The Left Closes Ranks to Protect the Great Charlottesville Whitewash

Mark J. Fitzgibbons

The violence in Charlottesville on August 12 has been used to promote the left's box of political chocolates: Republicans are addicted to racism. President Trump's ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals "on the heels of Charlottesville . . . is [a] signal[] to champions of hate and bigotry that their voices matter most." It is cause to end President Trump's voter fraud commission. Defund the Jefferson Memorial. Ban open carry of firearms. Attack free speech. Redouble Linda Sarsour's Women's March activism. Rename New York's Trump Park.

Charlottesville became a rallying cry for Democrats and social justice warriors. This helps explain the false narrative about Charlottesville promoted by the Liberal News Media.

At his August 22 rally in Phoenix, President Trump did his best (and funniest) New York, street-talking, blue collar verbal dismembering of the increasingly of out-of-touch, ideologically blinded elitists in the Liberal News media. He lambasted the "fake news" reporting about his comments that "both sides" were responsible for violence in Charlottesville earlier that month.

Trump knew Americans outside the liberal political establishment bubble would understand exactly what he was saying as he goaded the hopelessly deranged and dishonest liberal news media.

The liberal news media took the bait and fell hard over that speech. CNN's Don Lemon seemed to fight back a fit of weepish emotions by first insisting Trump's criticisms of the press had nothing to do with Lemon's upcoming smug and melodramatic response about an "unhinged" president. CNN's Eric Bradner, pushing the narrative that Trump is mentally unstable, called the speech "a 77-minute presidential therapy session in front of thousands of supporters."

Then came news reported on August 29 by Josh Meyer at Politico that the Department of Homeland Security warned Charlottesville and Virginia officials three days before the tragic events of August 12 that leftwing antifa and white supremacists were preparing for violence at their competing protests, and that it would likely be the worst clash to date between these two groups of maladjusted reprobates.

In other words, Trump was not only right after-the-fact about Charlottesville, but the violence from both sides was predicted, and city and state officials were warned about it. It has been over a week since the news about this DHS warning broke, but The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, and the major networks and liberal news media have ignored it.

At least one protester injured that day has filed suit against the city and state police chiefs for allegedly issuing a stand-down order that allowed the violence to escalate. There is a clear case of negligence by public safety officials for failing to take basic security precautions and snuff out violence early in the protests, which led to escalation and tragedy.

The lawsuit, however, is the work of liberal social justice warriors, blaming only the police chiefs, ignoring the role of the violent left that day and in events leading up to it, and failing to mention Governor Terry McAuliffe and his administration's clear role in preparations for the security of events that day. Objective lawyers would have sued the deep-pocket Commonwealth of Virginia, especially given McAuliffe's official press release the day of the violence saying, "In the days and weeks leading up to this event, my Administration engaged in extensive planning and preparation to ensure that the rally in Charlottesville could be held in a safe and lawful environment."

That's gold for plaintiff attorneys.

What this SJW lawsuit does to protect Democrat political officials by omission is startling. The Charlottesville police chief, after all, seemed to handle a July 8 protest by the KKK in textbook fashion. He was later criticized by city social justice warriors, however, because his department only arrested violent antifa counter-protesters but no KKK members at the July event.

In other words, the chief's good law enforcement in July wasn't politically correct enough for his leftwing critics. The disengagement of the police at the deadly August 12 protest noted by multiple witnesses -- including the ACLU of Virginia, and the subsequent spread of violence, seem rather clearly to have been the result of political pressures from the left.

But that never fitted the SJW's or liberal news media's dishonest narratives.

The tragic events gave the ambitious Governor McAuliffe a national platform, and left-wingers could point a finger at white supremacists, giving cover to their violent, strong-arm allies in antifa. Certainly, the August 12 Charlottesville events provided better ratings for the news media than the July 8 arrests of over 20 leftwing antifa protestors. Adding to the appearance of a whitewash, the City of Charlottesville hired their own investigator, a Democrat and Obama-appointee former U.S. Attorney who happens to be a donor to the city's mayor. The events leading up to Charlottesville's violence require a Department of Justice investigation instead

As everyone outside the liberal establishment bubble had already gathered, however, Trump was right all along about Charlottesville. Don Lemon and nearly everyone else in the liberal news media except Politico have been AWOL in reporting about this DHS warning to Charlottesville and Virginia officials. The DHS warning devastatingly crushes their false narrative about Charlottesville, Trump's comments, and, well, conservatives who believed Trump and were therefore considered racists.

The liberal news media's refusal to acknowledge the role of leftwing politics and the thuggish antifa in the Charlottesville violence then took another hit in a second piece by Josh Meyer at Politico on September 1, that in 2016 the Obama DHS classified antifa as a domestic terrorist organization.

Quoting a senior law enforcement official tracking domestic extremists, Meyer writes, "These antifa guys were showing up with weapons, shields and bike helmets and just beating the sh** out of people. … They're using Molotov cocktails, they're starting fires, they're throwing bombs and smashing windows."

As repulsive as the white supremacist message is, it appears their additional arming in preparation for their Charlottesville protest was in response to the known and expected violence of the leftwing antifa. Meyer's report continues, "Almost immediately, the right-wing targets of the antifa attacks began fighting back, bringing more and larger weapons and launching unprovoked attacks of their own, the documents and interviews show."

In describing how the law can be so stubborn that it reaches sometimes foolish results, Charles Dickens used the character Mr. Bumble in Oliver Twist to say that "the law is a ass - a idiot."

Not that many Americans didn't already know the mulishly stubborn and foolish ways of the liberal news media, but Charlottesville has proven these ideological purveyors of propaganda, with their constant false narratives and refusals to be fair, to be an even bigger ass than we thought.