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ACCORDING TO LIZ - In the days following MAGA-maestro Charlie Kirk’s murder, Utah’s Republican governor Spencer Cox, urged the country to lower the political temperature. “We have to find an off-ramp, or it’s going to get much, much worse.”
Instead, Trump denounced the “radical left” – seemingly anyone speaking out against him – as responsible for much of the political aggression in the country while disingenuously ignoring the escalating violence from right-wing factions, forces that he deliberately energized and let loose on the American people.
JD Vance, the president’s perfect mini-me, followed in his footsteps pompously opining on a postmortem Charlie Kirk podcast: “People who celebrated the murder or mischaracterized his views are creating an environment where things like this are inevitably going to happen.”
No.
Every life lost to firearms violence is a preventable tragedy. That is a choice made primarily by Republican politicians and talking heads, but also by others fearing the wrath of weapons- industry fueled gun advocacy kickback.
It’s too easy for anyone in the United States to grab a gun to settle petty grievances. Few have grandiose visions of making a statement for either the right or the left; they are just pissed off at something, and all too willing to target anyone who epitomizes their pain.
Civilian shooting deaths are not inevitable. Nowhere else in the world, even war zones – other than the genocide in Gaza, perpetrated by Israel and supported by the American government – suffers the same carnage as in the purported Land of the Free.
The drift-back from Trump and his fawning followers is that Kirk should be canonized, and all the kids killed in school shootings left to rot in the wake of “our prayers are with the family” mantras.
Republicans continue to demand punishment for the “crime” of criticizing Kirk. To whit, the Pentagon suspended an army colonel who called the assassination “tragic” but pointe out that Kirk had spread “hate, racism, homophobia, misogyny and transphobia.” Others have been fired from their jobs after conservatives outed posts in which they opposed Kirk’s beliefs.
Now this has gone viral with conservative influencers promulgated by platforms including X, Meta, TikTok, and Reddit, encouraging people to comb through the internet for comments condoning Kirk’s killing or even referring to him in unflattering terms, and pillory those who posted them.
Giving rise to the grave concern that this could spiral into multiple martyrdoms inspiring a new and even more internecine Civil War, especially given the call for the death penalty by Utah’s Attorney General and the strong opposition to capital punishment by a majority of liberals.
With the current administration stoking the fires of rancid animosity.
The Kirk memorial in Arizona looked more like a Nazi rally than a funerary function. Attendees included big-C Conservative famous faces from Trump and high-ranking members of his administration to fundamentalist influencers and far-right media personalities.
The dress code for the funeral was “Sunday Best” in red, white and blue, further politicizing the event that drew tens of thousands of Kirk’s followers. Instead of uniting the country against violence of any ilk, the president called the man a Martyr as he rambled on for three-quarters of an hour using this bully pulpit to attack political opponents and promote his personal agenda.
According to prosecutors, Tyler Robinson who was charged with killing Kirk texted that he had “had enough” of Kirk’s “hatred” and that “some hate can’t be negotiated out.”
Agreed. Kirk was a mean-spirited human being who often set up his “debates” against people who he knew were less knowledgeable and then made fun of them for his listening audience.
A legitimate opinion but, while many might disagree and just like Kirk did not deserve to die, neither should there be a railroaded response run by the Ranter-in-Chief to satisfy the blood-hungry MAGA masses.
Two wrongs will never make a right and the pageantry of a capital case trial will only continue to tear the country apart.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said she would target people engaging in “hate speech” despite the First Amendment’s broad protections in the United States. But whose hate speech?
What about all the rancor spouted by the MAGA-termites, and the president himself?
Kirk strongly supported Second Amendment gun rights. He thought the benefits of gun rights outweighed the costs: “I think it’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.”
Perhaps not his own.
In fact, he believed that the way to reduce gun violence was to put guns into the hands of more Americans.
Perhaps not his killer’s.
