Joe Biden isn't Bill Clinton. Not really the Sister Soulja moment some have urged.

More like praising with faint damns, as Wilde put it.

Statement by Vice President Joe Biden on the deadly violence in Portland

He blames Trump for inciting hatred and fear, not MSNBC, CNN, BBC, the NYT, and the Democratic propagandists and commentariat, generally.

He condemns violence "of left and right".

He focuses on killings.

And the rioting in general, the destruction of property, the economic and social damage, and the people hurt but not killed?

More than three months of riots by antifa, anarchists, BLM, racist radicals, and others of the idiot left in numerous cities across the country.

And it's been a long time since Charlottesville.

Biden Emerges From Basement, Sees Violence, and Makes This Unbelievable Statement

Snark? Scorn? This, too, is propaganda.

All the same.

It appears a Trump supporter was murdered by a leftist in Portland last night, but details are still emerging. 

Regardless of what happened, the shooting has finally prompted Joe Biden to denounce the violence in Portland that's been occurring on a nightly basis for three months now. 

"The deadly violence we saw overnight in Portland is unacceptable. Shooting in the streets of a great American city is unacceptable. I condemn this violence unequivocally. I condemn violence of every kind by any one, whether on the left or the right," Biden said in a statement. 

. . . .

Oh yes, I remember now. It was President Trump who encouraged chaos in the streets when he accused cops of being murderous racists, or when he said America was founded on white supremacy, or when he endorsed the vandalism of historic statues, or when he referred to looters and thugs as "peaceful" protesters as a violent mob raged out of control for months. 

That was all "fanning the flames of hate and division" all, right? But President Trump wasn't the one doing it. 

That was Joe Biden, the media, and the far-left radicals who will be running the government if Trojan horse Biden fools the American people into electing him president. 

Gaslighting: Blaming Left-Wing Violence and Rioting on Trump Is Brazenly Ludicrous

Once the violence spilled over into a small city in a swing state and public opinion started to shift, the Biden campaign finally rolled Biden out to condemn non-peaceful actions, which he's occasionally done with perfunctory statements. 

But his party ignored the issue in their four-night infomercial, elected officials have been bullied by the hard Left into deleting social media posts disavowing violence, and top Biden surrogates have contorted themselves to avoid saying anything too harshly negative about the rioters.

. . . .

As I wrote on Twitter, "there has been violence from the radical right in some cases, which is egregious, appalling and indefensible. Still, bothsidesing the violence & unrest is a form of gaslighting. The mayhem/rioting/looting/assaults has been profoundly asymmetric, and driven by the hard left." 

That's a fact.

Not a lot of social distancing at riots, either. Super-spreaders?

How far will this hurt Joe B in crucial swing states?

Will it even cost him Wisconsin?

538 says the polls there still look good for Joe B.

They think he has a 69% shot at an EC victory, with Trump trailing at 31%.

Maybe the "ride it out" strategy will work.

But nobody knows how to factor in the expected big increase in mail in and absentee voting 

A national pissing contest

Crazies of the left have caused no end of chaos and destruction in cities all over America, every day and every night, for more than three months.

And the crazy right?

What, a day and a night at Charlottesville?

Who is the grave threat to the republic, to democracy, to the rule of law, to domestic tranquility and ordered liberty?

Trump, too stupid, ignorant, and incompetent for the the role, and anyway with no institutional support to speak of, awaits his cue to step forward as . . . Pinochet? Fujimori? Franco?

What would that be like?

The second time as farce?

Or the third?

Whatever.

Could be a long time if the delay so far is a clue

Rev. Jesse Jackson calls for officers to be charged in Jacob Blake shooting

"We're going to march, were going to protest, nonviolent and disciplined and in big numbers, until these men are in jail," Jackson said of the police officers involved in the incident in which Blake, 29, was shot.

I could be wrong, but it looks like it won't go down that way.

Responding to a 17-year-old white suspect arrested in a shooting at a protest in Kenosha on Tuesday night that left two men dead and one wounded, Jackson said, "White citizens should not provide sanctuary for this kind of killing."

Ballocks.

Canada?

Statue of Canada's first prime minister toppled by protesters demanding police defunding

Andrew Sullivan seems to be back to blogging. About how democracies perish.

