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Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif. speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 13, 2013 CREDIT: AP Photo/Lauren VictoriaBurke

A group of Rep. Dana Rohrabachers (R-CA) constituents went to his office on Tuesday to deliver Valentines cards. They go every Tuesday now, asking Rohrabacher to hold a town hall meeting in his district.

But now, after a confused tussle in the hallway involving a 2-year old and a 71-year-old-woman, Rohrabacher is now accusing them of engaging in political thuggery, pure and simple.

The delegation is one of many grassroots groups around the country organizing around the Indivisible guide, which is a how-to manual for people looking to have a more effective voice in government. It was put together by former congressional staffers after Trumps victory.

Like many of the other Indivisible groups, the Orange County Indivisible group has been met with scorn and accusations of not being real constituents. For the past three weeks, at Rohrabachers office the door has been closed and locked, and they have slid their documentation underneath.

Two weeks ago, they were met with the police. And this Tuesday, as a 2-year-old girl slid a valentine under the door on Tuesday, one of Rohrabachers staffers opened it, hitting her in the head and knocking her to the ground.

According to local reporting, one of the constituents then grabbed the door and tugged on it, causing 71-year old district director Kathleen Staunton, who was on the other side of the door, to lose her footing and fall. A spokesman for Rohrabachers office told media that she later fell unconscious and had to go to the hospital.

In a video of the immediate aftermath, the little girl can be heard crying, as visiting constituents apologize, and one of them helps Rohrabachers staffer up. The door is then closed, and the group leaves.

I dont think anybody from either side was trying to hurt anybody, the mother of the young girl told a local reporter.

According to Mike Lisenbery, one of the organizers of the Indivisible group, the group visiting Rohrabachers office was predominantly composed of older retired women. This account is borne out in photographs of the group. The video shows that there were about 10 people in the hallway.

In his press release, however, Rohrabacher paints the incident as malicious and characterizes the activists as an unruly mob of thugs.

I am outraged beyond words that protesters who mobbed my Huntington Beach office violently knocked down my faithful district director, Kathleen Staunton, causing her to be hospitalized, Rohrabacher is quoted by saying.

Though the protesters think of themselves as idealists, they engaged in political thuggery, pure and simple. These people do not want, as theyve claimed, to hold a town hall meeting with me. These are unruly activists on whom the lessons of civility and democratic participation have been lost, he continues. These holier-than-thou obstructionists will be held responsible for this outrageous assault. They are exposing themselves for what they areenemies of American self-government and democracy.

Rohrabachers fiery response has flabbergasted his visitors, as did his one-sided depiction of the events. The only mention of the two-year-old is a passively-framed aside: In the tumult, a two-year-old girl apparently brought along with the crowd was also hit by a swinging door.

Everybody is taken a little be aback by his staff, really notnot trying to assume any culpability for knocking the little girl to the ground and really blaming it on us, Lisenbery told ThinkProgress. His staff should have known what was going on outside the door because they have security cameras outside the door, and theyve told us before they can see us on the cameras.

Rohrabacher posted his press release to his Facebook page. According to Lisenbery, any comments pushing back against his depiction of the events have been swiftly deleted, along with links to the video of the actual proceedings (embedded above).

This is a very hamfisted attempt by him to spin the events in his favor, said Lisenbery. Calling people political thugs, calling people activists, when its a lot of adults, mostly retirees with a lot of time on their hands, who are engaged in political action for the first time in their livesits offensive to the people he claims to represent.

This isnt the first time that Rohrabachers account has differed wildly from that of his constituents. In local media two weeks ago, his staff characterized the visitors as purposefully disruptive and from out-of-districtwhich the activists said was untrue on both counts.

While Rohrabachers response may seem hamfisted to those involved, his narrative is part of a long-running tactic of elevating small instances of violence in order to discredit larger movements. Right-wing commentators and lawmakers have long used isolated acts of violence to discredit the largely peaceful Black Lives Matter movement, for instance. And when protests in one city after Trumps election victory turned violent, the massive outpouring of peaceful protests were then lumped in as of-a-kind.

In dismissing the activists, Rohrabacher is also echoing a common refrain among Republican congresspeople who are struggling to respond to newly politically active constituents in the aftermath of the presidential election.

In Tennessee, Rep. John Duncan (R) said he wouldnt hold town halls for fear of extremists, kooks, and radicals. In Utah, Rep. Jason Chaffetz dismissed a particularly raucous town hall as more of a paid attempt to bully and intimidate. In Illinois, Rep. Peter Roskam snuck out the back door to avoid protesters, and a spokesman characterized them as national groups as opposed to local constituents.

