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A flyer went up on Twitter last week about a "free speech rally" for Proud Boys and other nationalists in San Francisco's Dolores Park on October 17 but this event has all the hallmarks of the weird, sometimes fictional, antifa-antagonizing rallies that happened in SF and Berkeley in 2017, which were mostly poorly attended gatherings of kooks with homemade shields gunning for street battles with libtards.

The Proud Boys are hopping mad about the fact that they were kicked off of Twitter two years ago. And while they're relegated to the right-wing circle jerk known as Parler, a bunch of gay men last week claimed the #ProudBoys hashtag to post a bunch of photos of men kissing men and the like on Twitter and Instagram, flooding social media and confusing other Americans who heard Proud Boys mentioned at last week's presidential debate and didn't know who they were.

So now, a Proud Boys event that's apparently being organized by a Black Texas man named Philip Anderson is scheduled for October 17 in San Francisco, with a focus on "free speech" and "big tech," and it appears to be, in part, a protest against Twitter itself. The rally is scheduled for 1 p.m. next Saturday, and then at 4 p.m. the flyer calls for some sort of protest outside Twitter headquarters. The rally has a website under the name #TeamSaveAmerica.

But as we learned in 2017 and saw again in Portland this year, among the multiple agendas of the alt-right crowd, one uniting purpose is going to war with black-clad youths in the street whom they see as a threat to patriotism and law and order while the black-clad youths see all these self-described patriots as fascists and racists and Trump supporters, which most of them are.

The original flyer for the October 17 event features a bunch of scheduled speakers, some of whom apparently hadn't agreed to attend like this QAnon conspiracy peddler who calls himself QAnon Obi Wan, who argued publicly with Anderson about his inclusion on the flyer.

The Berkeley Antifa Twitter account has taken the bait, and posted an alert about the event last week.

Also, Anderson claims that his group will have "police protection" at the rally.

Also listed as a speaker is former fringe mayoral candidate Ellen Lee Zhou, who infamously paid for a billboard last year with a racist depiction of a barefoot London Breed with her feet on a desk while she counts cash, apparently taken from human traffickers.

Now, to take a step back... Anderson has fewer than 1,400 followers on Twitter, and he is not a leader of the Proud Boys organization. The current leader, Enrique Tarrio, is listed as a speaker at this San Francisco event, but there's no guarantee he's agreed to this and he can't respond on Twitter because he's not on the platform. There's very little way to verify that any of these people have concrete plans to come to San Francisco and you can bet they haven't sought any permit for this supposed rally. Update: Rec & Parks spokesperson Tamara Aparton confirms that no one has applied for a permit for this October 17 event.

Like Anderson, Tarrio is Black (he identifies as Afro-Cuban), he lives in South Florida, and following the uproar after last week's debate, he spoke to a Miami TV station to declare that the Proud Boys are not a white supremacist group, they are not racist, and they are just "misunderstood." Speaking to the same broadcast, a regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, Sheri Zvi, described the Proud Boys as espousing "misogynistic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, transphobic and anti-immigrant rhetoric [that] is often paired with violence directed at left-wing protesters."

The Proud Boys organization was founded in 2016 by VICE Media co-founder turned alt-right figure Gavin McInnes. As the Southern Poverty Law Center explains, they are best known for their "western chauvinism" that comes with a lot of "anti-Muslim and misogynist rhetoric." McInnes has long railed against PC culture, and another tenet of the group is the "veneration of the housewife" and a pledge to not masturbate in order to have better sex. Group members have been arrested in multiple violent incidents in the last several years most recently a 50-year-old self-described Proud Boy named Alan Swinney was arrested in Portland for injuring protesters there with a paintball gun.

While members of the Proud Boys, and McInnes, have repeatedly tried to deny any type of white nationalism, their members have been present at events with white nationalists and a former Proud Boy, Jason Kessler, was an organizer of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville three years ago.

So-called "third degree" members of the Proud Boys get Proud Boys tattoos on their arms. And according to Tarrio's Wikipedia page, he became a "fourth degree" member, which is "a distinction reserved for those who get into a physical altercation, after punching a counter-protester in the face in June 2018."

In San Francisco, a group of 20 Proud Boys held a meetup in October 2017 at Southern Pacific Brewing Company in the Mission District, after which the brewery issued an apology.

Update: Berkeley Antifa has put out a call to "wear black" and show up to "defend Dolores" on October 17, because they are nothing if not good at taking bait.

Philip Anderson, who may or may not even have his plane ticket to San Francisco, calls them racist for attacking his event, because he's Black.

