Air Date 11/20/2024
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: [00:00:00] Welcome to this episode of the award winning Best of the Left podcast. We live in a deeply racist and sexist society, nearly devoid of people willing to admit to being racist or sexist. In a sense, this is a sign of progress. We're in the phase where prejudice still exists, but it has become socially unacceptable to openly express it. But to deny the impact on our politics, just because people don't admit their prejudice would be to completely misunderstand the nature of the issue.
For those looking for a quick overview, the sources providing our top takes in about 50 minutes today, includes Democracy Now!, The New Abnormal, Reveal, and MSNBC. Plus during my editor's note today, I'll discuss the tectonic shifts happening in the world of social media, with a few tips on how you can navigate them. And regardless of my analysis, find all the links to follow Best of the Left on your preferred platform in the show notes.
Then, in the additional deeper dives half with the show, there'll be more in four sections: Section [00:01:00] A- A Mirror for America. Section B- White Supremacy for the Win. Section C- Reverberation. And Section D- What Now?
The Racism of MAGA Is as American as Apple Pie Nina Turner on Trump & 2024 Election - Democracy Now! - Air Date 10-31-24
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: We turn right now, also on the presidential race, to Nina Turner, former Ohio state senator, founder of We Are Somebody, which has been out talking to voters in Ohio about early voting, voting hours, voting the whole ballot. She is a senior fellow at the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy here at The New School. Her new piece for Newsweek is headlined “Calling Trump a Nazi Is Giving Our Own History a Pass. The Racism of MAGA Is American.”
Nina Turner, unlike Bishop Barber, you have not actually endorsed your party’s candidate, Kamala Harris. But if you can explain why and then explain this piece, why you’re saying what’s happening in this country is uniquely American?
NINA TURNER: For [00:02:00] me, in this race, it’s important to give the voters the depth and the breadth that they need to be able to make their own decisions. As you know, I was on a presidential campaign twice, in 2016 and 2020, so I was actually out there stumping for my candidate, which was Senator Bernard Sanders. In this particular race, I mean, I’m feeling just as frustrated as most of the voters and the people that I’ve had the opportunity to talk to all over this country. People are really tired. They are exhausted. And we are going to have a lot of work to do after this election cycle. I’m more exhausted now than I was in 2016 and 2020, mentally and physically, although I am not on the campaign trail.
In terms of my piece in Newsweek, it was important to set the stage that the MAGA movement itself, and not to say that all people in the movement are white supremacists or bigoted, but President Donald J. Trump has certainly set a stage by which the unfulfilled promises of this country, the [00:03:00] undealt-with anti-Blackness and other types of racism and bigotry have not been dealt with sufficiently. And so it bubbles up to the top when you have someone like him that spreads that kind of stuff. And no one should be surprised.
But I think when people lay this at the feet of Nazi Germany, oh, no, no, no, wait a minute — that’s really what the crux of my piece was, is, “Oh, no, this is just as American as apple pie.” And also, when they do that, you diminish what happened to millions of people in Nazi Germany, and, more importantly, you diminish the Black liberation struggle right here on this soil, where a type of fascism, apartheid-type activity, chattel slavery itself, that deprived generations of Black people from living out their greatest greatness, from rapes to lynchings to generational chattel — you diminish that, and you say, “This is not us.” That piece was to say, “No, it is us, and we need to deal with it and not [00:04:00] push it off on some other nation.”
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And what are you hearing, Nina, from voters that you’ve been speaking to? What are their principal concerns?
NINA TURNER: The economy. I mean, that is the thing that I hear about the most. And I know now some numbers have come out. Gas prices are mysteriously lower now. Imagine that. I’ve had voters say that to me. But it really is the economy and how inflation has really siphoned off any advantages that working-class people from all backgrounds have been trying so hard to change their material conditions, but they have not been able to get ahead.
Some Americans Are Already Living in Trump’s Purge - The New Abnormal - Air Date 10-1-24
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah. They don't. No one deserves this. And the fact of the matter is that if Donald Trump and JD Vance become president and vice president, this will be the norm. Because what I remember is Donald Trump throwing people in Puerto Rico paper towels for their massive devastation from a hurricane during his administration.
What I remember is the last time that he was president of the United States, he [00:05:00] denied North Carolina federal funds for two weeks while they were dealing, again, with the impact of a hurricane. So in my mind, like, there are some people. Donald Trump's base and constituents that don't care what they don't have access to, so long as Donald Trump is denying the same people that they hate.
And that to me is fucking wild. But that's where those folks are.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: This is one of the many things that will become, well, it's the norm now. It will become much, much worse if Trump and Vance get into office. And along those lines, I'm assuming you are familiar with, even if you haven't seen the series of movies called The Purge.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: I don't watch horror films because being a political analyst is enough, but please go ahead and tell the audience what The Purge is.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: Okay. I watch horror films to cheer me up, Danielle. But so the conceit of The Purge is that for I think 12 hours, basically all laws are suspended in America [00:06:00] and you can do whatever you want to anyone else.
It's dystopian. It's not portrayed as a good thing. So Donald Trump over the weekend decided that what he thinks will solve crime —and again, he was spouting his nonsense about crime and violent crime being up when the exact opposite is true—but what he said was that he was speaking in Pennsylvania and he said, Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Mike Kelly should be put in charge for "one really violent day".
And then he went on to say "one rough hour". And real rough, the world will get it out and it will end immediately. End immediately. It will end immediately. So he basically wants a version of The Purge. And that comparison has been drawn by a lot of people.
But I think it's also important to note that in The Purge, this applied to all Americans. Any American could go out and loot and murder and do horrific things. What Trump is saying here is basically he wants one person in charge of this. And then basically it would be like The [00:07:00] Purge, but only for law enforcement. So basically giving law enforcement one really violent day to do whatever they want, which is, some might argue that's pretty much what we have right now.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: I was gonna, like, I'm sorry, give me a headline that's different from where law enforcement is now without full immunity. I'm confused.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: Yeah. But no, and Danielle, I'll toss it over to you, but it is basically, he wants to give qualified immunity. He wants to basically, or replace that with complete immunity for law enforcement for six hours, or sorry, for one day or one rough hour, whatever it is. Danielle, does this remind you of anything? Besides The Purge movies.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah, actually it does. And thank you so much for giving me that softball toss over here, which is, while folks are comparing this to a horror film that they want to believe could never possibly happen in these United States, let me remind you that over the course of history in this country, [00:08:00] there have been a number, a number that we couldn't even imagine, of White supremacist led mobs that would storm into segregated areas, Black towns, Black cities, and destroy them. Murder, rape, lynch, beaten, killing children, babies. And it was all okay. Because Black people in this country for nearly a hundred years lived under Jim Crow. And no, this was not just in the South. This was everywhere in the United States. Some places were more segregated and more terrorized than others. But let's not create this narrative that the North was somehow some utopia for Black people. It was just less bad.
And so when I think about what Donald Trump is saying, I think about the Tulsa Massacre that people in Oklahoma just learned about [00:09:00] in the last couple of years. But Black people in Tulsa have always known the story of what happened in the middle of the night where over 300 Black people were murdered. An entire prosperous city. town, Black town, was destroyed and that they never received any reparations, any money back from the government. And basically it was pretty much government sanctioned. So Black people in America and Indigenous people in America already know what the fuck The Purge looks like, because it has happened time and time again.
So, for folks that want to compare this to a horror movie, it's not a horror movie. It is very real American history that continues to be swept under the rug as if people can't imagine the horrors that people have done at the hands of White supremacy. So, when I heard that, Andy I didn't chuckle as some people [00:10:00] did on social media. I didn't shrug and just say, Oh, he sounds insane. He sounded like Bull Connor. He sounded like every other racist that was in a position of power to actualize their White supremacist fantasies. That's what that was like to me.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: Oh, absolutely, I think i've said this before but it's insane that... look, I would never claim to be the smartest person in the room, but I am what would be considered well educated and I read a lot and all that stuff. I had never heard of the Tulsa Massacre until I'm sitting there watching an HBO show called Watchmen. And then I immediately just started reading about it. I was like, how was I not taught any of this? Or how did I just not even come across it in, like I said, I read a lot. It is amazing to me what we don't teach in this country.
And like you said, what we sweep under the rug. And, which also ties directly into what Ron DeSantis and other Republican governors and Republican-run localities are trying to do, or are actually doing in our [00:11:00] public schools, is trying to prevent people from learning about stuff like this. But yeah, I, no, I agree with you.
I don't have a problem with people making Purge comparisons and saying 'Trump is insane', because yes, to both of those. But also this, as you said, there's nothing funny about this. This is fascism. This is, I don't know what else to call it. Even if you want to take race out of it, which I don't think you can, but even if you want to, the idea of giving cops complete immunity to act for one rough day, one rough hour, whatever it is, that's pure unadulterated fascism.
And I don't want to go off on a media rant here because we do that a lot, I know, maybe too much, but cover this shit. Stop, again, stop with the sane washing and everything else and report that this is what this guy is saying. And don't say he was just joking or he was exaggerating. I don't care.
He's running for the president of the United States. There are certain things that I'm sorry, you don't joke about if you're [00:12:00] running for president of the United States. Also, I don't think he's joking.
Why You Shouldnt Buy the Election Narrative About Black Men - Reveal - Air Date 10-23-24
VOTER: As far as President Obama, lecturing or chastising Black men to vote, I don't think it was with malicious intent. I do think that it is a tactic that does not work. I think we should be addressing why Black men are either voting for Trump or not voting at all.
His most recent comments around Black men are definitely disappointing because when you look at the stats, like when you look at who came out like the last time a woman was a Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, after Black women, Black men were with a segment of the population that voted for her the most. And so I feel like this critique against Black men is like a bit unfair.
GARRISON HAYES: And while it may look [00:13:00] like Black men aren't doing their part to uphold and bolster Kamala's strong Showing, as much as Black women, what they are doing, though, is something that is supremely American, and that is to hold candidates accountable for their promises and making them take notice. And I think that's what Obama did. He took notice and he spoke to them.
VOTER: I think Obama was correct. I think it's solid for me. I think when I first started this, my vote was against Donald Trump, but now it's for Kamala.
GARRISON HAYES: If Obama had made the same comments to a room full of Black men, and there were no cameras around, we wouldn't care. But this is at least the second time that I know of, the first time being Morehouse's convocation, where he has Taken on this kind of condescending tone towards Black men and Black people in our choices. And I, I want to say, 'brother, read the [00:14:00] room. He really doesn't know how to read the room.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: So Barak admonishes Black men on the campaign trail, but then, a couple days later, Kamala comes out with a plan specifically for Black men, which, I have to say, I don't think I've ever heard of a candidate coming specifically with a plan for Black men. It felt like Barack was acting as the stick and Kamala was acting as the carrot, that it was a planned thing to move Black men that are on the edges or possibly thinking about voting for Donald Trump.
GARRISON HAYES: And so in some very real ways, Kamala Harris is taking a political risk in releasing an agenda specifically for. Black men. What this agenda for Black men does is it contextualizes her existing policy proposals, the things that she's been running on for the last 70 something days. And it places it within the context of the way these proposals will impact or will potentially impact Black men.
Black people, [00:15:00] Black men specifically for so long. Politicians have been afraid to talk to and about the Black community. They've been afraid that if they frame their policies as something that will help Black people specifically, it will create a kind of racial resentment in the majority culture among white voters and it may turn them off from supporting them.
And so they've walked around with this Hey guys, I'm for everyone. And I think if politicians do much more of the framing of their plans for Black communities, particularly we'll have voters who are better informed and able to make the right decision for them.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: On the flip side, Donald Trump also tried to connect with Black men earlier this year, or at least that's what a lot of people assumed he was trying to do, when he started selling a shiny gold pair of sneakers called Never Surrender High Tops.
COMMERCIAL: That's the real deal. That's the real deal.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: So I don't think that I've heard anywhere Trump saying that specifically the sneakers were for Black men. Black men and Black [00:16:00] people and this is his outreach to Black men and Black people. I just felt like that's the subtext of it And I gotta be honest like I was offended because if you think you got to buy my vote with sneakers No, it doesn't. No, sir. Please give me policy over sneakers.
GARRISON HAYES: Yeah. I know that they framed those sneakers that way on Fox news, that this was something that was designed to serve as outreach to the Black community, because obviously Black people love their sneakers. Like that was the idea.
NEWS CLIP: This is connecting with Black America because they love sneakers. They're into sneakers. They love the, this is a big deal, certainly in, in the inner city. So when you have Trump roll out his sneaker line, they're like, wait a minute, this is cool. He's reaching them on a level that defies and is above politics.
GARRISON HAYES: I think more than the sneakers, Trump has repeated multiple times that his mugshot has helped him with Black people, Black voters particularly, and I can only imagine [00:17:00] as folks disproportionately represented in the car serial system that, that he means Black men in particular.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: A lot of the young people that I have spoken to, I had a good conversation with my son, who is, my youngest is 20, and him and I were talking about who his friends were voting for, and he was telling me that a lot of them, like Trump He also said, they're not actually going to vote, but they like Trump.