And on the radio on Tuesday, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), even extended the logic to a justification for ignoring Democratic politicians.

These are people who have brought in anarchists to destroy this town. Of whom 240-some where arrested, with the support of George Soros and the Democrat left. This is not a cooperative environment, he told Boston Herald Radio.

Theres no evidence that George Soros is paying protesters. Anarchists did smash some windows in downtown D.C. during Trumps inauguration, but they were not connected to political groups, nor to the hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters who marched the next day at the Womens March. Issas statistics are also misleading. The number Issa citeswhich, in reality, is 229includes both the protesters and legal observers, journalists, and bystanders who were rounded up dragnet-style by the police.

This post has been edited.

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Congressman says constituents asking for a town hall are 'enemies' of democracy - ThinkProgress

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Report: Agencies Withhold Intelligence from Trump over Leak Concerns - Democracy Now!

Until the last decade, the contributions of African-American soldiers in World War II barely registered in Americas collective memory of that war.

The tan soldiers, as the black press affectionately called them, were also for the most part left out of the triumphant narrative of Americas Greatest Generation. In order to tell their story of helping defeat Nazi Germany in my 2010 book, Breath of Freedom, I had to conduct research in more than 40 different archives in the U.S. and Germany.

When a German TV production company, together with Smithsonian TV, turned that book into a documentary, the filmmakers searched U.S. media and military archives for two years for footage of black GIs in the final push into Germany and during the occupation of post-war Germany.

They watched hundreds of hours of film and discovered less than 10 minutes of footage. This despite the fact that among the 16 million U.S. soldiers who fought in World War II, there were about one million African-American soldiers.

They fought in the Pacific, and they were part of the victorious army that liberated Europe from Nazi rule. Black soldiers were also part of the U.S. Army of occupation in Germany after the war. Still serving in strictly segregated units, they were sent to democratize the Germans and expunge all forms of racism.

It was that experience that convinced many of these veterans to continue their struggle for equality when they returned home to the U.S. They were to become the foot soldiers of the civil rights movement a movement that changed the face of our nation and inspired millions of repressed people across the globe.

As a scholar of German history and of the more than 70-year U.S. military presence in Germany, I have marveled at the men and women of that generation. They were willing to fight for democracy abroad, while being denied democratic rights at home in the U.S. Because of their belief in Americas democratic promise and their sacrifices on behalf of those ideals, I was born into a free and democratic West Germany, just 10 years after that horrific war.

Fighting racism at home and abroad

By deploying troops abroad as warriors for and emissaries of American democracy, the military literally exported the African-American freedom struggle.

Beginning in 1933, when Adolf Hitler came to power, African-American activists and the black press used white Americas condemnation of Nazi racism to expose and indict the abuses of Jim Crow at home. Americas entry into the war and the struggle against Nazi Germany allowed civil rights activists to significantly step up their rhetoric.

Langston Hughes 1943 poem, From Beaumont to Detroit, addressed to America, eloquently expressed that sentiment:

You jim crowed me / Before hitler rose to power- / And you are still jim crowing me- / Right now this very hour.

Believing that fighting for American democracy abroad would finally grant African-Americans full citizenship at home, civil rights activists put pressure on the U.S. government to allow African-American soldiers to fight like men, side by side with white troops.

The military brass, disproportionately dominated by white Southern officers, refused. They argued that such a step would undermine military efficiency and negatively impact the morale of white soldiers. In an integrated military, black officers or NCOs might also end up commanding white troops. Such a challenge to the Jim Crow racial order based on white supremacy was seen as unacceptable.

The manpower of black soldiers was needed in order to win the war, but the military brass got its way; Americas Jim Crow order was to be upheld. African-Americans were allowed to train as pilots in the segregated Tuskeegee Airmen. The 92nd Buffalo Soldiers and 93rd Blue Helmets all-black divisions were activated and sent abroad under the command of white officers.

Despite these concessions, 90 percent of black troops were forced to serve in labor and supply units, rather than the more prestigious combat units. Except for a few short weeks during the Battle of the Bulge in the winter of 1944 when commanders were desperate for manpower, all U.S. soldiers served in strictly segregated units. Even the blood banks were segregated.

A breadth of freedom

After the defeat of the Nazi regime, an Army manual instructed U.S. occupation soldiers that America was the living denial of Hitlers absurd theories of a superior race, and that it was up to them to teach the Germans that the whole concept of superiority and intolerance of others is evil. There was an obvious, deep gulf between this soaring rhetoric of democracy and racial harmony, and the stark reality of the Jim Crow army of occupation. It was also not lost on the black soldiers.