Photo: Sand Crain

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Proud Boys Rally Possibly Planned For Dolores Park (But Don't Assume These Jokers Are That Organized) - SFist

Federal investigators have foiled a domestic terrorism plot, hatched by an anti-government extremist group, to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer and take hostages at the state Capitol. Thats according to an unsealed criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan.

Six men face federal charges for conspiracy to commit kidnapping. Another seven face preliminary charges under the states anti-terrorism statutes, according to Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel.

The charges have sparked a broader conversation about the rise of what federal law enforcement refers to as domestic violent extremists. The Department of Homeland Security released its Homeland Threat Assessment two days ago, noting that last year was the most deadly year for domestic violent extremism in the United States since the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing. The report says that white supremacist extremists are the most persistent and lethal threat of domestic terrorist attacks.

I have found, at least in the past, that sometimes the public and judges did not take these militia groups as seriously as perhaps they should have. Sometimes discounting them as crackpots, tinfoil hat wearers, that sort of thing. And in fact, that doesnt make them any less dangerous. I submit it possibly makes them more dangerous, said Barbara McQuade, a law professor at the University of Michigan and a former federal prosecutor.

Stateside's conversation with Barbara McQuade

Domestic terrorist groups are often hard to prosecute, according to McQuade. Many supporters of international terrorist groups can be prosecuted if the FBI finds that they provide services or monetary aid to those groups. But that same material-support statute does not exist for domestic terrorist groups.

Prosecutors, McQuade says, use the term left of boom to describe FBI agents or military personnels legal ability to disrupt terrorist groups as they near a planned violent incident. When it comes to domestic terrorism plots, McQuade explains, federal law enforcement has to have more extensive evidence of a planned attack before acting.

The closer you get to the incident, the more dangerous the group becomes because they got the weapons and theyre ready to go. So it is more difficult and challenging to take down these groups when theyre domestic groups because you have to get closer to boom, McQuade said.

Alexandra Minna Stern is the author of the book Proud Boys and the White Ethnostate: How the Alt-Right is Warping the American Imagination. She studies the recent rise of right-wing extremism in the United States and says that the past 20 years have given rise to what she calls the fourth wave of far-right movements--or what is often referred to as the alt-right. The groups that fall under the umbrella of alt-right arent monolithic, Stern says, and cover a wide range of far-right views and ideologies, she says.

Stateside's conversation with Alexandra Minna Stern

But what weve seen over the past two years, is really a more concerted rise of white supremacism and white nationalism and in particular, groups that are willing to take to the streets, take to the ground, and basically, as we see with the situation with Governor Whitmer, devise elaborate plots to overthrow sitting governors and to, in the grand scheme of militias, to overthrow democracy and the U.S. government.

Social media can be a recruiting ground for peopleusually young menwho get involved with extremist groups. The men charged in the alleged plot against Governor Whitmer first came to the attention of federal law enforcement early in 2020 through social media posts that talked about violently overthrowing members of state governments and law enforcement, according to the FBI complaint. Over the summer, the complaint says, the men gathered for weapons training and to lay out a plan to kidnap the governor from her vacation home and try her for treason. FBI agents say some of the men had planned to meet on Wednesday of this week to make a payment on explosives and exchange tactical gear.

Stern notes that the pandemic, a divisive political climate, and social unrest have created an environment in which violent extremism thrives. The stress and uncertainty of the current moment has created a dangerous pressure cooker, says Stern.

And were living in a context where we have a president who, with his tweetstorms and other actions, is actively and explicitly emboldening these types of actors. And all of this is leading up, I think in now 28 days, to a really defining election in this country. I would not be surprised if we saw, unfortunately, I dont like to say this, but if we saw further instances like this. Not just in Michigan but throughout the country.

See the rest here:
Michigan, militias, and terrorism: Experts give context to alleged Whitmer kidnapping plot - Michigan Radio

As the Boredoms have repeatedly proved, you can't have too many drummers. If anything, the lineup of Portland-based instrumental collective Secret Drum Band needs moreon their recent second album, Chuva (Moon Glyph), they've usually got two or three at a time.

Thankfully SDB also bring two things to the table that are even more urgently necessary than more drummers: antifascism (two songs use percussion parts originally improvised during a counterdemonstration at an alt-right rally) and environmentalism (two other songs were commissioned by the Portland chapter of the Oregon Native Plant Society, and almost every track uses field recordingsincluding a few of Amazonian ants).

