Tag Archives: antifa

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Daily Broadside | Why Civil War Statues in the South Are Important

I had a thought prompted by an article in The American Spectator a couple of days ago. In it, R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. observes about the American Civil War that,

… the monuments to only one side remain, and many of the ignoramuses who are tearing down monuments have their eyes too on Union leaders whose reputations they sully with the slander of racism. There was racism to be sure on both sides in times past, and there were other forms of intolerance: religious intolerance, ethnic intolerance, and intolerance of immigrants, for instance. Today, intolerance is still around, but it is being taught in the nation’s classrooms. There, intolerance is being taught under the guise of progressivism with perfumed words such as diversity, equity, and inclusion. Intolerance, apparently, you always have with you.

He’s referring, of course, to the grotesque specter of the wild, woke and irrational antifa and BLM fascists who rampaged across our nation a couple of years ago in the wake of George Floyd’s death. Shortly afterward I chronicled the number of statues and monuments that were torn down or defaced. Several of them were men from the Confederacy like Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis, but others were from the Union including Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.

After the initial spasms, several cities and counties permanently removed statues honoring heroes of South. According to a CNN article in 2022, “73 Confederate monuments were removed or renamed in 2021,” leaving 723 across the US.

Last year, a towering statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee was removed in Richmond, Virginia, and added to the growing list of Confederate symbols that had been taken down across the country. This week, Richmond began the process of removing the pedestals that once held the monuments to the Confederacy, which included Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, Jefferson Davis and others, according to CNN affiliate WRIC.

Of course, the vandalism forced all of us to wrestle with a fair question: why do modern Americans tolerate monuments to men who were racists and who fought to keep the institution of slavery? Until then had it ever been seriously considered?

Here’s my thought: the answer is to be found in the final line of Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address.

“With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan ~ to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

After beating the Confederate army, Lincoln faced the task of healing a severely divided nation. He was extending an olive branch to the Confederate south, of which Lee would surrender his Army of Northern Virginia on April 9, 1865.

Healing the country, rather than vengeance, directed Grant’s and the Lincoln administration’s actions. There would be no mass imprisonments or executions, no parading of defeated enemies through Northern streets. Lincoln’s priority—shared by Grant—was “to bind up the nation’s wounds” and unite the country together again as a functioning democracy under the Constitution; extended retribution against the former Confederates would only slow down the process.

For Lincoln there would be no gloating, no shaming, no exulting in the defeat of his countrymen. He would not take out his anger and frustration on his kinsmen; he would allow them the dignity and respect due a noble foe. It started with Ulysses S. Grant allowing General Lee and his men to return to their homes and letting the officers, cavalrymen, and artillerymen keep their swords and horses if the men agreed to lay down their arms and abide by federal law.

It was as if two brothers had gotten into a fist fight and one finally gave up. The victor, rather than relishing his victory, hated that the fight had to be had, and extended a hand to help his brother up. Putting his arm around him, they walked into the house and got cleaned up. After all, they were members of the same family and would have to go on living together.

That’s why we allowed the memorials to be built. It was part of an extended act of forgiveness and respect for the members of our family who had made a principled, but misguided and ultimately, futile stand.

Our modern fascists, however, are determined to do what Lincoln refused to do: take vengeance. They are punishing in absentia those whom Lincoln refused to punish. They have withdrawn the offer of a “just and lasting peace” and instead have taken out their anger on both sides of the issue that had been settled nearly 160 years ago.

The South’s decision to defend slavery was indefensible. But they were Americans, our countrymen. We took them to the woodshed, but tended their wounds after breaking them of their poor habit.

If only we could still see it that way.

Have a good weekend.

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Daily Broadside | Remembering a Man of Principle in a Time of Racial Division

Daily Verse | Genesis 41:41
So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.”

Monday’s Reading: Genesis 41-44

It’s Monday and the annual day on which we recognize the life and work of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. King was a Baptist minister and social activist who is remembered for his leading role in the American civil rights movement. An advocate of organized non-violent resistance based on the approach of Mahatma Gandhi, King led peaceful marches and boycotts to draw attention to the segregation of blacks across America.