Post-Nazi Germany was hardly a country free of racism. But for the black soldiers, it was their first experience of a society without a formal Jim Crow color line. Their uniform identified them as victorious warriors and as Americans, rather than Negroes.

Serving in labor and supply units, they had access to all the goods and provisions starving Germans living in the ruins of their country yearned for. African-American cultural expressions such as jazz, defamed and banned by the Nazis, were another reason so many Germans were drawn to their black liberators. White America was stunned to see how much black GIs enjoyed their time abroad, and how much they dreaded their return home to the U.S.

By 1947, when the Cold War was heating up, the reality of the segregated Jim Crow Army in Germany was becoming a major embarrassment for the U.S. government. The Soviet Union and East German communist propaganda relentlessly attacked the U.S. and challenged its claim to be the leader of the free world. Again and again, they would point to the segregated military in West Germany, and to Jim Crow segregation in the U.S. to make their case.

Coming home

Newly returned veterans, civil rights advocates and the black press took advantage of that Cold War constellation. They evoked Americas mission of democracy in Germany to push for change at home. Responding to that pressure, the first institution of the U.S. to integrate was the U.S. military, made possible by Trumans 1948 Executive Order 9981. That monumental step, in turn, paved the way for the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education.

The veterans who had been abroad electrified and energized the larger struggle to make America live up to its promise of democracy and justice. They joined the NAACP in record numbers and founded new chapters of that organization in the South, despite a wave of violence against returning veterans. The veterans of World War II and the Korean War became the foot soldiers of the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s. Medgar Evers, Amzie Moore, Hosea Williams and Aaron Henry are some of the better-known names, but countless others helped advance the struggle.

About one-third of the leaders in the civil rights movement were veterans of World War II.

They fought for a better America in the streets of the South, at their workplaces in the North, as leaders in the NAACP, as plaintiffs before the Supreme Court and also within the U.S. military to make it a more inclusive institution. They were also the men of the hour at the 1963 March on Washington, when their military training and expertise was crucial to ensure that the day would not be marred by agitators opposed to civil rights.

We structured the March on Washington like an army formation, recalled veteran Joe Hairston.

For these veterans, the 2009 and 2013 inaugurations of President Barack Obama were triumphant moments in their long struggle for a better America and a more just world. Many never thought they would live to see the day that an African-American would lead their country.

To learn more about the contributions of African-American GIs, visit The Civil Rights Struggle, African-American GIs, and Germany digital archive.

Maria Hhn, Professor and Chair of History, Vassar College

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African-American GIs of WWII: Fighting for democracy abroad and at home - Salon

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Were looking at the growing scandal over the Trump administrations alleged dealings with Russia before and after the November election. In early January, Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show and suggested the intelligence community may try to get back at Donald Trump.

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER: Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you. So, even for a practical, supposedly, hard-nosed businessman, hes being really dumb to do this.

AMY GOODMAN: That was the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, in January.

Some supporters of Trump, including Breitbart News, are now accusing the intelligence agencies of attempting to wage a "deep state coup" against the president. Meanwhile, some critics of Trump are openly embracing such activity, like Bill Kristol, the prominent Republican analyst who founded The Weekly Standard. He wrote on Twitter, "Obviously strongly prefer normal democratic and constitutional politics. But if it comes to it, prefer the deep state to the Trump state."

So, still with us, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept, speaking to us from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Glenn, explain what the deep state is, and respond.

GLENN GREENWALD: The deep state, although theres no precise or scientific definition, generally refers to the agencies in Washington that are permanent power factions. They stay and exercise power even as presidents who are elected come and go. They typically exercise their power in secret, in the dark, and so theyre barely subject to democratic accountability, if theyre subject to it at all. Its agencies like the CIA, the NSA and the other intelligence agencies, that are essentially designed to disseminate disinformation and deceit and propaganda, and have a long history of doing not only that, but also have a long history of the worlds worst war crimes, atrocities and death squads. This is who not just people like Bill Kristol, but lots of Democrats are placing their faith in, are trying to empower, are cheering for as they exert power separate and apart fromin fact, in opposition tothe political officials to whom theyre supposed to be subordinate.

