Mediaboss Marketing

As we approach the anniversary of the January 6 insurrection/attempted coup/riot/assault on democracy/pro-Trump demonstration gone awry/righteous protest to stop the steal/patriots come to save America/false flag operation, one thing is clear a year later that Americans cant begin to even agree on how to describe the assault.

And thats just the beginning of the problem. It not only reflects the ever more dangerous divide in our country, made worse not only by Donald Trump and Ted Cruz and the rest of the Trump political sycophancy, but also by Tucker Carlson and others in the ultra-right-wingosphere for minimizing the assault or still pretending as Carlson does in his online, uh, special called Patriot Purge that the assault was actually a false flag operation and an excuse for Democrats to prosecute and eventually persecute Trump supporters.

Youd be tempted to laugh have you been reading about the January 6 trials and those born-again rioters who now say they were duped by Trump? and I admit I did, momentarily. And then I remembered that Carlson reaches millions of Americans every night as the leading voice on cable TV news, if, that is, you accept the prime-time offerings of FoxNews as something other than propaganda.

Or until you read the polls, like the recent one from the Washington Post/University of Maryland, which found, disturbingly but no longer surprisingly, 34% of Americans believe violent action against the government is sometimes justified. Thats 40% among law-and-order Republicans. More than 60% of those polled say Trump bears a great deal or good amount of responsibility for the Capitol riot, but 72% of Republicans and 83% of Trump voters disagree.

Theres more. Yes, despite the fact that all the phoney-baloney 2020 election audits found no evidence of widespread fraud, 62% of Republicans still claim to believe the Big Lie of a rigged election and 58%, even now, say they believe Joe Bidens presidency is illegitimate. Are the Big Lie numbers really that high or is this something that Republicans feel obliged to say? I dont know. I also cant decide which would be worse.

On the anniversary date, Democratic politicians will lament the assault on democracy, the contagion of state-level voter-suppression laws and the dangerous place weve reached with a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court ready to overturn Roe v. Wade and then take up other battles in the culture wars.

Want to get early access to Mikes columns? Click here to become a premium member of The Sun.

The question for Democrats is whether theyre sufficiently moved by these issues, which may determine nothing less than the nations future as a democracy. Try to picture a 2024 election in which critical red states, having passed laws allowing state legislatures to basically overturn election results, decide that Donald Trump has won an election he lost. What would happen when neither side red or blue - accepts the legitimacy of any election if their party loses? What are we left with then?

Meanwhile, on Jan. 6, Donald Trump will counter-program with a news conference, in which hell say that the real insurrection took place on Nov. 3, Election Day. What Trump wont do is blame the January 6 insurrectionists, the ones he said he loved and called very special people and refused for hours to call down.

So here we are, wherever that is.

Read more of Mike Littwins columns.

By nature and by profession, I am not an alarmist, but smart people who have studied these issues for years dont just state the obvious, that Republicans, particularly at the state level, have put our democracy at real risk. Some blame the outmoded American system, with its unrepresentative Senate and an Electoral College that doesnt work. But some of these same people are even saying that we might be approaching civil war although most dont think of this as an 1861-style Civil War, but as a rise in political violence, born of what some academics call pernicious polarization.

One academic sees a comparison to Italys long bout of violence in the 70s and 80s the so-called Years of Lead with violence from left and right. Others see the possibility of right-wing authoritarianism, as we have seen develop in Hungary, whose prime minister, Viktor Orban, was recently endorsed by, yes, Donald Trump. Could Trump be making the case against Trumpism any more openly?

As the January 6 committee has learned, so much of what took place before and during the riot happened in plain view. And then once the committee dug a little deeper, it found text messages and calls to Mark Meadows from members of Congress, from Fox media, uh, personalities and even from the likes of Don Jr. to stop the riot. Weve learned of Ivanka Trumps failed pleas to her father to call off his supporters even as Trump watched gleefully, weve been told the insurrection play out on his wide-screen TV. They knew we all know this was a Trump-activated mob, openly hunting Mike Pence and openly allied with the president.

We know, too, what should have happened after Jan. 6, but didnt. Republicans had a chance to reclaim their party, to break the Trumpian spell. But after a few tries from a few of the leaders early in the game, they caved, virtually one and all. And now no one will be surprised if Trump is the GOP nominee in 2024, particularly given that the Department of Justice has shown little interest in pursuing whatever the January 6 committee reveals.

