CT Blue

I’ve written before (some might say ad nauseam) about the inability of the Democrats to push a consistent message; the ability of the right to label themselves in palatable ways (they’re “pro-life”!); and the willingness or helplessness of a compliant press to go along with their labeling.

We’re seeing that in spades so far as the fascists among us are concerned. They have branded themselves “white nationalists” and a compliant press had gone along. I was struck by this article (hardly an outlier) in the Boston Globe, in which the phrase is used repeatedly to describe people who are undoubtedly fascists. After all, they proudly displayed Nazi and fascist symbols in the banners they carried, though in the linked article we learn only that “Confederate flags and other banners” made an appearance. As with the concession of the term “pro-life” to a political movement that is anti-abortion and anti-people, the use of the term “white nationalists” concedes too much to these fascists. It obscures their racism and for many Americans (I just read somewhere that 25% of Americans think the sun goes around the earth) the term “nationalist” probably sounds patriotic.

It may be asking too much for the press to call a fascist a fascist, but they should at least come up with a term of their own, rather than going with the term the fascists want them to use. How about “avowed racists” or something of that sort? As for the Democrats, they should be avoiding the terms “alt-right” and “white nationalist” and call a fascist a fascist. Fox won’t like it, but we should be way past the point where anyone cares what the people on Fox say about Democrats. (I’m assuming by now they’ve arrived at a way to blame yesterday’s carnage on Obama.) In fact, the Democrats should simply be calling Fox the propagandists that they are. One of the reasons the press is so subservient to Republicans these days is that for years the Republicans (and they’re still doing it) labeled them the “liberal media”. It was mildly true at one point (facts do have a well known liberal bias), but nowadays they bend over so far backwards that the opposite is true. So it worked, and it might work for the Democrats if they only made some noise about it.