An ardent student of the teachings of Mohandas K. Gandhi, Dr. King was much impressed with the Mahatma’s befriending of his adversaries, most of whom professed profound admiration for Gandhi’s courage and intellect. Dr. King believed that the age-old tradition of hating one’s opponents was not only immoral, but bad strategy which perpetuated the cycle of revenge and retaliation. Only nonviolence, he believed, had the power to break the cycle of retributive violence and create lasting peace through reconciliation.

In a 1957 speech, Birth of A New Nation, Dr. King said, “The aftermath of nonviolence is the creation of the beloved community. The aftermath of nonviolence is redemption. The aftermath of nonviolence is reconciliation. The aftermath of violence is emptiness and bitterness.” 

Due in no small part to King’s leadership, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 2, outlawing discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.

Martin Luther King Jr Accomplishments Featured

The irony, of course, is that more than a half-century later, the progressive Left, Black Lives Matter, Inc., Antifa activists and the flying monkeys in the mainstream media have abandoned King’s approach and are using violence and shame to accomplish their mission of destroying “white” culture, rather than be “included” in it.

They’ve also set back race relations to the 100 years of Jim Crow laws, i.e., enforced or legalized racial segregation. You know, “separate but equal.” We now have separate commencements, housing and activities for Blacks on school campuses.

“The aftermath of violence is emptiness and bitterness,” indeed.

In essence, the radicals have gone to great lengths to undo all that King accomplished and that we commemorate on this day. I wouldn’t be surprised if his monument in Washington, D.C., is destroyed someday by the self-righteous judges of woke for King’s attempts to integrate black society with “white supremacists.”

In the meantime, I encourage you to appreciate who King was and how he led the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s. One way you can do that is to read his Letter from Birmingham Jail, in which he wrote one of his famous axioms: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” He explains in this letter his approach to non-violent direct-action demonstrations and he justified to his critics why he was in Birmingham and why he accepted being in jail.

He was a principled man of action—with emphasis on “principled”—something sorely lacking in today’s leaders.

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Daily Broadside | Society is Acutely Sick with More Than Covid-19

Daily Verse | Mark 13:37
“What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!'”

Monday’s Reading: Mark 14-16

Happy Monday! My parachuting school practices with 55-gallon black garbage bags while telling us to “roll like bananas.”

We live in a culture that is increasingly hostile and shows collective pathological gratification in the devaluing and destruction of others based on dubious moral claims and outright lies. We see it expressed in the violence of the BLM and Antifa movements, the cancel culture — and also in the hostility in the stands between fans of opposing teams.

NFL: Philadelphia Eagles and Baltimore Ravens

NHL: Nashville Predators and Seattle Kraken

NFL: Los Angeles Chargers and the Los Angeles Rams

MLB: San Diego Padres and Colorado Rockies

Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t recall seeing fights this regularly between fans. There’s always been taunting, yelling and the occasional hat-flicking, but these are hard-core bare-knuckle brawls. And many of them include women, as in this altercation between Carolina Panther and Minnesota Viking fans:

I’m no sociologist, but I think these outbursts, along with the near-anarchy of Burn Loot Murder, Inc. and Antifa, are evidence of the coarsening of our culture: the loss of self-control, the application of force to trivial matters, the lack of compassion and the devaluing of human life. It is quite barbaric in some cases.

I’ve heard some commentators say that a lot of this is the result of pent up frustration over being locked down and being otherwise restricted during the Chinese Panic Plague of 2020. On the other hand, maybe people are just showing their true selves. Or maybe both.

Whatever it is, our culture is displaying a sickness — and not just the Peking Pox variety. We’re showing a soul sickness.

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19-21)

Of course, the Bible doesn’t leave us without hope. It also goes on to describe what a life led by the Spirit of God looks like.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23)

What this implies is that our culture is not, generally speaking, led by the Spirit, i.e., we are a post-Christian society. I know most of us are aware of that, but I think it’s worth reiterating that whereas we still have with us the accoutrements of days gone by (e.g. the bas relief portrait of Moses in the House chamber that has hung there since 1950), they are mostly meaningless symbols to contemporary society except as irrelevant artifacts of an era long gone.

I used to say we were coasting on the fumes of our Christian heritage, but I don’t think even the fumes are with us any more — we’ve rolled about as far was we can go with the kinetic energy of our spiritual ancestors.

For believers, this presents a more difficult — but more illuminating — environment in which to demonstrate Christian character. Those who demonstrate love and joy and peace and the like will stand out like stars against a night sky.

