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Elon Musk is no stranger to controversy.

Aside from making billions of dollars and (hopefully) living on Mars one day, Musks primary occupation seems to be infuriating people up on Twitter.

A prime example of this happened in back May when Musk tweeted the cryptic message take the red pill.

Musks tweet caused huge backlash, including from Matrix director Lily Wachowski, who replied in a colourful way...

Why was this such a big deal?

On a basic level, taking the red pill (or the blue pill, for the matter) is a reference to the moment in The Matrix when Neo must choose between swallowing the hard truth in the form of the red pill, or take the blue pill and remain in a state of blissful ignorance. (Spoiler: he takes the red pill)

The concept of 'taking the red pill' has struck a chord with everyone from leftists to "men's rights" activists.

But the meme is well known for its association with the alt-right.

To the group of hardcore conservatives who primarily communicate via websites like 4chan and Reddit, being "redpilled" in means rejecting previously held leftist social ideals and accepting a world view which is heavily socially conservative. To some, taking the red pill means accepting white supremacy, while to others it means realising that they live in a world that favours women over men.

There is no single definition of what being redpilled means, even amongst the alt-right. For instance, whilst it has been linked to racist ideologies, American conservative Candace Owens runs a YouTube channel called Red Pill Black, where she espouses conservatism for African-Americans.

So was Musk's tweet an endorsement of the alt-right, Republicans or Trump?

People certainly seemed to take it that way at the time. Grimess mother (a Canadian journalist) called him out on Twitter, and Trumps daughter Ivanka gleefully accepted what she perceived as an endorsement.

But now Musk has confirmed that his red pill tweet was not an endorsement of Trump or any political agenda.

In an interview with the New York Times, Musk said that he did not have a political message behind the tweet:

No, its just: Accept reality as it is as opposed to what you wish it were.

On Ivankas quote-tweet, he said:

I think she was interpreting it through more of a political lens then it was intended.

This will no doubt be a blow for Trump, who has been complimentary of Musk, even describing him as one of our great geniuses. Musk sat on business advisory councils for Trump early in his administration but left once he removed America from the Paris climate agreement.

Musk tends to change his mind a fair bit when it comes to politics. Last week he threw his support behind Kanye West's bizarre campaign, before appearing to backtrack after West made several anti-abortion and anti-vaxx comments.

Anyway, Trump has until November to secure Musk's vote, so there's still time for an actual Twitter endorsement. And if 2020's shown us anything, it's to expect the unexpected.

Follow this link:
Elon Musk has finally confirmed whether his take the red pill tweet was a Trump endorsement - indy100

Tucker Carlson is capable of only two facial expressions. One is a deeply furrowed brow that narrows his eyes to a point at which they almost disappear, not dissimilar to the face a child makes when they are angry, or lost, or both. He uses this expression when he is describing the point of view of someone with whom he disagrees. The other is a wide-eyed look of pleading which sends his eyebrows at least an inch in the other direction. It is an expression meant to portray logic and reason, of why-do-you-hate-America indignity. He uses it chiefly when describing his own views and solutions to the problems facing the country.

All of this is to say that if eyes are windows to the soul, Carlsons spirit is black and white. He is a binary man whose whole career has been defined by his opposition to, and his apparent hatred of, other people and ideas. And at a time when America is more polarised than ever, he is having a moment.

Tucker Carlson Tonight, his daily show on Fox News, became the highest-rated programme of all cable news over the last quarter, with an average audience of 4.3 million viewers. His voice bounces off the walls in the White House residence each evening, where the president is an avid watcher. Republican strategists have encouraged him to mount his own run for the most powerful office in the world.

Sharing the full story, not just the headlines

The upcoming election has a real possibility of making Trump a one-term president, and conservatives are already looking for a vessel to keep Trumpism alive. Could Tucker Carlson, a man whose fortunes have risen in tandem with Trumps, outlast him?

*****

Carlsons breakout television role was not so different to what he does today. In the early 2000s, he played the voice of the right on CNNs Crossfire, a show that pitched liberals against conservatives in gladiatorial nightly debates. The format first aired in the 1980s and was revived when Carlson was brought in to do battle with alternating hosts from the left, Paul Begala and James Carville.

The show was emblematic of the growing trend in cable news at the time to chase ratings by setting up fights between their guests it was Punch and Judy punditry. It worked for a while, but viewers soon grew tired of it. The issue came to a head in an infamous appearance on the show in October 2005 by Jon Stewart, who took Begala and Carlson to task for their performative and partisan on-air fights, accusing them of hurting America.

