"Teamsters found not guilty in ‘Top Chef’ trial" by Maria Cramer Globe Staff August 15, 2017
The four Teamsters accused of hurling racial epithets and sexist slurs at a “Top Chef” crew filming in Milton in 2014 were acquitted Tuesday in a high-profile case that tested the line between illegal strong-arm tactics and legitimate union advocacy.
After nearly 20 hours of deliberations, the jury found the union members not guilty of conspiracy to extort and attempted extortion, federal charges that carried a maximum of 20 years in prison.
The men — Daniel Redmond, 49; John Fidler, 53; Robert Cafarelli, 47; and Michael Ross, 63 — were visibly relieved as the verdicts were read. Fidler, who had been accused of threatening to “smash” the face of “Top Chef” host Padma Lakshmi, rubbed his temples and nodded gratefully at the jurors, a group of nine women and three men.
Cafarelli leaned back in his chair and sighed as his wife, who sat three rows behind him in the courtroom, cried.
The case was closely watched by labor leaders, who worried a conviction could chill union organizing. It also cast a spotlight on Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh’s administration, as several prosecution witnesses described how a city official seemed poised to rescind permits for the show to mollify the Teamsters.
Prosecutors called 18 witnesses, most of them production assistants who were at the Steel & Rye restaurant in Milton when the Teamsters arrived to picket the set. Many of them said the four men, who represented the Charlestown-based Teamsters Local 25, cursed at female producers, threatened to beat up crew members, and tried to stop production by blocking a delivery truck.
At least two witnesses said the tires on their vehicles were slashed, although no one witnessed the vandalism. A video showed one of the men calling a female producer a “towel head” and an expletive used to insult women, among other slurs.
The whole culture is so immersed in Zionist values and control that Islamophobia somehow seeped into the kitchen (where is the hate crime charge when you need it?).
Prosecutors argued that the Teamsters were trying to intimidate the non-union show into giving them jobs driving equipment, positions filled by production assistants.
Witnesses also testified that Kenneth Brissette, the city’s tourism director, said the show should not receive permits to film in Boston until producers resolved their dispute with the union.
Brissette and another City Hall aide, Timothy Sullivan, face extortion charges in a separate case alleging that they threatened to revoke permits for the Boston Calling music festival because its organizers would not hire union members. Set to go on trial in January, they have been on paid leave since their arrests last year. They have pleaded not guilty.
Walsh, a former labor leader, said Tuesday he was relieved the trial was over and reiterated that no one in his administration had tried to interfere with “Top Chef’s’’ filming.
Except for the tourism director.
“Strong-arming is a thing of the past,” he said. “Regardless of what trade it is, what union it is, I don’t condone that activity. I never have. I never will.”
Strong-arming is done all the time in the corporate and government worlds.
Related: Acquittal in ‘Top Chef’ trial may boost Walsh, analyst says
How? He says he had nothing to do with it.
Prosecutors said the Teamsters violated the Hobbs Act, the 1946 law that made it a federal crime to use robbery or extortion to influence interstate commerce. Union members are historically protected from Hobbs Act prosecutions as long as their actions are taken in pursuit of legitimate union objectives.
Lawyers for the Teamsters asserted the men did not violate the act because they were picketing to replace underpaid production assistants with experienced union members who would receive better wages.
“We’ve always felt this prosecution was misplaced,” Carmine Lepore, Cafarelli’s lawyer, said after the verdict. “I think that the jury saw this case for what it was — the government had to prove a violation of law and they didn’t do it.”
In a statement, Acting US Attorney William Weinreb said he was disappointed by the verdict.
“The defendants’ conduct was an affront to all of the hard-working and law-abiding members of organized labor,” he said. “We will continue to aggressively prosecute extortion in all its forms to ensure that Boston remains a safe and welcoming place to do business.”
Union leaders said the verdict showed that the case was an overreach.....
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Thumbs up, hey!!
"Verdict in Teamsters’ case could have wide-reaching implications" by Katie Johnston Globe Staff August 15, 2017
The Teamsters’ victory does not mean their reputation hasn’t been hurt.
Gary Chaison, professor emeritus of labor relations at Clark University in Worcester, noted that the Teamsters are trying to become a more civil rights-oriented union, organizing immigrants and lower-paid workers to expand their base — including parking lot attendants in Boston — and this case makes it seem as if “picketing as extortion has won the day.”
“They’re having some difficulty repositioning themselves because cases like this bring up the images of the old Teamsters,” he said, referring to the aggressive tactics and mob connections associated with the union under Jimmy Hoffa in 1950s and ‘60s. In 2003, the head of Local 25 was brought down by conspiracy, embezzlement, and bribery charges.
(Cue music)
News reports about the recent Teamsters’ case “will appear on every bulletin board of every employer in the country that’s being organized by the Teamsters,” Chaison said.
And yet, labor leaders say, the victory was essential to preserving workers’ rights — and holding back anti-union forces that might otherwise have been emboldened to challenge unions’ right to picket.
“It’s a good day for democracy in the United States of America,” said Brian Lang, president of Unite Here Local 26, the Boston area hospitality workers’ union that frequently pickets businesses, including during a three-week strike of Harvard University dining hall workers last year.
The Massachusetts Nurses Association, whose members went on strike at Tufts Medical Center last month, also applauded the outcome.
“Although some speech and picketing can be uncomfortable, making these expressions illegal would undermine the rights of all and diminish a freedom that many have fought for and cherished as a principal right as an American,” spokeswoman Jen Johnson said in a statement.
Apparently it depends on what side of the line you stand on.
Despite the ugliness of the Teamsters’ protest, it’s vital that workers have the right to stand up for their rights, said Cambridge civil liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate.
“Picketing is very often unpleasant,” he said. “It’s high pressure, but high pressure is legitimate.”
Workers, Silverglate added, “have a right to speak very loudly and in a messy fashion.”
Yeah, I HEAR YA!
That's why they are shaming citizens out of jobs. Then you are not a worker with certain rights, you are a citizen with nothing.
