwhelming majority of working-class people of all nationalities feel for fascists.

Trump emboldened white supremacists

Feeling emboldened by Donald Trump’s statement that Nazi ranks contained “some very fine people,” the white supremacists scheduled a rally at Lafayette Park, right in front of the White House. With press coverage literally outnumbering them, the “alt-right” forces were confident of spreading their fascist demagogy and hate.

Organizers from the ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) Coalition immediately went into action to deny them the ability to use Lafayette Park unopposed to spread their odious message of hate, sending out the word that “the forces opposed to racism, anti-immigrant bigotry, Islamaphobia, anti-LGBTQ hatred and anti-Semitism will not be silenced or intimidated.” Volunteers began to pour in to help with all the tasks required – leaflets, phone calls, banner and sign making, as well as commitments to help with stage setup and security for the day of the protest.

Local ANSWER offices throughout the North East oriented volunteers to be disciplined and prepared for whatever might happen, knowing that in the past police, while protecting the racists, have often attacked protesters with clubs and tear gas.

Trade unions, restaurants, hotels announce they won’t serve fascists

The Washington Area Metro Transit Authority had actually planned to provide separate trains for the white supremacists to ride to their rally with a strong police escort. This Jim Crow-era plan for “white supremacist-only” transportation was exposed by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, which stated: “More than 80% of Local 689’s membership is people of color, the very people that the Ku Klux Klan and other white nationalists groups have killed, harassed and violated. … The union has declared that it will not play a role in their accommodation.”

In addition, restaurants and hotels throughout D.C. announced they would not serve or house the fascists and services such as Uber, Lyft and Airbnb gave their workers the option of refusing service to white supremacists.

Fascists get police escort

However, on the day of the Nazi rally, WMATA found a way to have a fascists-only train car and a large police escort anyway! Police shut down the station in Vienna, Virginia, blocking access for regular users to give the fascists ready access to the train, and while the train was in transit to downtown D.C., riders at other stations were notified to use different cars than those transporting the Nazis.

And on top of it all, the media rode with them the entire way, effectively giving the fascists an extended and personalized press conference

‘Hate and division hold up capitalism’

[Counter-protest rally stage at Lafayette Park. Co-MC Kerbie Joseph of PSL at mic. Liberation photo by Paul Wilcox.]<http://www.liberationnews.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/d6f6.jpg>

Counter-protest rally stage at Lafayette Park. Co-MC Kerbie Joseph of PSL at mic. Liberation photo by Paul Wilcox.

Speaker after speaker on ANSWER’s stage affirmed the strong, positive message of the anti-racist rally. Rally MCs Eugene Puryear, Yasmina Mrabet, and Kerbie Joseph pointed out the “impressive diversity”of the crowd and explained that “the messages of hate and division are what hold up capitalism.”

Kerbie Joseph, of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, declared that the crowd was “a beautiful sight to see” and that “standing together we have real people power. The Nazis have tried to scare the people, but they are the ones who are scared of us.”

“There’s nothing that scares them more than a multinational alliance dedicated to protecting each other,” she told the crowd.

Jonathan Hutto of Empower DC stated that, “No amount of ignoring was going to stop the Nazis … remember Stalingrad and finish the job!” He  also explained that the struggle was not just against racism and fascism but the “economic violence” of poverty.

Imam Mahdi Bray, the National Director of the American-Muslim Alliance, told the crowd that when he was a boy, his home had been firebombed by racist thugs with shotguns when his father had gone to vote.

Strength and power of diversity

To quote several protesters interviewed by Liberation News, the gathering in the park “looked like America.” Everyone seemed energized by the mix of people – over half people of color standing together with white anti-racists. The strength and power of diversity was the most common comment from the crowd.

Liberation News spoke with Samantha, who came to D.C. from the Louisville, Ky, area, where they are involved in a local anti-racist coalition. Samantha said it was “important for me to be doing something today. … The very idea that some people are willing to show up in person and say ‘I support genocide, slavery, anti-LGBTQ laws … that’s not okay with me.” They said they hoped to inspire others to become politically involved, just like they had been inspired by seeing protesters on the TV as a kid.