He just misses telling the horrible truth that the anti-democratic right are the legitimate offspring of their elders and legitimators in spite of themselves, the anti-democratic left.

It happened in Spain.

It happened in Weimar.

The Trap The Democrats Walked Right Into

But here’s one thing I have absolutely no conflict about. 

Rioting and lawlessness is evil. And any civil authority that permits, condones or dismisses violence, looting and mayhem in the streets disqualifies itself from any legitimacy. 

This comes first. 

If one party supports everything I believe in but doesn’t believe in maintaining law and order all the time and everywhere, I’ll back a party that does. 

In that sense, I’m a one-issue voter, because without order, there is no room for any other issue. 

Disorder always and everywhere begets more disorder; the minute the authorities appear to permit such violence, it is destined to grow. 

And if liberals do not defend order, fascists will.

I don't live where the rioters are running free, and I doubt AS does.

And my one issue is that I will never vote for a party sworn to kill me, but will instead vote for the party sworn to keep me alive.

I crucially need both Social Security and Medicare to avoid ending my life sleeping in an alley, fighting stray dogs for pizza out of a dumpster.

The GOP is profoundly devoted to destroying both of those, called "entitlements", by the way, because having paid to support both all our working lives we who now depend on them are entitled to count on them.

And so far the Dems are committed to coming through for us.

And as I’ve watched protests devolve over the summer into a series of riots, arson expeditions, and lawless occupations of city blocks, along with disgusting and often racist profanity, I’ve begun to feel similarly. 

And when I watched the Democratic Convention and heard close to nothing about ending this lawlessness, I noted the silence. 

. . . .

When a political party finds itself so wedded to a new and potent ideology it cannot call out violence when it sees it, then it is walking straight into a trap. 

When the discourse on the left has become one in which scholars and editors and Tweeters vie with one another to up the ante on how inherently evil America has always been, redescribe it as a slaveocracy, and endorse racist books that foment the most egregious stereotypes about “whiteness”, most ordinary people, who love their country and are mostly proud of its past, will rightly balk. 

One of the most devastating lines in president Trump’s convention speech last night was this: 

“Tonight, I ask you a very simple question: How can the Democrat Party ask to lead our country when it spends so much time tearing down our country?” 

A cheap shot, yes. 

But in the current context, a political bullseye.

. . . .

And look at the icons Trump invoked: Wyatt Earp, Annie Oakley, Davy Crockett, and Buffalo Bill. You can mock. 

But in the midst of a culture being redescribed by the left as a form of foul and relentless “white supremacy”, and in a moment of arson and rioting, it felt like a kind of balm. 

All this reassurance played out against a backdrop of Kenosha, which was burning, and Minneapolis, where a suicide led to a bout of opportunistic looting, and Washington DC, where mobs of wokesters went through the city chanting obscenities, invading others’ spaces, demanding bystanders raise fists in solidarity, with occasional spasms of violence. 

These despicable fanatics, like it or not, are now in part the face of the Democrats: a snarling bunch of self-righteous, entitled bigots, chanting slogans rooted in pseudo-Marxist claptrap, erecting guillotines — guillotines! — in the streets as emblems of their agenda. 

They are not arguing; they are attempting to coerce. 

And liberals, from the Biden campaign to the New York Times, are too cowardly and intimidated to call out these bullies and expel them from the ranks. 

. . . .

It was a sign that the establishment left were willing to tolerate disorder and chaos if they were directed toward the ideologically correct ends — which is how Democratic establishments in Minneapolis and Seattle and Portland responded. 

The NYT, CNN and the rest tried to ignore the inexcusable, and find increasingly pathetic ways to dismiss it. 

This week, their staggering bias was exposed as absurd.

. . . .

And let’s be frank about this and call this by its name: this is very Weimar. 

The center has collapsed. 

Armed street gangs of far right and far left are at war on the streets. 

Tribalism is intensifying in every nook and cranny of the culture. 

The establishment right and mainstream left tolerate their respective extremes because they hate each other so much.

And so on.

He pretty much predicts the worst, even if Biden wins.

Trump lies all the time, except when the truth makes him look good.

Trump: Protesters Your Ass, They Are Not Protesters; They Are Anarchists, Agitators, Rioters & Looters

And assholes, but he left that out.

