Andy Ngo thinks Antifa are on a level with the Nazis in terms of wanton violence. Furthermore, he says that 'even the Nazis knew to cover their tracks' and that we didn't know about the Holocaust until afterwards.

Wrong, and offensive on almost every level.

Violence had been building for years prior to the Nazis assuming power, and much of it was instigated by the SA.

In 1932 for example, 105 people died in clashes between SA and opposing groups in Prussia alone - that's one region.

SA activity - marching through 'red' neighbourhoods and fighting those who opposed them was a deliberate strategy. The spectacle of violence and the implied 'restoral of order' was the point.

Just think of how Horst Wessel was remembered following his death in 1930. He was turned into a martyr who fell 'bravely in battle' against the Bolsheviks. Violence was inherent to the message - a clash between forces for the future of Germany.

During his time as SA leader in Berlin, Goebbels worked on a strategy of provocation that almost always ended in violence, a form of trolling that would always provide the opportunity for a brawl and the implication that a menace had been dealt with.

To realize the extent of the treason committed on January 6, 2021, please watch this video.

https://t.co/FHmlTwkB5A

And then remember Canadian, especially Albertan, conservatives are moving in this direction and have been supportive of Trump’s cabal, since the beginning.

In fact many still are openly supportive of the far right even after January 6, 2021.

The violence in this video is disturbing. You’ll witness death chants, a scaffold with noose, a shooting and an officer suffering intense trauma from being crushed.

What is amazing to me are the videos of people relaxing in their hotels afterwards that are circulating on social media.

How mentally warped must you be to calmly sit down with drinks and bar snacks after attempting a violent coup?

And maybe that’s why Keean Bexte is rushing back to Canada. He was there. In full support of the initiative. Now he’s desperate to get to Canadian protection from American prison cells for supporting a violent coup in a foreign nation.

Bexte is a fugitive of sorts. His videos, rhetoric and behaviour choices are seriously in question. There is no doubt the FBI will want to confiscate his recordings. Extradition would make prosecution years away. Huawei’s extradition battle demonstrates that reality.

(THREAD) The main problem with that @DanDrezner piece in the Post is that it's an international politics prof writing about the field in which I'm a professor—communications. No one in communications would *ever* compare the blogosphere to either Twitter or Substack. Here's why.

1/ Back in the mid-aughts, I was a Koufax Award-nominated political blogger (I don't know what Drezner was doing then; I first heard of him about a year ago). So I was into the blogosphere pretty deep, as I also ran a second high-traffic blog that was focused on the art world.

2/ The "blogosphere" was an outgrowth of MySpace and LiveJournal, inasmuch as in the heady early days of the internet people suddenly realized that they could engage in private diaristic writing—a very specific subgenre of writing—in the public square, and it was suddenly "okay."

3/ So the blogosphere as such had *nothing* to do with journalism, which needless to say was in a different state just 15 years ago (note: unlike Drezner, I also teach writing and journalism at the university level, so this thread is squarely "in my area," unlike his Post piece).

4/ The blogosphere was a manifestation of the transformation of the public-private binary at the dawn of the internet—and *also* connected to the "creative writing" explosion (what I did a PhD on); in the aughts, creative writing was the fastest-growing discipline *in the world*.

THREAD: Why Anon?

1. Most of the social media world saw what @LLinWood posted to twitter recently. His post has drawn out much anger and much celebration.

He asked for prayer. He talked of potential death. He asked for protection.

He spoke of Isaac Kappy, who dared to speak.

1/12 Plan for today; we expect the #MOMA bill (Ministerial and Other Maternity Allowances) debate to begin around 12.45pm.
It is still not too late to email if you haven't already done so, but Tweeting about this and tagging MPs will raise more awareness on social media.

2/12 We have the names (in speaking order), of all those who are listed to speak. We suggest you Tweet these MPs (especially if you are a constituent) and make your views known. Use the #MOMA hashtag.

3/12 Minister Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North)
Shadow Minister Rachel Reeves (Leeds West)
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North)
Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire)
Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth)
Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham)

4/12 Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock)
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow)
Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke)
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower)
Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings)
Wera Hobhouse (Bath)
Dehenna Davison (Bishop Auckland)
Feryal Clark (Enfield North)

5/12 Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West)
Sarah Owen (Luton North)
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham)
Claire Hanna (Belfast South)
Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford)
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West)
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside)

I'm reading through US Supreme Court filing in Texas
versus Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin. I'm on page 30 of 92 pages...

Wow!

Pennsylvania:
• Ballots with NO MAILED date. 9 005.
• Ballots Returned on or BEFORE the Mailed Date. 58 221.
• Ballots Returned one day after Mailed Date. 51 200.
"These nonsensical numbers alone total
118 426 ballots and exceed Biden’s margin of
81 660 votes over Trump."

