Return of White Supremacy

I am checking out The Indiana Citizen. I am glad to see It’s been nearly a century since the KKK dominated Indiana, but Hoosiers see lasting effects. I am happier to see someone else thinking what I have been thinking since 2016. We are back in 1920s Indiana, only worse.

In James H. Madison’s book “The Ku Klux Klan in the Heartland,” he writes that the Klan posed the question, “Who is an American?” and came to the conclusion that an American is white, Christian, born in the U.S. and straight.

Those are your Trumpers, those wanting to make to make America great again. History repeats? Maybe history has taught its losers while its winners doze.

“[The] myth was, ‘Wow, they really weren’t that bad. They really weren’t that serious. People were manipulated into joining the Klan, they don’t believe this stuff,’” Madison said.

“We’re doing a great disservice to our children, and a great disservice to democracy if we present, as you say, a rosy picture of our past.”

I heard about the 20s Klan from my great-aunt. She also  talked about D. C. Stephenson. She condemned both in no uncertain times. She also voted straight ticket Republican. I cannot imagine her doing so now.

D. C. Stephenson raped and murdered Madge Oberholtzer. 

The downfall of the Indiana Klan came in two ways, Madison says in his book. The first was Grand Dragon D.C. Stephenson’s crime. More slowly, the state rose up against the group’s beliefs.

In 1925, Stephenson, a key figure in the politics of the Indiana Klan, raped and killed a 28-year-old white woman who worked at the Indiana Statehouse. Madge Oberholtzer, a former Butler University student, signed a statement on her deathbed that told the awful story of Stephenson’s abuse before he dumped the dying young woman off at her parents’ home in Irvington. She lived for another month.

Stephenson was a convicted rapist and murderer. Donald Trump is a self-confessed sex offender. Read the Indiana Supreme Court's Stephenson opinion and pay attention to how he claims to be the law in in the State of Indiana. Donald J. Trump thinks himself above all the laws.

The January 6 panel said Trump incited an ‘attempted coup’. Will it kill him or make him stronger? was The Guardian's headline:

...But today America, and its media, are bitterly divided, and Trump, who once boasted that he could shoot someone and not lose voters, has repeatedly shown that what does not kill him makes him stronger.

***

 “And, aware of the rioters’ chants to ‘hang Mike Pence’, the president responded with this sentiment: ‘Maybe our supporters have the right idea.’ Mike Pence ‘deserves’ it.”

Another point, one not dwelled upon in the Indiana Citizen story was the anti- Roman Catholic stance of the KKK. The Catholics have allied with the right wing Protestants on abortion. With the end of Roe v. Wade about to be delivered by a Roman Catholic Supreme Court Justice, the alliance may come to an end. The radical Protestants may remember the Roman church was to them the Whore if Babylon. Perhaps the Catholics will live to regret their voting Republican.

Maybe others will regret to whom they gave political power. Let us hope the rest of us live so long.

sch 6/12/22

And do read The Bulwark's Patriot Front and the Next Stage of the Culture War. 

I used to think that Trump was flawed as a dictator by not having an ideology. He was not Mussolini. He was a con man surprised by his own con and only wanting to rake in all the bucks he could.  

Now I think I was wrong. I see Trump now as part of an ecosystem that includes the white nationalists and Fox News. Trump is not the creator, progenitor, of a movement. He is more the arsonist bringing together fuel and match. He need not write a book about his struggles - the media has done so - and he need not create a cult of personality through colored shirts and public spectacles - reality tv did that for him - and all the ideas he needs are those of the common bigot to attract those with more capable of eloquence in their fascism.

From The Bulwark article:

Patriot Front, then, advocates a mix of standard right-wing extremist ideas, and its membership is fairly limited. What makes them significant, however, is their media savvy. For example, white supremacist propaganda distribution nearly doubled in the United States in 2020, and Patriot Front was alone responsible for about 80 percent of the total volume. That same year, they began transitioning away from the overt anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi language of their origins in their public appearances, instead favoring dogwhistle slogans such as “America First,” “Better Dead Than Red,” “Reclaim America,” and “Not Stolen. Conquered.” The group uses“flash demonstrations,” planned marches and events that are not announced in advance, to great effect as part of their larger media campaign....

Maybe they have learned the lesson of D. C. Stephenson. Like head lice, they never truly go extinct but only into hiding. Like lice to human beings these groups are a disease to the body politic.

sch 6/13/22