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Not everyone is applauding:
"Teamsters trial casts harsh light on film industry" August 15, 2017
AT LEAST taxpayers in Massachusetts now have a clearer idea of what they’re being asked to subsidize through the state’s film tax credit.
The violent, bullying behavior of the four Teamsters in the “Top Chef” case didn’t rise to the level of criminality, a federal jury found on Tuesday when it acquitted the men of extortion and conspiracy charges. But the testimony in the case lays bare the sort of tactics used to harass and intimidate producers filming in the Commonwealth. Witnesses in the case described homophobic language, chest-bumping, and tire slashing by the Teamsters — testimony their lawyers sought to minimize, rather than refute.
Almost like a certain guy in a certain house that is colored white.
Unfortunately, the not guilty verdict may well be interpreted as blessing such behavior going forward. That would only turn the union’s vindication Tuesday into a pyrrhic victory. Who’s going to want to make movies or TV shows in Massachusetts if their choices are to either hire such men, or endure their abuse?
Well, um.....
"The “Top Chef” trial may have dredged up unwelcome stereotypes about organized labor in Boston, but as jurors delivered a “not guilty” verdict to four Teamsters Tuesday, people in the industry say it’s unlikely the trial will have much impact on the state’s film business. Eric Smith, a reality television director who filmed two seasons of the non-union show “Boston’s Finest” for TNT, said that he never encountered any union opposition here and wouldn’t hesitate to film in Boston again. “I don’t think that Boston as a city should be singled out for this incident,” said Smith. “If I were to be offered a job in Boston in no way would I take pause to do it because of this unfortunate incident.”
I'm sure the $80 million set aside for this state-sanctioned heist of taxpayer money has a lot to do with it, and they can roll it up to a lot more (and now you know why it doesn't get pared back; it's a tax loot giveaway for $pecial intere$ts in the disguise of a tax incentive).
Who’s going to do business in an environment where the mayor is happy to denounce bigots in faraway cities, but whose own administration tried to force businesses to hire them here?
That's one thing about the Globe: they do provide a laugh now and then.
It would be bad enough if the case just left a black eye on the state, reviving the old image of Massachusetts as a hostile place for moviemakers. But the Commonwealth, in an effort to entice more Hollywood filmmakers, offers a generous tax credit.
Yes, that’s right: Of all the workers in all the unions in all the world, your tax dollars are going to the Teamsters.
The tax credit was designed to lure producers who had abandoned Massachusetts precisely because of its backwards reputation. A 2001 state report called the Commonwealth a “celluloid pariah,” largely because of the Teamsters.
In any normal industry, that reputational damage and lost work is the built-in check against heavy-handed practices. Behave too outrageously, and productions simply leave. But Massachusetts instead let the Teamsters escape the consequences of their actions, providing a handout to lure filmmakers back.
There’s room for public subsidies for the arts, and the film tax credit once seemed like a way to spur creative industries in the Commonwealth. But that’s not how it’s worked out. The cost is too high, and the impact on the state’s reputation seems to be precisely the opposite of intended: Instead of showcasing modern Massachusetts, it’s reanimating some of its worst stereotypes.
The union members’ position in the trial was that the tactics at the 2014 protest, rough as they were, were legitimate labor practices. That’s got to come as news to every union that’s negotiated a contract without slashing any tires. The acquitted Teamsters in the “Top Chef” trial won’t suffer any personal consequences, but policies that enabled them should change. The state should withdraw the financial cushion that shields the union from the consequences of its boorish behavior.
Ah, so that is the underneath agenda of the corporately liberal outrage, another blow to the union kneecaps.
That in no way is a defense of Marty's thugs, just a recognition of the ulterior motive of the pre$$.
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What they want is free labor without the side effects.
***********************
Now to the other side:
"Trump again blames both sides for Va. violence" by Michael D. Shear and Maggie Haberman New York Times August 15, 2017
NEW YORK — President Trump reverted Tuesday to blaming both sides for the deadly violence in Charlottesville, Va., and at one point questioned whether the movement to pull down Confederate statues would lead to the desecration of memorials to George Washington.
In a combative exchange with reporters at Trump Tower in Manhattan, the president repeatedly rejected bipartisan criticism for waiting several days before naming the right-wing groups and for placing blame on both the right and left for the bloodshed that ended with the death of a young woman after a car crashed into a crowd, and he criticized “alt-left” groups that he claimed were “very, very violent” when they sought to confront the nationalist and Nazi groups that had gathered to protest the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee from a park. He said there is “blame on both sides.”
Noting that George Washington owned slaves is apparently out of bounds and politically incorrect now. Myths and legends must be maintained.
I watched most of it on BBC and Fox, and it was great theater. The pre$$ yelling and screaming, being disrespectful to the president and cutting him off, and talking over each other. The indecipherable cacophony that erupted had me laughing. In the middle of something Trump blurts out "fake news" and my sides nearly split.
Trump defended those gathered in the Charlottesville park to protest the statue’s removal, saying, “I’ve condemned neo-Nazis. I’ve condemned many different groups. Not all of those people were neo-Nazis, believe me. Not all of those people were white supremacists by any stretch.”
No, turns out a lot of them are Jewish supremacists hiding under white sheets.
Trump unleashed a torrent of frustration at the news media, saying they were being “fake” because they did not acknowledge that his initial statement about the Charlottesville protest was “very nice.”
Again and again, Trump said that the nationalist protesters in the city were not all Nazis or white supremacists, and he said it was unfair to suggest that they were.
The president also said that blame for the violence in the city — which also took the lives of two Virginia state troopers when their helicopter crashed — should also be on people from “the left” who came to oppose the nationalist protesters.
Yes, the poorly-maintained helicopter crashed but the young woman is the face of Charlottesville now.
As for the antifa left, that movement is also oddly enough backed by Zionist interests with a face of Soros.
Quite a ballgame they have going, huh? On the white nationalist side you have Zionist Jews stirring up trouble while they are also behind the anarchic left protests that mimic and mirror the right -- whatever those terms mean for they have lost all meaning.