Youre doing theatre, when you should be doing debate, he told them, to applause from Crossfires own audience. Here is what I wanted to tell you guys: stop. You have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably.

That show was seen as a turning point. When it was cancelled three months later, Jonathan Klein, then-president of CNN, said he sympathised with Stewarts arguments.

Carlson was 35 when the show was canned. The Stewart dressing down was described by one YouTube commenter as Carlsons villain origin story, perhaps in recognition of the transformation he undertook over the next few years.

Following a three-year stint at MSNBC, during which his show was plagued by low ratings, Carlson co-founded the Daily Caller, a news website pitched as the conservative answer to Huffington Post.

No hype, just the advice and analysis you need

It was during his time as editor-in-chief of the Daily Caller that Carlson began to draw accusations of having sympathy for nationalist and white supremacist ideas. It would become a common theme in his career from here on out: Carlson would always deny harbouring these views himself, but would continually find himself in the company of people who did.

His association with the nationalist fringe became more pronounced with Donald Trumps ascendancy to the presidency. In 2017, the Southern Poverty Law Centre a non-profit that monitors the activities of domestic hate groups and other extremists wrote that the Daily Caller has a white nationalist problem.

Throughout the 2016 election and since, the Daily Caller has not only published the work of white nationalists, but some of its writers have routinely whitewashed the Alt-Right, while one editor there is an associate of key Alt-Right figures, the report said.

The Daily Callers embrace of white nationalists reflects the resurgence of the nationalist right, ethno and otherwise, represented by President Trump. Trumps campaign and Electoral College victory electrified the radical right and pulled the Overton Window further in their direction, it went on.

Carlson was still involved with the Daily Caller when he had his debut on the Fox News show that he still hosts today. Introducing the first episode on November 14, 2016, Carlson said he wanted to challenge people on their power, pierce pomposity, crush smugness.

And yet, he promptly started going after the party and associated establishment figures that had just lost power in a general election, along with the media, the deep state, and anyone but the most powerful man in the most powerful office in the world.

Like the Daily Caller, one of the shows primary themes was white grievance, a theme that continued to win him fans among white nationalists.

Will Carless, a journalist who covers extremism for the investigative site Reveal, co-authored an investigation into Carlsons influence on and relationship with the alt-right and white supremacists online. The 2018 report found widespread support for Carlson on websites and forums associated with hate speech.

Tucker Carlson claims senator who lost both legs in Iraq hates America

As our reporting showed, Tucker Carlson, more than any other major news personality, has been instrumental in bringing fringe ideas to the mainstream, Carless told The Independent.

Hes revered for that in some of the most vile corners of the internet, where racists and other extremists see him as their useful idiot, someone with huge reach who seems ever-willing to flirt with their hateful ideas.

Carlsons stock response to accusations of sympathy for white supremacists is indignation. Fox News did not provide comment when approached by The Independent.

Im not responsible for your views or the views of any other human being Im responsible for mine, he told Reveal in response to its investigation. Youre trying, quite transparently, to smear me with the views of people I have nothing to do with.

But the racism and the bigotry is not always so far detached. This month, his top writer, Blake Neff, was revealed by CNN to have been posting racist and sexist comments to an online forum for years.

CNN wrote that there has at times also been overlap between some material he posted or saw on the forum and Carlsons show. Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott and President Jay Wallace condemned horrific racist, misogynistic and homophobic behaviour.

Tucker Carlson Tonight is not so different to Crossfire, in that each night Carlson attempts to tear down a liberal position. But instead of debating another person, he argues against the most bad-faith interpretation of his opponents ideas.

In the early days of the show, he was fond of entertaining a theory that Trumps election was a blow to the corrupt elite, but that it still lurked in the background ready to rob hard-working middle-class Americans of their victory. This framing allowed the wealthy, privately educated heir to a large fortune (Carlsons stepmother is an heiress to the Swanson frozen food empire), avid supporter of the most powerful man in the world, to portray himself as an anti-establishment figure. In those shows he acted as a kind of anger translator for the syntactically challenged president. He would mock outraged reactions from the left to Trumps abuses of power.

The dog-whistle politics of Carlsons show has been a constant. But the 51-year-old father-of-four has grown increasingly fond of accusing those with whom he disagrees of hating America.

A recent segment on Tammy Duckworth, a Democratic senator from Illinois and a former US Army lieutenant colonel who lost both of her legs in Iraq, was a classic example.