And I was like, why do they like Trump? And he said that they like Trump because he's tough because he acts tough because he's because things like that picture of his mugshot or the picture of him getting shot at and him throwing his fist up in the air For their generation, for a younger generation, that's like Tupac getting shot and throwing, the middle finger in the air, right?
Like that, for my generation, that was like classic. That was defiance. That was like, you can't take me out. And so Trump basically took a page from Tupac.
GARRISON HAYES: Yeah, I definitely think that's true to a [00:18:00] degree. I think for younger generations, I'm not sure if the framework of toughness, I think for millennials and maybe older, I Toughness really is kind of part of that, that quoi that Trump has as an appeal to Black men, I think for younger generations, especially those who came up in kind of the internet age, it's his lack of care.
It's the unscripted, unwilling to bow to social norms and that element, that kind of trolling element, I think is what kind of endears him to the, to Twitch streamer generation. He is in that reality TV vein that we see a lot of folks adopting on TikTok and YouTube and streamers on Twitch.
And so he comes off as this untouchable kind of guy. He just says what he, the term is based, he just says whatever it is that he wants to say and he gets away with it and he's rich and he has all this stuff. And I think that kind of. countercultural affect is actually what endears him to younger generations, even if they don't have the [00:19:00] language to necessarily put to it.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: I think it all comes down to is that what Black men are looking for is action. They need to see change because the Black vote has been taken for granted by Democrats, Black people, Black men specifically. They need to see that you're actually doing something they need to connect the possible future Harris administration to actually something changing in their lives.
That's right. And I want to end with just a question to you that I will also answer. Do you believe the hype that Black men are leaving in mass to the Republican Party? And go into Trump.
GARRISON HAYES: I don't believe the hype, Al. I think Black men will show up in majority numbers for the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris.
I think the number that we will see grow are those [00:20:00] who don't show up to vote at all. Those folks who Terrence Woodbury at Hit Strategies frames as rightfully cynical. Folks who have been, Thinking about the political landscape and coming to the conclusion that this just ain't for them, that the politicians aren't working for them, that this country really isn't working for them, and that their vote really doesn't matter.
Trumps Nazi Rally at MSG Perfectly Reflected Republican Values - The New Abnormal - Air Date 10-29-24
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: So, Danielle, I feel like I've opened the show a couple of times recently talking about how I have a browser tab that just says Nazi shit. Today's a little different, because I have a browser tab that just says Nazi rally.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Oh, that's nice.
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah. Shout out to Donald Trump and the Republicans for letting me get out of my rut, I guess.
But obviously I'm talking about the rally that was held here in New York City at Madison Square Garden Sunday night, which was, I would say, every bit as awful as expected, if not possibly more. I guess let's just take it in order, because it started with a comedian named Tony Hinchcliffe telling jokes [00:21:00] about black people and watermelon, and then moving on to describing Latinos as basically mindless breeders, making a joke about that, and then calling Puerto Rico a, quote, "floating island of garbage."
This, needless to say, got a lot of play. And Danielle, I'm gonna guess you don't have strong feelings about any of this. It's just a sense that I have. This doesn't strike me as the kind of thing that really--
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Rubs me the wrong way?
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah, yeah. But prove me wrong. Debate me, bro.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Okay, I'm gonna try and get through this without just doing a primal scream, which is how I felt watching the coverage of this Nazi rally that took place at Madison Square Garden.
First off, I think that this was one of the most notable [00:22:00] signs of terrorism from this campaign that I think that we have seen since it started. Donald Trump and Republicans have alluded to white supremacy and white nationalism, have been a bit nuanced over the course of the last several years and how they frame their commentary. When Donald Trump is asked about white supremacy and to disavow it, he famously told the white supremacist militia to "stand back and stand by." When the march happened in Charlottesville, where the Nazis were screaming, "Jews will not replace us," Donald Trump embraced them and said that they were good people on both sides.
He has sat down to dinner with Nick Fuentes, a known white supremacist, and Kanye West. He has said to a group of Jewish people that if he does not win re-election, the [00:23:00] Jews will be to blame.
Donald Trump and every single one of his followers want a white nationalist version of America that is deeply rooted in their twisted and warped ideas regarding the Bible and regarding evangelicalism.
And what was on display was just unadulterated hate. There were no jokes that were said, so I don't even want to create this notion that because somebody puts on their resume that they're a comedian that anything that comes out of their fucking mouth is funny, right? And that's some way to soften the absolute vitriol that that motherfucker was spitting the entire time that he was on stage.
It's not a joke. Nothing that Donald Trump has said over the last nine years is a joke. Stephen Miller being up on that stage as another known white supremacist that he wants to put in charge of quote unquote their [00:24:00] immigration deportation plans isn't a comedian.
So I think that this was probably the biggest display of white terrorism, domestic terrorism, and hatred that we have seen since January 6th. But January 6th, you could have even said like, oh, well, that was about the election and they were hopped up on the election lie and that being stolen from them.
AOC was on MSNBC and she was very clear and articulated very clearly that this was about priming Donald Trump's audience and base for a wave of violence following this election.
And it was disgusting. And, yeah, those are my initial thoughts, Andy, without me screaming full fledged into the microphone.
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: No, I actually think you did a really good job. I 100 percent agree with everything you said. [00:25:00] I am finding it, I'm gonna use the word, funny. Except I'm not laughing when I say this, but I'm finding it funny that there are now a bunch of Republicans scrambling to disassociate themselves with the things that were said about Puerto Rico.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Not the watermelon joke though, right?
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: No, no, no, I haven't heard anything.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah, so they're very specific about their denouncements, but it's only about the slate of voters that are very prevalent in the actual states that they want to win. But black people and their overt racism, they are fuck that, they're good. Got it.
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Correct. Correct. And the reason I wanted, when I intro this, the reason I wanted to bring up the watermelon quote unquote joke was because I do feel like it's being completely forgotten about and overlooked and I don't think it should be.
I want to talk about a congresswoman in Florida, Republican congresswoman named Maria Elvira Salazar. She tweeted that she was disgusted by Tony Hinchcliffe's comments, and then she said -- I love this phrase -- she said, "This [00:26:00] rhetoric does not reflect GOP values."
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: [Laughs] Give me a break!
ANDY LEVY - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: And I've seen that numerous times now, since the rally. I have seen numerous Republicans out there, saying exactly that. And honestly, I think these -- Bedlam was a famous psychiatric hospital in England, and it did all kinds of horrible experiments to people back in like the 19th century and earlier than that. I really do think that if you are at the level of delusion to think that this rhetoric does not reflect GOP values, you are very lucky you're not living in 19th century Britain, because you would have had horrible experiments done to you in Bedlam. Because you would have absolutely been locked up as a delusional maniac.
And they can't be allowed to get away with it. And that's why I want to highlight it. Because nothing that was said at that rally last night, not a single thing that was said at that rally last night, not a single disgusting, hateful, racist, bigoted thing that was said [00:27:00] does not reflect GOP values. Those are GOP values in the year 2024. We know this.
And to sit there and try to say -- even the Trump campaign now is -- you know things are bad when the Trump campaign has to come out and say that what Tony Hinchcliffe said does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign, which again, well, that's a lie. And that's a lie right up there with this rhetoric does not reflect GOP values. Of course it does. And of course it reflects the views of President Trump and the Trump campaign.
But the fact that they have had to come out and say that, I do think gets to something that happened with that rally last night.
“The Confederacy Won” Why Donald Trump’s Reelection Is a Win for White Supremacy, Xenophobia & Hate - Democracy Now! - Air Date 11-6-24
Professor Anderson, let’s begin with you. If you can respond to Trump’s victory?
CAROL ANDERSON: The Confederacy won. When you begin to really think about [00:28:00] what he advocated, the kind of racism, the kind of xenophobia, the kind of hatred, all wrapped in a sense of honor and gallantry, and how that resonated with such a large, wide swath of the American public, that begins to tell you that you’re seeing the backlash to what they call the great — you know, that you’re seeing the backlash to what they fear was the great replacement. And so, this feels like the kind of last stand of white supremacy.
And it’s going to put so many of us in jeopardy. And it’s also part of the drug of American exceptionalism, where those who voted for him believe that they’re going to be safe from the policies that he’s going to rain down. And so, that becomes part of the amnesia of not seeing how he handled COVID, not remembering how he handled COVID, of not remembering his tariff wars that basically almost [00:29:00] bankrupted farmers in Iowa, and the kind of chaos that he brings, the kind of divisiveness that he brings. It’s like living in a reality show and believing that it’s not reality. It is — this is a dark day for America. I think of Thomas Jefferson when he said, “I tremble for my country, because God is just,” because that’s what we’re looking at. I’m trembling for our country right now.
JUAN GONZALEZ - CO-HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: And, Professor Anderson, the vote that Trump got, right now it’s at 71 million. It will probably go up 1 or 2 million more as other states are counted in and absentee ballots. But it’s still roughly about the vote that he got certainly last time. But the big drop appears to be in the vote for Kamala Harris. She’s at around — the national vote is 66 million now, significantly [00:30:00] below the 81 million that Joe Biden got. Why do you think there’s been such a disparity in her vote totals this time around?
CAROL ANDERSON: I think part of what we’re looking at, because she was explicit about policies, and so the language that she just needs to explain her policies is hokum. It’s that it is — we’re looking at the misogyny and the racism and the fear of what it meant to have a Black Asian woman who’s married to a Jewish man sitting in the White House, that this was not the kind of vision of America that that large swath that voted for Trump believe is America. It is the fear of what a multicultural, multiracial, multilingual, diverse America could mean. It means — and so, you’re seeing the backlash to her very being.
It’s a sad day for America. It’s a sad day because there was a — [00:31:00] really explicit about the horrors of Project 2025 and what that meant for Social Security, what that meant for Medicare, what that meant for education, what that meant for equity. All of that could not override the depth of the misogyny, the depth of the racism that fuels the MAGA movement, that fuels Trump.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Yeah, I’d like to bring in professor Michele Goodwin into the conversation from Georgetown University. Professor, your reaction to the results?
MICHELE GOODWIN: We have to understand this as a Project 2024. So, the response, which I think was so eloquently put just now, is an amalgamation of a number of things. If we look at what the election results were based on race, it paints a picture in the United States. It paints a picture with regard to [00:32:00] how people think about electing a woman, how people think about electing a woman who is Black and of Asian descent. It paints a picture policywise about what Americans are willing to embrace. And in that way, it’s a Project 2024, it’s a Project 1619, in terms of what Americans are willing to accept, to the extent that we know that Donald Trump is willing to fulfill on what it is that he says. He said that he wanted to criminally punish women. He said — in 2016, 2015, he said that he wanted to overturn Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. After that occurred, he took full credit for that. There were a number of things that he had hoped to dismantle. This was a president who right after coming into office had a Muslim ban, was responsible for kids at the border being placed in cages, being fed frozen burritos. This was an [00:33:00] administration that had its lawyers fighting to deny those children soap and toothpaste, arguing before federal judges that those children who were locked in cages in federal custody did not deserve soap, did not deserve toothpaste. This was a president who failed on COVID, who made sure that he had medications for himself, vaccine, and then also sent to others, including, what has been alleged, to Russia and to Putin so that there would be access to the best of what we had for COVID at that time, but for Americans, did not do a good job at all in terms of collaboration, cooperation and leading with regard to COVID, and instead had suggested that perhaps injections of bleach and other things might be the way to respond to COVID. And one could really go down the list in terms of what that presidency represented. And Americans [00:34:00] overwhelmingly voted for that.
But is that something that is new? I think that one of our challenges in our country is to really understand the arc of who we’ve been and the arc of who we are. We tend to think that we actually had our own truth and reconciliation, such that we have confronted what have been the thorny, horrific parts of our past. And we haven’t. We’ve not done the work of a South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Germany, right? We’ve not looked and said, “How could we tolerate systems where women were denied citizenship? How could we tolerate women being denied the right to vote? How could we tolerate women being denied the opportunity to become lawyers?” And I’m talking about Supreme Court cases. “How could we tolerate women being denied from serving on juries? How could we tolerate women being denied the opportunity to have bank accounts in their own names, have their own checking accounts in their own names?” And [00:35:00] that’s a modern iteration.
And then we can unpack what this means in terms of Jim Crow and slavery. How could we be a nation that tolerated children standing on auction blocks and being auctioned off, bid upon? Not for a horrific day, where we wake up and say, “My goodness, what was that all about? Bidding on children in shackles and chains?” No, but not practice that lasted a day, a week, a year. A year alone might have been waking up and saying, “How in the world could we have tolerated that?” But to see that flow into centuries and then to create patterns of justification and narratives for that, that then flowed into Jim Crow, a time in the United States that was marked very narrowly by what happened to Rosa Parks, but more fulsomely the denial of people being able to walk in the parks, swim in pools, go into motels, stay at hotels, live where they wanted to based on their race, and a practice that lasted for generations upon [00:36:00] generations, that then required federal intervention.