It's like the terrorists. The government is fighting the same people it created, directs, and funds. That's why we are winning, losing, winning, losing, they are lurking, blah, blah, blah, blah. When they are playing both sides and benefiting from both sides while advancing their agenda it is called getting played, folks. Same with the unwinnable drug war.
“You had a group on one side and the other, and they came at each other with clubs, and it was vicious and horrible. It was a horrible thing to watch,” the president said. “There is another side. There was a group on this side, you can call them the left. You have just called them the left, that came violently attacking the other group. You can say what you want. That’s the way it is.”
I did see the club-wielders after the car plowed into the crowd on what looked like a Hollywood set, but be that as it may.
The president’s raw and emotional eruption during a news conference about repairing infrastructure was a rejection of the more measured language that Trump offered in a brief statement on Monday.
The Globe only gave only three paragraphs (bottom left-corner, page A7) to the reason why he was there. That's about how interested the reporters were in it.
In that statement, Trump appeared to distance himself from his earlier assertions on Saturday that two sides were to blame for the weekend violence. But on Tuesday, Trump returned to his initial feelings about the subject, which poured out without much prompting from reporters at Trump Tower.
“There are two sides to a story. There are two sides to the country,” the president said.
That is a truism about anything, and you don't need to take sides to see it.
Trump said his initial statement on Saturday was shaped by a lack of information about the events on the ground in Charlottesville, even though television stations had been broadcasting images of the violence throughout the morning.
“There was no way of making a correct statement that early,” the president said. “I had to see the facts, unlike a lot of reporters,” but Trump also made it clear that even now he does not accept the overwhelming criticism that he should have reserved his condemnation for the white supremacist and Nazi groups.
I chuckled then.
Referring to the reporters assembled, he insisted that he had watched the protests “much more closely than you people watched it.” He said that he believes there were “bad” people on both sides, and he criticized others for being unwilling to say that.
“You had a group on one side that was bad. You had a group on the other side that was also very violent,” the president said. “Nobody wants to say that. I’ll say it right now. You had a group on the other side that came charging in without a permit and they were very, very violent.”
The president’s breathtaking statements inflamed and stunned people across Twitter.....
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"Some corporate chiefs have had enough of Trump" by Victoria McGrane Globe Staff August 16, 2017
WASHINGTON — Walmart, Merck, Intel, Under Armour. These are the sort of corporate titans that typically relish an opportunity to partner with the White House and lend a hand in guiding America’s economic policy. But the fallout over President Trump’s handling of a white supremacist riot in Charlottesville, Va., has opened a rare breach between prominent CEOs and a Republican president.
In the span of 36 hours, three chief executives from major US companies and one business association head resigned from one of Trump’s business advisory councils, citing concerns with the president’s flat-footed and lukewarm response to the violence.
The implication of the resignations was clear: The executives concluded that the values of the president of the United States were in conflict with those of their companies.
It was another crack in a presidency that has endured unprecedented erosion in relationships that normally would be strong for a Republican president — particularly one who prides himself on his business-friendly agenda and accomplishments.
Millennial employees and customers, in particular, demand that CEOs stand up for their corporate values and their employees “and speak out when those values are challenged by political leaders [in] today’s intensely polarized political environment, powered by social media,” said Micho Spring, chair of the global corporate practice at Weber Shandwick, a communications firm.
Globe going back to the 19th century rather than climbing the ladder to the 21st.
She pointed to the rising number of cases of CEOs speaking out on immigration, climate change, LGBTQ issues, and race.
And the ANTI-WAR BRIGADE of CEOs? Any BDS supporters?
Oh, right, PEACE is now equated with WHITE SUPREMACISM!
That's the REAL DEAL!
“The violence in Charlottesville is a reminder that getting into the political arena may be more perilous than ever,’’ she said, “but remaining silent when societal values are challenged has become an equal risk.”
To be sure, the vast majority of CEOs on Trump’s advisory panels seem to be staying put — but they’re for the most part keeping their heads down, not rallying to the president’s defense.
“I resigned because I want to make progress, while many in Washington seem more concerned with attacking anyone who disagrees with them,’’ Brian Krzanich, CEO of chip manufacturer Intel, wrote in a late-night blog post Monday, in a thinly veiled dig at Trump.
On Tuesday, Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, a partnership between US manufacturers and the United Steelworkers union, also jumped ship, simply explaining via Twitter that “it’s the right thing for me to do.”
The chief executive of Walmart, a brand closely connected to the deep-red rural areas that fueled Trump’s rise, joined in the criticism.
“As we watched the events and the response from President Trump over the weekend, we too felt that he missed a critical opportunity to help bring our country together by unequivocally rejecting the appalling actions of white supremacists,” chief executive Doug McMillon wrote in a message to employees Monday night, as first reported by The New York Times.
McMillon, however, has not resigned from a presidential advisory council on economic development because he wanted to remain engaged in policy making.
Trump hasn’t made it any easier for the CEOs who are sticking with him. The president issued a Twitter attack on the CEO defectors, calling them “grandstanders” who should not have had a seat on the council in the first place.
In the afternoon, at a Trump Tower news conference, he doubled down on his initial claim that there is “blame on both sides” for the Charlottesville violence and defended protesters who participated in the neo-Nazi demonstration.
After that display, Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, also quit the jobs advisory council.
“No adviser committed to the bipartisan American traditions of government can possibly believe he or she is being effective at this point. And all should feel ashamed for complicity in Trump’s words and deeds. I sometimes wonder how they face their children,” former US Treasury secretary and Harvard professor Lawrence Summers wrote in a scathing Washington Post column.
I wonder how he faces this:
"On December 12, 1991, while serving as chief economist for the World Bank, Summers authored a private memo arguing that the bank should actively encourage the dumping of toxic waste in developing countries, particularly "under populated countries in Africa," which Summers described as "UNDER-polluted."
He should be ashamed of himself.
He's also the one that put Harvard at risk with the hedge funds, but now Larry is a health and labor nut.
Nancy Koehn, a historian of leadership at Harvard Business School, said she has been surprised at how, with some exceptions, America’s corporate leaders “have been largely silent about the Trump presidency.”
Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate accord sparked a “surprisingly small response from corporate America,” given the investment so many had made in supporting it, she said.