Carlson took issue with a suggestion by Duckworth, whose name has been mentioned as a possible running mate for Joe Biden, that there should be a national dialogue over the removal of statues dedicated to historical figures with links to slavery, such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

Its long been considered out of bounds to question a persons patriotism, said Carlson. Its a very strong charge, and we try not ever to make it. But in the face of all of this, the conclusion cant be avoided. These people actually hate America. Theres no longer a question about that.

If eyes are windows to the soul, Tucker Carlsons is black and white

The attack prompted Biden campaign spokesperson TJ Ducklo to respond. Tucker Carlson and his colleagues who traffic in hate speech masquerading as journalism are accomplices to Donald Trumps perverse mission to use division and bitterness to tear this country apart, he said.

Ilhan Omar, the first Muslim woman elected to Congress, also hates America, according to Carlson. She is a regular target on the show.

Virtually every public statement she makes accuses Americans of bigotry and racism, he said in a recent tirade. This is an immoral country, she says. She has undisguised contempt for the United States and for its people.

He also regularly attacks Omars fellow freshman congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on one occasion calling her a moron and nasty, excoriating her for allegedly casting herself as a revolutionary while having had a comfortable upbringing.

There is indeed an aura of hate around Carlson, but most of it seems to emanate from him. It is directed towards anyone who doesnt look and think like Tucker Carlson, a side of America that is perhaps unfamiliar to him, but which is no less American.

Its a sign of the extremes to which Carlson has fallen that he attributes these unpatriotic feelings to Elmo, the beloved Sesame Street character. Carlson took issue with a segment on the show in which the puppet addressed the Black Lives Matter protests and tried to explain the issues behind them to his young audience.

Its a childrens show. Got that, Bobby?, Carlson said. America is a very bad place and its your fault, so no matter what happens, no matter what they do to you when you grow up, you have no right to complain.

Thats the message and it starts very young, he added, with his brow furrowed.

*****

A national reckoning over racial injustice sparked by the police killing of George Floyd might have been a humbling moment for Carlson. As the demonstrations spread to every corner of the country, polls showed a shift in support for the Black Lives Matter movement among the public.

At the same time, the public appeared to sour on President Trump and his handling of the protests, as he responded with calls to dominate the streets and displayed little enthusiasm to address the underlying causes of the anger.

Interestingly, however, this is where Carlson and the presidents fortunes differed. While Trumps ratings plummeted, Carlson seemed to find his voice. It might seem counterintuitive for a man who claimed racism doesnt exist in America to gain viewers at a time when the country seemed to be waking up to the idea that it very much did, but Carlson attracted even more viewers by pushing fears over the protests.

Carlsons show was dominated by images of fire and brimstone. The protesters were criminal mobs, the demonstrations were a form of tyranny and a threat to every American, according to Carlson.

Even as the protests calmed down and violence gave way to largely peaceful mass demonstrations, Carlsons backdrop remained on fire. It was us versus them.

On television, hour by hour, we watch these people criminal mobs destroy what the rest of us have built, he said during one nightly monologue.

People like this dont bother to work. They dont volunteer or pay taxes to help other people. They live for themselves. They do exactly what they feel like doing. They say exactly what they feel like saying.

There was little attempt to understand the grievances of the protesters, preferring instead to stoke the fears of his viewers by telling them they were in danger.

This may be a lot of things, this moment were living through, but it is definitely not about black lives, Carlson said. And remember that when they come for you and at this rate, they will.

It was Tucker Carlson at this angriest and most unhinged, and the ratings went up.

The president, who came to power by stoking us-and-them divisions, often takes his cues from Carlsons show. He watches it regularly and often models the White House agenda based on the shows topics.

A group of moms stands between federal agents and demonstrators during a Portland protest

REUTERS

A group of moms link arms to stand between federal officers and demonstrators in Portland. The call themselves the 'Wall of Moms'

REUTERS

Teal Lindseth reacts to tear gas after federal officers dispersed protesters from in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

Federal officers disperse protesters at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon, during demonstrations in favour of racial justice and against militarised federal officers making arrests

AP

A protester flies an American flag while walking through tear gas fired by federal officers during a protest in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

A federal officer pepper sprays a protester in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

Federal police disperse a crowd of about a thousand protesters at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty

Federal officers use crowd control munitions to disperse Black Lives Matter protesters outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

AP

A protester reacts to milk poured on his eyes after being tear gassed during a protest against racial inequality in Portland, Oregon