The era in which we live is not ideal, but embrace it without ignoring the dysfunction, and watch for where God is at work around you. Who knows but that you were born for such a time as this?

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Daily Broadside | Bush 43’s Appalling Comparison is Revealing

Daily Verse | Daniel 6:23b
And when Daniel was lifted from the den, no wound was found on him, because he had trusted in his God.

It’s Tuesday my friends. I’ve had enough of kumquats in the fruit salad.

I wasn’t always interested in politics. In many ways, I was your typical naïve citizen who believed that all of our presidents and congressmen were good men and women who sought the best for the country, revered our founding documents, and were worthy of the office.

It wasn’t until later that I discovered that many of them were scoundrels who played dirty out of sight of the public. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed historic civil right legislation but predicted that, by doing so, he would “have those n*ggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years.” Then there was Richard M. Nixon, who infamously lied about what and when he knew about the Watergate break-in and eventually resigned in disgrace as he faced certain impeachment and removal from office.

Still later, as I matured in my political knowledge and understanding of how our government operates, I began to see that even Republicans — the party of Lincoln! — and, ostensibly I thought, the keepers of tradition and conservative values — weren’t “conservative” as a whole. There were conservatives, of course, in the Republican Party, but there were also moderates and liberal Republicans — even libertarians!

And then I began to see a frustrating pattern. Democrats would be shredding the Constitution, our traditions, our morals, and the Republicans would make a lot of noise opposing the Democrats — but nothing would change. Republicans just sit there and act as if they’re powerless to do anything.

In other words, it slowly dawned on me that many Republicans were part of the “establishment” just as the Democrats were. And that awareness left me feeling politically homeless.

I write all of that to set up what has been a further disappointment coming out of the 20th anniversary of September 11. Former president George W. Bush gave a short speech at the 9/11 memorial service for Flight 93 in Pennsylvania on Saturday. Bush was president when the Islamic jihadist terrorist attacks were carried out, and he helped set the tone and the direction for the nation in the immediate aftermath of the devastation. He was generally lauded for his leadership then.

But now this speech.

In his brief comments, Bush likened the American citizens who breached Capitol Hill on January 6 to the radical Islamic jihadists who flew suicide missions on September 11, killing nearly 3,000 innocent people.

There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home. But in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit and it is our continuing duty to confront them.

That’s right. George W. Bush compared American citizens protesting a clearly questionable election result to Islamic extremists. The only people to die that day were two of the protestors, with one being shot by a Capitol Hill officer and the other possibly being killed by Capitol Hill police using “a highly noxious gas on protesters.”

The protestors had no guns, didn’t kill anyone (not even the officers who subsequently died of other causes!) and most simply wandered through the building like lost tourists. Those that did cause damage should be charged and held accountable, as many are.

But it wasn’t an insurrection.

That didn’t stop Bush, whose comparison was appalling. While he didn’t specifically mention January 6, his words implied who he had in mind by leading with “their disdain for pluralism.” He didn’t mention BLM or Antifa, either, and we know those two movements, which celebrate “pluralism” and disdain whites, have been more destructive to our national bonds than anything that happened in January.

Bush is part of the swamp and his comments demonstrate a frightening fact: it’s not just the Democrats who despise conservatives — it’s the entire ruling class that they’re a part of, including men like George W. Bush.

Our political machine is rotten through and through, and those fighting against it from the inside, like Donald J. Trump was, are the exception.

“So interesting to watch former President Bush, who is responsible for getting us into the quicksand of the Middle East (and then not winning!), as he lectures us that terrorists on the ‘right’ are a bigger problem than those from foreign countries that hate America, and that are pouring into our Country right now,” Trump said in a statement distributed by Save America PAC.

[…]

“He shouldn’t be lecturing anybody!” Trump added.

George W. Bush agrees with the illegitimate junta that America’s greatest threat are patriots who dispute the last presidential election and are therefore “domestic terrorists” or, as some have called them, “the American Taliban.”

We are under the illusion that there are two main political parties fighting each other for power and influence, but when you get right down to it, they are all part of the same untouchable elite who disdain “Normal” Americans.

It’s deeply disappointing, but instructive.