Koehn speculated that corporate reticence may be linked to the “unprecedented situation” these corporations find themselves in, facing a president who is emotional, erratic, and willing to lash out in personal terms.
To Bruce Haynes, a founding partner of Purple Strategies, a bipartisan Washington, D.C., communications and reputation management firm, the recent criticism from chief executives is symptomatic of a larger problem for the White House.
“If you’re a Republican, this is what is extraordinarily frustrating about this administration: Unemployment is at a 16-year low. The [stock] market is at an unprecedented high. All of the economic indicators are extraordinarily strong,” said Haynes, who has a background in Republican politics.
Not high for long.
“But it’s these unforced errors — particularly in the communications space — that are holding back his ability to really bring people together around his economic policies.’’
Just don't cut the health subsidies because they are $orely needed.
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About those communications:
"Trump retweets — then deletes — anti-CNN illustration" August 15, 2017
WASHINGTON — President Trump shared on Twitter a cartoon on Tuesday morning of a train running over a person with a CNN logo covering the person’s head, three days after a fatal collision in Charlottesville, Va. Trump deleted his retweet minutes later.
Trump has been under fire for how he has publicly addressed bloody demonstrations by white nationalists over the weekend. Promoting a cartoon of a person being run over by a train appeared to belittle the attack by a driver who ran into a crowd of counterprotesters, leaving a 32-year-old woman dead.
A White House official said early Tuesday that the tweet of the train was posted inadvertently and was deleted as soon as it was noticed.
A retweet requires two actions, clicks, or taps on a smartphone or computer, in order to post, meaning the president would have had a second chance to be sure he wanted to tweet the cartoon.
The president has long appeared to sanction violence, going back to his campaign when, at a rally, he said he wanted to punch a Black Lives Matter protester in the face. He later said the man, who was assaulted by Trump supporters in the crowd, might have deserved to get roughed up.
Was he the one pushing wars based on lies from the front pages?
Trump and his associates have long been critical of CNN. A network spokeswoman, Barbara Levin, said, “Anchors and reporters don’t have ‘enemies,’ but they do hold those in power accountable across the political spectrum and aggressively challenge false and misleading statements and investigate wrongdoing.”
That is what they see in the mirror, OMG!
Must have been why Holder and Obama were spying on them.
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"President Trump appears to have mistakenly retweeted a message from one of his critics saying ‘‘he’s a fascist.’’ Trump deleted his retweet Tuesday after about five minutes, but not before the message sent to his 35 million followers racked up a big response. Trump seems to have been trying to draw attention to a Fox & Friends article on a possible presidential pardon for former Phoenix-area sheriff, Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of a crime for ignoring a US court order to stop traffic patrols that targeted immigrants....."
It's a plague in Arizona.
"President Trump won’t say whether he plans to keep Steve Bannon, a top adviser and key campaign strategist, in the White House. ‘‘We’ll see what happens with Mr. Bannon,’’ Trump said at an impromptu Tuesday news conference where he fielded questions about his confidence in his adviser. Bannon, the former leader of conservative Breitbart News website, has been a contentious figure in a divided White House for months and has been viewed as on the outs before."
They want to pull him down like a, you know.....
"Removal of Confederate statues accelerates after Va. violence" by Jesse J. Holland Associated Press August 16, 2017
NEW YORK — The deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., is accelerating the removal of Confederate monuments in cities across the nation in much the same way that a 2015 mass shooting by a white supremacist led to the end of the Confederate flag being flown on public property.
‘‘We should not glorify a part of our history in front of our buildings that really is a testament to America’s original sin,’’ Gainesville Mayor Lauren Poe said Monday.
Some people refused to wait. Protesters in Durham, N.C., used a rope to pull down a nearly century-old statue of a soldier holding a rifle in front of an old courthouse.
Some violence and vandalism is okay!
Many officials who were horrified by the events that killed one person and injured dozens more Saturday in Charlottesville soon began publicizing plans to remove statues.
Not everyone is in favor of destruction.
A law professor and director of the Center for Terrorism Law at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio called removal a ‘‘slippery slope,’’ saying that judging historical figures through a modern lens can be difficult.
What is he, a Trump supporter?
‘‘A healthy democracy and people within that democracy should be able to say, ‘This is our history.’ And history is made up of actions of human beings, and human beings aren’t perfect,’’ said Jeffrey F. Addicott, who stressed he was speaking for himself and not the law school.
Statues, he added, can be moved, but he’s opposed to them being ‘‘put in a warehouse never to be seen again, because then you’re kind of erasing or rewriting history.’’
Turns out history is a pack of lies, agreed upon by the powerful, and nothing proves it more than the acceptance of the official narrative of 9/11.
The director of public history for Northeastern University in Boston suggested adding context to existing Confederate statues, and adding new statues to mark prominent slavery or lynching sites throughout the South.
‘‘I think simply destroying them or removing them and turning them into junk metal, there’s a nihilistic element to that. It’s wiping out history,’’ Martin Blatt said. ‘‘However, looked at from the perspective of African-Americans . . . . I can understand destruction.”
I can't because, as the Beatles once sang, when you talk about destruction, don't you know that you can count me out.
In Jacksonville, Fla., City Council president Anna Brosche ordered an immediate inventory of all of the Confederate statues in her city in preparation for their removal.
‘‘These monuments, memorials, and markers represent a time in our history that caused pain to so many,’’ she saids.
So we should repress it and block it from our memory.
You know where that leads, right?
In Memphis, City Attorney Bruce McMullen said Monday that he plans to file a petition to remove a statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate cavalry general and an early leader of the Ku Klux Klan, from a park. The state historical commission has been blocking the move.
In Nashville, protesters draped a black jacket over the head of a Forrest bust at the Tennessee Capitol while cheering, ‘‘Tear it down!’’ Republican Governor Bill Haslam later said Forrest should not be honored at the Capitol.
Then NO MORE RERUNS of GUMP on TV!
Of course, Graceland is fine based on the photos (third one down) I saw on page A2 in my printed paper, the same page as this article and the next below. Elvis was a racist and ripped off the black man, but he was a king so it's okay.