SDB actually has four drummers on Chuva, but never all at once. Two of them are ensemble directors Lisa Schonberg and Allan Wilson, who also contribute synths, processing, field recordings, and occasional wordless vocals; the other two are Anthony Brisson and Heather Treadway. Wilson is formerly of !!!, and Schonberg and Treadway used to play together in Explode Into Colors. The new record also features at least eight guestsamong them guitarist Marisa Anderson and former Decemberists drummer Rachel Blumberg, playing synth mallets.

On her website, Schonberg explains that SDB's core members "document habitats and soundscapes in their compositions, with the goal of drawing attention to issues concerning endangered species, habitat loss, and other environmental issues." She also says that Secret Drum Band's music alludes to "Liquid Liquid, the Creatures, and Crash Worship."

I have irrationally strong feelings about Crash Worship, but I won't dispute the comparison beyond saying that SDB sound way less evil. I like the rough-and-ready feel of Chuva: the unfussy, energetic drumming centers acoustic rather than electronic sounds, and the elements that might read as "new age" (heavily reverbed chants, drifty synths, wilderness ambience) stick to supporting roles, inflecting the percussion with extra color and texture. The compositions evolve and progress in compelling ways, not just by adding and subtracting layers but also by shifting through distinct movements and sections.

The sound of Chuva isn't polished, but it isn't rough or unfinished either. There's no distortion, no dissonance, no noise to speak of. But this isn't wallpapery, unchallenging hippie bullshiteven though the music is warm, inviting, and sometimes serene, it's never directionless or lazy. Every track pushes forward with resolve and purpose, driven not by aggression but by confident collective strength. And that's punk as fuck.v

The Listener is a weekly sampling of music Reader staffers love. Absolutely anything goes, and you can reach us at thelistener@chicagoreader.com.

View post:
Secret Drum Band build their beats as an act of collective strength - Chicago Reader

How much do we really know about Stephen Miller?

A senior adviser to President Donald Trump, the 35-year-old Miller has emerged as the leading far-right ideologue in this administration outlasting his only real competitor, Steve Bannon. By all accounts, Miller is the driving force behind Trumps most extreme anti-immigration measures from the separation of migrant families at the border to Trumps infamous Muslim ban. Now hes in the news for an entirely different reason: On Tuesday, he was the latest top Trump aide to test positive for coronavirus.

As my Vox colleague Jane Coaston pointed out, Miller delights in provocation for provocations sake. And yet, in this role, he has gone beyond triggering the libs to shepherding real policies with real consequences. Hes also been enormously successful at reinforcing his power in one of the most chaotic White Houses weve ever seen.

A new book called Hatemonger by journalist Jean Guerrero takes a deep dive into Millers background where he comes from, the events and people that shaped his worldview, and what he really wants. Its a fascinating look at Millers upbringing in southern California and the Trump-like family dynamics that turned him into a conservative firebrand.

Millers ambitions are all the more important in light of recent comments from a former Trump DHS official suggesting Miller has a list of shock and awe immigration orders to unleash if Trump wins a second term, orders that were unacceptable to issue in a first presidential term because they knew they would lose voters because they would be so extreme.

I reached out to Guerrero to talk about Millers life and ideology and, hopefully, get a sense of what those extreme orders might look like. Miller, Guerrero argues, might be a troll, but hes also much more than that and we dismiss him at our own peril.

A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows.

The premise of your book is that we should take Stephen Miller seriously because hes someone who genuinely thinks hes on a quest to save the country. What does that mean?

It means hes a fanatic. I really believe that Stephen Miller is one of the few people in the White House who has a firm ideology and has invested in that ideology over the course of his life so much that its become inseparable from his identity. And that ideology is basically that multiculturalism poses an existential threat to Western civilization, as we know it.

So his entire obsession with the immigration system and trying to limit the number of people from different countries, particularly from Latin America and Africa, to come here, it goes back to that belief that multiculturalism is a threat to civilization, which is a prominent view among white supremacist groups and its why they want a white majority in this country.

These are ideas that Miller learned at a very young age and over the years invested more and more in them. My sense, based on the conversations I had with people who have known him since he was a kid, is that this has become his lifes mission and it drives everything he does now that he has real power.

Its a little surprising to hear you say that Miller has a firm ideology because he built his reputation as a troll, and we dont typically think of trolls as serious ideologues.

His friends tell me that, at first, they also couldnt tell whether he was joking, And maybe early on in his life, it was less about ideology and more about being a teenager and looking for attention and finding ways to stand out and wanting to make certain people laugh. But over the years, he learned that being provocative was a good way to get attention and power and so that become a key political tool for him.

So yeah, I do think Miller started out as a kind of troll but eventually the ideas he was flirting with became a huge part of his identity and he really believed it. This sense of mission he has is inseparable from his identity, hes consumed by it. Whatever lightheartedness he may have had when he was younger is gone we should see him above all as a committed ideologue.