So we have to ask ourselves: How could we have tolerated all of that? And in part, the answer is what we see in the election yesterday, is that we’re willing to tolerate more of that. And then we have to ask ourselves: Why? What is behind that?
Trump campaign was built on 'hate' which has contributed to 'racial terror' NAACP exec - MSNBC - Air Date 11-8-24
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: And I want to go back, Charles, to what he said about the ubiquitousness of information that's out there.
But, I was struck by the fact that so many of the recipients were young, that they were college students, high school students, middle school students, who, before their parents would ever want to, may have to sit down and have a very serious conversation. But from a legal standpoint and the search that's going on for who might be behind this, does that tell us anything about the type of person, the group that might do this, or is this just what people, horrible people do and how they think they can [00:37:00] get it out there.
CHARLES COLEMAN: Well, certainly, Chris, there is a profile of a person who is a horrible person who engages in this sort of behavior, a White supremacist, someone who is on the far right, but make no mistake about it, regardless of the illegality of this—and the FBI has the tools necessary to make those assessments and to identify and characterize who they need to, in order to do their investigations—there was one thing that you said in your reading that I had a problem with, and it was the characterization of this as shocking. It's disappointing. It's upsetting. But it's not shocking. And the reason why these individuals who have been targeted are oftentimes younger is because the people who are sending these messages want to send a very clear message as early as possible so that folks understand where we are going and what this is.
And as we have this conversation, it's incredibly important that we realize that for those people who are expressing a little bit of hesitancy, a little bit of reticence, a little bit of unsurety around whether they are going to [00:38:00] continue to be in lockstep around our coalitions, this is why. Because this is a real fear, and as Jonathan talked about, this cannot be put in the same breath as wondering whether you'll be ostracized for people not knowing how you voted.
No, this is a safety issue that Black people in America are not going to be able to escape. And so it is a false equivalency for us to say at this point, we should all just come together and be able to move forward.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: Take a breath.
CHARLES COLEMAN: Take a breath, right. Because this is something that is affecting us, our children, our families, our livelihoods, in ways that other people simply cannot understand.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: And Patrice, the president of your organization, CEO at Derrick Johnson condemned these texts, but he also said something I think to Charles point, these actions are not normal. And we should refuse to let them be normalized. Talk about that and what can be done about it. I feel like every time I have [00:39:00] you on, every time I have somebody from the NAACP, every time I have Charles on, cause we talk a lot about civil rights cases, I'm asking this question: What do we do about it? And here we are again.
PATRICIA WILLOUGHBY: Well, Chris, thank you for having me on. And this is a critical point that leadership and the tone is very important. Elections have consequences and the president-elect's campaign was built on hate and grievance, which has contributed to an environment of hate, racial hatred, and racial terror that the NAACP has seen since its inception in 1909.
As Mr. Coleman has indicated, there is a great deal of empowerment and joy among young Black Americans. And these messages are meant to tamp that down. But their proliferation is the evidence that when you don't denounce [00:40:00] hatred and you actually promote it, there are consequences for fellow American citizens.
These text messages are disturbing, but they are only beginning. We saw this going back from the enactment of the 14th Amendment and the rise of Jim Crow and the rise of racial terror. This is simply the latest iteration of that strategy.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: Jonathan, one mother whose daughter received one of these texts told your paper, and it's related to Charles' point, she said, "I'm disappointed, but I'm not shocked". Is this a new world for Black Americans, or a continuation? I guess maybe the better question is, is this a continuation or an escalation of the world that Black Americans were already living in? And I should say by that I've also had other people of color reach out to me and say that they have also had the same kind of reaction given where we are right now in this moment
JONATHAN CAPEHART - HOST, MSNBC: It [00:41:00] is a continuation. And I think a lot of the fear, especially as a result of these text messages is, is this the beginning of an escalation? I mean, there was a reason why people were in the streets four years ago after the murder of George Floyd, but George Floyd was not the first Black person killed by law enforcement, unarmed Black person killed by law enforcement. People had been marching in the streets for generations. What's concerning here is we don't seem to learn the lessons—by we, the American people—don't seem to learn the lessons of the past. And when we—meaning Black people—talk about our concerns, talk about, you know, fill in the blank person who has just been killed by law enforcement, just been killed by vigilante, set upon by White supremacists that suddenly, when we [00:42:00] ask for our leaders and ask for our government to take our lives seriously, suddenly it's you're catering to the far left, that you are not paying attention to other issues. When all we're asking you is to, can you pay attention to our dignity? Can you pay attention to our lives?
We are very much a part of the American fabric. And so when we say to you, we don't think it's right that law enforcement has done this to George Floyd, that you take what we're saying seriously, especially since we have been saying the same thing for generations. Ms. Freeman, who is the woman you showed at the beginning of this segment, that conversation she had to have with her child as a result of getting those text messages, that's the conversation that Black parents have been having with their children for generations. Unfortunately, because of text messaging and social media, [00:43:00] she wasn't able to have that conversation on her timetable. Painful timetable. She had to have that conversation because someone decided to weaponize her child's identity,
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: And we know, as you said, that information is out there on all of us, but it's not hard to find out details of a person. Charles, is this a hate crime?
CHARLES COLEMAN: It is unquestionably, and I think that one of the things—I don't use this word very often, Chris, but the notion of being terrified. As a civil rights attorney, I am terrified when I think about where we are right now, meaning that, this is November; by January, there will be a new Attorney General and there will be a new person heading the DOJ's Office of Civil Rights. Kristen Clark will no longer be there to do the amazing job that she's done. This investigation, wherever it goes, will likely end there. And then what happens? What happens to the people who are responsible for perpetrating these wrongs? What happens to the other people [00:44:00] who feel emboldened at that point? Because we can almost guarantee that under a Donald Trump DOJ, whomever he decides will be the AG, the level of attention that is paid to civil rights cases will not be what it was under this past administration. And that is what terrifies me. Because there will be no guardrail. There will be no stop. There will be no legal repercussions to even stop these actions as they have been identified as illegal and as hate crimes. And that's deeply problematic and something we have to stay keeping our eyes on.
The Hard Truth About Why Harris Was the Wrong Choice for America - The New Abnormal - Air Date 11-6-24
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah, the thing is, and there are a lot of people, particularly Black women on social media right now, that are saying, I'm done. I'm actually tired. I'm tired of being on the front lines of America's war with itself, America's reckoning with its racist and misogynistic foundation that they choose to ignore, and saying, where I am going to be is taking care of myself and my community and my family and leave the 50 percent of [00:45:00] white women who voted for Kamala Harris to do the work, leave the rest to do the work.
What do you say to that? Because I understand that the path ahead is going to be, I don't even actually -- I don't even think I've wrapped my mind around it. But what do you say to those that, particularly for black women that have been carrying the burden, I'm not doing it anymore? Because this is already going to be damn near impossible for me.
So you're on your own.
JARED YATES SEXTON: I'm glad you brought it up this way. And the first thing that I would say is that I'm terribly sorry. I am terribly sorry, not just for the circumstances that have led us to this point, and have inundated the lives of vulnerable communities and populations that have been targeted and discriminated for forever.
But I also want to apologize for something else. In the past eight years, since Donald Trump became a political figure in the United States of America, what black women in other communities that we're discussing, what they have experienced are the aesthetics of support and [00:46:00] allyhood. They have seen on social media a lot of people who post a lot of things, who say a lot of things about what they care about and what their principles are. And a lot of that was delusional. And a lot of it was dishonest. And it wasn't backed up by anything that actually meant anything.
And we're now seeing all of these DEI and diversity statements at universities and corporations that are going away. And this entire thing about quote unquote "wokeness", there are people who have woken up to the actual circumstances and those people are your allies. But we also need to understand that a lot of people saw a financial and political advantage to using those things as a costume, and using those things as a marketing opportunity.
So the first thing I would say is I'm sorry. And the second thing that I would say is this: right now, people are tired, and part of the reason they are tired is because some of them have put their blood, sweat, tears, and livelihoods on the line, and they were betrayed. And they were not helped by people who purported to help them, or who purported to [00:47:00] be their allies. And I understand that exhaustion.
The other part of this is a lot of people were misled by politicians. They were misled by online influencers. They were misled by a lot of people who told them, Hey, we're almost done with this thing. It's going to be totally fine. And I want people to imagine. -- and I hope this metaphor resonates -- I want people to think about being on a road that is many, many miles long, and you're being pursued by wolves as you're on that road. It is exhausting. You think that you only have another mile left to go after many, many miles, and then you suddenly realize that you have another 5, 6, 10 miles left to go. That disappointment and frustration and exhaustion is natural.
And I would invite people to take the moment of rest that we currently have. We have a few months until this thing actually takes off. This is a time to fortify yourself, to catch your breath, to drink your water, metaphorically [00:48:00] and literally, to actually get yourself in a position where you are ready for the fight that is coming.
Some people aren't going to be able to do it. But guess what that means? You and I and the other people listening, we have to pick them up and help them. We have to do our part. And that's what actual solidarity is about. It's about going on a journey and understanding that sometimes you are going to carry others, and sometimes those people are going to carry you.
And the only way that we can actually make that happen is to build trust and intimacy and solidarity. And if there's anything that the United States of America is missing right now, and we are missing many things, it is trust, intimacy and solidarity.
I understand why people feel like they're not going to get picked up. I understand why people feel alone. That is part of the abuse of authoritarianism, which is systematic abuse which is supposed to crush your spirit and kill it.
And by the way, that's what it's about. You're supposed to reach a point in which you have no [00:49:00] hope and you either put the armband on and you goosestep down Main Street, or you close your door and hope and pray it doesn't come to your door. I have bad news for everybody: It's coming for your door. And putting that armband on is not an option.
So the whole point is we need to fortify ourselves. We need to find trust. And we need to find hope and solidarity and intimacy that has been missing. And that's the only way we're going to make it through this thing.
Note from the Editor about the shifting landscape of social media
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: We've just heard clips starting with Nina Turner on Democracy Now! discussing the very Americanness of the white supremacy endemic in the MAGA movement. The New Abnormal described historical and current threats of violence at the hands of white supremacy. Reveal discussed both the political targeting and scapegoating of Black men. The New Abnormal focused on Trump's Madison Square Garden Nazi rally. Carol Anderson on Democracy Now! described the election as a victory for the Confederacy. MSNBC discussed the racist text messages that were sent out to mostly young Black people in the immediate wake of the election. [00:50:00] And Jared Yates Sexton on The New Abnormal described our current state and the importance of supporting, and being supported by community. And those were just the top takes, there's a lot more in the deeper dive sections. But first, a reminder that this show is supported by members who get access to bonus episodes, featuring the production crew here, discussing all manner of important and interesting topics. To support all of our work and have those bonus episodes delivered seamlessly to the new members only podcast feed that you'll receive, sign up to support the show at bestofleft.com/support. There's a link in the show notes, through our Patreon page, or from right inside the Apple podcast app. Members also get chapter markers in the show, but depending on the app you use to listen, you may be able to use time codes that we put in the show notes to jump around the show, similar to chapter markers. So check that out if you like. If regular membership isn't in the cards for you. Shoot me an email requesting a financial hardship membership because we don't let a lack of funds stand in the way of [00:51:00] hearing more information.
Now, before we continue on to the deeper dives half of the show, speaking of the importance of depending on community, there is an interesting shift happening online as people are making moves between social networks in large numbers. This isn't the first time this has happened or threatens to happen. There were a lot of people who wanted to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition. And of course some did, but the forces of network effects are strong. And so many people stayed put or, like us, many created accounts on new social networks, just in case, but then didn't end up actually engaging on them. Now, thanks to Musk's heavy hand in the election and close ties with Trump combined with all of the new policies turning X into an explicitly right-wing haven, this time feels different. And the exodus to alternate platforms is more substantial than before. As one headline put it, "'I'm going to Bluesky' is the new 'I'm [00:52:00] moving to Canada.'"
So, regardless of where you go, you can follow us on Bluesky, Mastodon and Threads. Those are the big three right now. And if you have any sense, like you may want to be dabbling in more than one, I recommend the app Open Vibe, which consolidates posts from all three of those platforms and lets you cross post to all of them, creating a unified experience.
As for a couple of tips specific to Bluesky, Bluesky is the big one that is, I think, enjoying the most benefit from people actively leaving Twitter right now. I've been using a tool called Sky Follower Bridge, which helps you track down accounts that have migrated from Twitter to Bluesky. So you use it to find all of the accounts that you followed or who followed you on Twitter, who have now migrated to Bluesky and lets you reconnect with them by following them on the new [00:53:00] platform.