The convergence of white nationalists and neo-Nazis with Confederate imagery in Charlottesville will make it difficult for government agencies to defend having Confederate statues on their property, Boston College history professor Heather Cox Richardson said.
‘‘The idea that this somehow is about Southern heritage, I think that ship sailed,’’ Richardson said.....
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Related:
"FUNCTIONAL ILLITERATES TRYING TO ERASE HISTORY
“True patriotism sometimes requires
of men to act exactly contrary, at one period, to that which it does at
another, and the motive which impels them the desire to do right is
precisely the same.” ― Robert E. Lee
I consider myself a student of history. I’ve always been fascinated by the personalities who drove events throughout history. I probably would have been a history major in college if I didn’t feel the need to make enough money to support myself and my family. I chose a business major and decided studying history would be my hobby. Over the years I’ve taken a particular interest in the Civil War. You could even call me a Civil War buff.
\I’ve probably read 60 books on the Civil War, from Bruce Catton, Shelby Foote and numerous other historians. I’ve visited the Gettysburg battlefield a half dozen times, as it is only 150 miles from my home. My basement office is decorated with six prints depicting various scenes from the Civil War. One depicts Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson at Fredericksburg, another depicts Jackson leading his troops through Richmond, another depicts Grant taking command of Union forces, another shows Chamberlain leading the charge down Little Round Top, another portrays Lee and Longstreet making the fateful decision to send Pickett’s men on their futile charge into history, and the last showing the slaughter during Pickett’s charge.
I’ve even taken an executive education course in leadership where the final day is a trip to Gettysburg where a park ranger guides you through the three day battle and the professor asks you to assess the leadership shown by officers on both sides during that tide turning battle. My fascination with the Civil War isn’t based on rooting for one side or the other. I wanted to understand the motivations of the main characters and understand why and how they fought that bloody war. There were so many fateful decisions, errors of judgement, acts of courage, acts of cowardice, brilliantly bold maneuvers, and just plain good and bad luck.
Robert E. Lee, before the outbreak of the war, was overwhelmingly regarded as the finest military mind in the U.S. army. Winfield Scott offered him command of all Union forces at the outbreak of hostilities. But he chose allegiance to his state of Virginia, rather than the Federal government. He didn’t fight for slavery. He freed his slaves. He was fighting for states’ rights. He was an honorable God fearing noble man. Stonewall Jackson was an extremely religious man who waged war with a passion, but also taught Sunday School to slaves. Lee and Jackson must be viewed in the context of the 19th century rather than being judged by the standards of the 21st century.
The vast majority of Confederate soldiers who did the fighting and dying during that war didn’t own slaves. They weren’t fighting to maintain slavery. They were fighting because a foreign army had invaded their land. In 1860 this nation was more an amalgamation of states than a centralized government. States still had a tremendous amount of power and leeway to run their states the way they chose. The ever increasing power of a central authority occurred during and after the Civil War. The South were not the bad guys. Their leaders, generals and soldiers were not evil. They were Americans.
The revisionist history now being peddled by the left wing media and their non-thinking acolytes lacks a factual basis, historical context and a true understanding of history. The Civil War was the climax of decades of tension between the North and the South over states’ rights, economic policies, slavery, and a myriad of other complex issues. Examined within the context of generational theory, it was a Fourth Turning that was unavoidable. It was a crucial important event in U.S. history. It wasn’t the shameful episode portrayed by the brain dead faux journalists babbling on CNN and MSNBC.
Illegally pulling down statues of Confederate soldiers and taking videos of “brave” unemployed liberal arts major social justice warriors kicking the Confederate soldier is what passes for activism in today’s warped society. Liberal mayors and city councils across the south are falling all over themselves wasting time and taxpayer money to remove statues of Confederate generals to appease the left and make a display of how anti-racist they can be. Meanwhile, their cities are bankrupt, their infrastructure is decaying, black crime is rampant and their education systems matriculate functionally illiterate deranged snowflakes into society.
These courageous left wing politicians, like the mayor of New Orleans, have statues removed in the middle of the night to avoid protests by those who understand you cannot erase history by removing statues and names. In a hysterical development, Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh on Monday said in a statement she intended to move forward in removing several city statutes, including those of Lee and Stonewall Jackson. I suppose the soaring murder rate, blacks rioting and burning down neighborhoods, crumbling infrastructure, failing schools, and white flight is due to a few Confederate statues. It’s good to see this diverse mayor has her priorities in order.
The ignorance and disregard for history knows no bounds for generations taught to feel rather think in our government run indoctrination centers known as public schools. The left wing media reinforces their ignorance with misinformation, fake news and government sanctioned propaganda. Snowflakes across the land melt at anything they are instructed to find offensive. Everything and everyone who doesn’t agree with their half baked views are declared racists.
Pointing out that leftist antifa thugs, without permits to protest, initiated the violence in Charlottesville is racist. The uproar against Trump’s truthful assessment of the situation by CNN, MSNBC and Fox proves there isn’t a wit of difference among these corporate media outlets. True colors are revealed. The ongoing coup attempt against Trump continues unabated.
Trump’s impromptu press conference and his push back of this false narrative was a thing of beauty. The hypocrisy of the left and their utter contempt for facts must be thrown back in their faces at every opportunity. Across the country, 718 Confederate monuments and statues remain, with nearly 300 of them in Georgia, Virginia or North Carolina. There are also 109 public schools named for Robert E. Lee, Confederate President Jefferson Davis or other icons of the Civil War-era South. Will the left be satisfied when all 718 monuments are destroyed and all 109 schools are renamed Oprah Winfrey Middle School? No. They will find something else to be offended about, and violently attack again.
The funniest part about watching these social justice warriors wail and gnash their teeth about the racism of these monuments is knowing these unemployed functional illiterates couldn’t tell you when the Civil War occurred, name two major battles, name five generals, provide a death count within 250,000, or fill in the blank in the phrase Surrender at __________. They don’t know jack shit about history, the Civil War, Lincoln’s true feelings about blacks, or the fact the Democratic Party is the party which suppressed blacks for one hundred years following the Civil War. Only truly ignorant snowflakes think they can erase history by protesting it and trying to destroy monuments to those who fought and died for a cause they believed in.