And you gothis is not just about Russia. You go all the way back to the campaign, and what you saw was that leading members of the intelligence community, including Mike Morell, who was the acting CIA chief under President Obama, and Michael Hayden, who ran both the CIA and the NSA under George W. Bush, were very outspoken supporters of Hillary Clinton. In fact, Michael Morell went to The New York Times, and Michael Hayden went to The Washington Post, during the campaign to praise Hillary Clinton and to say that Donald Trump had become a recruit of Russia. The CIA and the intelligence community were vehemently in support of Clinton and vehemently opposed to Trump, from the beginning. And the reason was, was because they liked Hillary Clintons policies better than they liked Donald Trumps. One of the main priorities of the CIA for the last five years has been a proxy war in Syria, designed to achieve regime change with the Assad regime. Hillary Clinton was not only for that, she was critical of Obama for not allowing it to go further, and wanted to impose a no-fly zone in Syria and confront the Russians. Donald Trump took exactly the opposite view. He said we shouldnt care who rules Syria; we should allow the Russians, and even help the Russians, kill ISIS and al-Qaeda and other people in Syria. So, Trumps agenda that he ran on was completely antithetical to what the CIA wanted. Clintons was exactly what the CIA wanted, and so they were behind her. And so, theyve been trying to undermine Trump for many months throughout the election. And now that he won, they are not just undermining him with leaks, but actively subverting him. Theres claims that theyre withholding information from him, on the grounds that they dont think he should have it and can be trusted with it. They are empowering themselves to enact policy.

Now, I happen to think that the Trump presidency is extremely dangerous. You just listed off in your newsin your newscast that led the show, many reasons. They want to dismantle the environment. They want to eliminate the safety net. They want to empower billionaires. They want to enact bigoted policies against Muslims and immigrants and so many others. And it is important to resist them. And there are lots of really great ways to resist them, such as getting courts to restrain them, citizen activism and, most important of all, having the Democratic Party engage in self-critique to ask itself how it can be a more effective political force in the United States after it has collapsed on all levels. That isnt what this resistance is now doing. What theyre doing instead is trying to take maybe the only faction worse than Donald Trump, which is the deep state, the CIA, with its histories of atrocities, and say they ought to almost engage in like a soft coup, where they take the elected president and prevent him from enacting his policies. And I think it is extremely dangerous to do that. Even if youre somebody who believes that both the CIA and the deep state, on the one hand, and the Trump presidency, on the other, are extremely dangerous, as I do, theres a huge difference between the two, which is that Trump was democratically elected and is subject to democratic controls, as these courts just demonstrated and as the media is showing, as citizens are proving. But on the other hand, the CIA was elected by nobody. Theyre barely subject to democratic controls at all. And so, to urge that the CIA and the intelligence community empower itself to undermine the elected branches of government is insanity. That is a prescription for destroying democracy overnight in the name of saving it. And yet thats what so many, not just neocons, but the neocons allies in the Democratic Party, are now urging and cheering. And its incredibly warped and dangerous to watch them do that.

AMY GOODMAN: And The Wall Street Journal's report that says now intelligence officials are not giving President Trump all the information because they're concerned about what hell do with it, not to mention intelligence agencies of other countries deeply concerned about what Trump will do with it, and particularly concerned about what he might share with Russia?

GLENN GREENWALD: Well, so, first of all, theres a media issue here, which is that if you look at The Wall Street Journal report, its pretty much exactly the same as every other significant report about Russia over the last six months, many of which have proven to be completely false. Its based on anonymous officials making extremely vague claims. Even The Wall Street Journal says, "We dont know whos doing this, withholding information. We dont know how much information is being withheld."

Secondly, the idea that Donald Trump is some kind of an agent or a spy of Russia, or that he is being blackmailed by Russia and is going to pass secret information to the Kremlin and endanger American agents on purpose, is an incredibly crazy claim that has been nowhere proven to be true. It reminds me of the kind of things Glenn Beck used to say about Obama while he stood at his chalkboard and drew thosethose unstable charts that he drew, these wild conspiracy theories that are without evidence.

We ought to have a serious, sober, structured investigation of the claims that Russia hacked the DNC and John Podestas emails and that there were improper ties between Donald Trump and the Russians, and that ought to be made public so that we can see the information. But this constant media obsession of leaking whatever someone whispers to them about Donald Trump and Russia, because they know it will get their reporters huge numbers of retweets on Twitter and tons of traffic by people who are being fed what they want to hear, is really feeding into the worst kind of hysteria and even fake news that the media says theyre trying to combat. These are really serious claims that merit serious investigation, and thats exactly what were not getting.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, in a recent piece in The Intercept by one of your colleagues, they write, "If in fact all of this is 'non-sense,' Trump has the power as president to make that clear immediatelyby declassifying all government intercepts of communications between Russian nationals and anyone in his orbit." So, do you think, Glenn, that Trump ought to be doing that?