Remember Good Mitch McConell, who on the day he refused to vote to convict Trump of impeachment charges, blamed Trump for the insurrection and said the mob did this because theyd been fed wild falsehoods by the most powerful man on Earth because he was angry he lost an election? Soon, McConnell was saying that he would vote for Trump if he runs in 2024, and there hasnt been a Good Mitch sighting since.

For his part, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy spoke loudly after the riot that Trump bore more than a little responsibility and then oh-so-quietly slipped away to Mar-a-Lago to make amends and to promise to never say anything like that again.

It was Bad Mitch who doomed any chance of Senate approval of an independent commission to study the January 6 assault. And so the House had to set up one of its own, which Democrats hoped to make sufficiently bipartisan. But the only two semi-responsible Republicans the committee could successfully recruit were anti-Trumpists Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney.

It was Cheney who said last Sunday that Republicans were faced with an existential choice We can either be loyal to Donald Trump or we can be loyal to the Constitution. But we cannot be both.

Democrats are faced with a similar choice. While Bidens $1.9 trillion safety-net, climate-change bill is being blocked by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, the far more important issue even more important than the checks, now stopped, from the poverty-fighting expanded child tax credit program is the protection of voting rights. That cant happen unless Senate Democrats all 50 of them vote to reform the filibuster, this time in a carve-out for voting rights bills.

Biden has now said he supports the filibuster carve-out, but his support has been sporadic and not nearly as pointed as it needs to be if he and Chuck Schumer are going to convince Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema that saving democracy with voting-reform bills is more important than saving a Senate rule.

On Jan. 6, we will stop for a moment and presumably try to recall just what it is that American democracy means. And some will even wonder how many more chances well get to make things right.

Mike Littwin has been a columnist for too many years to count. He has covered Dr. J, four presidential inaugurations, six national conventions and countless brain-numbing speeches in the New Hampshire and Iowa snow.

The Colorado Sun is a nonpartisan news organization, and the opinions of columnists and editorial writers do not reflect the opinions of the newsroom. Read our ethics policy for more on The Suns opinion policy and submit columns, suggest writers or give feedback at opinion@coloradosun.com.

We believe vital information needs to be seen by the people impacted, whether its a public health crisis, investigative reporting or keeping lawmakers accountable. This reporting depends on support from readers like you.

View original post here:
Littwin: As the January 6 Capitol riot anniversary nears, we're in no better shape one year later - The Colorado Sun

Kathleen Hennessey

David Halbfinger | The New York Times

Im thrilled to announce that Kathleen Hennessey, one of the most knowledgeable, skilled and gifted political editors around, will be our new deputy politics editor for enterprise.

Kathleen comes to The Times from The Associated Press, where she has served as a White House reporter and editor, deputy Washington bureau chief and, most recently, as regional politics editor, charged with surfacing and elevating the best political stories taking place outside of Washington.

In that role, as in earlier ones, Kathleen quickly established herself as a driver of news coverage, sharp-eyed trendspotter, exceptional story framer and loyalty-inspiring nurturer of talent. She spearheaded much of A.P.s coverage of the fight over democratic fundamentals like access to the ballot and the administration of elections, the forces behind school-board battles and the divisions within the G.O.P. During the 2020 campaign, she co-edited America Disrupted, a deep, data-driven series exploring the American electorate amid the turmoil of the pandemic.

She not only gets politics, she gets how politics is perceived outside the Acela corridor: After overhearing parents in her sons Little League complaining about mask rules and curriculum fights, she pushed for more political coverage of school boards and culture wars coverage that we and other major competitors often wound up following.

The word of mouth on Kathleen is a bit, well, beyond: Amy Fiscus called her hands-down the best framer of stories Ive ever worked with. Elizabeth Kennedy, who shared the title of A.P.s deputy Washington bureau chief with Kathleen, said she learned more from her about Washington, how to write about it, how to cover it, than from anyone else and said Kathleen knows politics better than anyone I know.

Thats no surprise, really, when you find out that Kathleen has politics in her genes. Her grandfather, Thomas Byrne, was the mayor of her hometown, St. Paul, Minn. Her parents met at a political convention. And her first job after graduating from Boston College was at a museum dedicated to Hubert H. Humphrey.