Do these left wing zealots have any sense of awareness? Maybe they were too busy studying for their gender studies finals to see the reports of the Taliban destroying ancient Buddhist monuments in territory they had captured. Zealots, terrorists, and extremists attempt to destroy symbols that offend them as a way to prove their strength and power. In reality, they destroy what others have built in a feckless effort to boost their self-esteem. Intellectual lightweights attempt to bring others down because they realize their lack of intelligence and inability to get ahead in life has to be blamed on someone else.
If these social justice warrior weaklings were
transported back in time 154 years to the Gettysburg battlefield where
real men displayed real courage and bravery, they would be covered in
their own urine cowering behind a tree as Pickett’s charge commenced.
Could you imagine any of the Soros paid professional antifa protestors
charging across an open field towards certain death? Those pussies would
be high tailing it south as fast as their fashion designer sneakers
would take them.
Trump was absolutely correct in asking, “Where does it end?” Washington owned slaves. Do we get rid of all dollar bills and quarters? Do we change the name of our capital? Do we change the name of Washington & Lee University to Obama & Spike Lee University? Do we blow up the Washington Memorial? Jefferson owned slaves. Do we get rid of nickles? How about the Jefferson Memorial?
Why stop only in our country? The Egyptian pyramids were built by slaves. Should we tear those down? If these are symbols of hatred and racism that must be destroyed, why do we never hear calls from the left for the destruction of the Nazi death camps. Talk about symbols of hate. Why would we want to remember the holocaust? It couldn’t be that it doesn’t fit the left’s narrative.
This Confederate monument narrative is designed by the left to provoke a backlash from whites who are tired of being scorned, ridiculed, belittled and called racists, rednecks and deplorables by so called open minded progressives. It’s working. The cold race war is beginning to turn hot. The president has no intention of trying to bring the two sides together because it’s impossible at this point. That’s how Fourth Turnings roll. The mood of the country will continue to darken. Reactions to these types of events will intensify. More blood will be shed. It’s too bad these functional illiterates didn’t pay attention in history class or ever read a book. They are going to learn some harsh lessons over the next decade.
“We’re doomed to repeat the past no matter what. That’s what it is to be alive. It’s pretty dense kids who haven’t figured that out by the time they’re ten.” ― Kurt Vonnegut Jr..
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"White nationalist groups plan to be ‘more active than ever’" by Jay Reeves Associated Press August 15, 2017
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Emboldened and proclaiming victory after a bloody weekend in Virginia, white nationalists are planning more demonstrations to promote their agenda after the violence that left a woman dead and dozens injured.
The University of Florida said white provocateur Richard Spencer, whose appearances sometimes stoke unrest, is seeking permission to speak there next month.
Turns out Spencer is apparently Jewish, which is probably why the Times of Israel interviewed him.
Also, a neo-Confederate group had asked the state of Virginia for permission to rally at a monument to Confederate General Robert E. Lee in Richmond on Sept. 16, but later canceled its plans.
Matthew Heimbach, a white nationalist leader, called the event Saturday ‘‘an absolute stunning victory’’ for the far right because of the large number of supporters who descended on the city to decry plans to remove a statue of Lee.
Hundreds of white nationalists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klan members, and others were involved, by some estimates, in what Heimbach, leader of the Traditionalist Workers Party, called the nation’s biggest such event in a decade or more. Even more opponents turned out, and the two sides clashed violently.
A neo-Nazi website that helped promote the gathering said there will be more events soon.
‘‘We are going to start doing this nonstop. Across the country,’’ said the site, which Internet domain host GoDaddy said it was shutting down.
The head of the National Socialist Movement, Jeff Schoep, said Charlottesville was a ‘‘really good’’ white nationalist event that was being overshadowed by the deaths. ‘‘It’s unfortunate,’’ he said.
He blamed the violence on inadequate police protection and counterdemonstrators and said he doubts white nationalists will be deterred from attending more such demonstrations.
The police stand down is true because they were in on the production.
Preserving memorials to the Old South has become an animating force for the white nationalist movement, not because all members are Southern, Schoep said, but because adherents see the drive to remove such monuments as part of a larger, anti-white crusade.
It's more Identity Politics and labeling, and who benefits?
‘‘It’s an assault on American freedoms. Today it’s Confederate monuments. Tomorrow it may be the Constitution or the American flag,’’ Schoep said.....
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Maybe the names of the mountains need to be changed, 'eh?
Related: Who is the Boston Free Speech Coalition behind Saturday’s rally?
Some are hoping a tree will fall on them.
Meanwhile, the self-inflicted acts of anti-Semitism continue, God help us all.
UPDATES:
They are now calling for Trump's resignation and ‘‘I feel like there is nothing any of us can say right now without being judged.’’
Moral superiority
The Truth about Charlottesville (includes video)
Eyewitnesses: James Fields' Car Was 'Attacked,' Police Set Up Rally-Goers To Be Assaulted
"Donald Trump Acts Presidential while Social Justice Warriors run Amuck
Wednesday, August 16, 2017
Dog Poet Transmitting.......
Finally Trump did something courageously presidential; something that went contrary to all the efforts of the deep state forces that are trying to paint everyone that disagrees with the ever increasing pressure of the historical revisionists, the sexually dysfunctional, the color coding Nazis, the gender bending lunatics and the aggregate tiny splinter of population, whose needs triumph over those of the much greater majority ...because the Satanist say that they should because they represent the destruction of the family unit and all of the core values of a functioning society that stands in the way of bat shit crazy and howling chaos.
He said that both sides represented at Charlottesville were equally wrong and that they were equally responsible for the violence that ensured and oh! Oh the faux, staged and fabricated outrage!!! The self righteous wringing of hands and sanctimonious holier than thou, offended parties, who are Hell Bent on tearing away the underpinning of society that holds us together! It may not have been the best we could collectively come up with but it is nowhere near as bad as those seeking to destroy it say it is, or intend to replace it with.
