Dave Neiwert detects a pattern you may have already. But he documents it at Daily Kos. Those “antifa buses” and “antifa arsonists” so-called patriots warned you about? Pure projection:
Because for the past three years, busloads of right-wing thugs eager for violence from rural and exurban areas have been organizing to descend on unsuspecting liberal urban centers—primarily Portland, Seattle, and San Francisco—in order to engage in faux “protests” primarily designed to spark violence.
A recent Washington Post feature about the man who organized a “Cruise for Trump” rally in Portland described in clear detail how this all works: A nonresident of a liberal urban center organizes a protest ostensibly around the right-wing cause du jour, which then attracts a horde of other nonresidents, whose supposed purpose is to come tell people who live in those cities how terrible their politics are—but whose underlying purpose, betrayed by the weapons and defensive gear they bring along with an attitude of eagerness to punch “leftists,” is to engage in violence.
The purpose is intimidation. They view the tactic as successful and you know what that means: more of it. Neiwert concludes:
Perhaps most ominously, the “Cruise for Trump” and other pro-Trump rallies in Oregon featuring Proud Boys and other far-right extremists have become more than mere attempts at intimidation—they are becoming massive conduits for the full absorption of extremist politics into the mainstream Republican Party. Indeed, whatever line existed between them appears to have vanished with a flourish of semiautomatic weapons and camo gear.
The stakes could not be higher in 2020, and the Trump-loving right—seeing the polls manifesting their leader’s massive failures, particular in mishandling the COVID-19 pandemic—is increasingly sounding desperate and angry. If this is a strategy that has worked in Oregon, we can probably count on it being applied in many other locales before the year is out.
So far, little of that here. Not expecting trouble on Election Day in the Cesspool of Sin, but we’re watchful. Anyway, Imperious Leader has told his vigilantes they need to go vote on Nov. 3.
Maybe, let’s show them how we do things downtown. Bring a friend to the polls. Better yet, ten.
Update: More from The Guardian backs up Neiwert’s reporting.
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