President Donald Trump criticized the protests and riots that ensued in the streets of Washington, D.C. following his acceptance of the Republican nominee for president at the White House. 

Trump said Friday at a campaign event in Manchester, NH that they are anarchists, agitators, rioters, looters who do not get denounced by Democratic politicians.

"Today's Democrat party is filled with hate," Trump said Friday. 

That's a lie, but the Democrats sure are walking right into it.

Antifa and anarchists have no love for Democrats and may even hope their violence gets a win for Trump.

Maybe some of the BLM or other radical racial left, too.

"Just look at Joe Biden's supporters on the streets screaming and shouting at bystanders with unhinged, manic rage. Right? You see it. It's crazy. You ought to see last night in Washington, it was a disgrace. It was a disgrace that these people are representing the United States of America. It was a disgrace."

"Protesters. You know what I say? Protesters, your ass. I don't talk about my ass. They're not protesters. Those aren't protesters. Those are anarchists, they're agitators, they're rioters, they're looters. You say that and some of the people, not all of the people, back there how dare you? These are friendly protesters, right?" Trump said.

Do Trump's work for him

Wheeler just spent about five seconds deploring the shooting last night and the riots in Portland and then at least five minutes blaming Trump for it all and complaining about Trumpist counter-demonstrators.

He made it clear neither Trump nor counter-demonstrators are welcome, but he continued to defend the right and duty to speak out against racism by tying up the city and making a path for violence every single day for as long as it can be kept up as absolutely constitutionally guaranteed.

95 days so far.

A parade of public officials is endorsing the official Democratic view that defends and sides with the demonstrations and demonstrators.

Trump is right. These slugs will never stop this.

Wheeler is back telling everyone proudly he and local officials will do pretty much everything BLM and the others have demanded.

Everything that looks like "attacking systemic racism", that is.

Probably a lot of that in Portland, too, where the Dems have been running everything for about forever.

Guess the terrorists have won, eh?

But even Fox and Kelly Anne Conway are wearing yellow stripes down their backs.

Portland shooting leaves 1 dead as pro-Trump group clashes with BLM

The victim was pro-Trump and the Dems are blaming him for the violence.

What would they be saying if the victim had been a BLM or antifa type?

Trump rails against 'incompetent' Portland mayor, says 'backlash' involving supporters not 'unexpected'

Did George Floyd kill himself?

George Floyd died of a drug overdose

Prosecutors knew that by June 1.

The prosecution of Derek Chauvin for a murder that didn't happen, for the fake murder of George Floyd, has not been dropped even now.

Why not?

I [John Hinderacker] can answer the last question. 

If charges against Derek Chauvin and the other officers were dropped, rioting would break out not just in Minneapolis, but across the country. 

Broad swaths of the City of Minneapolis have already been burned to the ground, and that is probably nothing compared to what Black Lives Matter would do if the criminal justice system followed normal procedures. 

Derek Chauvin, at this point, is a man without a country, a man who probably cannot receive a fair trial anywhere in the United States. 

Certainly not in Hennepin County, where he has been charged.

Derek Chauvin, former officer accused in George Floyd's death, wants murder charges dismissed

Floyd's killing, captured on video, sparked worldwide protests against systemic racism and police brutality.

Defense attorneys sought to put the blame on Floyd for his death, arguing that his alleged drug use was the critical factor.  

"Put simply, Mr. Floyd could not breathe because he had ingested a lethal dose of fentanyl and, possibly, a speedball," Chauvin's attorney said in the court documents. 

"Combined with sickle cell trait, his pre-existing heart conditions, Mr. Floyd’s use of fentanyl and methamphetamine most likely killed him."

They argued that without knowledge of Floyd's alleged drug use or symptoms of overdose, Chauvin "was unaware of the potential dangerous of using MRT (Maximal Restraint Technique)," a reference to the officer's knee on the victim's neck.

"Instead, he (Chauvin) relied on his training and the information available to him to try and assist his fellow officers and to prevent Mr. Floyd from harming himself," the defense attorneys argued. 

"Derek Chauvin did not cause George Floyd’s death." 

Some of the "good people" on the left extreme

Protesters in Name Only

Another story about the mob that harassed Rand Paul and his wife.