REUTERS

A Black Lives Matter protester carries an American flag as teargas fills the air outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

AP

Orion Crabb holds his head back while a medic rinses tear gas from his eyes after federal officers dispersed a crowd of about 1,000 protesters from in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

Federal officers use crowd control munitions to disperse Black Lives Matter protesters in Portland, Oregon

AP

A protester kicks in temporary boarding at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

AP

A protester holds his hands in the air while walking past a group of federal officers during a protest in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

Hundreds of Black Lives Matter protesters hold their phones aloft during a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, where militarised federal police have been arresting demonstrators

AP

Federal police walk through tear gas while dispersing a crowd of about a thousand protesters at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

KaCe Freeman chants during a Black Lives Matter protest outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

AP

A group of moms stands between federal agents and demonstrators during a Portland protest

REUTERS

A group of moms link arms to stand between federal officers and demonstrators in Portland. The call themselves the 'Wall of Moms'

REUTERS

Teal Lindseth reacts to tear gas after federal officers dispersed protesters from in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

Federal officers disperse protesters at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon, during demonstrations in favour of racial justice and against militarised federal officers making arrests

AP

A protester flies an American flag while walking through tear gas fired by federal officers during a protest in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Getty Images

A federal officer pepper sprays a protester in front of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon

Excerpt from:
Does Tucker Carlson hate America? - The Independent

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- For Americans, the stakes in the November election are huge. For Europeans, they may be even bigger.

Thats an exaggeration, but only slightly. Since May 9, 1945, the U.S. has kept the peace and prosperity on the continent, which in the previous three decades had set off wars that killed more than 100 million people. The Europeans themselves deserve immense credit for finally getting off of each others throatsand forming a series of trade and legislativeorganizations that reached its apogee as the European Union.However, as my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Niall Ferguson wrote on July 19: Europeans like to give the EU credit for the fact Europe is no longer the worlds number one battlefield, but Americans understand that it has been the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the presence of U.S. troops that have really kept the peace.They are rightly proud of that achievement.

Theres not been so much to be proud oflately. The U.S. is clearly the side dragging the transatlantic relationship into the mire. President Donald Trumps words (insultingEuropean leaders,fawning over dictators) and actions (ordering U.S. troops withdrawn from Germany,slapping tariffs on everything from airplane parts to single-malt whiskies) have placed 75years of shared success at risk. How serious is it?To answer that question, I talked to someone witha foot on either side of the ocean:Anne Applebaum, whose latest book is titled,Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism.A longtime fixture in Washington foreign-policy circles, first as a columnist at the Washington Post and currently atthe Atlantic, Applebaum lives in Poland with her husband,Radek Sikorski, who was that nations foreign minister from 2007 to 2014.Here is a lightly edited transcript of our discussion:Tobin Harshaw: Lets start with the $850 billion European Recovery Fund that EU leaders hashed out this week. There were people talking about this as the continents Hamilton Moment. Do you see an eventual United States of Europe?

Anne Applebaum: One of the oddities about the EU is that for all the complaining that its overbearing and that it's telling people what to do, its central structures are really quite weak at least outside of trade, the one area where members have seen it as in their interests to cede power to the European Commission. But the EU doesn't have the ability to run a proper fiscal policy, let alone a foreign policy or defense policy. Because of that, it has a very weak voice in the world.

I dont think we need a United States of Europe, but I would like to see the EU play a bigger role in geopolitics, to represent a set of values, in opposition to the values of Russia and China. I would like it to think about projecting stability and prosperity into its neighboring regions Eastern Europe, North Africa and to play a bigger role in international institutions.

But it is also true that it has to get there through means of consensus and so thats going to take a long time, if it ever happens.

TH: How much desire do Europeans have for that?

AA: It depends whom you ask, and when. But don't underestimate the desire of millions of Europeans for Europe to have a bigger voice in the world. As 27 separate countries, they arent really heard, and there are many who would like that to change.

TH: Do you think that a tighter fiscal union would be the driver in all this?

AA: It may well be that a tighter fiscal union would transfer more power to the European collective, that shared monetary instruments will be the tool that brings countries together. Personally, I would prefer that the EU consolidate around foreign and defense policy, but Europe integrates thanks to crises, and this is the one that we have at the moment.

TH: Governments like those in Poland and Hungary what we call the illiberal regimes are driving a wedge into Europe. Is the illiberal movement an anomaly or a long-term trend?