Finally, the last tip is from Bluesky, which has this next tip built right into their system, no extra apps or plugins necessary. In Bluesky, you can create starter packs of accounts that you want to promote. So naturally Best of the Left has a starter pack of progressive writers, activists, and organizations, so you can follow them all in just a couple of taps. That means you can also create your own starter pack. I would certainly hope that you would include Best of the Left in your starter pack, if you were to do that. And you should also encourage other individuals or activists or, you know, organizations, people with trust with existing networks to create their own starter packs, to help people get started on the new network.
Obviously building a community from scratch is a daunting task and this is a major tool to help you do that much more quickly. So check the show notes for all of those links.
SECTION A - MIRROR FOR AMERICA
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: And now we'll continue to [00:54:00] dive deeper on four topics. Next up section a a mirror for America. Followed by section B white supremacy for the win. Section C reverberation and section D what now?
American Coup Wilmington 1898 Film Examines Massacre When Racists Overthrew Multiracial Gov't - Democracy Now! - Air Date 11-12-24
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: The trailer for American Coup: Wilmington 1898. We’re going to speak to the director, but first this clip lays out how Wilmington was the largest city in North Carolina in 1898. Black people held many positions in government alongside white people.
CRYSTAL SANDERS: The removal of troops from the South ushered in the end of Reconstruction, and white supremacists are once again able to regain power.
LERAE SIKES UMFLEET: Democrats and Republicans of 1898 are not the Democrats and Republicans of the 21st century.
CAROL ANDERSON: Remember, what we had coming out of the Civil War was that Lincoln was a Republican, and the Republican Party was founded on an [00:55:00] anti-slavery platform.
LERAE SIKES UMFLEET: That meant that most African American voters were going to vote for the Republican candidates.
CAROL ANDERSON: The Democrats were the Klan members. The Democrats were the slaveowners, the enslavers. They were deeply committed to the denying citizenship rights to African Americans.
ROBIN D. G. KELLEY: The Democratic Party holds the state in the 1870s throughout the 1880s. It’s really not until the 1890s that you begin to see the Democrats again lose their power. There’s a depression that takes place in 1893. White farmers are suffering.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: These white farmers felt that the Democratic Party was beholden to the banks and the railroads and the moneyed interests.
ROBIN D. G. KELLEY: And they bolt from the Democrats and join the [00:56:00] Populists, which is a third party.
LERAE SIKES UMFLEET: Neither the Republican Party nor the Populist Party had the voting power to unseat Democratic Party candidates if they were running in a tripart election.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: So they form an alliance, white Populists and Black and white Republicans. This became known as fusion.
CRYSTAL SANDERS: We see a political alliance between African Americans and working-class white people.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: The Populists were as racist as any of the members of the Democratic Party, but their economic interests were so strong that they were able to set that aside.
CAROL ANDERSON: It’s not some kumbaya moment. We’ve got to be really clear about that. It was a pragmatic moment.
CRYSTAL SANDERS: So, both in 1894 and in 1896, this fusionist coalition of Black and white men are able to sweep the North Carolina General Assembly.
ROBIN D. G. KELLEY: North Carolina elects a [00:57:00] fusion governor, Daniel Russell. They send George White to Congress. And they start to pull back all the things that the Democrats did to reduce democracy. So, for example, the positions that were once appointed in Wilmington are now turned into elected positions, which allows Black people to run for office.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: It created, really, a situation in Wilmington that was unique. You had Black men in positions of authority and power.
CRYSTAL SANDERS: So we see Black and white men on the Board of Aldermen. We see Black and white men serving in various municipal offices.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: Ten of the 26 policemen were Black men, the city treasurer, the city jailer, the city coroner. John C. Dancy was the custom collector at the port, which is a federally appointed position. He made $4,000 a year, which was $1,000 more than the governor made.
ROBIN D. G. KELLEY: The mayor of [00:58:00] Wilmington is also a fusion candidate. It’s not the majority of Black, it’s the majority fusion that makes the difference.
KIDADA WILLIAMS: So, with Wilmington by 1898, African Americans had still held on to a lot of the rights and privileges and the institutions and the power they had enjoyed.
CAROL ANDERSON: It was a land of possibility, a land of hope, a different vision of what American democracy could be, that it could actually be multiracial and work.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: That last voice, Carol Anderson, Emory professor. And this is another clip from American Coup: Wilmington 1898 that describes an editorial in Wilmington’s Black newspaper, The Daily Record, before the coup.
DAVID ZUCCHINO: Rebecca Felton, she was the wife of a congressman in Georgia. She gave a speech to the agricultural society condemning white men for, in her mind, not doing enough to stop the Black beast rapists and this supposed rape epidemic [00:59:00] in Georgia. There was no rape epidemic, but she created one. White supremacist newspapers in Wilmington realized they could make something of this, so they reprinted her speech in August of 1898. And as soon as Alex Manly saw that, he sat down and wrote an editorial in response to Mrs. Felton.
KIERAN HAILE: “Mrs. Felton from Georgia makes a speech before the agricultural society at Tybee, Georgia, in which she advocates lynching as an extreme measure.”
ALEX MANLY: [dramatized] Experience among poor white people in the country teaches us that women of that race are not more particular in the matter of clandestine meetings with colored men that are the white men with colored women. Meetings of this kind go on for some time until the woman’s infatuation or the man’s boldness bring attention to them, and the man is lynched for rape.
Every negro lynched is called a big burly black brute. When in fact, many of those who have thus been dealt with, have [01:00:00] had white men for their fathers, and were not only not black and burly, but were sufficiently attractive for the white girls of culture and refinement to fall in love with them.
KIERAN HAILE: “Tell your men that it is no worse for a Black man to be intimate with a white woman than for a white man to be intimate with a colored woman. Don’t think ever that your women will remain pure while you are debauching ours.” Alex Manly editorial, Daily Record, August 18th, 1898.
CAROL ANDERSON: This was blasphemous. You know, to say that a white woman could actually desire a Black man? What?
DAVID ZUCCHINO: The other point he made was that for generations, white men had been raping Black women with impunity, and that had been going on forever, and nobody talks about that.
CAROL ANDERSON: Alexander Manly’s rebuttal to Rebecca Felton was absolutely courageous. He didn’t say it behind closed doors while he’s talking with his friends. He did it in an [01:01:00] editorial published in The Daily Record that has white advertisers. I mean, so he’s really putting himself out there. You had some members of the Black community who were like, “Oh, Manly? Manly doesn’t speak for us.”
CRYSTAL SANDERS: There were many who perhaps, even if they believed it was true, thought that it was, you know, too inflammatory to be printed. We also see prominent Black men in Wilmington urge Manly to recant the editorial, to apologize, in an effort to avoid conflict. He refuses. He sees himself as someone who has done nothing wrong. He has spoken a truth that he believes has gone unspoken for too long.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: American Coup: Wilmington 1898 premieres tonight on PBS and will also stream online.
The Hard Truth About Why Harris Was the Wrong Choice for America Part 2 - The New Abnormal - Air Date 11-6-24
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: You're nicer than me. I think that it's absolute bullshit to blame this loss on the Harris Walz ticket. In a hundred days, they put together one of the most formidable [01:02:00] campaigns we have ever seen. This had nothing to do with her. This is the thing that gets me. about racism and misogyny is that it has you questioning like yourself.
This had nothing to do with perceived deficiency on the part of the Harris walls ticket. And I know that people will love particularly Democrats as they run and leap to move to the right. We'll love to have this conversation and do this autopsy about all of the ways in which she was wrong. The only ways in which she was wrong for America is that she is black and Asian and a woman.
That is how she was wrong. And that's the reality. Just the same way, like, I could look in a very conscious way and say, here are some of the things that Hillary Clinton in 2016 took for granted and did wrong. This campaign knew all of those things from 2016, took that, took also the things that they learned from 2020, and applied them.
What we have to understand [01:03:00] is that there were going to, there was never going to be a facts and figures case that was going to be presented to racists and to misogynists that were going to have them let go of their perceived power in the goal of trying to help other people. That was never going to be the case.
So while we could sit down and tell folks the ways in which Donald Trump is going to be bad for them as well, they do not care so long as he is going to be worse for people that they don't like. And that's the rea so there's no like, rationalizing with people that are inherently racist. And see their position and their power in this country being challenged by the perceived other.
Whether that other be black people, which it often is, and always is. Whether it be now too educated and too lippy of women and too free of women who don't know their place and will be put back in it. Like, so, whether it's [01:04:00] gay or trans people that, like, have the audacity to say, to want to live inside of their own skin and not operate on this false binary.
To me, the analysis is really a critique of America and how far we have yet to come and probably will ever come because we don't really want to have the hard conversations about embedded racism and misogyny. Which is what won this election, along with the help of American oligarchs, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, who used their platforms to either suppress information, depress information, or spread misinformation.
NICHOLAS GROSSMAN: Yeah, absolutely. And look, I want to talk about another thing that I've seen a lot of people sort of hitting about Kamala Harris, and that they say that she should have distanced herself more from Joe Biden. Yeah, absolutely. And here's how I look at this. That's first of all, that's easier said than done because she [01:05:00] was his vice president.
Second of all, Joe Biden did a pretty damn good job. The problem is that because of misinformation and disinformation, people don't know that, I guess, or see that. The third problem is. Why do I feel like if she had tried to distance herself from Joe Biden, the response to that would have been, who does this uppity black woman think she is?
Like that was the first thing I thought of. Like the first thing that they will say is who is this ungrateful black woman that Joe Biden elevated and now she's out here. distancing herself from him, and I just find it hard to believe that we wouldn't have seen that from a lot of places. I sort of feel like she was, that was a real lose lose situation for her.
And look, one of the things that's been written about, that was something I really didn't pay much attention to, is the strong anti incumbency feeling all across the And if you look at, you know, in Europe and here and how many [01:06:00] incumbents were tossed out this year, and it really is staggering. I think it's almost every incumbent party was thrown out of office this year.
It feels like there was just this wave of anti incumbency. And look, for all intents and purposes, she was the perceived as the incumbent, even though she's not Joe Biden. So I get why the argument is she should have distanced herself from him. I'm not really clear where, though. Should she have distanced herself from record low unemployment?
Should she have distanced herself from record high stock market? I mean, look, people are going to bring up Israel and Palestine. I don't care what side of that you're on. I don't think that means anything. A hell of a lot to the majority of American voters. Anyway, that's how I feel about that, because that's one I've seen thrown around.
Everything I've seen mentioned, well, she should distance herself from him here. I'm like, really? But it almost always comes down to the economy. And I'm like, I don't know what to tell you about the economy. Like, by every, normal metric, the economy is in good shape. And [01:07:00] the economy is particularly in remarkably good shape, considering where we were four years ago, even though there are so many Americans who seem to think they were better off four years ago, because as someone tweeted, Americans, and I think this is true of humans in general, have no sense of object permanence.
And somehow, They remember a completely crashed economy under Donald Trump as being good. I don't know how you fight that. I honestly, I don't know how you fight people who simply believe things that aren't true and won't be moved from that belief when you show them how. actual real facts. I don't know how you fight that.
And that's the wave that Donald Trump rode.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Yeah, a hundred percent. Like I said, you can't argue facts and figures with people that have told themselves that Donald Trump is the second coming of Christ. Like you can't, you can't show facts and figures to people that believe that he is the Messiah. He is, you know, a, an [01:08:00] unusual tool that which, you know, to, to wield in order to exercise, like the policy.
that they have been foaming at the mouth for, for the last 50 and 60 years. So there, to me, there was no appeal that she was going to offer to these people that are formulated, have formulated their, their lives in a scarcity mindset that believes that there just is not enough for all of us. And some of us should have nothing right like should like are deserving of nothing and not even are deserving of nothing but on top of that are deserving of pain so like that there there's like there's no what what would the slogan have been to try and bring those people over you try to link arms with more thoughtful and conscientious Republicans who believe in democracy if not if agree on nothing else right And that didn't work.
Like, oh, you don't have to align yourself with this guy over here. Here are some people that share your same values, but they [01:09:00] also believe in the value of democracy. I believe that white America, they decided in this election that democracy no longer works for them. Because democracy means adding more people to a table that they say there is not enough.
That exists for them already. So don't pull up those chairs. This is all mine. And if the way that I keep it mine is through authoritarianism and autocracy, then that's what I'm gonna do. That's what they voted for.
NICHOLAS GROSSMAN: Donald Trump got up there at a debate and said that they're eating the dogs, they're eating the cats.
And the only possible response to that is No, they're not. And that was the response, but it didn't matter. And that's the truly sad thing. That's the truly frightening thing. It didn't matter that the Haitian immigrants who moved to Springfield, Ohio and took jobs in factories took jobs that were sitting vacant.
They didn't steal those jobs from white people. And they improved the [01:10:00] economy of Springfield, Ohio. Radically. And none of that matters. Because Donald Trump got up there and said, they're eating the cats, they're eating the dogs, and people were like, yeah, we got to get these people out of this country.