Pennsylvania: CSV file from the state on November 4 depicts 3.1m mail in ballots sent out but on November 2, the information was provided that only 2.7m ballots had been sent out. "This discrepancy of approximately 400 000 ballots from 11/2 to 11/4 has not been explained."

Georgia: "Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, without legislative approval, unilaterally abrogated Georgia’s statute governing the signature verification process for absentee ballots. This unconstitutional change in Georgia law materially benefitted Biden"

Michigan: "Secretary of State, Jocelyn Benson, without legislative approval, unilaterally abrogated Michigan election statutes related to absentee ballot applications and signature verification. Michigan’s legislature has not ratified these changes..."

Think about the Dec 21, 2017 Executive Order signed by @potus

Blocked property of persons involved in serious human rights abuse or corruption

One month Before @potus signed this EO Saudi King had Prince Alwaleed bin Talal (aka Prince Dopey) arrested. He was told he had to

Exchange his billions for his freedom but he had a small problem. The US Gov froze his assets ($6 billion) and he remained A prisoner. He was interrogated (maybe a little more than interrogation but who cares he’s a monster) and some believe Black Water was involved in the

interrogation. This occurred around 11/4/17. As a result of the interrogation he squealed like the pig he is and gave up valuable intel on Soros, the Clintons, the deep state and creeps like Adam Schiff.

Notice Q’s drops after Dopey was arrested. January 27 2018 Q mentions

Time to play - Black Forest

Immediately the deep state knew Prince dopey must have blabbed his mouth about the horrific games the Rothschilds, “royalty”, Schiff, Clintons, Hussein like to play in the Black Forest in Austria with children. Look it up if ur not familiar

Q points out a week or so later that The mere mention of Black Forest by Q resulted in the Rothschilds dumping their Black Forest estate in a fire sale

Why? Because of @potus Dec 2017 EO. They knew If @potus could get the King of SA to arrest and interrogate and divest his

Kamala Harris is the president-in-waiting. Here's how the VP is balancing building her own brand against serving as a loyal soldier on Team Biden. https://t.co/2HTKlpmEd9 by @rbravender & @TinaSfon ($) @businessinsider

Kamala Harris is the president-in-waiting.

It's the awkward reality that has always come with being second-in-command. The vice president's principal job function is to be ready to step in if she's needed.

At the same time, Harris can't appear over-eager to get the top job, and Democrats bristle at questions about whether she's interested in a future White House run or whether Biden — the oldest president in US history at age 78 — intends to try for a second term in 2024.

So — just like (the male) veeps who came before her — Harris & her team must walk the fine line of protecting her image & building a brand while also portraying her as a loyal Biden soldier & dismissing any speculation that she's eyeing another presidential run of her own.

Harris was "an icon before she even set foot in the White House," said Joel Payne, a Democratic strategist who worked on Hillary Clinton's 16 campaign. "I think she's a bridge to the next generation of Democrats" and a bridge to progressives, women, and people of color, he added.

THREAD: ELECTORAL COUNT ACT DAY.

Usually no one pays attention to Jan. 6 after a presidential election. But today the world is watching. Follow along, if you dare, as we watch Congress. We know the outcome: Joe Biden's win will be official. But it could be bumpy. 1/

What normally happens? A fairly boring, routine joint meeting of the Senate and House in which they open the electoral college votes from each state, in alphabetical order. Senators and House members can object, but it's usually not drawn out. 2/

The vice president presides as the the president of the Senate. There are two "tellers" from each House. The process goes through all 50 states and DC, and the winner is announced. All routine. Even Al Gore presided to announce his own loss in Jan 2001. 3/

But today, a few rogue Republicans plan to muck up the process to object to several states' votes. Not because they have any evidence of any problems--there isn't any. They are lying just because their preferred candidate lost. This is anti-democracy conduct. 4/

As @derektmuller explains in @nytimes, Dems objected to EC votes in 2001, 2005, and 2016. It takes an objection from a member of both Houses to move to a two hour debate. That happened in 2005. Big difference in context: the pres candidate had conceded. 5/

#Thread Take action to defend free speech 📢

Stage 2 scrutiny of the Hate Crime Bill begins tomorrow, Tuesday 2nd February. Members of the Justice Committee will debate and vote on various amendments. It is vitally important that more, significant changes are agreed.

We still believe the best course of action is to drop the controversial stirring up hatred offences altogether. At the very least, MSPs must back changes previously promised by the Scottish Government.

The govt has pledged to: restrict the offences to ‘intent’ only; strengthen a free speech provision covering religion and insert a new provision on trans identity; remove provisions on 'inflammatory material' and provide an objective test for what ‘abusive’ behaviour means.