GLENN GREENWALD: I mean, its an interesting point, because, for example, there have been lots of claims made about the communications that General Flynn had with Russian diplomats and what these transcripts supposedly reflect, and yet nobody has seen the transcripts. Weve seen little bits and pieces of them. We havent seen the whole transcript. We ought to see that whole transcript. And my colleague, Jon Schwarz, who wrote that piece, is absolutely right that its within President Trumps power to order it instantly declassified. Theres no review of that decision, and then it could be made public.

On the other hand, it is really bizarre, just as a reporter who has been in the middle of a controversy for the last four years about the leaking of classified information, to hear people suggest that the president now ought to take the most sensitive intercepts that the government is capable of obtaining, which is how they eavesdrop on Russian officials inside the Kremlin, and just toss them to the public like theres no problem at all with doing that. I think that what youre seeing here is this really disturbing double standard, that all weve heard since the war on terror is that classified information is sacred and anybody who leaks it is treasonous and satanic and belongs in jail for a really long time, and now classified information seems to be something thats just a plaything, like something that we just toss around for fun if it serves a certain agenda. And I think that thats one of the issues thats bothering me about the way this discourse is unfolding.

AMY GOODMAN: Glenn, were going to break, then come back and ask you about the Trump-Netanyahu news conference yesterday. Were also going to want to talk about Yemen and the news that the Pentagon is considering U.S. ground troops in Syria. This is Democracy Now! Were talking to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald. Stay with us.

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Greenwald: Empowering the "Deep State" to Undermine Trump is Prescription for Destroying Democracy - Democracy Now!

A cool thing happened in Brentwood on Wednesday. Twenty-eight immigrants from 13 countries, during a ceremony held in observance of Presidents Day, were sworn in as citizens of the United States.

The nation of origin among the guests of honor ranged from A to V(Algeria to Vietnam). They were a diverse group with a common thread they see, in the United States, opportunity and ideology that is lost on some Americans these days. Thats not the cool thing either.

Heres the cool thing:Not one word of pointed partisan politics was spoken.

Well, OK, maybe one politico strayed from the feel-good for a moment or two. But well excuse birthday boy George Washington, who was channeled to the gathering bystate Assemblyman Jim Frazier,D-Oakley.

President Washington once said, America is open not only to receive the opulent and respectable stranger but the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and religions, Frazier read. He emphasized the idea that citizenship is not about race, religion or national origin but rather our character as a country.

Thechildlike joy of new Americans receiving their citizenship certificates was in stark contrast to the wild televised scenes from airports thrown into chaos by the immigration ban. There was no bitter point-counterpoint regarding our countrys history as an inclusive melting point and the perceived need to lock down our borders. I know because Iasked.

I dont want to go into politics, said Cicily Joseph, born in India and now living in Pittsburg with her husband and four sons. But I think there are rules we go by and legal stuff that you have to do. I think it should be done the same way it is now, to welcome immigrants.

Joseph, a nurse, is struck by the diversity of her patients.

Im glad I ended up in California, she said. Im free to practice my religion and to raise my family with more opportunities and with a broader outlook on life. I see patients from every country almost. I really love their stories. And I dont think Ill find that anywhere else in the world.

Orlando Martinez Quezada and wife Wendy Villalta both became naturalized citizens Wednesday. Natives of El Salvador, they met in this country. They live in Martinez with their three children.

Our plan from the beginning was to stay, Martinez Quezada said. Were all happy that we have stability today. Thats what we were looking for.

They may be among the newest U.S. citizens, but their ethic, hopes and dreams are universal. Villalta has worked for Wal-Mart for 12 years. Martinez Quezada is the manager of a McDonalds restaurant.

Always, Im focused on my family, Martinez Quezada said. When I wake up every day, I see the sun on all their faces and I say, This is a good day to work hard for them.'

And about the current climate of bans and deportations?

Thats hard to talk about, Martinez Quezada said. I think were in a country of free democracy. We have an election to choose wholl govern our country. We have to have a winner. We have to be with him. If we wish bad things for him, were all affected. I dont share some of his ideas, but I wish he can do the best.

Ever been to a swearing-in ceremony? You should add it to your to-do list. Tolook the naturalization process in the eye is to see nothing less than democracy in action. And if George Washington is to be believed, thats what makes us, us.

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Immigrants become citizens, illustrating democracy at work - East Bay Times