But about different people attacked by them.

Interesting how many photos show the rioters to be overwhelmingly white.

Fox goes on offense for Rittenhouse

Accused Kenosha shooter's lawyer claims self-defense amid new video

A 17-year-old charged in two shooting deaths amid a chaotic demonstration in Kenosha, Wis., earlier this week feared for his life after being attacked by rioters who chased and beat him, his attorney said Friday.

In a lengthy statement, the lawyer for Kyle Rittenhouse, John Pierce, said prosecutors rushed to judgment in charging his client to appease "divisive" and "destructive" forces without analyzing Tuesday's events.

"This was not a serious investigation," Pierce said. 

"Rather, after learning Kyle may have had conservative political viewpoints, they immediately saw him as a convenient target who they could use as a scapegoat to distract from the Jacob Blake shooting and the government’s abject failure to ensure basic law and order to citizens."

Just to clarify

Kneeling on the neck of an habitual criminal for seven or eight minutes until he dies is murder.

Shooting a fleeing habitual criminal to death as he flees when much less force would have worked is murder, even if some cop manual permits or even recommends it.

But I am not on board for the absurd mythology of overwhelming and overwhelmingly powerful racism, systemic or otherwise, exploited and spread every election season by the depraved propaganda of Democrats without concern for its destructive consequences.

And I am even further from on board with condoning or tolerating riots for three f-ing months.

Update 8/30.

George Floyd wasn't killed by Dereck Chauvin. He od'd on recreational drugs. The kneeling had nothing to do with it and was apparently by the book.

Jacob Blake's shooting might have been by the book. Seems he was a fleeing felon resisting arrest and had or was reaching for a weapon.

Where is Biden? Where are the Democrats?

This Is How Biden Loses

Increasing numbers of Americans are seeing Democrats as complicit in or at best tolerant and indulgent toward the mad rioters who are trashing so many cities.

This article and the alarm of so many Democrats are so many confessions.

George Packer at The Atlantic joins Don Lemon and others calling for Biden and Democrats to hammer away at the riots and rioters.

Every day of silence makes credible the Duce's charges Biden is weak, putty in the hands of radicals and a party taken over by revolutionaries and America haters, a Trojan horse for friends of antifa, the worst of the BLM crazies, and the Red Guards and Culture Warriors smashing and burning American cities.

Every day the Republicans turn up the volume on exactly these accusations and attacks.

But it may already be too late for the late conversion at the top Packer is calling for.

And too little.

The whole party is stained.

In the crude terms of a presidential campaign, voters know that the Democrat means it when he denounces police brutality, but less so when he denounces riots. 

To reach the public and convince it otherwise, Biden has to go beyond boilerplate and make it personal, memorable.

Harris, a Black former prosecutor and now an advocate for police reform, seems uniquely positioned to speak to the crisis. 

But she has said little all week, which suggests that there might be things she doesn’t want to say. 

On Thursday, Harris directly addressed the events in Kenosha, affirming that Americans “must always defend peaceful protest and peaceful protesters. We should not confuse them with those looting and committing acts of violence.” 

She quickly moved on. 

Democratic leaders, from the nearly invisible mayor of Kenosha up to those on the presidential ticket, are reluctant to tarnish a just cause, amplify Republican attacks, or draw the wrath of their own progressive base (Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut deleted a tweet saying that both the Blake shooting and the riots were wrong after commenters accused him of equating the two). 

So Democrats continue to mute their response to the violence and hope it will subside, even though it has persisted straight through the summer.

. . . .

On Tuesday night, the CNN host Don Lemon warned his colleague Chris Cuomo that riots were hurting Biden and the Democrats: “Chris, as you know and I know, it’s showing up in the polls, it’s showing up in focus groups. It’s the only thing right now that’s sticking.” 

Lemon urged Biden to speak out about both police reform and violence. 

With Kenosha and the political conventions, the coverage seems to be changing. On Thursday, the Times ran a piece headlined “How Chaos in Kenosha Is Already Swaying Some Voters in Wisconsin.” 

Half a dozen Kenosha residents, reckoning with damaged buildings and businesses, expressed displeasure with the uncertain response of Democratic officials. 