AA: Its a long-term trend. Hungary is no longer a democracy. I don't believe an opposition political party can win a national election in Hungary the playing field is too tilted. Note that Hungary is now doing deals with Russia and China; I believe the prime minister, Viktor Orban, knows he could eventually wind up outside of the European Union.

TH: And Poland?AA: Poland is more complicated. There are reasons to believe that democracy can be preserved the opposition is very large, independent media still exist, the economy is big and diverse although we'll see what happens over the next three years. But Polands destruction of judicial independence may pose an even greater problem for the EU, which needs its member states to have reliable courts for all kinds of business reasons as well as political reasons. European companies and people need to have faith in the idea that courts will treat you fairly. Polish courts are in danger of no longer meeting that standard.

TH: Are there tangible connections between these countries that have turned illiberal and the populist movements in Western Europe?

AA: Yes. There are connections between the Hungarian ruling party, the Polish ruling party, the far-right in Italy, the far right in France and to a lesser extent the far-right in Spain. All of them have links to the U.S. too, to the Trumpist part of the Republican Party, as well as the online alt-right.

Some of the links are personal: the party members and leaders meet one another and go to conferences together. There are also connections between their followers online. They copy one anothers posts and promote one anothers ideas. They will often fixate, as a group, on one particular incident; after the Notre Dame firelast year, many began posting and tweeting about alleged Muslim responsibility, or using the fire as a symbol for the supposed destruction of Christianity.

TH: There's probably no way to quantify the damage that Trump has done to the transatlantic alliance. But how fixable is it?Or is it permanent?

AA: The idea that America would always be a voice for democracy and for freedom, the idea that America would always be a reliable ally for Europeans as well as Americas partners in Asia is probably gone forever.

TH: Wow. Thats quite a statement.

AA: Of course President Joe Biden would seek to revive these alliances. But unless there's a major change inside the Republican party unless, post-Trump, it is taken over again by people who seem to have genuine interest in America's alliances around the world then I think there will always be the fear, another lost election and we lose America again.

For many, many decades, U.S. foreign policy has maintained a bipartisan consensus around a few issues, and one of them was the alliance with Europe. If that is no longer the case, if the Republican Party is no longer interested in alliances, then Europeans will rightly see that one of the political parties favors them and the other one doesn't, and that it is time to start planning a world without the U.S.

Its beginning to happen already. French President Emmanuel Macron is arguing for a deeper and more integrated Europe partly because he wants Europe to prepare for a world in which the U.S. is, if not hostile, then no longer a friend.

TH: In that case, is there a future for Republicans and conservatives who want to engage with the world and promote democracy so-called Never Trumpers?

AA: It depends on what happens in the election not just whether Trump loses, but how he loses. I think if he loses quite badly, if the Republicans lose the Senate, then perhaps there's a chance for a different kind of Republican leadership to emerge.

If Trump wins, or if he loses but only by a little bit, then Don Jr. or Tucker Carlson or someone else who wants to continue Trumps nationalist politics may well take over.

TH: I'massuming you were being sarcastic about Donald Trump Jr. and Tucker Carlson.

AA: No. Tucker Carlson concerns me a lot Trump was proof that you don't have to be a politician to become the party leader or to become president. Now other celebrities will seek to use their popularity and their Facebook followings in politics.

TH: Finally, I had one personal question for you. I'm wondering how being married to a prominent Polish politician complicates your role in writing about these things, and how do you keep your home life and your journalism separate?

AA: This is the main reason why I wrote Twilight of Democracy the way I did. It is not a magisterial political science treatise about illiberalism in Europe and America, its not a piece of third-person reporting or an objective history.Its written in the first person, it includes some elements of memoir or my own experiences and it really tries to explain what my biases might be precisely because I am part of the story.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Tobin Harshaw is an editor and writer on national security and military affairs for Bloomberg Opinion. He was an editor with the op-ed page of the New York Times and the papers letters editor.

2020 Bloomberg L.P.

Here is the original post:
The November Election Could Not Be Bigger for Europe - BNN

In mid-June, on a sunny late afternoon, dozens of protesters led by Indigenous and youth organizers gathered in front of the Albuquerque Museum at the feet of La Jornada, a statue of Spanish conquistador Don Juan de Oate. They called for the statues removal, saying it was a monument to a genocidal colonial history. On the outer banks of the crowd, at least six militiamen from the New Mexico Civil Guard, a civilian militia, flanked the protest in a tight semicircle, some of them shouldering assault rifles.

