In the aftermath of Trump’s indictment, several good articles were written about right-wing calls for violence on fringe platforms. But in my latest piece, I focused on mainstream Republicans who are promoting violence, declaring war, and calling on people to take up arms & organize militias.
The findings were alarming — and left me w/ the impression that they believe the war has already begun.
https://weaponizedspaces.substack.com/p/declaration-of-war-right-wing-calls?utm_source=twitter&sd=pf
The mainstream rhetoric was striking:
One GOP congressman issued literal battlefield commands on Twitter.
Another GOP rep. tweeted, “We have now reached a war phase.”
Former AZ gov candidate Kari Lake invoked the NRA, saying Republicans have a lot of guns and would use them to defend Trump.
The “MAGA Inc. War Room” said in a statement that the DOJ must be “confronted & destroyed.”
Over on Fox News, Mark Levin declared, “This is war!” in response to the indictment.
Right-wing media figure Wayne Allen Root called the indictment a “Declaration of War.”
Stephen Miller said on Fox that Friday “was the day that we ceased to be a democratic republic.”
For the past 2 days, most Fox News hosts & guests have been frenzied as they told their audience that this would be the end of US democracy.
On The Donald, two separate posts called for the assassination of AG Merrick Garland. Both posts featured his picture with a caption saying ‘this is what the 2nd Amendment is for.’
One post called on people to “buy a gun or help organize your local militia.”
The other said “Get ready for war.”
To reiterate: They’re trying to get the US Attorney General assassinated.
Trump, meanwhile, used Truth Social to call on his supporters to show up when he’ll be at the Miami courthouse on Tuesday. He also targeted special counsel Jack Smith repeatedly, posting his picture calling him a “deranged … Trump Hater”, and suggesting he was bribed or pressured into charging him. Trump also reposted (“re-truthed”) conspiratorial content and election disinformation to further incite people.
Oh, and he’s using his indictment to fundraise for his campaign.
As I was analyzing Truth Social, the sponsored ad on Trump’s Truth Social page — placed immediately below a meme declaring “THIS IS NOT A GAME. THIS IS WAR.” — was an ad for a gun. The ad had pictures of hands holding a gun, and flashed through three words:
“Lock. Load. Fire.”
The calls for civil war were striking, and in many ways it really does seem like American right-wingers believe the war has begun. And maybe it has.
If/when civil war happens here — or maybe it’s already happening! — it won’t look like the types of war we have seen. It won’t be two sides fighting continuously in a delineated geographic area. It won’t even have a clear start or end. It’ll be a type of warfare that most Americans haven’t ever experienced — making it hard to recognize.
Civil war in America today would look like many different groups, with shifting alliances, carrying out “isolated” (but connected/coordinated) acts of violence like mass shootings & terrorist attacks targeting people, power stations, supply chains, government buildings, etc. It would combine cyber/infrastructure attacks with violent attacks on the population. There’d be few rules, and little/no distinction between civilians & combatants.
ie, it would be irregular warfare.
Given our unfamiliarity with this unstructured form of war, how will we recognize it if it happens? Perhaps by looking for signs of coordination between cyber & physical attacks; extremist groups merging to form new alliances; shortages of things like medications; large, frequent, or unusually damaging power outages; more frequent mass shootings or violent attacks.
As you might’ve noticed, some of those are already happening. Now.
But this war won’t be declared — that’s the whole point.
@Ex_spurt @rvawonk The risk isn't entirely that they win, it's the collateral damage inflicted in any conflict.
I've said before, from here in SW Missouri "It'll take 3 days to put them down" is cold comfort because it'll be happening here on day 1. Days 2 and 3 aren't relevant to the casualties of day 1.
@rvawonk
One of the right wing's common clamors about #J6 is that they loudly proclaim that if it was actually an insurrection than the MAGA Republicans would have brought guns (which many of them actually did, but that's not the point of this post).
I fear that tomorrow at the federal courthouse that they might consider that a call to arms and come guns a blazing.
Other than the damage and harm that would occur from that I almost hope they do in order to help wake up more Americans to threat
@66gardeners @GreenFire
You’re kidding right? When it all goes down, the police aren’t going to be fighting any fascists. Look what happened recently in Glendale,CA. The cops protected the christofascists against the LBGTQ+ activists.
When red state Senators won't vote for disaster relief for blue states, we're at war.
@corbden @rvawonk @ravenonthill
Michael Flynn has been recruiting around the country for the last couple years (partially paid for with the military pension that he's *still* getting).
It wouldn't be be that big of a jump for him to fully 'cross the Rubicon.' He's already got a foot and three toes on the other side.
https://apnews.com/article/reawaken-america-tour-michael-flynn-910e83b515185751be82868b227ca22e
We're in a place where savvy instigators can hop on OANN (or Fox or) and give marching orders (insinuating) while keeping things barely on the side of legal. Or just a smarter 'Q'.
But no, not a well coordinated attack. Thankfully at least the most of those capable of such a thing are in jail, or will be soon
@rvawonk If this war "won't be declared", why are prominent Republicans going full-on declaring war on the DOH, Merrick Garland, et. al.?
We desperately need leadership right now! The courts can't do it alone. The unions can;t do it alone. The Democratic Party can't do it alone. We have to be marshaling support from industry leaders, religious leaders and, yes, from the Murdoch family.
@rvawonk To compare this to the US civil war... it's 1858. Churches have been splitting for twenty years over the issue of slavery. There's been a decade of small to middling violent outbursts over the issues (Bloody Kansas, John Brown at Harper's Ferry, etc.). Voices are getting more strident, and compromise seems farther away than ever.
Maybe we'll get a three way presidential race with an unknown taking power and that will scare the alt-right? Hard to say.
But until the rich people decide that they will lose money over whatever issues are pissing off the alt-right these days, there won't be a declared war.
Will pissed off people still shoot places up, plant bombs, and otherwise make the USA a shitty place to live, over issues abhorrent or sympathetic? Of course - we've been doing that in the USA since before we were the USA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_civil_unrest_in_the_United_States
@rvawonk We're in Civil War then. These things are all happening and being done by groups who align with the right/conservatism.
Connections may not be clearly or easily defined, but they exist across social media platforms and in offline spaces.
The calls for violence and war documented here and elsewhere are all connected and deliberate.
@rvawonk And it didn't just begin.
19 children were considered acceptable "collateral damage" in 1995.
It's a slow war, but a war nonetheless.
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