40 thoughts on “The Left Has Discovered Armed Protesting”

  1. I find it interesting because our friends on the right have always assumed that if Der Tag came, flashing their weapons would be sufficient to cause resistance to melt away, except maybe for State or UN sponsored Black Helicopters. Because, you know, everyone knows the left doesn’t have any guns, and, owning a gun automatically makes you right-thinking (pun intended).

    Beginning when I was in the Army during the Vietnam Era, reading everything I could find in the post library about guerrilla warfare, I noticed that practically all historically successful guerrillas had been leftists. Then when I became interested in the “militia movement” in the 1990s, but concluded it was tactically silly, I couldn’t help but notice that participants were being steered away from studying the only effective guerrilla war in the First World, presumably because the guerrillas were “leftist.” Since tactics have no ideology, that led me to conclude that the intention of the militia movement was to have armed citizens playing with themselves until such time as they might be needed for some demagogue’s Sturmabteilung.

    What is somewhat interesting about this current example is, it is apparently not linked to the Black Bloc in any way, though the Black Bloc to date has demonstrated the greatest propensity for actually initiating and engaging in violence. Will they get together? Time will tell, probably depending on where history heads.

      1. “The Swamp Fox in Revolutionary South Carolina?”

        No, that’s who the Patriot Militias thought they could emulate.

      1. “Why do you think there is no Black Bloc connection?”

        I could be wrong, depending on what is meant by “connection.” But, they are not using the Black Bloc tactic of wearing an anonymizing uniform.

        Of course, that doesn’t mean they never talked to anyone who is Black Bloc.

      1. Yes, and go to the head of the class. ;-)

        I withheld saying that outright, because I wanted to see if anybody would guess it. When I first thought to study their tactics back in the mid-1990s, I got a distinct impression that people on the right were being deliberately steered away from studying them. I still have that impression.

        I repeat that, tactics have no ideology. So, it seemed very strange to me that “First World” people (like our militias) were ignoring the only ongoing paramilitary rebellion in the First World that at that time had already survived undefeated for nearly 30 years; and that within a few years (1998) would bring their superpower opponents to the bargaining table for a political settlement.

        (You may recall their “Not One Single Round” refusal to surrender their weapons as part of the settlement.)

  2. The left has all the experience using violence to successfully win political outcomes. Check the 20th Century for plenty of examples. When it comes to tin-potting your local federality, the Left has a plan and knows how to make it work.

    For them its wash, rinse and repeat. The moderate conservative isn’t about to don a hanky and burn the town. But the left will, and they have a whole army of dumb college students just itching to be drafted.

    I, for one, do not look forward to any revolutionary events.

    1. It will be ugly beyond belief. The left will not be stupid enough to engage in guerrilla warfare. They will use the government’s forces once the GOPe has done its job of turning over the government to their fellow corporate whores, the Democrats.

      1. The Left does seem happy enough to encourage lone-wolf attacks though. Considering the ambush attacks on police we have seen since the rise of the BLM.

  3. I notice that a number of them were wearing identical brown shirts. Hmm, armed brownshirts. That rings some sort of a bell….

  4. Good grief. Watching the video of the encounter between the fascists and the reporter, and I can’t help but be reminded of Mises’ quote, “The worst thing that can happen to a socialist is to have his country ruled by socialists who are not his friends.”

    1. Oh man that video was hilarious! Those commies are so puffed up, so full of themselves, yet ultimately so paranoid, and so foolish. Do they imagine they actually managed a show of force? That they gained any respect for themselves or their imagined ‘message’? They even pissed off a lefty reporter who in theory is on their own side!

      Other than the tatted up beardo with the AR-57 who was all too happy to get violent (probably a sociopath, and wouldn’t surprise me if he is a prohibited person), my overall impression is the demonstrators are just a bunch of cosplayers.

  5. “The worst thing that can happen to a socialist is to have his country ruled by socialists who are not his friends.”

    Von Mises error was in making that “socialists” rather than just “authoritarians.”