After journalism school at Berkeley, Kathleen went on to cover campaigns and government at every level, beginning at the statehouse in Carson City, Nev., where she owned coverage of the debate over taxing brothels. Her last reporting job was covering the Obama White House, first for the Los Angeles Times and Tribune newspapers and then for The A.P.

Shell start with us on Jan. 10. Please welcome her to The Times.

Originally posted here:
Kathleen Hennessey is joining The New York Times - Editor And Publisher Magazine

Far-right domestic extremists like those who attacked the US Capitol a year ago have faced criminal charges from law enforcement and crackdowns from social media companies. But they have not gone away.

On the contrary, they have evolved and adopted new strategies while regrouping, recruiting, and muscling their way into the mainstream with worrying success, experts say. And their ranks are growing.

Many of us thought these groups would splinter and fall apart and go underground after the FBI started going after them. But that hasnt really been the case, Heidi Beirich, cofounder and chief strategy officer of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, a nonprofit focused on transnational hate and far-right movements, told BuzzFeed News.

Indeed, as the country marks the anniversary of one of the darkest days in American history and prepares for the consequential midterm elections in the fall where extremists, such as MAGA supporters, could again try to undermine the will of voters extremism researchers and government officials are warning that homegrown extremists pose a greater threat to our democracy than they did before Jan. 6, 2021. They just look a bit different now.

The threat of domestic extremism today is perhaps less obvious. Were not seeing the Proud Boys organize massive marches in Washington, DC, or militias storming capitol buildings every weekend. But whats happening is gravely serious, Jared Holt, a resident fellow at the Atlantic Councils Digital Forensic Research Lab, told BuzzFeed News.

In a new report published Tuesday, Holt wrote that domestic extremists were battered by the blowback [they] faced after the Capitol riot, but not broken by it. In fact, the sentiments espoused by domestic extremist causes are as public and insidious as ever.

Far-right extremists, he told BuzzFeed News, are increasingly seeking legitimacy by latching onto mainstream conservative causes; they are taking a decentralized approach, preferring to operate in small groups or cells; and they are switching their focus from national actions to hyperlocal initiatives, like focusing on school board and city council meetings.

There have been several reports in recent months about far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists, including members of the neo-fascist street gang the Proud Boys, showing up and intimidating officials making decisions on health measures and school initiatives at community meetings.

Holts report highlights how extremists ideas are increasingly finding fertile ground among disaffected conservatives and leading voices in the Republican Party who are teaming with them to fight culture wars on topics like vaccines, race, and education.

Beirich said that shift is a serious cause for alarm.

When I look back at the last year, the thing that I find most astounding isnt really about the groups wed label extremist its about whats happened with the Republican party The infiltration of extremists into its ranks, she said.

She cited extremist and white supremacist ideas such as the great replacement theory the false idea that white people are being purposely replaced by nonwhite immigrants being peddled by GOP politicians and Fox News commentators as evidence of the radicalization of the conservative right and extremism going mainstream.

Im hard-pressed to even call them fringe ideas anymore, she said. Theyre not confined to extremists. You cant call it a fringe idea; its a mainstream idea among conservatives.

The experts concerns were backed Tuesday by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who said that authorities over the past year have improved and strengthened our approach to combating this dynamic, evolving threat.

In the wake of the pro-Trump mob attack on the Capitol, President Joe Biden made combating domestic violent extremism one of his top priorities and enlisted leaders across government agencies to help. Department of Justice and FBI officials, in particular, have led the charge. They have testified in front of Congress on several occasions about the threat posed by extremists, particularly those on the far-right side of the political spectrum. With Jan. 6, they are at the forefront of not only the festering extremist problem but also one of the largest criminal investigations in US history.

More than 700 people, including several with military experience and many associated with white supremacist and anti-government extremist groups like the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and Three Percenters, have been charged in the sweeping federal probe into the Capitol attack that was blamed for the deaths of five people and dozens more injuries. The images of the rioters stomping on Capitol police officers, crashing through barricades, bashing in windows with poles adorned with the American Flag, and storming the halls of Congress are seared into the American consciousness.

While the Biden administration has made some strides in the fight against domestic violent extremists, Mayorkas said the threat of them remains very grave.

Some experts think the US government was slow to respond and will have trouble tackling the problem of extremism.

