General Discussion

Celerity

(53,997 posts) Thu Jun 16, 2022, 08:33 PM Jun 2022

Arresting Trump Will Get Ugly, The Alternative Is Worse

We are damned if we do, and damned if we don't. But the future of America is at stake, so bravery is needed to confront this grave existential threat.

https://thebanter.substack.com/p/arresting-trump-will-get-ugly-the

Sometimes I wonder if the people who write for the major news outlets really understand the moment in history we find ourselves trapped in. By and large, these same people completely ignored the danger of the right’s growing addiction to racism, violence, and authoritarianism. Now that America’s fascist movement is too obvious to wave away as liberal hysteria, they don’t quite seem to get what it is they’re looking at. Steve Phillips’ Guardian column, “If America fails to punish its insurrectionists, it could see a wave of domestic terror,” is correct, and solidly based in history. But it overlooks what cannot be wished away: If America does punish its insurrectionists, we’ll see a wave of domestic terror anyway.

No accountability = more terrorism

Phillips makes the case that we must hold Republican insurrectionists accountable or the consequences will be dire. He doesn’t mean that Republicans will try again, although they obviously will. What Phillips is referring to is the very clear historical precedent set after the Civil War:

Phillips is correct here. Instead of hanging the entire leadership of the Confederacy for treason, they were allowed to go home unscathed. The men responsible for more American deaths than almost every other war in American history combined then started a long campaign to undermine the rule of law. As Phillips points out, it worked. Southern conservative racists ran rampant for a century, murdering thousands and assaulting and assassinating elected officials. The government put up a desultory effort to stop it but withdrew federal troops in 1877 as part of a crass political deal, leaving the southern Black population at the mercy of terrorists. Eventually, this prompted the Great Migration during which millions of American citizens fled the violence of the South.

What makes us think this would happen again? Because it never really stopped. The police have been terrorizing Black communities for generations. White America didn’t bother noticing until it was on video and impossible to avoid but police violence against Black skin is a constant reality. It’s important to note that once it become undeniable that the police were out of control, very little happened. The opposite occurred, in fact. We gave the police weapons of war and made it easier than ever to evade accountability. The response from the police has been to become “warrior cops”, ever ready to pull the trigger with little to no provocation. Now, no one is safe from their violence. Men, women, children, the elderly, the handicapped, all equal targets of opportunity for a power trip and a rush of adrenaline. But the terrorism inflicted on the Black community is still on another level.

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