I always wonder with these alt-right types if they began as trolls and picked up a coherent ideology later or if its the other way around. I guess its the former in Millers case, but also a little complicated because there was real resentment pretty early on in Millers life.

Even though I said he may have started out as a troll, its misleading to think of his early years that way. As you said, there was a lot of actual resentment present in his early years, particularly towards students of color, and the trolling was often a mask for that resentment.

Where did that resentment come from?

He started to express his conservative and contrarian views at a time when his family had lost a lot of money, and he had to move from a very affluent part of Santa Monica to a less affluent part. And he looked around at his high school, his very diverse public high school, where otherwise he mightve attended a mostly white private high school and he was clearly annoyed that so many of his class were getting special attention and having their voices elevated. And this is when he starts to express his resentments out loud. He becomes more vocal and more aggressive.

When I look at some of these clips of Miller, especially when he was younger, its so hard tell where the trolling ends and the earnest beliefs begin. Everything he says is tinged by that half-cocked grin, and you can see it still today. Is it just impossible to disentangle the performance from the ideology in Millers case?

I think theyre impossible to disentangle, partly because he takes such pleasure in triggering people. When he goes on television or gives interviews, he sometimes has this glimmer in his eye and will say things that are kind of humorous but its never totally clear if its a joke. But what hes really doing is trying to expose what he thinks is the false moral outrage of a lot of progressives this is his thing. So yeah, its trolling but its also a way of advancing his ideology because he believes trolling is an effective way to do politics.

There are a lot of bizarre anecdotes in the book, but the one about Miller and the high janitors is so revealing. Can you explain briefly what thats about?

He gave this speech at his high school where he was screaming, Why do we have to pick up our trash when we have janitors to do it for us. And I remember reading his friend, Chris Morriss justification of it. Oh, it was a joke. Obviously, it was a joke. It was just meant to get people to laugh.

One of the questions I wanted to answer was, how much of a joke was it really? I went back and interviewed a lot of his classmates and former friends and I dont think it was a joke. There were numerous instances, not just in high school but also in college, where he would throw his trash or leave his trash out and encourage others to do the same, saying, This is what we have the janitors here to do. And at one point, he told a teacher who was encouraging students at a rally to clean up after themselves, he interrupted her and said, No, dont listen to her. This is what we have janitors here to do. They need a job. So throw your trash on the ground.

It struck a lot of classmates as not only classist but racist. At Millers high school, there were a handful of janitors for this very large student population, and they were mostly people of color. So giving that speech the way he gave it made a lot of classmates feel like he was trying to incite a race riot at the school and thats why they had to push him off the stage, because he wouldnt stop talking and the student body was getting really riled up.

So what do you think hes doing in the White House? Does he really want to change the world or is the White House the ultimate trolling platform?

Its an interesting question. Nothing in any of my discussions with his colleagues in the White House have indicated that he has looked to influence other countries consciously. I do think that it would be a natural next step for Miller to try to spread his ideology overseas and coordinate with others and share his views in other countries, and try to turn that into some kind of global movement, as we saw Steve Bannon attempting to do.

I think Miller would be more effective and more dangerous than Bannon by the way, because I dont think that Bannon has a real ideology the way that Stephen Miller does. So far, hes been extremely focused on the United States. He has an almost tunnel vision for immigration policies in the US and thats what hes focused on. But I wouldnt be surprised he expanded his focus outward in the future.

What would you say is the most important thing people should know about Miller?

I think people should know that he is arguably the most powerful advisor in the White House. And he is a case study in radicalization, someone who was consumed by an extreme ideology at a very young age, and then went on to become one of the most powerful advisers in the White House, shaping not only immigration policy, but Trumps speeches and even the reelection strategy for 2020.

Why is Miller the one adviser, apart from Trumps family members, that has survived all these years?

Its a few things. The most important is that Miller gets Trump emotionally, psychologically, even spiritually. Part of it is that Miller grew up in a family that was very similar to Donald Trumps. Several people described Millers father to me as Trump-like. He was tangled up in numerous legal disputes and bankruptcies related to his real estate company over the years, as Miller was growing up. He is described in court documents as being a master of evasion and manipulation. He was described to me as being very combative. I think this experience helps Miller manage his relationship with Trump, helps him manage Trumps personality.

The other part of it is that Miller is always tasks himself as a devoted vehicle for Trumps agenda and is careful not to overshadow his boss. And this is partly one of the sources of his power within the White House. Whenever he wants something done, he invokes Trump. He invokes Trumps desires, Trumps demands. He invokes Trumps name. So hes constantly channeling Trump and this makes officials in the White House afraid to challenge him, because its like they would be challenging the president. And theyre aware of his special relationship with the president.