There's no way to fight that other than the way that was tried. Would you say that? Well, that, that's, that's just not true. He's lying. You know, he's making shit up to try to scare you. It didn't matter. That's what people believed when they walked into the voting booths on Tuesday. Uh, that's what they believe today, and apparently that's what they want for at least the next four years.
American Coup Wilmington 1898 Film Examines Massacre When Racists Overthrew Multiracial Gov't Part 2 - Democracy Now! - Air Date 11-12-24
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: We’re joined by the co-director, Yoruba Richen, award-winning filmmaker.
Yoruba, welcome back to Democracy Now!
YORUBA RICHEN: Thank you, Amy. Thanks for having me.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Yoruba, I wanted to start off by asking you — the Manly editorial became the basis for the first attack of the white supremacists, when they burned down his newspaper. Can you talk about — and [01:11:00] again, they were spurred on by the editor and publisher of the white-owned News & Observer. Talk about the role of that publisher, as well.
Absolutely. So, the editorial that we just saw was used as the spark to, you know, go into action. But this coup had been planned meticulously in the months leading up to it. It was planned by a group called the Secret Nine, otherwise known as the Chamber — you know, very prominent members of the Chamber of Commerce. And they were self-styled, self-called white supremacists. And it was led by Josephus Daniels, who was the editor of The News & Observer in Raleigh. And the newspaper had published [01:12:00] continually this idea, this racist idea, of Black men raping white women and of bad government that Negroes were in charge of, and that if we continued — you know, if they continued to let this happen, white women would be debased and continue to be raped, an epidemic of rape.
And that’s what you saw, you know, the Rebecca Felton newspaper — her speech reprinted in the newspaper, and Manly responding and saying, “No, that’s not true,” and debunking that. And it was that editorial that was — that they said, you know, “Look what happens when Negroes are in rule. Look at the things that they can say. We’ve got to get rid of them. We’ve got to get rid of this newspaper.” And that was the spur for the attack. But it had been planned [01:13:00] many months before the actual events happened.
JUAN GONZALEZ - CO-HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: JUAN GONZÁLEZ:
And in making the film, you not only went into the archival records, but you made a decision to locate and interview both white and Black descendants of families that were involved in the events at the time. Could you talk about that?
JUAN GONZALEZ - CO-HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: Absolutely. My co-director and I, that was one of the first things that we knew we wanted to include in the film. We found out that a group of Black descendants and, really, one white descendant had been meeting for about a year before we started the production, through an organization called Coming to the Table, which is a national organization that deals — that brings Blacks and whites together dealing with racial issues. And they had been meeting. And we were able to meet them through that organization, attend those meetings and start to create a relationship [01:14:00] with some of the descendants who you see in the film. And then we did work to find more descendants, particularly more white descendants, because they were harder to locate or to invite to come and be a part of the film. And we’re very grateful for their participation.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: And one of the white descendants was the descendant of the newspaper editor, right?
YORUBA RICHEN: Absolutely, yes.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: And he and the other descendants took down his statue.
YORUBA RICHEN: Yes, yes. So, The News & Observer, up until the 1960s, was the paper that we saw in 1890s. And then there was a change. And the family recently took down the statue, I think in about 2020. And, you know, Frank was a part of it. He is in the film admitting to what his ancestor did and the harm that it produced not only to North Carolina but to the nation.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: And what happened, actually? [01:15:00] What did all of this lead up to? How many people died?
YORUBA RICHEN: So, you know, we’ll never know the numbers, the exact numbers. They weren’t — you know, they weren’t taking it down. But it’s said that it was maybe 200 to 300, but it was probably more than that, you can imagine. Black people were run into — ran into the swamps. One of the — Alfred Waddell, one of the leaders, said, “We’ll choke Cape Fear with their bodies.”
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: We have 10 seconds.
YORUBA RICHEN: And then it returned to — and, sorry, then it became a majority-white city. And two years later, Jim Crow was instituted, and there was not another Black person elected from the state of North Carolina ’til 1992.
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: Wow. It is an amazing film, and I encourage people to watch it. It premieres tonight on PBS and also live-streamed. Yoruba Richen is co-director of American Coup: Wilmington 1898. That does it for our show. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González. This is Democracy Now!
Is Trump Who We Really Are America’s True Face Revealed w Rohn Kenyatta - Thom Hartmann Program - Air Date 11-11-24
ROHN KENYATTA: Tom, I've kept my powder dry for this last almost week since Donald Trump's election, which is absolutely no surprise to me. But what I am astounded by is that, uh, it is. It is such a [01:16:00] surprise to other people on. I find that very just, uh, on an ominous reality. And if I might, I know that you don't, uh, cotton to pardon the phrase people reading.
On your program, the author of this piece, which is about to be published in a few moments called the man in the mirror. I'd like to, uh, if I could read a paragraph from it, uh, for it. Donald Trump won because he is a true reflection of what the United States is. He is a reflection in the spiritual and social mirror of the United States.
Republicans figuratively, if not literally, embrace and adore the grotesque, selfish, entitled, greedy, racist, obese, vile creature that they see in the mirror. While the Democrats would rather lie to themselves and say, that isn't me. [01:17:00] Ah, but it is the mirror mirror on the wall, as in Snow White, racist tropes will always be the trump card.
Pardon the ridiculous pun. In the United States, we saw it from the times of the Civil War. To, uh, super Predators and the Crime Bill to Willie Horton ads to, uh, black people from Haiti eating cats and dogs. And the media was complicit in this time when Donald Trump and during that debate with Kamala, uh, Kamala Harris, uh, you know, made.
That ridiculous statement. The media jumped on weeks instead of just saying he said something ridiculous because you see, immigration and the border was is, you know, repeatedly, he said that is his central issue. [01:18:00] And as long as that and until we understand that, and I know it's uncomfortable for people who probably many in any event, Um, have good hearts, you cannot get past it.
Racism is always going to be, especially anti blackism, the sexiest thing in U. S. politics. It has been repeated over and over and over again. What Donald Trump did was a tried and true strategy. Yep. And he won on it. And he didn't, you know, and I, you know, I went so far as to say right after within a week of Joe Biden's, uh, State of the Union address this year in March, within a week, He's called the State of the Union 2025.
And I'm not, you know, I'm not plugging myself. I'm simply saying that I'm not, I'm not understanding how [01:19:00] this is a surprise to anyone because I'm not that, you know, I said this to you before. I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I'm in the dull ones and and And how no one could see this coming really is worrisome to me.
THOM HARTMANN - HOST, THOM HARTMANN PROGRAM: Well, when you look at the people who voted for Joe Biden over Donald Trump, and then voted for Donald Trump this time around, do you really think they just just suddenly became racists?
ROHN KENYATTA: Oh, and I, and no, and I'm glad you said that because you know what,
THOM HARTMANN - HOST, THOM HARTMANN PROGRAM: I mean, I, I agree with you that, that, you know, racism is, is more endemic, more deeply entrenched, more vicious than, and frankly, I ever imagined.
I, I, I'm totally with you on that, but,
ROHN KENYATTA: well, I was actually going to quote you, uh, from a few weeks ago, maybe a month. You said that, you know, and, and you're a very well traveled. Very intelligent person, uh, and a historian to boot. Uh, you said that, [01:20:00] you know, uh, with your vast experience, the idea that the United States was as racist and white supremacist as it is, that's not a surprise to, to me.
Yeah. You see, I know. And when you talk about, when you talk, when you talk about Joe Biden, pardon me?
THOM HARTMANN - HOST, THOM HARTMANN PROGRAM: I said, I know we've had this guy before.
ROHN KENYATTA: Yeah. Yeah. And when you talk about Joe Biden, uh, and the people that voted for him in 2020, let me tell you something, uh, Donald Trump right now is telling people, um, that particularly he's saying that I won three times.
Okay. You know, he sees this election as a validation of Of, you know, uh, what he called the, the steal.
THOM HARTMANN - HOST, THOM HARTMANN PROGRAM: No, I get that. But to my question, you've got enough people who voted for Joe Biden last time [01:21:00] to make him president who voted for Donald Trump this time to make him president. What happened with those people?
I don't, you know, do you, do you think it's race that they suddenly decided, Hey, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll be even more racist? I, you know, I, I think s like I said, I think there's more going on here, and I think that. The demonization of trans people had something to do with it. I think the, the, the quality of the campaign that Kamala Harris ran in some cases, you know, lacked, uh, she, she failed to embrace economic populism.
I was talking about all these tariffs that Joe Biden has put into place that she not, not only didn't mention, but ridiculed, um, you know, I, I, I think that there are other pieces to this, although I agree with you, the foundation of Donald Trump's candidacy. And that's been the GOP since Richard Nixon talked about the silent majority, which we all knew was code for white people.
And Ronald Reagan gave his first speech of his official campaign in Philadelphia, [01:22:00] Mississippi.
SECTION B - WHITE SUPREMACY FOR THE WIN
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: Now entering section B. White supremacy for the win.
“The Confederacy Won” Why Donald Trump’s Reelection Is a Win for White Supremacy, Xenophobia & Hate Part 2 - Democracy Now! - Air Date 11-6-24
AMY GOODMAN - HOST, DEMOCRACY NOW!: very quickly, Professor Goodwin, the historic ballot measures enshrining the right to an abortion passed in seven of the 10 states that they were introduced, passed in Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Montana, Maryland, New York and Missouri, where voters backed a measure that will overturn one of the strictest abortion bans in the nation that prohibits abortion even in cases of rape and incest. The significance of that, and yet at the same time Kamala Harris loses?
MICHELE GOODWIN: Well, again, if we parse this out, what we can see is that white women overwhelmingly voted for the former president, but yet also voted for the constitutional protection or statewide protections of abortion rights in their state. So they were able to parse these issues out, even though Donald Trump has articulated wanting to criminally punish women and wanting to — [01:23:00] in the past appointed federal judges and justices on the lower courts, as well as the Supreme Court, in order to make it very difficult to access reproductive healthcare. Yet they could parse their vote. And it’s not just them. It’s men, too.
And I want to make one clarification, too. In Florida, it’s being articulated that women in Florida rejected the ballot initiative there. No, overwhelmingly, the majority of people in that state voted for that initiative, except it was required that there be at least 60%. And what we know is that it’s been over 57, 58% that voted for the initiative, so it failed by a small percentage. But it’s worth noting that that was a requirement that meant more than a majority had to vote in support of that initiative.
Separation Anxiety Part 2 - This Week In White Supremacy - Air Date 11-13-24
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: A hundred percent. A thousand percent agree. And you know, well, that comes to this, you know, we need trouble. You know what we need. What do we need? Clearly, we need another [01:24:00] Women's March, isn't that right?
I'm not about to crush
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: you out on this podcast. The Women's March organizers. I'm not trying to get fired.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: The organizers are planning another big march. It says the Women's March event organizers say they're preparing a, quote, comeback tour. A
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: comeback tour? There's no fucking tour. This is not a celebration.
People are going to be dying. A comeback tour? Like, what are we, Justin Timberlake? You know what we need right now? A tour. Pussyhats and marches. A parade. No, this is why, after all of the other conversations, they pushed out the leaders of the actual Women's March. Yes. Samika! Carmen and Linda because they were radicalizing and training women about their rights, about policies, about the need to fight and organize a tour.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: Yes,
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: a tour.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: You're not going to take our joy says Rachel O'Leary.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I am tired of. Go back. [01:25:00] Why we wanna be I so bad, man. I'm tired of people making, when we talk about joy being radical, we're talking about using joy to fight for a future and, and, and build the community. We're not talking about just having like a party.
We're talking about finding joy and solidarity, finding joy in the fact that we haven't been broken, finding joy that there are people who are. still fighting for a better tomorrow, fighting joy, and the fact that we have tears that we can share with people who've gone through the same things and understand that there is a better day ahead.
When we're talking about joy being radical, we're talking about joy being something that drives us to organize, to fight back, not just to go march and have a parade and these.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: Women.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: You know, I don't,
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: I don't
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: support all women, right? I don't believe all women are right. Yes. And when we talk about a tour, what type of, no, what do you go?
Oh my God, there's going to be a tour on January 6th. Like what? No, there needs to be, there needs to be a riot, there needs to be a [01:26:00] protest. There needs to be a strike. When we're looking at what our, our, our mothers did, they took to the streets. Even if you want to talk about the, you know, the women wearing white, the suffragettes, they weren't just outside, but we're going to have a tour.
Y'all know they were organizing and there were some racist people, you know, out, but they were organized and mobilizing women to actually get up and do something.
TREBLE NLS: Yeah. And this, I feel like this is like a, This is a call to action to people, right? It's like the same way that we on this podcast and like encourage you to question your politicians and question those in power.
We also would encourage you to question your organizers and the people that are putting these things together, question the, the intention behind what they're trying to organize question. How this will actually help towards your liberation and if it'll actually help towards your liberation, or if it's just smoke and mirrors and, and, and identity politics or just like, you know, parading.