Beirich said authorities should have taken steps a decade ago to quash the rise of far-right extremism and white nationalism, when this stuff really was on the fringe [and] it could have had a massive impact.

Now, with it so deeply entrenched in the mainstream political right and white supremacist and anti-government groups backing them up with threats of violence, she fears it may be too late to turn the tide.

If 2024 is contested like 2020 was, she added, referring to the upcoming midterm elections, were going to have major civil unrest in this country.

See more here:
The Threat Posed By Domestic Extremists Is Even Greater A Year After The Capitol Attack - BuzzFeed News

Coronavirus cases are once again exploding in the United Kingdom. Yet Prime Minister Boris Johnsons Conservative government, dominated by extremist ideologues who value their notion of individual freedom above the public good, is again unwilling to impose necessary measures a reluctance that has already cost innumerable lives in previous COVID-19 waves.

Last month, about a hundred Tory Members of Parliament voted against a very modest government plan that mandates the wearing of masks and vaccine certificates in some places. As hospitals fill up again with COVID-19 patients, they talk about an ancient British tradition of liberty. Were not a papers please society, Tory MP Marcus Fysh claimed, This is not Nazi Germany.

Given such anti-government rhetoric, you might not guess that Johnson, who has been dogged by reports he was partying at his official residence during a general lockdown last year, and has often appeared maskless in public spaces, matches Donald Trump in his disdain for public health regulations.

Or that the British media, overwhelmingly right wing, provides the background chorus for freedom from COVID-19 restrictions. In fact, it led the Tory celebrations of Freedom Day in July this year.

The celebrations were as foolish as they were premature. These days, the world watches again in appalled fascination as omicron spreads fast, and rowdy invocations of personal responsibility and individual choice delay preventive moves in the United Kingdom and, by extension, everywhere else.

Public-spiritedness is by no means alien to Britain; its present-day embodiment, the National Health Service, was widely applauded during the early weeks of the pandemic. Tory fanboys of Winston Churchill like to invoke his lonely defiance of Nazi Germany as they insist on their right to remain maskless. But there is no record of Tory freedom-lovers keeping their lights on at night during the blackout enforced by Churchills government in 1940.

Contemporary Tory libertarianism derives from the American ideologue Ayn Rand more than any ancient British tradition of liberty. And the present-day contempt for collective welfare is largely a legacy of the revolution launched by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Thatcher notoriously doubted the existence of society; Reagan claimed that the nine most terrifying words are Im from the government, and Im here to help.

The strange thing is that the battles launched by Reaganites and Thatcherites against tax rates, protectionist industry and labor union privilege were won a long time ago. Libertarians in the United States even managed to discredit major government involvement in health care.

So, what makes Anglo-American individualists so dangerously inflexible, even self-destructively fanatical, today?

Two recent events have spoiled the show for them. First, the rise of China, which proved again after the previous successes of Japan and the East Asian countries that government intervention is crucial to national success in education and health care as well as industrial growth and technological innovation.

The other, arguably more unnerving event, which has occurred right at home, is the increasing assertiveness of historically silent, often disenfranchised peoples: women, non-white immigrant populations, and sexual minorities.

During two centuries of Western expansion and hegemony, a minority of white men enjoyed a relative freedom to do and say whatever they wanted without much regard for the rights and sensitivities of others. Unsurprisingly, many of them loathe the demand from previously voiceless peoples that old attitudes ranging from the narcissistic to the selfish and cruel be re-examined and, preferably, abandoned. The demand is frequently and unfairly derided as woke.

Those still clinging to political power and cultural capital would rather stoke conflict and polarization than admit that their societies are irrevocably diverse, and ought to acknowledge the dignity of people who were once systematically degraded by the gender and racial hierarchies erected by white men.

They naturally fear and loathe scholarship that underlines long-established facts: that the unique wealth and power of a male minority in the West was built on slavery and imperialism rather than any innate superiority, and that the white mans burden was actually carried by black, brown and yellow men.

Instead, faced with the smallest challenges to their moral and intellectual authority, many historically advantaged males have chosen to double down, accusing activists and intellectuals of promoting cancel culture and historical revisionism.