So this elevates Millers power within the bureaucracy, but it also elevates his power over Trump personally, because it works for Trumps ego, unlike other people who have exaggerated their influence in the White House. Miller is more comfortable in Trumps shadow.

What do you think Miller does after Trump? Does he find another political vehicle or is he likely to get involved some other way?

His initial goal was to be a prosecutor and then become a senator. I think becoming a prosecutor is not on his mind anymore, but I do think its possible that he might still run for office somewhere. I think its possible he might try and make a living as a commentator on conservative outlets.

I do think that if Donald Trump loses the election, Miller will double down on his ideology and look for new ways to elevate it through the media, something hes very good at doing. He understands the media and has been exploiting it since he was a teenager going on conservative talk radio in southern California. And if Trump wins in November, well, I think hes going to double down on his agenda and become even more powerful.

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How Stephen Miller became a top Trump aide in the White House - Vox.com

People like McCusker, Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and the N.S.C. expert Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman are the sort of civil servants Michael Lewis celebrated in his book about Trumps assault on the bureaucracy, The Fifth Risk, another of Lozadas favorites. They do due diligence, they adhere to protocol. Their truth is not postmodern. They do their jobs without fanfare; they do not turn their work into self-aggrandizing performance art. Their rigor is what makes our federal government legitimate and credible, despite its flaws.

Impeachment was a hard case. Trumps shenanigans were illegal, and definitely unseemly, but they didnt rise to the level of bipartisan horror necessary for a successful conviction. In the end, the Democrats probably did themselves more harm than good. But what Trump on Trial makes clear is that the Republican response was an all-out assault on regular order, expertise, law, diplomacy and the quotidian chores of holding a democracy together. I had forgotten how blatant it was. Elements of the Civil Service have decided that they, not the president, are really in charge, said Devin Nunes, the California Republican. Matt Gaetz, the Florida Republican, paraphrased what he thought was the Democrats message: We the elite, we the permanent Washington, we the smart folks, have decided that this is not acceptable conduct. Or, as Trump told one of his rallies, Were dealing with people that dont respect you. The Michigan Democrat Elissa Slotkin, a former intelligence analyst and senior Defense Department official, saw herself in civil servants like Yovanovitch and Vindman: Their life was her life. It was an ethos shared by her friends, especially the ones who had sworn an oath in the military. Slotkin went back to the nations founding documents: The framers had warned against the danger of Americas leaders soliciting foreign interference in the countrys internal affairs. Hadnt this president admitted to doing exactly that?

There could not be a more obvious example of Yuval Levins dialectic. The Republicans were all about What do I want? The Democrats worried, How should I act? The parties had traded their traditional places. The counterculture never died, Lozada writes of the alt-right movement, summarizing the views of the journalist Angela Nagle. It just switched sides. Transgression now lives on the right, dogmatism on the left. The Democrats have become traditionalists. The Republicans, a most illiberal group of libertarians, tear down the pillars of the temple. The former Trump adviser Steve Bannons nihilism is the spiritual heir to Abbie Hoffmans jolly anarchy in the 1960s. What losers and suckers the traditionalists were! To read Trump on Trial in the context of What Were We Thinking is to be scalded. The pain is excruciating.

Carlos Lozada is a book critic, not a policy wonk. He doesnt propose specific solutions to our current state of disgrace, but he does offer a vision of American stability being eviscerated by the publics need to be entertained. This reminded me of the dichotomy that Machiavelli posited in The Discourses: the contest between virt and ozio. Virt is the quality that keeps a republic strong: It is rigor and responsibility and intellectual achievement, albeit with a distressing tinge of militarism. Ozio is indolence; it is the laziness that overtakes a republic when it is not at war or in crisis. In America, we experienced 70 years of unprecedented peace and prosperity, without a perceived existential threat, from 1946 to 2016, a bacchanal of ozio. In the process, far too many of us lost the habits of citizenship. Truth became malleable. Morality became relative. Achievement became pass-fail and, more recently, just showing up. Rigor was for chumps. You didnt have to do anything to become famous, except be an influencer. And to be an influencer, you didnt need to train or study, although plastic surgery branding certainly helped. You didnt have to serve or sacrifice; that was for chumps, too. This was the America that elected Donald Trump president. What were we thinking? We werent. Critical thinking was just too hard and another episode of Duck Dynasty or Keeping Up With the Kardashians always beckoned.

More:
Does an Intellectual History of the Trump Era Exist? It Does Now - The New York Times