    Everyone can and will build lasting friendships based on what they mutually hope to shove down others’ throats.

    When Mr. Trump said “I’d like to punch them in the face,” he was not talking about people who agreed with him. Nor was the audience that cheered him for it.

    1. Ludwig von Mises also said,

      It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilization. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history. But though its policy has brought salvation for the moment, it is not of the kind which could promise continued success. Fascism was an emergency makeshift. To view it as something more would be a fatal error.

      Some people have argued that quote demonstrates von Mises’ favoritism toward fascism. I think the complete quote doesn’t really support that, though he regarded fascism as having “saved” Europe from socialism. I’m offering it in support of my contention that had von Mises taken a moment to think, he would have generalized his “socialist” quote more.

      1. Upon further reading, I find that on March 1, 1934, von Mises joined the Austro-Fascist Patriotic Front and their Werk Neues Leben social club.

        From that we can deduce at minimum that having been born Jewish, he was not quite as clear-eyed about fascism as he was about socialism. A Jew joining the Austrian parallel to the German Nazi Party sounds like the stuff of jokes.

        But at worst, we might think his criticism(s) of socialists and socialism were based more on ideologies competing for power, than on pure intellectual reasoning.

        1. Sometimes Jews would join the Party to try and hide in plain sight. It was a gamble, but better than a camp. Not saying that was his motivation, just mentioning it as a possibility.

          1. Actually I believe that von Mises was no longer practicing Judaism at that time, and I doubt many people thought that being genetically Jewish would ever become the liability that the Nazis would later make it.

            The accounts that I’ve read say that von Mises valued the “defense of private property” to be a value above all others, and believed that only fascism would defend private property. With our present day hindsight, it is hard to fault someone without that benefit for being so wrong.

            “Camps” weren’t really underway in 1934; I believe at that time people were still being sent to Dachau, and coming out after their sentences were completed. Nazi prisons were already deadly places, but “death camps” were still years in the future.

    2. Yes, authoritarian is a nice and generic enough of a term that doesn’t carry the political baggage that the other synonyms do.

  6. “Stay-Puft” I see. The opinions and actions of overweight people do not matter.

    When will we stop underestimating our opponents? I guess when blood is spilled.

    1. “When will we stop underestimating our opponents?”

      In following up on this story, I found someone commenting on Facebook that these folks don’t count for much, because they allowed their banners to touch the ground, thus demonstrating that they are not well-trained; while we are.

      From the history I found, it seems the John Brown Gun Clubs have been in existence since c. 2002; which would lead me to think they are at least as “well-trained” as any of our erstwhile “Patriot Militias.” (How long have the Oath Keepers been in existence?)

      1. John Brown was a terrorist, in a good cause but still a terrorist. When he killed some neighbors in Kansas because he assumed them pro-slavery (they weren’t) he lopped off their arms first, then beheaded them.

        1. “he lopped off their arms first, then beheaded them.”

          Do you suppose that’s why the John Brown Gun Club chose the name? Or, some other reason?

        2. Are you referring to the Pottawatomie Massacre? I have seen references that the victims were “hacked to death” but no details on whether or how they were dismembered.

          But in that incident, the victims are generally reported to have been pro-slavery, and associated with other pro-slavery personalities said to be “rabid pro-slavery activists.” And, abolitionists had only recently also been hacked to death by pro-slavery characters. So, then as now, it would appear there were no Good Guys nor innocent victims.

      1. “Their actions in guerrilla warfare. . .”

        I think the contemporary term is “asymmetric warfare,” which I think is more accurate and carries a little less connotation-baggage.

        I would not discount anyone who is motivated, and as I keep saying, tactics have no ideology.

  7. Stupid stupid commies

    https://antifascistnews.net/2017/03/27/into-the-fire-a-report-back-from-the-huntington-beach-antifascist-clash-with-trump-rally/

    I found that link from scrolling through the Phoenix commies website “Redneck Revolt”.