Johnsons government has prosecuted its war on woke with remarkable zeal and clinical efficiency throughout the pandemic. Indeed, rightwingers talking of freedom are shriller than ever before in Europe and America. Their battle against COVID-19 restrictions has become part of their larger, and very desperate, war against political correctness an existential struggle, no less, something as urgent as the existential struggle of many today against severe illness and premature death caused by COVID-19.

The consequences for the rest of us are incalculable. While freedom-loving Tories make their last stand, the mounting evidence from elsewhere is that coordinated action by governments and solidarity among citizens are what will contain the pandemic.

Indeed, the lesson from the U.K. epicenter of delta and now omicron, and home to a dysfunctional government and failed ideology is profoundly ominous: That in societies deliberately divided by culture wars, trust and confidence in an unscrupulous ruling class will inevitably run low, and the pandemic is what will enjoy true freedom.

Pankaj Mishra is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. His books include Age of Anger: A History of the Present, From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia, and Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet and Beyond.

In a time of both misinformation and too much information, quality journalism is more crucial than ever.By subscribing, you can help us get the story right.

PHOTO GALLERY (CLICK TO ENLARGE)

Continued here:
Boris Johnson and the woeful and costly Tory war on woke - The Japan Times

I moved to Hull in 1971 because it was the most unlikely place in the world to start an experimental theatre company plus rents were cheap and social security were unlikely to find us any proper jobs. I was 23 and I believed that theatre could change the world. I still do.

I wanted to make uncompromising, provocative, funny, tough, sexy plays about people you didnt see in plays, for people who didnt go to the theatre. I wanted Hull Truck to be a nuisance.

Number 71 Coltman Street was cold and dark. On the ground floor was a room full of broken furniture and feral cats. We lived and rehearsed upstairs. The play Children of the Lost Planet was devised over 12 weeks. It was about a bunch of young people of our age living in Hull and trying to negotiate their way through the minefield of sex and drugs and rocknroll always write what you know about.

The winter of 1972 was freezing. We only had a small fan heater and rehearsed under a tent of blankets. The heater blew up so we burnt the broken chairs from downstairs. We bought a clapped-out Morris van for 35 and a lad from the youth theatre stole us a tax disc.

We didnt have many bookings, possibly because the administration office was the phone box outside.

When we performed Children of the Lost Planet in York, the local paper wondered why we wanted to bring such disgusting people to the stage. On the way to our first London show the van broke down and we abandoned it in a pig farm in Gilberdyke. We hitched to the gig with the props and costumes.

But we carried on. After Children of the Lost Planet came The Weekend After Next, The Knowledge, Oh What!, Bridgets House, Ooh La La! and Still Crazy After All These Years. We performed countless kids shows, pub shows and musical cabarets. Our quest for always telling the uncomfortable truth often got us into trouble. Ironically The Knowledge getting banned in Manchester proved to be our biggest break. The theatre took exception to a rude line spoken by the ex-biker dope dealer Dooley. The day the show was pulled off there was a rave review in the Guardian, which the next day printed a piece about the ridiculous ban. We loaded up the van and headed straight for the Bush theatre in London where we performed an impromptu showcase gig. The word had got round, and we got a standing ovation. The theatre immediately booked us for a month in November. The run was a sellout.

After that followed grants, wages, a proper van, rave reviews and a telephone.

We toured the length of the country garnering accolades and abuse in equal measure. One particular scene from Bridgets House in 1976 caused a lot of fuss. Bridget (Rachel Bell) and Mo (Cass Patton) are discussing their sex lives. At one point Bridget observes that most men wouldnt know what a clitoris was if it jumped up and bit them on the leg.

One night in Gainsborough a couple in the audience split up during the scene. He stormed out and drove off into the night. We had to give her a lift home in the truck. That same year we were invited to perform Bridgets House at the new National Theatre.

One of the few people who saw those early plays was a very young Richard Bean. When he told me he was going to write 71 Coltman Street, a dramatised story of Hull Truck, he said I would hate it. I dont. Richard has written a terrific show. Not a word of it is actually true of course, but he has captured the spirit of what he thinks the spirit of Hull Truck was. Thats not an easy thing to do when most theatres seem to be giving in to neo-puritan censorship and politically confected culture wars.

The bargain of real, proper theatre is when a group of human beings on stage get together with a group of human beings in the audience to fearlessly celebrate their human being-ness. Pass it on.

Follow this link:
I wanted to be a nuisance: the riotous rise of Hull Truck - The Guardian