I'm guessing they are really going to come after him now. I'm guessing he has to have something up his sleeve as well, if he had the stones to come out and say what he did. At the moment, all reasonable voices are silenced. The shrill screeching of the sold out loons and talking heads is deafening. The posturing politicians are working like fevered baboons to outdo one another in their genuflections before the twerking ass of the infernal one. They line up to kiss it every one and there is not a shred of dignity, honor or integrity among them. Little Chuckie Schumer is Lizard King of the Left. There is page after page of him here. I'm guessing you can read to your hearts discontent. Looking at and into the man's face, I see such extremes of depravity that I can only imagine what I would rather not imagine.
The corruptions stream down from the places of power. They slip into the legislations and the nine preening vultures, perched on the dead branches at the highest court, cackle among themselves as they rubber stamp the death certificate for The Constitution. The government has been hijacked and is sailing for the rocks. The media trumpets and cheerleads for the degradation of humanity. Sanity has completely left the building. What is around the corner? What is around the corner? Where I live there is no sign of the madness I hear about. At any moment a mass awakening may come, or not. It presently slumbers in the hearts of everyone.
Beneath the surface of the earth an incipient trembling shudders in uneasy dreams. The Earth is not pleased with its share of the reverie that comes to it from its contact with the forms that walk upon it. The Earth is a living thing. It knows. The eyes of the residents are fixed upon insubstantial hallucinations and cannot see the invisible forms that have come to feed on their hunger and to inflame it to impossible levels and to hollow them out from within. The fruits of these hungers are rage and despair. The anger goes inward and then the anger comes out. People feel like they have been cheated and old enmities and distorted myths from the past emerge to enrage them. They have been cheated. They thought there was some satisfaction to be gained from certain pursuits but there is none to be had. Guilt is rampant. How did I get in here? How do I get out?
I tell myself that it is all a movie and there have surely been more desperate times. I have read in some detail about the horrors of war and the proliferation of rats among the carrion. The rats always come. During the Iraq-Iranian War the rats grew to be 26 pounds, more or less. Our country was neck deep in that one, as it has been in so many conflicts abroad. The sheer scale of death and torment in any one of them, much less the totality, is beyond the comprehension of any one of us to imagine it. There's no way to explain war to anyone who hasn't seen it. Some people are able to compartmentalize the experience. Many cannot. The idea that men in suits, with fountain pens in their hands, orchestrate these conflicts for the purpose of profit is also a difficult image to grasp. How is it possible that they can be like this? What terrible darkness lives in their souls that makes it possible for them to do these things? It is a mystery.
They are not our problem, you and I. Our problem is ourselves. We need to have the faith and certitude to walk through these times, come what may and not sacrifice the important parts that make us human and capable of more than that. What we carry within us is our passport to the worlds beyond. One must understand what this world is, especially in the time that we find ourselves in. It has not always been as it is but what it was is irrelevant unless we are in a position to return it to its former beauty. We've had our share of visionaries, Utopians and social reformers who have tried their hand at it and more people have died at the hands of social reformers than just about anyone else.
Too many people are trying to change the world while also seeking to make it in their own image. The problem with that is that they don't even know who they are in the first place, so the image is, well... rather blurred. This is what we have at the present, a rowdy mob of unbalanced individuals who have no comprehension of the meaning of the word. They lumber about with clubs and swords too heavy to wield, screaming at one another and everyone else about how unfair the world is. They're not wrong about that... unless fairness means we should all be reduced to the level of incompetent morons; a feat they are determined to pull off and presently appearing, against all reason and rhyme to be on the verge of accomplishing. It's not going to happen but they are nonetheless inspired by small victories of a certain timely tyranny over everything that is sane and sensible. It makes you wonder at what has made the whole process possible. Enter the ineffable. If you can see the whole of it as something of a joke, it makes it easier to digest. Otherwise it is just horror piled upon horror and makes no sense. However, if you see it as a form of amusement for the ineffable, it begins to make a great deal of sense because it doesn't make sense in any other way that I have encountered and anyway, that's what I have been told is happening so I have to go with it.
I've been told more than that and it isn't going to be amusing for some/many, only for those of us who are going to witness it and who aren't a part of it. That doesn't make us altogether innocent. It just means that one can only get the humor at a certain distance from the spectacle. Up close it's not funny at all. So... for whatever the reason that you are at the proper distance it should be worth the experience of seeing it.
Yes... we've got some real entertainment on the menu and it is not to be confused with the fare we've been subjected to for far too long. It's also real street theater coming to a sidewalk near you soon. It's already playing in the more dense urban locations and the hijinks are coming at a relentless pace in the cloistered sections, where the high and mighty engage in their special couplings with what... well, the less we know the better. Here is where tragedy and comedy meet in a special dance of resolution, also called, on occasion, the purpose of demonstration.
It is my wish that you learn to take it all lightly. What possible good will it do to become fearful or depressed, much less angry and hostile? Believe me, at one time or another I have entertained them all to no great advantage or good result. They are no longer welcome where I am. I've evicted them all. They were bad house guests is the truth of it. My recommendation is to not let them in.
We're up for a time of it my friends. The best I can say is that we must let the best of us out and trust that that will be sufficient to the needs of the moment, whatever those needs may be. Surely, the chance of a positive outcome is more likely when the best of us is being expressed than the worst. We've only to look around to see what that accomplishes.
Way to go, Donald Trump!!! Gee... I guess the dual nationals and that great big Middle Eastern Crime Syndicate are not going to be happy. I'm guessing the Golda Meir Library in Milwaukee will continue to be named after a mass murderer. It was supposed to be named after the USS Liberty, which Israel sunk, in hopes that it would cause the US to attack Egypt, or just because they could, or some reason even worse. I'm guessing that with no right wing, except in revolutionary settings, back in some rural hill community, where they huddle out of sight from insidious, prying eyes, mention of God will still be made and patriots will speak about a nation they once knew. There are no left wing patriots; only communists and atheists. It's going be hard for the nation to fly very far in any direction with only one wing. Informed scientific minds tell me it will be flying in circles.