This false [01:27:00] concept that doesn't really lead to any true liberation.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: You mean like wearing a blue friendship bracelet to show that she didn't vote for the safe one. It says in response to presidential election results, some white women are crafting blue friendship bracelets on social media that signal that they did not vote for Donald Trump.
The movement seemingly began when a content creator posted a viral tick tock asking fellow white women. How are we signaling to each other which side we are on and the video racked up 4. 2 million views. I'm not mad at it,
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: but at the same time it's like very centralist. It's very look at me ish. No, it's not.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: The problem is y'all gotta learn whisper campaigns.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: The reason
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: why you've made this whole like normal thing happen and we know y'all lie.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: That's a fact.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: Right. We, we, we know that y'all do not tell the truth. Yes. The numbers do not lie. They don't lie. Right. Unless you know, they do. And it's like, oopsie, my bad.
But so you need to start like a whisper [01:28:00] campaign. Who did you vote for? Let me, did you screenshot your ballot? What proof do you have? Right. Then you get this little bracelet. And then next, why are people wearing these braces? You'll find out soon enough. Right. Have you seen, then you give it to your circle and you do it like that.
You got, you organically, uh, Move people, you can't put stuff on social media because that allows people to fake the funk. And I, we've seen before, like there are people, I guarantee you, there are people who have a immigrants are welcome here sign that voted for Trump. There are people who have a black lives matter sign that voted for Trump.
There are people who like all are welcome here who are calling ice right now to report people. And so again, when you try to do these. Symbols, these symbols are great. It's like, yes, do something, but it's also like, you got to learn to organize better.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: Somebody said, this is one of the widest things I've ever seen.
And I'm white.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I mean, yeah, I do think that [01:29:00] the simplification of what white women's protest needs to be studied, but it's like this idea that at some point you're going to actually have to do something.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: Right. And you could like, how about donating to 100 media? Like, why not like put your money where your mouth is or volunteer somewhere or, you know, do something like that.
Why don't you do that?
Some Americans Are Already Living in Trumps Purge Part 2 - The New Abnormal - Air Date 10-1-24
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Also, can we have the media. Stop saying like, Oh, it was a joke. Oh, it was a, he's not a fucking comedian.
Like he's not a comedian. So the only person that I give a shit is somebody that is actually paid to do fucking standup. That's not what this is. And it is a lie. And it is just a, an abdication of duty for journalists to turn around and not report on like, and all I'm saying is. Just report on what is being said.
This is what Donald Trump said. You don't want to add your fucking opinion into it. You don't want to, you know, provide any deeper analysis. Then just run the goddamn transcripts for the love of God.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: [01:30:00] There were so many of those. Just in this, uh, just, just over the weekend, you had Trump saying that Joe Biden became mentally impaired.
And then he followed up by saying, Kamala, although he mispronounced her name, cause he loves to do that. He said, Kamala was born that way. And I mean, again, like this is a Republican nominee. for the President of the United States saying this about the Democratic nominee. And I'm tired of being told that, like, Oh, that's Trump being Trump, like, like, like you said, Danielle, or, you know, that's just Trump.
He needs to be held accountable for shit like this. There were so many other things. He was talking in, I think it was in Pennsylvania, and he was talking about immigration. And then there was a fly. He saw a fly. And he was like, Oh, I wonder where that came from. Two years ago, that fly wouldn't have been here.
And he was talking about an influx of immigrants. And he was basically saying, look at these dirty immigrants. They bring, you know, flies and disease, et cetera. This shit is not funny. This shit is not acceptable. It is stuff that [01:31:00] has to be. It is stuff that has to be denounced. And yeah, I get it for the media and for people who cover politics.
It's like, it's a full time job to do that. Well, that's the job you chose.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: Right? It's a full time job. I'm like, ain't that your job?
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: I mean, because that's, that's where we are now. That is the political situation. I don't want to read about Harris is up one in Wisconsin or Harris is down three in Wisconsin.
Reporting that is not journalism. You know, reporting what the candidates are saying is journalism, and this is the kind of stuff, I mean, those are only a few of the examples of the nutty things he said over the weekend.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: That comparison of human beings, human beings to flies, when Donald Trump then said a couple of months ago, That they were vermin?
Yeah. This is the language of a dictator and a fascist and that is why you just had recently a group of hooded mass fucking cowards show up in Springfield, Ohio with [01:32:00] a banner that said that Haitians are not welcome here. Meanwhile, there was a very brave woman. Who was driving in her car, stopped her car to scream out her window and say, you are not from Springfield.
Like, we love all people here. The Haitian population is welcome here. Like, take your hate and go someplace else. And it was a non Black woman who was doing that. And I was just like, that's what we need to see more of. More people who live in these areas, who are from these towns. That J. D. Vance and Donald Trump are lying about, are creating hysteria around, are turning into dangerous places because of the escalation of bomb threats and school closures and buildings closing down.
That the real people who are being impacted of all races need to link arms and say, Not in our [01:33:00] town. Like, not, like, stop using our town's name for your political points and your, like, hate mongering because that is the only time that people are actually going to see that they're full of shit. And not only are they full of shit, but that they're dangerous.
MATTHEW SELIGMAN: Yeah, I don't know if you saw, uh, there's the, uh, I guess he's a factory owner or businessman in, in Springfield. And he spoke out in an interview, he said, of the Haitian immigrants who he employs, he said, they come to work every day. They don't cause drama. They're on time. I wish I had 30 more. Take a guess as to the responses he got.
Here is as reported by the New York Times, because this is actually a case of the New York Times doing journalism. People were leaving messages on his company voicemail. The owner of McGregor Metal, that's Jamie McGregor, the guy who said this, the owner of McGregor Metal can take a bullet to the skull and that would be 100 percent justified.
Another one said, why are you importing third world savages who eat animals and giving them jobs over United States citizens? Uh, another one said stack [01:34:00] all 20, 000 Haitians inside Jamie McGregor's factory at once and forced him to praise the benefits of foreign labor while being crushed to death by black bodies themselves being crushed to death.
Uh, and he is sitting there and he's basically saying, I have to buy a gun now for my home. His exact quote was, I have struggled with the fact that now we're going to have to have firearms in our house. Like what the hell? And he said, they're now taking classes. They're going to shooting ranges. This is unbelievable.
Because he said that, hey, these people that he has hired have been great employees. So this violence and, and, and, and so this traces back all the way, you know, we can, we can go back to the quote unquote purge comments to, like you said, the constant description of immigrants as vermin, as animals, saying that they're bringing flies and bringing disease with them.
That's where all of this leads. And And Donald Trump knows this, and JD Vance knows this, and this is what they want.
WTH Trump Wants REPARATIONS for WHITE PEOPLE Who Were 'VICTIMS' OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION - Roland S. Martin - Air Date 11-13-24
ROLAND S. MARTIN - HOST, ROLAND S. MARTIN: Donald Trump is saying, white people, [01:35:00] I'm coming to you with reparations.
CLIFF ALBRIGHT: This country was founded on identity politics. There's never been an era that hasn't been defined by identity politics, by white identity politics, by white male identity. It was literally identity politics is literally enshrined in the constitution.
Y'all said only white men, property owners could vote. That's the original identity politics, and every decade since then has been defined by that identity politics.
ROLAND S. MARTIN - HOST, ROLAND S. MARTIN: And fact clip, here is Donald Trump touting identity politics today!
DONALD TRUMP: And getting their money's worth. Furthermore, I will direct the Department of Justice to pursue federal civil rights cases.
Again, schools that continue to engage in racial discrimination and schools that persist in explicit unlawful discrimination [01:36:00] under the guise of equity will not only have their endowments taxed, but through budget reconciliation, I will advance a measure to have them find up to the entire amount of their endowment.
A portion of the C's funds will then be used as restitution for victims of these illegal And unjust policies. Policies that hurt our country so badly. Colleges have gotten hundreds of billions of dollars from hard working taxpayers. And now, we are going to get this anti American insanity out of our institutions once and for all.
We are going to have real education in America. So, Donald Trump is saying,
ROLAND S. MARTIN - HOST, ROLAND S. MARTIN: White people, I'm coming to you with reparations. For more UN videos visit www. un. org
CLIFF ALBRIGHT: Exactly. And, and that was written into everything that he just said is a part of project 2025. Yep. You know, the project 2025 that he said he didn't know anything about, [01:37:00] but before the, the, the, or before the votes are even counted in this election, he's already rolling out the project 2025 policies and his, his transferring or, or transforming.
The department of justice and office of civil rights from something that investigates and deals with anti black racism, he is now redefining it as dealing with anti white racism, anti white discrimination, which doesn't exist. But that's the identity politics. And that's from Jim Crow through the Southern strategy, right?
Which was identity politics defined to Ronald Reagan, to Pat Cannon all the way through through this person. That's all they do is identity politics. In fact, even the economic anxiety argument, even the economic anxiety argument is really another form of identity politics, because when they talk about the working class and economic anxiety, they're only talking about the white working class.
But as if black folks [01:38:00] ain't working class, that's identity. It's all this country knows.
Separation Anxiety - This Week In White Supremacy - Air Date 11-13-24
DONALD TRUMP: If we don't have free speech, then we just don't have a free country. It's as simple as that. If this most fundamental right is allowed to perish, then the rest of our rights and liberties will topple, just like dominoes, one by one, they'll go down.
That's why today I'm announcing my plan to shatter the left wing censorship regime and to reclaim the right to free speech for all Americans. And reclaim is a very important word in this case because they've taken it away. In recent weeks, bombshell reports have confirmed that a sinister group of deep state bureaucrats, Silicon Valley tyrants, Left wing activists and depraved corporate news media have been conspiring to manipulate and silence the American people.
Maybe they have collaborated to suppress vital information on [01:39:00] everything from elections to public health. You can, you can pause the censorship.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: Um, It's very interesting when people talk about free speech, because it's like what free speech we're talking about, because like you censor a lot of stuff when it's stuff about trans people, stuff about black people, stuff about Palestinian people, stuff about immigrants, that gets censored everywhere.
But if you want to tell people to drink horse medicine to save a virus, that gets pushed out. So I'm very confused about what we're talking about here. Well,
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: I think that's the question because he was on record as saying like, CBS should get their, their license revoked because they fact check them, right?
I think ABC, he was calling that they're the worst network. So he has been saying these things about other net, like threatening them. And so again, like does free speech mean Like we have the ability to say whatever we want to say, because remember, even Elon Musk, who was supposed to be like, I'm a free speech, whatever absolutist, whatever word that he called.
But then when he bought X or Twitter, the first he started [01:40:00] to take out or kick off accounts, including the one that followed his private jet all around the country. Right. And so again, like free speech, but whose speech is considered free. What I hear you saying is. White speech, right? Any speech that bigs you up or that is white supremacist speech.
That's cool. But like you said, miracle, any speech that threatens that white supremacist structure probably is going to be in some way defunded or shut down. Is this something that we as producers of media should be concerned with?
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I mean, what's a little, what's a little shut down, state violence, statesmanship to be worried about?
But I will tell you, like, when you have, we're having these questions. Conversations and your immediate thought is like, well, what have the Democrats said they're going to do to protect free speech? And when you don't have an answer that shows you the state of survival that we [01:41:00] really need to be in. And I do think that people are now trying to create their own media, thinking about the Tik TOK ban and how our government tried to under a democratic government.
Ban tick talk and ban our access to information. And so now is really the time to think about the ways in which we're able to connect, how we're able to put out media. We're going to have to start doing like projectors, you know, talking to our elders and figuring out like, what do they do with the radio, going back to radio stations, all these different things.
But I do think there is some cause for concern. You know, even today with, you know, 9495 possibly being passed, I do think that we're going to have to start to organize and mobilize a lot more, but You know, who knows? Because it seems like he has a hit list and we may not be on his hit list. He may, you know, review our episodes and be like the MAGA Muslims like me and he may, he may let us go.
We may be, I mean,
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: you did, you were his [01:42:00] lawyer in New York City. I mean, he'd be like,
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I don't hate free speech. I support, you know, this week of white supremacy. Like I let them go, who knows? But I do think the way that we have, um, Come to know the world is going to radically change because people decided not to fight for the world that we have.
I did just want to
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: say before I come to you trouble that you mentioned house bill nine four nine five, which is the stop terror finance and tax penalties on American hostages act. And basically what this bill, if this bill passes, it would give the United States the ability to just terminate any like taxes in the tax exempt status of any quote unquote terror supporting group.
So by, so if this passes, somebody could say, Oh, you know, one hood, we saw y'all show up at this rally. and supported Palestinians. Therefore we're taking away your nonprofit status, [01:43:00] right? No video up at a rally. I'm just saying it could, this could be, this could be something that could happen, right? We saw it could be right.
We saw you at this rally supporting against police. We saw y'all organized against the police in Pittsburgh. Therefore, we feel like you're supporting terror. Y'all got Muslim names, you know, y'all wearing all types of Palestinian stuff on the show. Y'all got Palestinian nails.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I wonder who he's talking to.
I wonder who he's talking to. Palestinian nails is crazy. I wonder who he is talking to and who he's talking about. And luckily, you know, as an individual, I express and I fight for people who are oppressed and oppressed. Come on, come on, I try to use your fashion
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: as a faction in my activism. Let's go. No,
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: I'm just, I'm not, I'm not
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: coming
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: at you.
You didn't see any one hood stuff when I was out here fighting for freedom. We do have a red, black and green one. That's RBG.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: Again, again, revolutionary. Right. But that's all this is in the platform. So
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: [01:44:00] let it out. And any other, any other things of note that I've done that you forgot to mention? I'm not saying
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: it's you.
I'm saying us, us collectively miracles. I told you what my price was talking about you have a contract, you can't leave.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: Wow.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: So anyway, that's what the bill means. And if this bill passes organizations like ours, organizations that do this type of work that strive to be also a radical in many ways, that radicalism, remember it was like, remember under Trump, it was the, what was it?
The black. Black identity extremist, black identity extremist, right? That could mean our tax exempt status can be taken away under Trump, particularly if you're a dictator on day one. That could happen just right
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: on day one, all across the board. Just want to say it doesn't have to be radical organizations.
They could just basically say any organization that talks about birth control, any organization that talks about abortion, any organization that talks about interracial marriage. Like I think a lot of times we think when we hear terrorism, we think of violence or [01:45:00] Muslims or, or Islam, but we got to remember that what they have been talking about is a, a false narrative.
Fight for men's rights. And it's talking about women and feminists have been terrorists. So we are not even thinking about all these other nonprofits.
SECTION C - REVERBERATION
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: Up next section C reverberation.
Why You Shouldnt Buy the Election Narrative About Black Men Part 2 - Reveal - Air Date 10-23-24
BARRACK OBAMA: You're coming up with all kinds of reasons and excuses. I'm speaking to men directly. Part of it makes me think that, well, You just aren't feeling the idea of having a woman as president.
GARRISON HAYES: Wrong approach, wrong tone, wrong message. This is the reality. The
NEWS CLIP: party has to stop scapegoating black men. Black men are not the problem. And then
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: In this election cycle, the spotlight has turned on black men. And it's complicated. To talk about it, I invited my colleague and good buddy, the great Garrison Hayes.
Garrison, how you doing, man?
GARRISON HAYES: I'm always doing well when I get to hang out with you and, and I, you know, I'm just hoping not to get into any trouble today.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: Well, as a great John Lewis would say, we can get into some good trouble. [01:46:00] So let's do it. So you just reported an episode of reveal called red, black, and blue, which is all about black Republicans.
GARRISON HAYES: I spent the better part of the last year reporting on Black political power. You know, even the title itself, Red, Black and Blue, is all about putting Black people at the center of our kind of political discourse this election cycle. And I learned a lot throughout the process. I focused primarily on conservatives, Black conservatives, because I thought that they might represent some of the dynamism.
Which feels like perfect for this political moment, but I had a lot of conversations with a lot of folks all across the political spectrum in the black community.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: Listeners, if you haven't heard it, go back and listen to his reporting. It's excellent. And today we're going to hash out what's happening on the Democratic side.
for your time, Farron. Now, there are some recent polls suggesting that fewer Black men might support Harris than came out for President Joe Biden in 2020, and that 20 percent of Black men might vote for Trump. And with those [01:47:00] numbers, there came a lot of hand wringing and finger wagging from Barack Obama and others about whether or not Black men are going to turn out and vote for Kamala Harris.
GARRISON HAYES: I do think there is something Uniquely frustrating about a conversation that skulls or looks down on, um, the second most reliable group of people for this party.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: And the first constituency being black women who resoundingly vote Democratic.
GARRISON HAYES: I mean, we looked at the gubernatorial race in Georgia. We look at Hillary Clinton back in 2016, um, black men showed up for that woman candidate.
And so I guess. There's a little bit of frustration at the same time. It's created a national discourse It's created at the very least a conversation in the community that's showing up today on this show
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: So Garrison and I wanted to kind of bring our group chats to you So we got some of our friends to weigh in on this.
This is my buddy a day
FRIEND OF SHOW: This [01:48:00] idea that black men are leaving the democratic party to vote for Donald Trump, uh, this election cycle in large numbers is absurd. I mean, it's, it's absurd. It's propaganda is propaganda that's being pushed by both Democrats and Republicans. And I think that Democrats are pushing it so that they can use black men as a scapegoat, uh, in case Ms.
Harris doesn't win the election. I do think that black people in general. Are having issues with the Democratic Party and how they deal with the black community, but also, uh, how they treat the people that have supported them since the late sixties. So I do think that this is a time of reckoning for the Democratic Party and its black supporters.
AL LETSON - HOST, REVEAL: Garrison, what resonated with you about what Adaye had to say?
GARRISON HAYES: I do think that a point was made about scapegoating. I mean, you know, we know the racial history of this country. We know that the history of this country is one that [01:49:00] often looks to place blame on Black people, and they do that to Black women and to Black men in different ways.
But one of the ways that we've seen every single election cycle is that there's always this conversation about, Whether or not black men will, you know, show up and quote unquote, do the right thing and vote along with black women and in every single election cycle, black men do to some, to some degree, sometimes it's at basically 90%.
Sometimes it's closer to 80%, but they do every single time. And yet the very next cycle, we're having a conversation again. Um, and I do think we, we need to kind of interrogate that a bit as, as kind of like media professionals, as the, the quote unquote media, we, we need to ask, why do we continue to do that?
Um, and what is the utility? Um, but I think that politicians also need to ask, why is it that some black men don't feel represented by their, Parties. I think that answer comes a little easier for black folks when looking at conservatives or republicans There's the [01:50:00] anti dei anti woke anti crt stuff just blatant racist and the literal blatant racism You know what?
I mean? Like that's definitely kind of a turnoff to black folks. I just had to burp. I don't know why But it's a headline. It's just kind of a turnoff. It's a headline. Read extra, extra, read all about it. Black people don't like racism. Right? I mean, like, I, I don't know. So I I, I'm, I'm with you on it. I, I would say, I, I, I wish the listeners could see me right now.
'cause as you were saying that, like, I'm, I'm doing my hand like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Exactly, exactly.
Separation Anxiety Part 3 - This Week In White Supremacy - Air Date 11-13-24
DONALD TRUMP: Every gang street crew and drug network in America, every single one of them will be dismantled. We already know where these turf wars and drug dens are. We know who the people are. I'm going to charge them and charge the culprits with every crime that we can find. We're going to be fair, but we're going to be tough.
We also need the death penalty for drug dealers. So important. Consequences.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: So somebody tell Waka Flocka that right now, [01:51:00] but this is very much in the Philippines that happened in the Philippines and they just used it to kill young men and this is what this is going to do. So now is also the time if you know, people who are straight pharmacists to try to reroute them into, you know, different, different avenues.
But I also want to point out that white supremacist biker gangs, you know, Are the ones out here flooding the streets with this poison and y'all think it's just like urban gangbangers.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: But are those, are those gangs going to be the ones targeted? No. And that's the unfortunate reality is it's like we're moving from mass incarceration to like mass execution.
Because we know when a white men say gangs, and we're talking about dismantling gangs, that these white people think crips bloods, they think like MS 13, they think like the Mexican mafia. They're not thinking about the white biker gangs, right? They're not [01:52:00] thinking about those angels and these type of, these type of gangs, right?
Or sons of anarchy, right? They're not thinking about that. They're thinking about, yo, we voted for this man because he told us he was going to You know, this is about punishing black and brown people. To me, ultimately, this is about you seeing a country that. Black and brown people like having babies and birth rates rising.
White people's birth rate are not remaining stagnant or going down. And you want somebody that's going to get all of these people either out of the country by mass deportation or literally execute black people. And again, now that the police understand that they have this power, right? We want to dismantle these gangs up until the death penalty.
We want And, and, and they have a president in place that saying police immunity, what do we think the out, the outcome is going to be apparent according to what we've heard recently of Michigan state police shot and killed a young man recently. So [01:53:00] are we going to see more of this?
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: You know what's interesting?
Like the, the irony of all of this is sickening because we're acting like Trump didn't have 34 felonies, right? We don't, we acting like his entire cabinet in his last administration was all people he built out of jail and got pardons and like, they wasn't out here breaking the law. Yeah. Like they was like, we act like he
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: like runs a criminal gang.
He has like
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: this motherfucker. Wasn't impeached twice. Yes. You know what I mean? Like he wasn't on the suspicion of. Trading sensitive information with other countries like he wasn't looking at you know Flushing down nuclear launch codes all that Mar a Lago under the toilets and all that. Yes Like what are we really talking about here?
Yeah, I mean like oh It's, it's, it's scary hours right now in the States, man. Like it's really spooky out here. It
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: is, it is really, it's like we have to brace, right. And particularly like if you're black and brown, because you know, Trump also is [01:54:00] naming, you know, Stephen Miller. Who we know is like, really like, you know, one, like, I think, how old is Stephen Miller?
He's like 35, but it looks like
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: man. So how, when you were a bigot, man, you aged like milk. Yeah, he looks,
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: he looks, but anyway, Stephen Miller is somebody who is, was the architect of Trump's family separation plan, right. Where he was separating families. And then Trump named a new border czar.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: Crazy.
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: And this borders are is on record.
What's this man's name? Oh, Tom Hammond is his name. He did prior to being elected borders are or named borders are by Trump. He did an interview on 60 minutes. We'll play a clip of that interview.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: This is, yes, this is foul talk, man. If it'll queue up, there we go.
CLIP: We have seen one estimate that says it would cost 88 [01:55:00] billion to deport a million people a year.
DONALD TRUMP: I don't know if that's accurate or not.
CLIP: Is that what American taxpayers should expect?
DONALD TRUMP: What price do you put on national security? Is that worth it?
CLIP: Is there a way to carry out mass deportation without separating families?
DONALD TRUMP: Of course there is. Families can be deported together. For
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: That's such a crazy scene.
One estimate.
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: He talking heavy families can be supported together. So can I, can I say what I had said yesterday on social media? So what did you say? So what I had said yesterday was the overwhelming majority of the 55 percent of the other races that voted for Trump. Yes. Right. And the Latin for Trump movement being so powerful.
Yes. No one was surprised about Their resurgence in this election, right? I think that for me, what was interesting was the 55 percent of [01:56:00] other races. Like Arabs, Asians, everybody else. Yes. But the question I have is what do you lot plan to do when your chickens come home to roost? What are you going to do with those eggs?
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: I mean, they're going to have to go back to their country
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: with them. Eggs. I mean, what can they do? Like, yeah. You know, so it's like, you know, you're voting, you clearly were suckered into voting against your self interest and now the immigration is probably going to be the forefront and the number one thing that they, this administration starts to enforce when they resume power in January.
So you. Absolutely have family members that are undocumented a thousand percent have siblings. You have people that are close to you that are absolutely undocumented. So you voted for what to, to eliminate them. Like there's
JASIRI X - CO-FOUNDER, 1HOOD: a clip I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm putting this clip and it really, this clip kind of sums up the mentality.
Mind you, this is a Latino man. That has a Trump hat on. They
CLIP: let in hundreds or thousands of people who already have criminal records. If [01:57:00] deporting them creates a mass deportation, I'm all for it. But what if rounded up in all of that are people who work on a farm? If they're doing the jobs that Americans don't want to do, does that worry you?
That wouldn't be fair. Of course, you know, they need to make sure that they don't throw away, they don't kick out. They're on the poor people that are, that are family oriented, right? So it's this idea of like, Oh, I'm a good, I'm one of the good ones. But
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: you were, you, you bought into that dream. Like the thing is, it's like.
It doesn't stop or start with you. You're part of the collateral damage. Like, you're not exclusionary in this. Like, there's no, there's no exemption for you. It's the fact that you voted for an America that does not include you. Right. In any shape or form, you are not included in this election. Doctrine.
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: But again, like, and it's funny and they told you, don't vote though. Immigrants who are undocumented can't vote. Right. Right. So when we're talking about what this is, what you voted for, people who are going to be deported did not vote for this. [01:58:00] Correct. And I think that's very important. Number one, number two.
I know twinning
FAROOQ AL-SAID - DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. 1HOOD: besties,
MIRACLE JONES - DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY AND POLICY: you know, it's the toxicity that just like, but I think that's very important. Right. But also when we're talking about why these, whatever for Trump's existed, we've said before the elasticity of white supremacy brings people in and it kicks people out and it makes people think that they're special.
Like they're the chosen ones. They're going to be protected. And that man said, no, you, your family. Yes. And the citizen that you are connected to can all get the F on it. Your anchor baby, all you niggas can go. And so I think that is something that we have to think about. But also for me, my question is, does that mean the sanctions end?
Does that mean Cuba can finally be free? Does that mean Venezuela can finally be free? Oh, probably not. Talk about this, these mass deportations. What are we now going to do when that's going to cause social unrest [01:59:00] in other countries where their anger is going to be targeted at the U S
Racist texts sent to Black Americans appears to be 'phishing scam' Louisiana AG - MSNBC - Air Date 11-8-24
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: We are just getting some new findings in the investigation into where a deluge of racist text messages are coming from the recipients as young as middle school. Those messages largely target black Americans and warn them to prepare for a return to slavery. The FBI and law enforcement in at least two dozen states, including Louisiana are investigating right now.
I'm joined by Louisiana's attorney general, Liz Murrell, among those. into this. So I underst some preliminary findings What can you tell
LOUISIANA AG LIZ MURRILL: us? Wel that these text messages
Virtual private network server that's that's located in Poland. So, you know, that that doesn't tell us where the person is, or the group, or the organization is that's actually pushing them out. [02:00:00] It could be from the basement of a small town in Louisiana, or it could be coming from Bangladesh. We don't we don't know that yet.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: So tell me about what you folks are doing and what kind of cooperation, as I said, there are at least two dozen different states. Now, I think initially they were saying maybe these were received in 10 states. Now it's up to 24 25. Who are you talking to? Who are your investigators cooperating with?
LOUISIANA AG LIZ MURRILL: Well, of course, we are, um, talking to the FBI.
Um, it is a national problem, not just a state problem. That's that's limited limited to Louisiana. I can tell you it's not just text messages. I received 1 of these directly to my personal email just this morning. So they are going out fairly broadly. Um, it is very much. It looks a lot like a phishing scam, and there is what appears to be a hyperlink in it.
So we really want to caution people not to click on it, uh, delete it. [02:01:00] Um, you can report it to your local to your attorney general. If, um, if you're in another state or to us in our state, and you can report it to the FBI, but we are all trying to get to the heart of it and figure out where they're coming from.
But it behaves like a phishing scam. It can. It can get into your network and perpetuate itself through your
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: network. And it also has had a real impact on people, um, the emotion that comes from getting something like this, the fear that it engenders. Um, I wonder if you had an opportunity to talk to anyone else, particularly, um, black Americans, black Louisianans, and what impact you're seeing or hearing about.
LOUISIANA AG LIZ MURRILL: You know, I haven't had that conversation with, I think that, you know, I received one of them. They're vile, they're racist, um, they are certainly not from any official source and, and, and I think every official that has seen them or heard about this has condemned [02:02:00] them. Um, so, you know, our, our main message right now is not to be victimized because we don't know whether, uh, Uh, that's a it is some kind of phishing scam there.
It does appear to be a hyperlink in it. So we don't want people to click on it. Um, and we would just urge people to, um, to delete them. You know, they are intended to be offensive. Uh, they are intended to be divisive and we need to, um, reject all of that.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: What went through your mind when you saw that you got an email like this?
LOUISIANA AG LIZ MURRILL: Uh, you know, I was surprised that it was in my email box. I mean, I don't think that Any of us know exactly how they access these locations. Some people get them through their telephones, which it feels very personal when that happens. You know, I think that, um, when you see something that lands in your text message box, you're used to texting back and forth with people that you know, um, or that you have some familiarity with, and then this comes through.
And so you wonder, you know, how did [02:03:00] they get my phone number? Um, and, and I think you feel the way when it comes into your personal email box like it did for me. Um, but I think there are a lot of ways that they can access this particular kind of information. Um, they can, uh, they can also piggyback on other people's networks and an email list.
The text messaging specifically, in our opinion, is coming through an email server. So it is really an email. It's just coming through your phone and your text messages, but it's coming through an email server. Then that's, um, so it's also coming through people's email boxes, but. It's offensive.
CHRIS JANSING - HOST, MSNBC: Yeah. I was just going to say we have literally just 30 seconds left, but, um, you know, how, um, sophisticated some of these folks can be.
Uh, they route through, as you, you point out, they can route through servers all over the world. What is your level of belief that, uh, someone, whether it's the FBI or anyone else investigating, we'll get to the bottom of this. [02:04:00]
LOUISIANA AG LIZ MURRILL: You know, it's hard to say. Um, we are going to try and continue to investigate and figure out where they're originating from.
Uh, we have been very successful and chasing a lot of criminal activity that occurs in the dark web. And so I actually have a fairly high degree of confidence that we will eventually find out where these are coming from. Um, but it's, it's, you know, like a lot of scams, you're right. They can be routed through a lot of different pathways.
Um, this 1 is mainly appears to be intended to, uh, offend people. And, uh, at this point, we aren't sure whether it has more nefarious effects, but that's why we're saying don't click on it.
SECTION D - WHAT NOW
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: And finally section D what now?
The Hard Truth About Why Harris Was the Wrong Choice for America Part 3 - The New Abnormal - Air Date 11-6-24
JARED YATES SEXTON: well, I mean, to get him at midterms would mean having a workable strategy and it has now been proven that there was never a strategy to begin with and we now have to cobble together an actual strategy.
And I want to be very intentional as I answered this [02:05:00] because we have entered into a new era. And, you know, I, I've been warning about this for years, and one of the things is the time to stop this has passed. The time to actually make sure that some of the worst case scenarios come to pass, that's gone.
And we had that opportunity, uh, back in 2016. If you think about the idea of you're living in a gated city and there is an army coming towards you, the time to lock the doors in order to ward them off is before they get there. They're now in the city. And as we look at this, we have to wrap our heads around a couple of crucial facts.
And to be frank, and this is some hard love, there are a lot of people who are going to have to grow up very quickly. They need to get away from some very, very delusional self serving fantasies that have been motivating them for years, that this was all fun, that everything was going to be fine, that they could meme their way out of it, that they could, you know, simply engage in a lot [02:06:00] of these soothing behaviors.
Bye. The truth is this. We are now engaged in an all out war, and that war has been coming towards us for a while and the time to ward it off is gone. This is now going to be the work of our lives. Even if there are elections in four years, even if we are able to elect a Democrat or at least keep a Republican from getting elected, this is going to be the fight that defines the rest of our lives.
That's the truth of this thing. If you can think about it in terms of a disease, you can either detect the disease early and mitigate the consequences of it or you can detect the disease later when it has metastasized and you have to take care of the radical consequences of that. So what we're actually talking about right now With Project 2025, with Elon Musk having control, unchecked power over the budget, I'm already thinking about what they're going to do.
What we're actually [02:07:00] talking about, Danielle, is we are talking about the culmination of a strategy that has been playing out for decades. The Republican Party, on behalf of their billionaire donors, have been working to destroy the progress of the 20th century, to get rid of all the social safety nets, the regulatory power of the federal government, everything that was put in place to actually serve citizens.
They've been going after that, education, science, reality itself. Now, all of a sudden, we are a couple of minutes from midnight on that. They have the apparatus in place that can actually deal a final blow to it. should have been answered with the 2024 election. And quite frankly, it should have been answered with the Joe Biden administration.
It should have been answered with the 2016 election. And to be frank, it should have been answered before the 2016 election. We now find ourselves in the reality of the moment, which is we are in the middle of a battle that is going to last the rest of our lives, and it's [02:08:00] going to define our lives. And quite frankly, for anyone listening to this who has children or grandchildren, it's going to define the lives of their children and their grandchildren.
All of this is not to make people feel powerless or hopeless. This is to talk about the facts of where they are and to start leaving behind childish delusional notions that we are not dealing with what we are actually dealing with.
DANIELLE MOODIE - CO-HOST, THE NEW ABNORMAL: You laid it out so beautifully and so perfectly. This is defining who we will be now, moving forward.
And I personally think, Jared, too, that the time for pointing fingers or Democrats doing what they normally do, which is let us do this autopsy and then move vigorously to the right. And forget about the base of black women. Forget about the base of progressives. We need to move dramatically to the right, uh, so that we have a fighting chance.
I think that the reality is, is that the fighting chance was 2024 [02:09:00] and that is now past us. And so my question to you is then, what does resistance look like moving forward? Because none of us Inside of these United States, we have not lived in an autocracy or a dictatorship before, so we have no idea what resistance looks like.
In the terms of this new context, we've only ever known go out and march, go out and protest. Well, Donald Trump wanted to shoot people back in 2020 for doing so. He's already talked about operationalizing our military against the American people. So, Jared, what does it look like? What do you think it looks like to resist inside of a country whose rules are now completely and totally thrown out the window?
JARED YATES SEXTON: Well, I would like to start by Probably reframing the way that some of the people listening to this podcast are thinking about American politics look at politics, you know, you were talking about pointing fingers and we could talk all day about the [02:10:00] results from the election and what they show us about politics moving forward, but that's not actually what we're talking about right now.
I need people to understand that 2024 was the moment that we could have possibly mitigated some of these consequences. And we could talk about the tactics of the Harris campaign, the Democratic Party, all we wanted. I want to talk about the, uh, the, the consultants and the, uh, the strategist and the operators within the Democratic Party.
We now know that billions of dollars were spent on this election. And by the way, that we had one grifter political action committee after another that raised tens of millions of dollars. Basically to enrich themselves and all of this is to point out that what we have done is we have outsourced resistance we have expected politicians and Operators to take care of it for us almost like hiring a contractor to take care of a leak or something going wrong in your house those notions Are no longer true and it's time we left them behind because we've been betrayed by these people And [02:11:00] they are going to be fine because they have made millions of dollars and they have lined their pockets You know, they went ahead.
They sold their soul for the silver and that's where things are now If we actually want to make a difference, what we need to do is on a personal level, we need to take a look at ourselves and decide what it is that we actually want, where it is that we actually want to go, what do we want this country to look like.
I understand that you oppose Donald Trump and the Republicans, and that's a great starting point. You need to understand why you oppose them. What is it about this agenda that offends you so much as an individual? When you decide that, You start figuring out your principles and principles are not about supporting a party.
They're not about sharing things on social media They're not about proclaiming what it is. You believe It's determining what it is that you want to live for and what it is that you're willing to die for That is one of the first rules of surviving in a dictatorship or an autocracy You have to decide i'm not going to go along with this I'm not going to put my [02:12:00] head in the sand when you're able to do that You're going to be able to talk to other people and what I want to challenge people to do besides healing in themselves the ways that authoritarianism and capitalist oppression has leaked into them, it's to start reaching out to other people and having real conversations to actually talk about how you're treated in your workplace, whether or not you think it's right that people are being exploited like this.
And I'm not just talking about coworkers. I'm talking about immigrants. I'm talking about vulnerable communities. Once you start dealing with these issues, those things, and we're talking about actual material conditions and experiences, you can start to form coalitions. And Danielle, what you just said is exactly right.
We are entering into a period where intentionally state power has created apparatuses in order to stave off protest. And I'm not just talking about the Gaza protest in which we saw students being absolutely decimated by law enforcement. I'm also talking about what happened during the BLM protest. I'm talking [02:13:00] about surveillance.
I'm talking about all these things that some people have said, Man, this is awful and then turned a blind eye to. The reason that we need to be with other people is because we need to recognize the interdependence of our situations, how I rise or fall based on what happens to you and what happens to people that I have never met and will never meet.
And when that comes together, all of a sudden there's a lot more people in the street and, you know, all you have to do It's look at China, you look at Iran, you look at actual social movements, and if this resonates with people, look what happened with civil rights. It wasn't that Martin Luther King made a speech that resonated with people.
It's that they got in the streets and actually stressed the system until the system had to look at its own privilege and make decisions. Liberals did not suddenly decide to pass civil rights legislation. It wasn't out of the kindness of their hearts. It was because they were confronted with the reality of their privilege and the oppression that came from that privilege.[02:14:00]
And so what is going to happen if we are going to get to a place where things are actually going to get better is a lot of people are going to have to be made uncomfortable. And that is the basis of modern America, is comfort where you can find it. That's why it's a premium. You have to pay extra to be comfortable in America, right?
Whether it's a gated community or to live in a blue state away from the oppression of the red states. People are going to have to take a look at what the actual conditions are that underline their own comfort and their own privilege. And you don't get a Donald Trump, you don't get the Republican Party, you don't get an autocracy or an authoritarian regime if people have not been living comfortably at the expense of Of others and so this is going to take a spiritual political Cultural and social sea change and if what i'm saying sounds hard and daunting it's only because it's hard and daunting But the alternative to it the alternative to it honest to god [02:15:00] Is a type of tragedy that I don't think most people are ready to really wrap their minds around but quite frankly The time to wrap your your mind around it is now
Credits
JAY TOMLINSON - HOST, BEST OF THE LEFT: That's going to be it for today as always keep the comments coming in. I'd love to hear your thoughts or questions about today's topic or anything else. You can leave a voicemail or send us a text at (202)999-3991. Or simply email me to [email protected]. The additional sections of the show included clips from Democracy Now!, The New Abnormal, The Thom Hartmann Program, This Week in White Supremacy, Roland Martin, and MSNBC. Further details are in the show notes.
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