    What the link shows is one of their own commie thugs at the recent California anti-Trump attack, openly violating California weapons law, displaying worn ‘brass knuckles’ which are a felony crime to possess within California.

    I’m going to save that image before it gets scrubbed.

    1. The article claims some Trump supporters were wearing brass knuckles and holding knives.

      Does the image show that? Or show one of the anti-Trump commies?

      I took one look at that image, and from the context of the people around him and how they were dressed (red and black head covers, masked face) and understood him as one of the commies. But apparently the article is implying otherwise? There is no caption to the picture, and oddly enough some of the words on the cap have been blurred so they can’t be read.

      1. To make a historical analogy, in early 1930s Germany the Nazis and Communists would routinely accuse each other of what they had done themselves, or were in the process of doing.

        In our current example, I doubt either faction embraces many people who will ever be nominated for sainthood.

        What do you make of the guy wearing the Hammerskin patch?

  8. If leff wing and right wing goons annihilate each other, pass the popcorn. The averge IQ of the country would go up. I’d rent them some property where they could have at it, but I doubt either side could afford the deposit I’d need to clean up after.

    1. “If leff wing and right wing goons annihilate each other…”

      Sounds like the 2016 presidential election.

  10. In America, the Second Amendment is for all lawful citizens. If they want to be armed, that is fine. If they cross the line by threatening or actually using firearms, then it is time to mow them down.

    Of course, the fact that they choose to wear masks proves they are scum.

    1. “If they cross the line by threatening or actually using firearms”

      If someone displays a firearm while entering into a situation most would regard as confrontational (e.g., competing factions demonstrating and counter-demonstrating) would they be construed to be “threatening?”

      Suppose they use their firearms claiming they were in legitimate fear that their lives were in danger or there was a threat of severe bodily harm?

      Do we give the benefit of any doubt to one faction, more so than another?

      I’m just thinking how in the Randy Weaver scenario, the FBI agents presumed they should/would get the benefit of doubt, because they were dealing with known white supremacists. In our example here, we’re dealing with leftists.

  11. Also, it seems to me that if you are armed and concealing your face with some kind of mask or a bandanna, you will not be perceived by 99% of people as “the good guys”. If your cause is righteous, why cover your face? That’s the kind of thing criminals do.

  12. ” If your cause is righteous, why cover your face?”

    Because sometimes your opposition isn’t righteous. But, they’re the ones with the political power.

    Historically, police forces have almost always sided with the fascist elements.

    At the classic Battle of Cable Street, London’s Metropolitan Police sided with Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists (Blackshirts), and the people had to fight both the Fascists and the police.

    The battle is credited by many/most historians with leading to a chain of political events that (arguably, of course) prevented England from going fascist, and all of the horrors that would have been attendant to England accommodating the Nazis. Nonetheless, many ordinary British citizens went to jail at the time, for being on the right side of history.

    Thinking that being “righteous” counts for anything in the confrontational political world, is to be a total schlemiel.

    1. The Battle of Cable Street was a major factor leading to the passage of the Public Order Act 1936, which required police consent for political marches and forbade the wearing of political uniforms in public.

      1. Yes. I have mixed emotions about that. In theory it would not have been possible under our constitution. It would be a violation of the First Amendment.

        However in England at the time, marches by the fascists were their primary tool for recruitment, and nothing succeeds like success. A successful march for the purpose of intimidating unpopular people (in England, anyone not Anglo-Saxon) was just the ticket for recruiting more of the same.

        (Not to digress, but the Nazis’ “Master Race” theories were actually an adaptation of a similar Anglo-Saxon Master Race theory promulgated and popular in the 19th century, both in England and the U.S.)

        There even is a theory that the chain of events following Cable Street (which allegedly caused the nobility to “get serious” about the fascists for the first time) led to the abdication of King Edward VIII, who was a fascist sympathizer; i.e., that he was pressured out of the throne by the now-serious anti-fascist nobility, and that his love for divorcee Wallis Simpson was just a more socially acceptable, protocol-friendly and romatic excuse for the deposing of a monarch.

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