When some of the protesters began taking a pickax and chain to the statue, a man in a blue shirt later identified as Steven Baca Jr. sprayed a cloud of Mace at them. Then he threw a woman to the ground. Her head hit the pavement with an audible smack, and Baca fled, with protesters trailing him, shouting at him to leave. Baca turned to face a man in jeans and a black hoodie, who tackled him. A bystanders video caught the scuffle that followed: Baca drew a handgun from his waistband and fired four shots. Theres a man down, someone shouted. Theres a man down!

Protesters call for the removal of the statue of Juan de Oate as an armed militia member looks on outside the Albuquerque Museum on June 15 in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Throughout the hours-long demonstration, Albuquerque police had waited behind the museum with an armored car, some watching from museum security cameras. Meanwhile, members of the so-called Civil Guard, dressed in Army uniforms and helmets, tried to keep protesters from the statue. They were there, they claimed, to keep peace and enforce the law. After Baca shot the protester three times, the militia surrounded him, protecting him as he sat in the street. The nearby police took four minutes to arrive. The protester, Scott Williams, was eventually taken to the hospital in critical condition.

The shooting at La Jornada, Spanish for the expedition, occurred several weeks after the beginning of #BlackLivesMatter protests in Albuquerque. At those demonstrations, too, a disquieting camaraderie between official police and another militia, the New Mexico Patriots, emerged. Were all here for the same cause, man, an Albuquerque police officer said to a group of body-armored gym-goers and militiamen before a #BLM protest, according to a video taken by a militia member and shared online. Were here to help.

The incidents are in line with the deeper history of the Albuquerque polices behavior during the civil rights movement in the 1960s and early 1970s. High Country News unearthed archival documents from the Center for Southwest Research illuminating a history of police cooperation and cross-pollination with radical right-wing and vigilante groups in New Mexico. According to police and FBI reports, newspaper clippings and the testimony of activists, that cooperation included surveillance, harassment and misinformation campaigns against social justice movements by informants and radical provocateurs.

While community members and activists have long complained about excessive use of force and surveillance at protests and in minority neighborhoods, these documents clearly show that New Mexico law enforcement tolerates and at times embraces white vigilantism. And despite the Albuquerque Police Departments statement condemning the New Mexico Civil Guard after the shooting, militiamen with known white-power affiliations continue to patrol protests with the silent encouragement of law enforcement.

Theres this overlap between the people who populate militias and populate police departments.

THEY ALL TRAVEL in the same circles, said David Correia, associate professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico. Correia has done extensive research on the cross-pollination that occurred between police, radical right ideology and vigilantism during the civil rights movement. These are all former police or former military, or former guardsman or current guardsman. Theres this overlap between the people who populate militias and populate police departments.

Police brutality and political repression flourished in Albuquerque throughout the civil rights movement. A 1974 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights documented an array of alleged abuses and found that police in Albuquerque and across the state used unconstitutional and at times violent, even deadly, methods when policing minority neighborhoods and political dissidents, including the Chicano groups Alianza Federal de Mercedes and the Black Berets.

The militant Black Berets regularly faced death threats from the local Minutemen militia as well as misinformation campaigns organized by the anti-communist John Birch Society. According to Beret leader Richard Moore, the group sent an informant to the militias meetings in the late-1960s and created a roster of those who attended, including multiple police departments comprising the secretive Metro Squad, a police intelligence unit. Many members of the right-wing Minute Men [sic] organization were from the sheriffs, the state police, and the Albuquerque Police departments. So making a distinction between the two sometimes wasnt easy, said Moore in 2001. The group gave out the list at a press conference in Santa Fe, including to a New Mexico attorney general, hoping for an investigation. It never came.

In 1968 and 1969, a spate of bombings struck some of Alianza leader Reies Lpez Tijerinas relatives. In May 1968, William Tiny Fellion a paid assassin, demolitions expert and John Birch Society member, as reported by state police just two months earlier blew off his left hand planting a bomb at Alianzas headquarters in Espaola, New Mexico. According to a New Mexico State Police report, Fellion told an officer that he would kill Tijerina and his followers free of charge because he has no use for that type of people. After Fellions botched bombing, tips came in that led both Alianza and the FBI Albuquerque Field Office to believe local police were behind the bombings.

