While President Trump plays Dick Cheney and hides in the Presidential bunkers some of the men in blue around the country who are dealing with the fallout from his braggadocio are pulling Colin Kaepernick’s and taking a knee instead of pressing it on justice.
The President was as quick as me to lay the blame for the anonymous fire bombing. He laid the blame on Antifa (antifascista) a loosely organized group intended to fight fascist groups that cheer the President on and bring their own mayhem around the country. I blamed people who wanted to start a race war. Call them the Helter Skelter crowd. We are both surely being overly simplistic. A mob has its own synergy and many if not most peaceful protests bring out people who are simply gratified by chaos.
I’ve been doing some writing about the Vietnam peace protests in Mankato when I was attending the college there. I stayed far away from the takeover of Highway 169 in the Spring of 1972 which led to bottle throwing at the police and some use of tear gas. In France the mobs lopped off heads much to the discomfort of retired American revolutionaries. Angry crowds have a hard time policing themselves so the police must do it. When the Mankato peace marchers headed to the Highway I vividly remember seeing an old nemisis of mine who didn’t go to college heading in that direction in a state of some intoxication. I mentioned him in an old column of mine twenty years ago. He was the rat taking great pleasure in aiming his kicks at my gonads while I was locked in combat with Wayne…….Wayne turns out to be the hero of this story.
I have been impressed with the Duluth police and I’m not surprised. Anyone knowing the history of Duluth and the origins of our City’s greatest shame will understand the lengths to which Chief Tusken is inclined to go toward decency. That inclination is doubled in what has become Denfeld High School which has the highest minority student population. It’s new principal is the Chief’s brother.
I’ve just called the Secretary of State’s office in St. Paul to make sure I have everything I need to file for Congress today. Claudia didn’t realize I’d be required to go there and is suffering a little anxiety because of all the news about the late night riots. It will be my fourth trip down to file for Congress and my second time to file as a Republican. For any elective office covering over two Minnesota counties this is the only place to file. I asked the fellow who answered the phone about the Covid-19 protocols. It will be just like going to Mt. Royal Supermarket. I’ll take the mask that Claudia hand sewed with me. I also asked about riots. He assured me that everything is calm. Then I joked with him about whether President Trump might get his way and cancel the elections all together after all the crisis he’s helped foment and heap fuel on. The staff member seemed a little puzzled at any serious thought of a postponement of our elections. I hope he’s not underestimating the work of our troll under the White House.
By the way. This post will serve as my Press Release. I should add, if I haven’t been clear, that this election is about the fitness in office of President Trump and any of our representatives who are too timid to challenge the mayhem our President has caused the United States. I’m filing as a Republican in a last ditch effort to prevent the forces of darkness from snuffing out the last vestiges of the Republican Party’s founder Abraham Lincoln. I hope its not too late. For my part, I was far ahead of George Conway and the Lincoln Project (but they have better commercials).
My efforts to alert America to the danger of Donald Trump began in 2016. five years ago at the prospect of having an uninformed egoist and demagogue sweep away the passel of nothing-burger presidential wannabes of today’s Republican Party. Here’s my first contribution to that message in snow which I later turned into a “trading card”:
