We're seeing an obvious effort by the right-wing to create hysteria about "left-wing violence" that does not actually exist.

Political violence in America has always been from the right, from the days of the KKK lynching "uppity niggers" and the Pinkertons gunning down union organizers, right up to today with the recent murder of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, there is an unbroken line of racist and fascist violence - deadly violence... murder .

There is no equivalent violence on the left, and there never has been.

So... why are all our right-wing shills working so hard to convince the Unthinking Faithful ^TM , and perhaps even a larger public, of something that doesn't exist?

What's going on here?

I remember a decade ago, on NV, seeing a sudden irruption of seeds/articles, all with the same theme: "The US is not a democracy, it is a republic".

At first, I took these crazy articles at face value. (I was even more naive back then than I am now!) I presumed that the folks who put this up had read some wacko theory, and were just repeating it, without understanding it. So I patiently explained why that sentence is nonsense.

It was frustrating to observe that these people were impervious to fact and reason. I thought, "Good Lord, but these people are dense! "

I was wrong. Very wrong...

Those people were not describing America as it is. They were describing America as they intended to remake it. They were laying the groundwork, the justification, for all the voter-restriction actions that have since been taken. The purpose of those "not a democracy" articles was to separate the public from the very idea of democracy... in order to transform America from democracy to authoritarianism.

That project is ongoing...

As George Bush so famously said, "Fool me once, shame on... ... ummmm... errrr..."

It took me a couple years to understand what was going on with the "not a democracy" meme.

That's far too long. The nation must not be so late in understanding what the alt-right is working on now...

Does everyone remember that Hitler's first attempt at power was the laughable "Munich beer-hall putsch"? I'd guess that many Germans lauged at that, and then laughed again when the first Brownshirts began appearing among them on the streets.

We have some idiots who make us laugh, too...

We surely should not be laughing.

Let's remember that not long ago, "militia" pointed loaded weapons at Federal law enforcement officers... to "defend the rights" of a thief, Cliven Bundy.

Those "militia" did not agree with the law that Bundy was breaking, and were ready to open fire on anyone who tried to enforce that law. They were ready and willing to use force to impose their own law .

There's another episode from 1930s Germany that should be remembered here. At 10pm on 27th February 1933 the Berlin Fire Department received a call that the Reichstag building was on fire. A young communist, Marinus van der Lubbe was discovered on the premises clad in just trousers and footwear. A number of small fires had been started around the building but most failed to take hold except the fire started in the great chamber.

Van der Lubbe and four other communists were arrested and charged with arson and attempting to overthrow the government. Although van der Lubbe confessed to the crime, many people believed that the real culprits were the Nazi Party, probably members of the SA.

The truth of the Reichstag Fire is forever unknown... but its consequences are perfectly well known. The Nazis accused the Communists... and then arrested them en masse ... along with everyone and anyone who opposed them . Anyone who resisted was shot.

Fast forward to America today: The truth is that the left has never used deadly force, while the right has used it constantly. But as the Nazis demonstrated with the Reichstag Fire, the truth is unimportant.

Make the people fear! Accuse your adversaries!

Then kill your adversaries...

... and anyone who refuses to docilely help with the killing of whoever else needs killing...

We have seen this movie before. Will we be satisfied to sit back and watch it again?