Protester Tim Eure told Liberation News he was “glad to see so many communities standing together against racism” and that “white workers were affected by racism, too.”  He said that the rally was a “great start” to continue the struggle, not only against Trump, but the domination of “corporations overseeing the distribution of wealth upwards.”

A young immigrant from Comoros Island (between Africa and Madagascar) told Liberation News that his family had come to the U.S. in 2006 seeking political asylum. But today, he said, “my family would not get asylum” and, he asked, “What is great about America today?”

Activists from the District of Columbia emphasized how white supremacy isn’t limited to sworn fascists, but is endemic to the structures of capitalist society. Puryear, who works with the Stop Police Terror Project, noted that Metropolitan Police Department officers had been caught wearing custom-made shirts bearing white supremacist symbols not just on duty but in court! Norman Momowetu Clement noted that the name of Washington, D.C.’s professional football team is a racial slur for Indigenous people, and that its continued use as a mascot normalizes white supremacy in everyday life.

Morgan Artyukhina, of the Party for Socialism and  Liberation, told the crowd about fascism’s long history of anti-LGBTQ and anti-disabled violence, noting that Nazi talk about “genetic superiority” was also endorsement of eugenics that dismisses disabled people as inferior and disposable.

The speakers at the rally represented a broad cross section of progressive forces including Tighe Barry, CODEPINK; Daryle Lamont Jenkins, One People’s Project; Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, executive director, Partnership for Civil Justice Fund; Reverend Graylan Hagler, Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ; Kristi Matthews, community organizer; Delonte Wilkins, LinkUp; activist Kay Shante; Megan for Socialist Alternative; Nate Brown, Ward 6 council candidate and D.C. community member; Caneisha Mills, ANSWER Coalition; and many others.

Massive police presence escorts fascists

The two dozen or so Nazi and Klan members arrived at the opposite end of the park escorted by incredible numbers of police. It was obvious the fascists were only able to have marched and demonstrated at all because they had extensive police protection. The police were all that separated them from the raging fury of the antifascist crowd. The massive turnout of anti-racists was waiting for them with a chorus of boos and  chants of “No Nazis, no KKK, no fascist USA.”

Late that afternoon thunder and rain arrived, but the crowd was determined not to leave the park until the Nazi/KKK left first. Soon, the tiny Nazi/KKK gathering slinked away, still under police escort, to lick their wounds.  In reality, they had been trying to impress corporate America by taking attention away from Wall Street and placing the blame for the suffering of the working class on the backs of people of color, immigrants, LGBTQ people, disabled people and others. The corporate media is always ready with free publicity for racists, but that wasn’t going to happen this day because their organizing had the opposite effect – the anti-racist movement was energized and inspired by the strong gathering of anti-racists.

The right-wing New York Post, ever ready to promote its own brand of racism, headlined the next day in its article, “White nationalists fail to draw crowds on anniversary of deadly rally.” The fact is that they did draw crowds, but not the kind of crowd the Post was looking forward to. Other mainstream media likewise downplayed the size of the anti-racist protest – or ignored it completely.

The mass mobilization of the multinational working class is not only the best way, but the only  way, to stop fascist demagogy in its tracks.On Aug 14, 2018, at 16:57, C G Estabrook <cgestabrook at gmail.com<mailto:cgestabrook at gmail.com>> wrote:

Are those ‘taking to the streets' like Glendower’s ‘spirits from the vasty deep’?

GLENDOWER
I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
HOTSPUR
Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them?
GLENDOWER
Why, I can teach you, cousin, to command
The devil.
HOTSPUR
And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the devil
By telling truth: tell truth and shame the devil.
If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither,
And I'll be sworn I have power to shame him hence.
O, while you live, tell truth and shame the devil!

Isn’t our job to tell truth?


On Aug 14, 2018, at 5:40 PM, Karen Aram <karenaram at hotmail.com<mailto:karenaram at hotmail.com>> wrote:

Carl, though you addressed Mort to this communique, I will respond to say Rosa Luxemburg did say “it is and remains the most revolutionary act to always say loudly what is.”

However, Rosa didn’t stop with just “speaking truth," she acted upon it and urged others to do the same. In other words we can all talk, but unless we take to the streets using civil resistance such as demonstrations, strikes, sit downs, etc. well, here we are after fifteen years with more wars, more killings, interventions, destruction, poverty, loss of jobs, more homeless, public schools being decimated, loss of healthcare, the list goes on and on, and too many people are under the illusion “the next election” will save us.