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Daily Broadside | High School Teacher: “I Have 180 Days To Turn You Into Revolutionaries”

Daily Verse | Ezekiel 18:23
“Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign Lord. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?”

Happy Friday, my friends! I’m thinking of opening a shop in Wyoming called “Spur of the Moment” for impulsive cowboys.

After firing Broadside after Broadside about the disaster in Afghanistan over the last couple of weeks, I’m sure you’re probably wondering if I know that other things are happening in the world. I do, but the appalling and unnecessary (but intentional) failure in Afghanistan is so beyond the pale that it warranted the emphasis.

C.S. Lewis defined integrity as “doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” Unfortunately, you can’t trust cultural Marxists to do the right thing when no one is looking — you have to set up a sting to catch them. Project Veritas is phenomenal at setting up stings to reveal what the people in positions of power are doing behind the scenes.

Their latest example is of a high school teacher “boasting about politically indoctrinating his students at Inderkum High School.” Gabriel Gipe, who teaches an Advanced Placement Government class, told the interviewer, “I have 180 days to turn [students] into revolutionaries.”

Watch for yourself on the Project Veritas site.

I encourage you to watch the whole thing, which will be troubling for any parent who entrusts their impressionable children to the public school system. In particular, listen to two things that the overly tattooed Antifa Marxist says.

“I have an Antifa flag on my [classroom] wall and a student complained about that — he said it made him feel uncomfortable. Well, this [flag] is meant to make fascists feel uncomfortable, so if you feel uncomfortable, I don’t really know what to tell you. Maybe you shouldn’t be aligning with the values that this [flag] is antithetical to.”

See what he did there?

He replaced what we would consider a culture norm, i.e. “the values” the Antifa flag opposes (such as capitalism, hard work, personal responsibility and traditional morality and faith) with the values that the Antifa flag stands for (such as socialism, diversity, equity and “just do it” atheism). In other words, he’s telling the student that Antifa values are the norm, and if the student is uncomfortable with that, the student should think about changing his values. It’s the student who is off, not the teacher.

This is clearly indoctrination and the guy has no business whatsoever indoctrinating the kids he has in his classroom into his personal ideology. That’s not what he’s getting paid with taxpayer dollars to do.

The second thing to pay attention to is when he says, “There are three other teachers in my department that I did my credential program with — and they’re rad. They’re great people. They’re definitely on the same page.“

The school is infested with teachers who think like Mr. Gipe does.

That probably shouldn’t surprise us, but it does because we still don’t understand that the Left has been infiltrating our cultural institutions for decades, and now their “long march” is bearing its poisonous fruit. We’re naïve to think that the public schools are still teaching reading, writing and arithmetic or that teachers like Mr. Gipes are the exception.

They’re not. For instance, watch this.

Of course there are good teachers out there and of course kids are still learning some of the basics. But you only have to look at international educational surveys to see how far down the list the U.S. has fallen.

Back to Mr. Gipe. He has been placed on unpaid leave as a precursor to being terminated by the school. The Project Veritas video created an uproar in the community.

Sacramento Parents Demand Prosecution of AP History Teacher who Admits Communist Indoctrination of Students

At the intense Natomas Unified School Board meeting Wednesday evening, parents showed up in droves demanding justice for their children, demanding the teacher be fired, and even demanding criminal prosecution.

Video of furious parents at the Natomas school board meeting is available, before the board took a recess during the meeting, came back, took another recess, and then disappeared out the back door before the meeting ended, according to several parents.

It was apparent the school board did not have control over the emotional board meeting.

They didn’t have control? Good, it’s about time they didn’t have control. And it’s about time parents got involved in the school districts, replacing these woke and weasely school boards with parents who will fight the junior commies.

Another parent told the board, “this does not begin and end with him… this went on for years. Complaints were filed and nothing was done.” The parent asked for a full investigation to root this out, not just at Inderkum High School, but in the entire district. “Without warning, my daughters Constitutional Law class was changed to a Social Justice class,” he added.

“Complaints were filed and nothing was done.” That about sums up our entire educational and political institutions. Parents and concerned citizens have to be willing to step up and begin going on the offensive against the radical Left to eject them from their positions of influence.

That’s the only way that we can trust teachers and politicians to do the right thing when no one is looking.