The right wingers won't be deep in the hills. They will still be able to hear the sounds of the month long, interstate Gay Pride Bacchanal, as it marches from Washington D.C. To LA. There's talk of a Mathew Perry statue to replace the one of General Lee but there's also a strong and vocal lobby for John Wayne Gayce, a misunderstood, social justice, trailblazer. I've heard that some have suggested a sculpture of Gacy and Richard Dalmer with their arms round one another, symbolizing true social justice warriorhood. Some have said that a group sculpture of them with Randy Kraft (check out the intro just below the title!!!) and Dean Corll with musical instruments and the inscribed tag, “getting the band back together in Hell” would be nice too.
Well... now you know who is running things, as if there was ever a doubt. First look into who is funding the political arms of all these alternative lifestyles and race war efforts. I'm surprised they have the time, what with the War on Christmas and the Christian religion and the Palestinian Genocide; not to mention all those other banker engineered and financed wars everywhere else. The Avatar is coming. Sooner or later, what we could not accomplish for ourselves will be taken care of by one who takes care of such things. In the meantime, live right and keep your inner eye open, there are limits to what the devil's own can accomplish. Everyone needs permission. You might not think so, given how some stomp around the place with seeming impunity but everyone needs permission, which is something they find out if they mess around where they shouldn't mess around. “Greater is that which is in you than that which is in the world.” “If God is for me then who can be against me?”
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"We Have Established that you are a Whore. The Question Now is, how much do You Cost
Wednesday, August 16, 2017
Dog Poet Transmitting.......
You can feel it and you can see it, as the 'more love, no hate' Khmer Rouge robots rise out of the Soros funded swamp of programmed, propaganda logged and saturated ambulatory cornflakes. The problem that arises with all this uninformed outrage is that these people have no idea why the civil war was fought. As is the case when certain people want the truth to be other than what it was, you will find a plethora (Jesus, Visible, who says, 'plethora?) of arguments to the contrary, just as the holocaust fantasists like to come up with specious fabrications to support their position. It's the same people making both claims. Generally, most wars are fought for economic or territorial gain and the second motive is the same as the first. Let's just stay with General Lee however, the man whose statue was just toppled. You will find once again that the historical revisionists (same people again) have been busy bees of late, defaming and demeaning the man. He was, as all of us are, flawed to some degree but a better man than most. Once again we have to look at the same people who, out of all proportion to their numbers, were deep into the slavery business. Once again, if you go to the Tribe owned search engines you will find a plethora (hee hee) of refutation of what happened. Let's just say that no matter how they try to scrub history, by their works they are known and we have certainly seen their works, -thank you Mr Apocalypse-, in recent times from Palestine to 9/11.
The mind of the general population is mired in particular pursuits. It's like shooting fish in a barrel. Materialism and the generation of insatiable sexual hunger that creates more and more hunger is what's up these days.
It's clear what is taking place and the media, which is in the hands of the same people, is being used to promote an image of those pushing back against the tyranny of the ignorant and perverse as being Nazis and similar. They are not but... this is why you take control of the media in the first place. When it comes to Nazis we only have to look at the photo-ops of famous senators and other politicians standing next to real Nazis in the Ukraine and all over the Mid-East.
What's going on should be apparent but people see what they are told they should see because they don't realize the media is bought and paid for and all those cable guys like John Oliver and Bill Maher work for the people who own the means of expression and the same guys work for the mainstream news networks and report in the New York Times and write for The Atlantic and are the same people who get paid for editorials and opinion pieces. It's the same breed of perversity junkies who teach in the universities. Let's just say they got all the bases covered and if it weren't for the internet, most of us wouldn't know anything real whatsoever. The thing is, if they don't write and report what they are told, they don't get paid. It isn't whether they are whores or not, it's the level of whoredom they operate at. A rent boy on the sidewalk and a high end escort are only different in terms of what they get paid. A whore in the alley and a corporate call girl are the same, so are news reporters that are all competing for the opportunity to lie in front of a bigger audience and to bend over whenever they are told to by their paymasters.
If you are determined to tell the truth you must be prepared to forget about the money. They are not going to pay you to expose them. They are serious about what they are up to and what they are up to is to is to enslave you and then destroy you. This is their objective and in the present they are fomenting a civil war between two different sides with chaos as their objective. One side wants to protect their traditions and their security and the other side wants to tear down the traditions and destroy their security and most of them are completely unaware of who is arranging the scenarios.
Who controls the media? The truth is there in black and white. However, if you go to the search engines, you will see how busy the whores have been about this hard, cold, crystalline fact. This is happening everywhere at the moment so as to obscure what is what and turn it into what is not. It is a short step from knowing this, to becoming aware of the agendas that are at work. On any given day you can tune into the jabber of the mouthpieces who have been bought by the syndicate to serve the real slave-masters who know that the way to take control of anyone is to take command of their mind. This is where a person becomes enslaved.
Still... when anyone wants to be divisive they will find a way and we also have to find a way not to be divisive ourselves because usually that is the very result that is being sought. It's difficult to stay out of conflict, especially in times like this but we have to do our best and pray that we can be equal to the task. There seems to be some mysterious power that throws us off center, despite our best efforts to avoid that happening. We have to be on the lookout for this.
What has happened so far is a prologue to what is coming. Trump needs to exert maximum care in times to come because 'they' are surely out to get him, any way they can. He needs to do something about the media as well. I don't know how to take the man. I've never been fond of him but I'm never actively disliked him either. He's always been another one of those massively successful individuals who want to live like Louis the 14th without finding himself in similar straits to Louis the 16th. I always reserve certain judgments when it comes to the unexpected being placed in positions of authority. You never know when the times will make the man. They can just as well unmake him too. We have to wait and see but unless he does something about the media they will succeed in tearing him to pieces.
It doesn't look good... what I've seen so far ...but I can only see the part of the story that is shown and the parts I accurately intuit. There is a large area of the truly real that is hidden from me. Time will tell and we shall see.....
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Also see: When Doubt and Uncertainty Come, Step Outside and Say Hello to the Sun