Ellen Ferwerda, an antique store owner, “said that she was desperate for Trump to lose in November but that she had ‘huge concern’ the unrest in her town could help him win. She added that local Democratic leaders seemed hesitant to condemn the mayhem.”

Jason Whitlock on the current craziness

BLM 101: career politicians who created systemic unfairness are playing LeBron and his disciples for suckers

Read it yourself.

A bit more on the McCloskeys

Protesters are clearing a path for Trump

If there is a couple who have come to epitomize this fork in reality it is Mark and Patricia McCloskey. 

They are the couple from St Louis who made headlines in June when a BLM protest broke on to private property. 

Fearing for their lives, and their notably elegant home, the McCloskeys came out on to their terrace with their guns and stayed there until the protesters left. 

This week they made a five-minute appearance at the Republican convention.

. . . .

They are two law-abiding home-owners. 

A protest broke on to private property and they asserted their right as American citizens to defend their home. 

No shots were fired, yet thanks to the activist local circuit attorney Kim Gardner, the McCloskeys are now charged with ‘unlawful use of a weapon’, which is a felony. 

None of the people who broke on to the property have suffered any harm.

. . . .

But you know, a couple of months ago Mrs McCloskey was sitting in the home she and her husband had worked their lives to create. 

The mob started by shouting: ‘Racist!’ 

Audio of the event shows that at least one member of the crowd shouted: ‘We gonna kill you, bitch.’ Soon a man in the mob was screaming: ‘I’mma rape you, bitch.’

‘You can’t stop the revolution,’ the group’s Marxist ring-leader bellowed at the couple through a bullhorn as the mob milled. 

That ring-leader has since been given the Democratic nomination to enter the US House of Representatives as congresswoman for the area. 

Harris on Trump: His plan to kill the payroll tax will kill Social Security in less than two years, and his Justice Department is in court right now trying to kill every bit of Obamacare, including the only protection for people with preexisting conditions

On the wrong side of the Blake affair and the Floyd/BLM riots.

But right on the rest.

Trump plan to scrap payroll tax would reduce benefits by 2021, top Social Security actuary says

A different view of the Blake shooting

Brandon Tatum: Jacob Blake Police Shooting Was Justified

Blake was a criminal who was committing crimes, was told to stop, was told he was under arrest, and before trying to flee in his car he had fought with police and been arrested for that.

He and the cops had been rolling on the ground fighting on the other side of the car when he got up and starts walking around the car as we see him doing in the famous video.

There was a warrant outstanding on him, anyway.

He has quite a criminal history.

Now we know why they didn't want to just let him drive away.

We also know why that cop looks so angry.

So, does this make it OK to shoot him seven times in the back?

Is that the law?

Tatum is police and he says yes, at that point under those circumstances the police didn't have to wait to see what he was reaching for, if anything, in that car.

It is interesting none of the major media are reporting all this about who Blake is.

This is Brandon Tatum.

A firm Trumpist Republican.

91 days of "lawful protest" and riots in Portland

Do they expect us to think local officials have no legal right to call a halt to their city being trashed after three months of people "exercising their constitutional rights"?

Pence, GOP overshoot the mark, shoot selves in foot.

NPR plays a clip of Pence last night telling America the riots everywhere must stop, Americans must stop hurting and killing Americans, Biden is complicit with the rioters and will not make Americans safe, but he and Trump will not tolerate rioting and violence and destruction, Trump will put an end to it and make Americans safe!

Vote for Trump and he'll put a stop to it!

NPR interviewer to GOP spokesperson:

Really? Why wait? 

Trump is in the White House now and has been for nearly four years, over all the time the rioting has been happening. 

It's all happening on his watch. Why wait?

GOP talking points urge Joe B was silent on rioting from the outset until just the other night, demanding why he didn't once condemn it all that time.

They are very boldly hanging the riots on the Democrats and Biden in particular.

Blake's lawyer on CNN just minutes ago was angrily complaining Rittenhouse wasn't shot by Illinois police when they arrested him.

My guess he didn't resist arrest.

He's on video trying to surrender to police that night in Kenosha.

Democratic media are absolutely lambasting this kid.

You would think he'd gone into a black church and sprayed the worshippers with gunfire, killing dozens.

Nobody is telling the audience what actually happened, how the shootings occurred.

Not once.