We are a people under siege in our own country, led by a cabal of overt Marxists who hate the United States of America as envisioned by our Founders and are doing everything they can to wrest power away from We the People and hoard it unto themselves.

We need to wrest it back.

Have a good weekend.

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Daily Broadside | Two-Fisted Provocateurs: Part II

Daily Verse | Job 41:11
“Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.”

Happy Thursday, my Daily Broadside friends! Pants are required to enter this establishment.

I’m turning over the keyboard tomorrow to a childhood friend, military veteran, musician, author, fitness instructor and devoted Christian family man who blogs at Muscular Christianity Online. Bruce Gust and I go back to our early teens in a church youth group where his dad was a leader and mentor I admired. He blogs on politics (and other topics) from an unapologetic Christian perspective, and he’s agreed to provide a “Daily Broadside” for the next two weeks.

My thanks to him in advance. You’ll be in good hands.

Before I go, however, I owe you Part II of the essay I wrote about Antifa for Salvo magazine last year. Yesterday in Part I I explored the history of Antifa, including where it came from and how to define the movement. Today I explain why it’s important to understand this movement and showcase their most recent offense at the time of writing.

This article first appeared in Salvo #55.

Reason for Surveillance:
Antifa’s purported objective is to prevent the spread of fascism, as reflected in racist groups like the KKK, neo-Nazis, and white supremacists. But its concept of racism seems to have evolved to include “institutional” or “systemic” racism and “white privilege.” Antifa has often made common cause with Black Lives Matter, Inc., as indicated by how often “BLM” is spray-painted on monuments, buildings, barricades, and vehicles during protests and riots in which Antifa participates. Will Antifa’s definition of “fascist” expand to include all white people as intrinsically racist?

This isn’t a far-fetched concern. According to Scott Crow, a former Antifa organizer, liberals are starting to adopt Antifa’s radical ideals. “They would never have looked at (those ideals) before,” he said, “because they saw us as the enemy as much as the right-wingers [did].”8 If Antifa’s ideals go mainstream, white people, as well as Christians and conservatives of all colors, will increasingly become targets.

In fact, that has already happened. In February 2017, Antifa members set fires, threw rocks at police, and vandalized businesses in the course of protesting the appearance of Milo Yiannopoulos at the University of California—Berkeley.9 Numerous policemen and civilians have suffered violence at their hands.

Most Recent Offense:
In August 2020, Aaron “Jay” Danielson, a member of the conservative group Patriot Prayer, was shot to death on a street in Portland, Oregon, following a series of confrontations between participants in a pro-President Trump caravan and counter-protesters along the route.10 The shooting was caught on video, and the apparent shooter, Michael Reinoehl, later seemed to admit killing Danielson, allegedly in defense of “a friend of mine of color.”11 Earlier, Reinoehl had written a social media post proclaiming, “I am 100% ANTIFA all the way! I am willing to fight for my brothers and sisters! . . . Today’s protesters and Antifa are my brothers in arms.”12 Reinoehl was killed a few days later as investigators tried to arrest him near Olympia, Washington.

When Joe Biden claimed during his first debate with President Trump that “Antifa is an idea, not an organization,” the president responded: “When a bat hits you over the head, that’s not an idea. Antifa is bad. Antifa is a dangerous, radical group.”13 He’s right—it is a group. Rhetorical subterfuge must not be allowed to confuse us about who Antifa are or what they want.

Notes: Part II
8. CNN (May 31, 2020): https://edition.cnn.com/2017/08/14/us/what-is-antifa-trnd/index.html.
9. New York Post (June 1, 2020): https://nypost.com/article/what-is-antifa-and-why-does-trump-want-to-label-it-a-terror-group.
10. Washington Post (Aug. 30, 2020): washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/08/29/blm-activists-counterprotesters-clash-portland-leading-arrests.
11. The Independent (Sept. 4, 2020): independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/portland-protests-trump-supporter-killing-michael-forest-reinoehl-aaron-jay-danielson-a9704296.html.
12. Ibid.
13. Real Clear Politics (Sept. 29, 2020): realclearpolitics.com/video/2020/09/29/biden_antifa_is_an_idea_not_an_organization.html.

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Daily Broadside | Two-Fisted Provocateurs: Part I

Daily Verse | Job 40:2
“Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!”