Some of us already know why our corporate owned government/ruling elites are doing what they are doing. Getting others to realize the same isn’t going to come from just social media, or Utube, which is being blocked and censored as we speak. It’s in the streets where action needs to occur, in DC, in Lafayette Park, Wall Street, and a few other places. Maybe Lockheed or Boeing. But being a purist and focusing only on the worse horror as the only issue to be addressed isn’t getting us anywhere.

”On Aug 14, 2018, at 12:58, C G Estabrook <cgestabrook at gmail.com<mailto:cgestabrook at gmail.com>> wrote:

Mort—

I’m not very interested in what ANSWER (or even Trump) thinks. I am interested in opposing US government war-making - and working to some extent with others who want do the same.

It's been rightly said that in the absence of an accurate analysis, the best will in the world can do the right thing only by accident. Therefore it’s worthwhile to figure out why the US has killed more than 20 million people in more than 37 nations since WWII - and continues to do so today.

Evil as they are, it’s not because of the "fascist and white supremacist forces in the United States” but rather the profits of the US ruling class. But the situation is not perspicuous, not only because of its inherent difficulties but because that ruling class has over the last century produced the most efficient and effective propaganda system in history - outdoing all previous tyrannies - to protect itself against the only enemy it really fears, the US populace.

Those of us who have the leisure to read and write, think and talk, about these issues would seem to have a responsibility to give an accurate account of the situation. I was surprised to read recently that Rosa Luxemburg (murdered by a socialist government a century ago) said, “...it is and remains the most revolutionary act to always say loudly what is.”

That it seems to me should be the aim of the contemporary anti-war movement in this country, as well.

Regards, Carl


On Aug 14, 2018, at 12:24 PM, Brussel, Morton K via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:

An excellent response, Karen. Thanks.

It seems that Carl, especially, would have us all believe that Trump is a peace-nik, and that his behavior otherwise is only due to the machinations of his cohorts, the Dems, and the so-called "deep state”.

"Behavior otherwise" should include his Iran policies, his at best ambiguous behavior towards N Korea, his unvarnished support of Israel, and his administration's support of Ukraine relative to Russia by beefing up NATO forces near Russia’s borders. Have I left out mention of China? And the exorbitant military, nuclear and projected space  budgets!?

Of course, we expect inconsistencies from a mentally deficient Trump.  One cannot truly fathom just where his policies are leading, but they seem frighteningly dangerous, not only with respect to war and peace, but to climate change policies as well.

And then there is his domestic agenda in education, the environment, the justice departments, …

—mkb


On Aug 14, 2018, at 11:23 AM, David Green via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:

So you can get all those people to counter-protest "fascists," but you can't get them to protest Yemen or Gaza?

That's absolutely disheartening in my view, on a number of levels, including the authenticity of their alleged political consciousness.

DG

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 9:30 AM Karen Aram via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:


  *   Print<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.html?view=print>
  *   Leaflet<http://intsse.com/wswspdf/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.pdf>
  *   Feedback<http://www.wsws.org/en/special/contact.html?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.wsws.org%2Fen%2Farticles%2F2018%2F08%2F14%2Fwash-a14.html&t=What%20the%20neo-Nazi%20debacle%20in%20Washington%20showed>
  *   Share »<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/14/wash-a14.html#>

What the neo-Nazi debacle in Washington showed
By Patrick Martin
14 August 2018

The turnout at the Washington neo-Nazi rally Sunday gave a glimpse of the real character of the fascist and white supremacist forces in the United States. Amid a blare of media publicity, grossly exaggerating the popular support for the ultra-right, less than two dozen people turned up for the “Unite the Right 2” rally in Lafayette Park, across from the White House.

The entire affair should be described as a state-sponsored provocation rather than an actual rally. The handful of neo-Nazis were given their own private car on the Washington Metro, separated by police from other passengers. They rode through subway stations patrolled by more police, were escorted from the Foggy Bottom Metro station through a private exit, escorted by still more police on the walk to Lafayette Square, and protected there by hundreds of riot police, who kept away anti-fascist protesters who outnumbered the neo-Nazis at least a hundred to one. After the rally, the fascists boarded white vans, supplied either by the police or Metro, and were whisked away to safety.