ON THE CLOUDY EVENING of June 1, two weeks before the Baca shooting, members of the New Mexico Patriots met with at least six Albuquerque Police Department officers outside the Jackson Wink Mixed Martial Arts Academy in downtown Albuquerque, before a #BLM protest. If you guys would see something, gives us a holler, an Albuquerque officer told the militia. But take care of each other and, the main thing, take care of the people in Albuquerque.

Jon Jones, an MMA fighter, explained that their goal was to stop protester shenanigans without brandishing their guns.

A lot of these (protesters), they just move from one block to the next block to the next block, an Albuquerque police officer responded. So even just being two blocks away because police are moving there from one side that would be helpful, just right there.

Militia groups regularly coordinate with police.

Emily Gorcenski, a researcher and founder of First Vigil, a group that tracks far-right violence, says that there is an extensive history of armed vigilante groups collaborating with police. Militia groups regularly coordinate with police, she wrote, over Twitter. From Portland to Charlottesville, weve seen armed paramilitaries working directly with police against protesters over and over.

During the Charlottesville Unite the Right rally in 2017, police circulated a false white supremacist rumor that antifa planned to inject police with fentanyl. That same year, at a Portland alt-right rally, American Freedom Keepers militiamen helped police arrest counter-protesters, allegedly at police request.

In New Mexico, the NM Patriots and the Civil Guard both claim to coordinate with local police, reported the Albuquerque Journal, while the Civil Guard also says it has current and former law enforcement and military within its ranks.

Members of the New Mexico Civil Guard militia group are apprehended after a protester was shot in Albuquerque in June.

THE ALBUQUERQUE POLICE DEPARTMENT did not respond to requests for comment or to questions regarding its officers potential membership within citizen militias,including the New Mexico Civil Guard a group which APD Chief Michael Geier proposed bestowing hate group designation after the Baca shooting. In an email, a spokesperson from New Mexico State Police said their Investigations Bureau is actively investigating possible NMSP membership within militia ranks.

The Albuquerque Police Department has released few details about the shooting at La Jornada. The departments criminal complaint reported that Steven Baca Jr. acted in a manner in which to protect the statue from the protesters. It failed to mention his violent provocation, and described the crowd ejecting Baca from the scene as maliciously in pursuit of him. Steven was similarly recorded, leaving the area of the statue toward the street interacting with the crowd, the report read. However, his specific type of interaction with the crowd is unknown at this time.

Bacas charge for the shooting was dropped, leaving multiple other battery charges. He was an Albuquerque City Council candidate in 2019 and is the son of former Bernalillo County sheriffs deputy, according to Albuquerque Journal.

Given the departments history, Correia said, It's not clear where the line is between police and right-wing fascist militia in New Mexico.

We know it led to violence directed specifically at individual activists (and) should make us suspicious of the way APD operates today when it confronts social movements like (#BlackLivesMatter), Correia said. Because they've done this before, we shouldn't be surprised if they're still doing it.

After the June 1 meeting between Jon Jones, NM Patriots and the police, thebearded militiaman filming the meeting turned to address the camera directly. Were going to be out patrolling in a little bit,he said. See you guys out there.

Kalen Goodluckis a contributing editor atHigh Country News.Email himatkalengood[emailprotected]g or submit aletter to the editor.

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At 37, Jacinda Ardern became the worlds youngest head of state in 2017, as New Zealands Prime Minister. Over the weekend and a little less than three years later, the latest Newshub polls indicate record approval ratings for Arderns Labour party.

The results came in on the same day that Ardern turned 40, and they are recorded as Arderns leadership is being recognised internationally.

Birthday celebrations are being marked by a number creative means. Block Vandal, a Wainuiomata street artist, painted a Lego-styled image of the Prime Minister on a Lower Hutt retaining wall in the Wellington Region in NZ. He took a picture of his work and posted it on social media with a caption: Happy Birthday Jacinda. Hope you had a great day with your family!

Arderns face now accompanies a dozen other Lego faces of superheroes including Batman, Wonder Woman and The Incredible Hulk.

To mark this significant birthday milestone from one of the worlds most celebrated leaders, were taking a look at just some her incredible achievements since taking the role.

She became the second female state leader to have a baby in office, and challenged expectations

On 21 June 2018, less than a year into her tenure as PM, Ardern became the first sitting New Zealand PM to give birth and the second female state leader to do so in the world, when her daughter Neve Te Aroha Ardern Gayford was born.

Im sure were going through all of the emotions new parents go through, but at the same time feeling so grateful for all the kindness and best wishes from so many people, Ardern has said.

Ardern had announced her pregnancy on social media, saying, Ill be PM & a mum.