Happy Wednesday, Broadsiders. I’ve caught you in the middle of something.

Last year I had the opportunity to write an essay about Antifa for Salvo magazine that was subsequently published in the Winter 2020 issue. I’m pleased to present it here in two parts.

Part I explores the history of Antifa. Where did it come from and what is it? Tomorrow in Part II I’ll explain why it’s important to understand this movement and showcase their most recent offense at the time of writing.

This article first appeared in Salvo #55.

Background:
Shortly after Donald J. Trump became president in 2017, the term “Antifa” entered the United States’ consciousness and lexicon. While most of us have heard of Antifa, many of us don’t understand what it is, where it came from, or why it’s here.

The word “Antifa” is short for “anti-fascist” or “anti-fascism.” Fascism is “a political philosophy, movement, or regime . . . that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.”1 The word “fascism” comes from the Latin fasces, which means “bundles.” In ancient Rome, fasces of sticks or rods bound together with an ax became the symbol of a magistrate’s power and authority, and Benito Mussolini, the founder of Italian fascism, adopted this emblem when he became dictator of Italy in 1925.

Antifa then sprang up as a far-left, militant reaction to Mussolini, and later, to Germany’s Adolph Hitler. The Antifaschistische Aktion was the paramilitary arm of the German Communist Party, which opposed Hitler’s National Socialist Party, i.e., the Nazis.

Following World War II and the defeat of the Axis powers, fascist governments collapsed across Europe, but ideologically related movements lived on. It wasn’t until the 1980s, however, that militant anti-fascism re-emerged. It came to the U.S. in the late 1980s and 1990s, using the original abbreviated name of Antifa, and over time evolved into its modern incarnation.

Ideologically, today’s Antifa defines itself as allowing “no platform for fascism,” meaning that it aims to keep its opponents from having a public voice. So it shows up at public rallies, college campus lectures, and similar gatherings to confront and squelch the fascism it purports to find there. Populated by a variety of revolutionaries (e.g., Marxists, anarchists, and social democrats) who “don’t feel constrained by conventional norms,”2 Antifa embraces direct action, using violent tactics to force change, rather than working peacefully for policy reform.

Antifa is not, however, a national organization with a recognized formal leadership (unlike Black Lives Matter, for instance). This has led some politicians and opinion leaders, seizing FBI Director Christopher Wray’s statement that Antifa is “not a group or an organization,” but “a movement or an ideology,”3 to minimize it as no more than an “idea.” But Wray also said that the FBI has observed Antifa individuals “coalescing regionally into what you might describe as small groups, or nodes,” which the agency has been “actively investigating.”4

So Antifa is an ideology, yes, but an ideology expressing itself through a loose affiliation of individuals and groups that engage in “militant street activism.”5 And although there is no national structure, that doesn’t mean there isn’t any organization. Indeed, it has not gone unnoticed that “in city after city, the tactics, banners, clothing, weaponry, etc. [of Antifa activists] have been virtually identical.” Moreover, the “lasers, explosives, military helmets, protective gloves, body armor, and other deadly weaponry” used by “local protesters” don’t pop up out of nowhere. “Someone selects them, orders them, pays for them, and delivers them.”6

Journalist Andy Ngô, himself a victim of Antifa violence, is aware of several Antifa groups, among them: Rose City Antifa (Portland, Oregon); Antifa Seven Hills (Richmond, Virginia); Antifa Sacramento (California); Atlanta (Georgia) Antifascists; and the Youth Liberation Front (mainly on the West Coast, but also with chapters in the Midwest and the Carolinas). “There are many, many antifa groups,” Ngô writes. “And they are violent.”7 They also often network together at the regional or national level, and use social media to coordinate their actions. That’s why we hear individuals describe themselves as members of Antifa.

Notes: Part I
1. Merriam-Webster (as of Oct. 16, 2020).
2. Vox (June 1, 2020):msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/antifa-explained/ar-BB14T80j.
3. Quoted in National Review (Oct. 1, 2020): nationalreview.com/corner/fbi-director-wray-didnt-call-antifa-an-idea-he-called-it-a-movement-or-ideology.
4. Ibid.
5. Loren Balhorn, “The Lost History of Antifa,” Jacobin (May 8, 2017): jacobinmag.com/2017/05/antifascist-movements-hitler-nazis-kpd-spd-germany-cold-war.
6. Brian Camenker, “The Riots: More Questions than Answers,” American Thinker (Sept. 17, 2020): americanthinker.com/articles/2020/09/the_riotsd_more_questions_than_answers_on_the_riots_.html.
7. Andy Ngô (Sept. 29, 2020): https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1311128023085625344.