At every point, the neo-Nazis were outnumbered by the journalists covering the non-event. Dozens of reporters trailed Jason Kessler, the organizer of the rally, recording his every word. As for the scale of the media hype, the number of hours of cable television coverage proved to be greater than the number of neo-Nazis in attendance.

And this was not primarily Fox News, which was somewhat embarrassed by the pro-Trump character of the white supremacist rally. CNN and MSNBC provided virtually unlimited airtime, and National Public Radio granted Kessler a seven-minute-long interview to spew his racist filth virtually uninterrupted to a nationwide audience. The effect was to build up the neo-Nazis as a potentially formidable force, out of all proportion to their actual support among the American people.

Kessler called the rally to spit on the memory of Heather Heyer, the anti-fascist protester murdered by a white supremacist in Charlottesville, Virginia, exactly a year before, during the first “Unite the Right” rally in that university town. But it was clear that he miscalculated. While Charlottesville in 2017 was the scene of a full-scale fascist riot involving hundreds of torch-bearing racists, ostensibly defending Confederate statues from planned removal, Lafayette Park in 2018 was a debacle.

Many of the racist groups that took part in Charlottesville decided not to come to Washington, at least in part because of the planned left-wing counterprotests. Also, much of the Virginia-based ultra-right is engaged in the campaign of Republican Senate candidate Corey Stewart, who is openly appealing to racism and anti-immigrant bigotry and is being shunned by the Republican Party establishment, although not by Trump, who has effusively endorsed him.

It is worth pointing out that efforts to organize counterprotests to “Unite the Right 2” were censored by Facebook, on the thoroughly bogus grounds that they represented an artificial movement supposedly instigated by the Russian government to set Americans against each other. Facebook shut down one website promoting the counterprotest claiming that it showed signs of “inauthentic activity.”

In reality, thousands of young people and working people turned out for the counterprotest, with some traveling from New York City or even further to show their hatred for the fascists as well as their hostility to the Trump administration, which they clearly regarded as the moral author of the neo-Nazi rally, if not the actual sponsor.

It was “Unite the Right 2” which better deserved the label “inauthentic” since it was made possible only by state and media manipulation, attracted almost no one, and had no genuine popular support.

The debacle in Lafayette Park does not mean that neo-Nazis and white supremacists can be dismissed or ignored. But it showed where the real danger lies: not as yet in any significant mass support for their ultra-reactionary politics, but in the systematic promotion of such forces by the capitalist state, both by the Trump administration and through police forces at every level, from ICE and the Border Patrol down to the local cops.

Fascist elements are promoted to intimidate popular opposition to the Trump administration, and to create the impression that there is significant support for its right-wing rampage against immigrants and its all-out backing of police violence and brutality against the working class.

A particularly foul role is played by the corporate media, backed by sections of the pseudo-left, who present the white supremacist groups as having widespread support, in keeping with their habitual slanders of white workers as being incorrigibly racist.

For nearly two years, the Democratic Party and its media allies have peddled a racialist explanation for the election of Trump and the right-wing policies being pursued by his administration. According to this narrative, Trump won the presidency because of a white racist vote in the working class in states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

The claims that America is awash in racism, and that Trump’s election proves it, have been repeatedly disproven by serious analyses of the voting patterns in 2016 (see: “The myth of the reactionary white working class<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/11/12/pers-n12.html>”).

It is especially absurd, given that the same states voted twice for Barack Obama, the first African-American president, and several were won by Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries over Hillary Clinton. It was only the right-wing campaign of Clinton, who made not the slightest appeal to the working class, that drove down turnout among both white and black workers and gave Trump the opening to win support on the basis of economic nationalism and populist demagogy.

WSWS.ORG<http://wsws.org/>

The author also recommends:

Facebook censors the left
<http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/03/pers-a02.html>[3 August 2018]

_______________________________________________
Peace mailing list
Peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:Peace at lists.chambana.net>
https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace
_______________________________________________
Peace-discuss mailing list
Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net<mailto:Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss

_______________________________________________
Peace-discuss mailing list
Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net<mailto:Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss




-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.chambana.net/pipermail/peace-discuss/attachments/20180815/ad66f811/attachment-0001.html>