And increasingly, the authoritarian actions of this administration are impacting the American economy. The tariff debacles are now being overshadowed by the showdown – yet again – over passing a continuing resolution to keep the government funded past September 30.
In the House it needed – and received – a simple majority, albeit along party lines, but Senate Republicans don’t have the 60 votes needed and recent events are only augmenting acrimony and divisiveness which could usher in a very bitter holiday season to cap off Year 1 of Trump’s reign.
Especially with El Presidente threatening more mass firings of government employees in the event of a shutdown.
The administration is striving to emphasize links between burning of Teslas, anger against immigration agents, and progressive media publications to justify treating the left as a malign influence.
It is trying to skirt protections embedded in the Constitution and Bill of Rights with a myriad of strongarm methods such as accusing ActBlue, a donation platform used by Democrats, of having links to terrorism, by targeting the tax-exempt status of any nonprofits critical of Trump and his MAGA-conservative support base, by levying punitive fines against universities and media outlets for the crime of allowing free speech, by pushing them to fire nationally-recognized public figures, and by bringing spurious charges against anyone and any entity that won’t cower at its feet.
And, if the charges don’t stick, doing it over and over again in different courts using the public purse to deliberately drain the financial resources of such individuals and small-dollar funded organizations.
That is not fair. That is not what it means to be American.
Conservatives continually cast liberalism as a politically dangerous perspective, skewing just about anything they can to fit that narrative. And increasingly isolating minorities – racial, religious, gender-based and political – so their rabid online acolytes can target and terrorize individual examples of their venomous invective.
What we are seeing is the rise of an American Hitler and the creation and encouragement of 21st century Brownshirts and betrayers.
Intensifying vitriol will not inspire solutions.
To overcome the rise of the radical right, decent Americans of all political persuasions must band together, winning back working-class voters who feel abandoned by all sides, and buckle down to build a better future.
“We Will Do It in Charlie’s Name” must be embraced, not as the anthem of the calculating and self-serving billionaires of the presidential entourage, but in the name of Kirk’s youthful followers who stand to inherit this country with their brethren across the political spectrum.
Whether it’s a still-functioning super-power or a bowdlerized third-world ghost of what it once was.
This death must certainly not be used to call for the lynching of practically anyone to Kirk’s left… which is a mighty long list.
Given conservatives have most of the guns in this country and, in the past ten years, three-quarters of political murders have been by right-wing extremists, this issue is increasingly dire.
And the squirreliness of too many in the Democratic establishment and their me-too PC hangers-on only gives rise to more excuses for the right-wing radicals to take down their leftist opponents.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion. Muslims and Jews. Strong women and LGBTQ+ advocates. BIPOC and immigrants – and even those who look like they might be. Seniors and children. Americans who believe in climate change and gun control. Those who stand strong against A.I. predation, cryptocurrency abuses, and corporate overreach.
People who call for locavorism, smaller safer communities, and living within our personal and planetary means.
All are fodder for the presidentially-sanctioned hate speech that has replaced critical discourse and, more and more, gives rise to violence.
The example of a president excoriating other world leaders and is attempting to use the full powers of the federal government for personal retribution has become a clear and present danger.
Barack Obama points out “this nationalized ideological struggle…[has] seeped into us through our phones and addled our brains.”
Including those of the present president. Who believes that any reporting that criticizes him is “really Illegal.” Curious, because all commentary about public figures is protected by the Constitution. Now even laughter is becoming a government-regulated product.
Americans’ free speech, which used to be far broader here than in other countries where hate speech is more firmly regulated, is being grievously assaulted by this administration.
Except when the president and his proxies employ it to stir up the mob against their adversaries.
(Liz Amsden is a former Angeleno now living in Vermont and a regular CityWatch contributor. She writes on issues she’s passionate about, including social justice, government accountability, and community empowerment. Liz brings a sharp, activist voice to her commentary and continues to engage with Los Angeles civic affairs from afar. She can be reached at [email protected].)