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Daily Broadside | How To Defeat Uncertainty Between the Races

Daily Verse | 2 Chronicles 12:14
King Rehoboam did evil because he had not
set his heart on seeking the Lord.

Happy Monday my friends. I’ve only met one person I wanted to spend my whole life with.

It’s no secret that our country is being torn apart by Critical Race Theory, which posits that power is based on race, rather than personal character, skill or achievement. In today’s narrative, if you’re white, you’re inherently racist and therefore an oppressor; if you’re a person of color, and especially if you’re black, you’re a victim of a power imbalance that is the result of a rigged system.

This ideology has swept colleges, corporations and, unfortunately, even churches. Not all churches, not all corporations, not all colleges, but enough to further erode our culture. We’ve seen with blazing clarity this last year the effect it’s had through Burn Loot Murder and antifa’s destructive marauding through our cities. We’ve seen it with companies like Coca-Cola that tell us to “try to be less white.” And we see it with “woke” majority-white churches that abase themselves before black brethren for sins they didn’t commit against them and preach a gospel of social justice.

I realized recently that while I completely reject CRT and the nonsense it espouses, I’ve nonetheless been affected by it personally. And by that I mean that I have become hyper-aware of race. Because of the constant drumbeat of “white supremacy,” “white privilege,” “systemic” or “institutional” racism and how aggrieved blacks are portrayed in the media, I find myself second-guessing interactions I have with someone of another color—especially blacks.

Last week an Amazon delivery truck pulled into my driveway while I was outside doing some yard work. Since I was there, I walked over to the truck to take the parcel from the driver, figuring I could save him some time. As I approached the truck, I saw that the driver was a young black man.

Normally I’d walk up, say “Hi” and complete the transaction without giving it a second thought. But this time my brain started asking questions even though I hadn’t asked it to.

“Does he think I’m a racist?”

“I wonder if he resents delivering packages to white people in the suburbs?”

“I wonder if he’s angry at me?”

“Will wishing him a good evening once I’ve got the package be interpreted as I think I’m superior to him?”

“Does anything I say even matter to him?”

These questions all floated, unwelcome, through my mind as I walked over to the truck. Note that I couldn’t possibly answer any of them—they all depended on what he thought, and I couldn’t possibly know what he thought unless he told me.

In the end, I greeted him, he said “Hey,” he gave me my package, I thanked him and said, “Have a good one.” He wished me the same. No sign of contempt from him. Just a guy doing his job.

But the experience deeply bothered me. I have never been so conscious of race and have always treated everyone the same, no matter their skin color or national origin. I can’t claim to have done so perfectly but, frankly, I’d be surprised if anyone can. Motivated by my Christian faith, I keep in mind that I’ve never locked eyes with anyone who didn’t matter to God. As the old children’s song goes,

Jesus loves the little children,
All the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black and white,
They are precious in His sight,
Jesus loves the little children of the world.

I leaned on that knowledge and brushed the other thoughts away from my mind. But that’s evidence of the damage being done to our society. The few people I’ve shared that story with have immediately recognized themselves in it. CRT activists are causing whites to second-guess themselves, creating uncertainty. Uncertainty leads to division and demoralizes those who can’t sort it out.

Over the weekend I flew to Atlanta and stayed overnight in a hotel in Marietta, Georgia. I shared the elevator several times with black men and women. It never got wonky, it was always friendly and the only vibe I got was from a young black guy wearing a “Black Lives Matter” facemask. He didn’t say anything or acknowledge my presence even though we were the only two in the elevator.

But so what? Everyone else was friendly. I took some encouragement from that. Maybe most blacks are cool with whites; maybe they don’t buy what BLM is selling. Most whites I know are cool with blacks and are horrified to be thought of as racist.

Me, I’m going to keep going back to the scriptures. That’s my foundation. If I do what God calls me to do, then I’ve done what is right—even if those questions present themselves—and the grievance mongers can complain to Him if I don’t go along with the program.