Since then, she has transformed public assumptions about women in leadership. The transparency she offers the world (frequently posting videos, updates and news on social media abodut her role as a parent) has been a welcomed relief from the traditionally opaque obscurity into the private lives of our politicians.

Six weeks after the birth of her daughter, Ardern posted a Facebook Live video about her time off from her duties as a PM and settling into life with new baby daughter, Neve. During the stream, Ardern revealed that the family isdoing really well, but laughingly acknowledges she and partner, Clarke Gayford have no routine to speak of.

I can hear now a chorus of parents laughing at the suggestion that you would ever have a routine with a five-week old baby but were doing really well nonetheless, the Prime Minister joked.

She eliminated COVID-19 in her country

In late April, Ardern announced that there was no longer any undetected community transmission of COVID-19 and that her country had effectively eliminated the virus, with health authorities aware of and able to trace each current case.

We have done it together, Ardern said in a press conference on Monday afternoon, just hours before the country began a phased exit from Level 4 lockdown measures. There is no widespread undetected community transmission in New Zealand. We have won that battle. But we must remain vigilant if we are to keep it that way, she said.

A short while after, New Zealand has since lifted all COVID-19 restrictions except for international border closures, meaning New Zealanders lives can return to normal, or as normal as we can in the time of a global pandemic.

She became the first world leader to bring baby to the UN general assembly and challenged more expectations

Ardern made headlines in 2018 when she brought her daughter into a UN speech after she brought her daughter into a UN General Assembly in New York.

On the global reaction, she said at the time: I love that people have shared in this joy with us, and thats been because I have a really public role and so I accept that means that our family life will be quite public But at the same time, Ive chosen a public life, Neve hasnt.

Ardern appeared with her three-month-old daughter at the UN and was seen playing with her before giving a speech at the Nelson Mandela peace summit.

Ardern told reporters that her partners expenses were paid for out of her own pocket; later, her partner posted a photo on Twitter on Monday of their daughters security pass, which reads first baby, adding I wish I could have captured the startled look on a Japanese delegation inside UN yesterday who walked into a meeting room in the middle of a nappy change. Great yarn for her 21st (birthday).

She banned military-style semi-automatics less than a month after Christchurch shootingsArdern received universal praise for her leadership in the aftermath of the Christchurch shooting, where an alt-right white suprematist killed 51 people and injured 49 in two mosques.

Ardern refused to name the Christchurch terrorist attacker in her public addresses: saying, I implore you: Speak the names of those who were lost, rather than the name of the man who took them. He may have sought notoriety, but we in New Zealand will give him nothing, not even his name.

Just six days after the shootings, Ardern announced gun control measures to ban all types of semi-automatic weapons.

On 15 March [the day of the attack] our history changed forever, she said. Now our laws will too. We are announcing action today on behalf of all New Zealanders to strengthen our gun laws and make our country a safer place.

She became the first NZ PM to march in an LGBTQ+ Pride event

In February 2018, Ardern was the first ever NZ PM to march in a Pride parade. She joined a crowd of more than 25,000 in Auckland that called for more support for LGBTI people with mental illness.

Ardern told TVNZ that the parade was about diversity and inclusiveness. Im really proud of the work the team has done to make that real over the years and in our laws.

But we cant be complacent. As long as there are kids in New Zealand, if they are LGBTQI, if they have high levels of mental health issues or self harm, that tells us that we still have work to do.

She pledged to to provide period products to all girlsEarlier this year, Ardern made a public commitment to end period poverty by giving all school-aged people who have periods free sanitary products. Access to sanitary products and to safe, hygienic spaces in which to use them is not equally distributed and Ardern wanted that changed.

By making them freely available, we support these young people to continue learning at school, she told reporters. We know that nearly 95,000 nine-to-eighteen year olds may stay at home during their periods due to not being able to afford period products.

She promised to spend NZ$2.6m on a scheme that would provide free sanitary products (aka tampons, pads, menstrual cups, etc) to schools in an effort to tackle period poverty.

As NZ heads to the polls on September 19, things are looking positive and certain for this incredible leader. Despite the promising poll figures, Ardern told Newstalk ZBBreakfast host Mike Hosking that she always keeps a healthy skepticism around polls.

We will never be complacent, a lot can change very quickly, she said. We know that we have to continue everyday to earn the support of New Zealanders.

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Jacinda Ardern turns 40. Here are just some of her massive achievements to date - Women's Agenda