Other useful amendments have been lodged to: remove the vague term 'abusive' altogether; insert a broader trans free speech provision; provide a ‘dwelling defence’ for words spoken in the home; and insert a 'prosecution lock' requiring consent from a senior law officer.

Please take the time to write to Justice Committee MSPs and ask them to back these vital changes. Details of the amendments and how to contact MSPs are below.

#FreeToDisagree

The top recommendation of experts & election-protection groups to protect the 2020 election had been to conduct robust manual election audits using a reliable paper trail. But Rs blocked the SAFE Act which wld have required them. -@jennycohn1 4 @nybooks 1/

2/ “America’s preeminent election-auditing expert, @philipbstark, ...told me a few weeks ago that “only a few jurisdictions currently audit elections in a way that has a good chance of catching and correcting wrong reported outcomes.“

3/ “‘That requires a trustworthy paper trail—primarily hand-marked paper ballots kept demonstrably secure throughout the election and the audit—and [what is known as] a risk-limiting audit using that paper trail,’” Stark said.

4/ Stark added, “‘to the best of my knowledge, even those states only audit a few contests in each election.’” 😳

5/ “A report by the National Conference of State Legislators confirms that just three states (Colorado, Rhode Island, and Virginia) require risk-limiting audits for one or more races.”

Trumpism is no more a thing than Justin Bieberism. It's a fad. 5 years ago there was no Trumpist majority in the GOP. What's enduring is the GOP formula of exploiting the racism/nationalism of rural/suburban Americans to provide political fuel for policies that benefit the rich.

That formula--populism in the service of corporatism--has been with us for ages, was reshaped for the modern age under Reagan and has driven both the widening economic and political divides in America ever since. It will long survive Trump.

Trump weaponized it-fanning the flames of social division so that he could do even morefor a smaller & smaller percentage of the population. The reality was, he has not be very good at it. While he has GOP support, his popularity in polls has lagged all other recent presidents.

At the same time, growing recognition of shifting demographics in the US and the advent of social media have created new opportunities for the most extreme members of the GOP coalition to unite, mobilize and increase their voice.

That isn't just bad for the US. It's a problem for the GOP, particularly in terms of national elections. (The GOP has won the popular vote only once in the past eight presidential elections. While they benefit from electoral college advantages, this is a terrible trend for them.)

1. The hot take that "D's need to learn to talk to the other side of the electorate" is absolutely the WRONG take.

I mean my god. Biden, Lincoln, the outside groups: they threw the best persuasion messaging in the history of persuasion campaigns at them.

What Ds need to do is

The manufacturing trade deficit is up significantly in the first two years of the Trump Presidency. Pretty clear that stimulus and a strong dollar has had a bigger effect than his trade protectionism.

Stimulus has meant strong import growth. Strong dollar has meant weak export growth. Shows up clearly in the nominal data.

Deficit in goods trade ex ag and petrol is closing in a on a trillion dollars (tis just under 5% of GDP)

And since the strong dollar is holding down import prices, the "real" change is likely even bigger ...

Export growth hasn't kept up with import growth since the dollar appreciated in 2014. In fact exports of manufactures haven't grown at all in last 4 years

I know there are technical problems with this measure but it still gives some indication of scale; the "real" non-petrol goods deficit (ex ag) is up $180b (e.g. just under a pp of GDP) in Trump's first 7 quarters.

& that follows on a big increase after the dollar's 14/15 move

p.s. adding services here wouldn't change much (and there isn't any true data for most services for q3, a lot of services trade is estimated in the monthly data)

A list of questions about the 1/6 siege: a thread. About motives, planning, and operations.

Did members of Congress or their staff unwittingly take participants in the riot on private tours before the rally? If so, and after the tours, did any of them have reason to think that these tours would be used in service of a seditious act?

Did these private tours (if they happened) bring participants by leadership offices? Did the participants request to see certain Democratic offices? Did they gain access?

During the hour snd a half that President Trump was watching the insurrection in real time, did he explicitly say no to a request for National Guard troops?

Did Acting SecDef Miller speak with the President during this period? Did Trump convey disapproval tacitly? Was he in communication with any outside advisers during this period?

If you haven't been paying attention, China and several other countries attempted to overthrow the American elections. China used proceeds from the US trade deficit to purchase influence in the very heart of the US Government, and battleground state governments. Trump has all..

Consent-Manufacturing For Patriot Act II Continues

The way to stop far-right extremism would be to reverse the crushing neoliberal policies which led to Trump. Instead Biden's already pushing new domestic terror laws and reducing people's stimulus

President-elect Biden promised unambiguously that if voters gave the Democratic Party control of the Senate by electing Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in Georgia earlier this month, checks of $2,000 would "go out the door