Saturday was a patriotic high, shared with millions of America's true patriots.
Like the millions in the streets Saturday, I will always be Antifa
TAT readers,
Welcome back readers. Today’s offering will be shorter than my normal essays, but I thought that I would like to offer some thoughts on Saturday’s massive Antifa protests. Yes, to me all patriots that support defending our true constitutional values against fascism, are Antifa. Like so many of the words that have been redefined by Republican leadership and their mouthpieces like FOX News, to fit the agenda of an increasingly fascist Republican Party, it’s time to take back those words and their actual meanings.
Antifa, plain and simple simply means to oppose fascism. Yes, there is a universally accepted ideology or rather more of an underlying set of beliefs, that articulate some of the loosely connected believers and devotees to the movement’s belief system. Those beliefs in nearly all circumstances well overlap with our nation’s founding principles. The bottom-line for me, is that opposing fascism is part of who we are as Americans. It is written into our Constitution, Declaration of Independence and especially, into our Bill of Rights. Over the centuries, there is a consistent thread of Amendments to our constitution, that plainly reinforce our anti-fascist founding principles.
"The first ten amendments to the Constitution make up the Bill of Rights. James Madison wrote the amendments as a solution to limit government power and protect individual liberties through the Constitution. For example, the Founders saw the ability to speak and worship freely as a natural right protected by the First Amendment. Congress is prohibited from making laws establishing religion or abridging freedom of speech. The Fourth Amendment safeguards citizens’ right to be free from unreasonable government intrusion in their homes through the requirement of a warrant." - Bill of Rights: 10 Amendments - Bill of Rights Institute
As I meander through a few comments about Saturday’s breathtakingly patriotic protests, I wish to also ask you to consider adding a TAT essay that I call “The Essentials to your “digital library.” That grouping of essays cover history, values, things that are diametrically opposed to our founding principles and why we must succeed in our defense of America. I will also add links to a couple of recent essays that put our current administration threats into context.
It’s also time to begin considering what else we must do as a nation, to stop any such attempted coups from occurring again. After the Civil War, we made similar adjustments in our laws, including the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to our constitution or as they are titled, The Reconstruction Amendments. The heartbeat of American Democracy, just like our own hearts require maintenance over time to keep them healthy. I will address the future in an upcoming essay but for today, let’s celebrate Saturday’s victories with one eye forward towards a safer, more secure American future.
As usual, I arrived late to the Travis Park protest here in downtown San Antonio. The park is named after an iconic Texas hero, William Barrett Travis, the commander of the Texians for the battle and siege of the Alamo. My late arrival was largely due to massive construction downtown but as I neared the park, I also realized that there were in excess of 10,000 protesters enjoying a protest with a party atmosphere. There was joy, vivid displays of patriotic symbols, music, art and creative whimsy.. Unlike the Republican’s illegal police actions in Portland, Chicago and other cities, we showed how much honest San Antonians and other local Texans love our nation and our constitutionally guaranteed rights.
My fellow Texan compatriots, bore the 97 degree heat like camels crossing the Sahara Desert, with the ease that we’ve become accustomed to living in Texas. It did take a bit of a toll on those who following Portland’s lead, donned large inflatable costumes to highlight the absurdity of masked, tactically equipped thugs from ICE trying to intimidate peaceful and joyfully eccentric protesters. This juxtaposition of a Darth Vader costumed ICE force against those celebrating real American values with satire, song and dance, makes for a shockingly vivid disparity between today’s MAGA Republican Party, and honest patriots.
These protests in Texas struck fear into the hearts of our Texas Taliban governor, “Hot Wheels,” Greg Abbott and his GOP henchmen. Of course, Hot Wheels, the pejorative many Texans of all political stripes call Abbott, due to his subservient bootlicking of Trump and the national GOP, called out the Texas National Guard in another of his well-known and expected political stunts. Texans don’t give a damn about such nonsense, other than the fact that we have to pay the bill for his stunts.
Here in Texas, an outgrowth of our protests has been to call for a “Greg Abbott Boycott” due to his hysteria of Texas National Guard mobilizations for these protests. Texas companies like Tesla, Dell, ExxonMobil, American Airlines, USAA, Southwest Airlines and AT&T are on the boycott target list. This is an important step in imposing costs on the corporate oligarchs that are behind the Republican assault on all working Texans. They are also underpinning the Trump installed oligarchy running our government. You might remember from earlier essays that our constitution is considered by Harvard and other scholars, as the “Anti-Oligarchy Constitution.”
Like much of the country, Republican congressmen in Texas are running scared. These protests remind them just how out of step they are with America, and therefore a serious threat to reelection. When adversaries are frightened, they make poor decisions. The more pressure, the worse it gets for them. Those spineless bootlicking GOP congressmen’s fear is the key to not only the midterms, but also will help us get to them before a martial law event from Trump and his cabinet of gangsters. Remember that Trump is a malignant narcissist and like the gangsters he loves to emulate, only have one tactic to deal with opposition and that… is to become more sadistic in opposing his threats. We are all his targets and this even includes those red-hat wearing fake-patriots.
Well my friends and fellow Americans, I promised y’all a short piece today so I will wrap this up. At the end of the day, Saturday was an extraordinarily beautiful representation of American values. Those protests are now also, part of the oppositional foundation of our resistance. It was heartening to also see so many Veterans from as far back as the Vietnam War, participating loudly and proudly. No one called for violence and despite the preposterous claims of Republicans, no one called for assassinations or even revenge. We just protested to vanquish the coup mongers and erase their hateful legacy from the annals of American History. One day and I hope soon, this era will be nothing but a painful blip on our nation’s path towards, “a more perfect union.”
Thank you to every single protester and their supporters. You are the true patriots.
Publius Redux