Back in the 1950's and 1960's, there were two Civil Rights eras.
There are many different epoch's along the path that brought us here. Different people argue about which ones were most important, about which ones "started it", about which moments of history should be focused upon. I am choosing to focus here for several reasons, many of which should become apparent by the end of this post if they were not already.
In the 1950's, Republicans tore down "Jim Crow", series of laws that Democrats had enacted in local areas with the purpose of using the government to keep blacks down. In the 1960's, the Democrats succeeded in beating the Republicans with promises (which were fulfilled) of using the government to advance blacks over whites. At that time, a group of angry Democrats who had thought that the 1950's was about racism joined the Republicans, and they and their descendants are there to this day.
There are a couple of takeaways here. One is that when the Republicans retort that racism against blacks was a Democrat behavior, they are correct; when the Democrats retort that a bunch of those old racists are Republicans, they are also correct.
The big takeaway is that Civil Rights, for the Democrat Party, was never actually about racism. They didn't care if they were elevating or trampling blacks. What mattered was a particular core strategy: Get the populace to accept big government by making them enemies of each other and promising each group that you will use the government to trample their enemies.
Fast-forward to 2008 and Obama's election. He basically campaigned, more or less openly, on this strategy. He was elected by people who believed that he would use the power of the government, all the power they could give him, in order to bludgeon their enemies. They did not, as our founders did, fear the government more than they feared the people with whom they merely disagreed. Under the Obama Administration, we saw the IRS scandal among other incidents. I think the IRS scandal struck the hardest impact, because it showed us that Obama's government was willing to go after ordinary folk for disagreeing with him. Many praised his election as an achievement of the Civil Rights movement in that "people were willing to elect a black man as our President". It was an achievement of the Civil Rights movement in that people were willing to elect a man on promises that he would use government power against their 'enemies'; their fellow citizens.
I did not cast my vote for Trump and did not speak in support of him during the election period. Too many people believe that I agreed with them that he is misogynist, or stupid, or somehow unqualified to be President. Too many other people believed that I was against him because I preferred "the status quo in Washington", because I hated whites, because I wanted to be marginalized as Obama had marginalized me. When he made his "bitter clingers" quote, after all, he was talking about me. When Hillary made her "deplorables" quote, she was talking about me.
This is the real reason I did not cast my vote for Trump.
I saw among his followers too many people who were looking to him to use the government as a bludgeon against the people who had declared this 'war'.
Angry people on one side elected Obama in hopes that he would use the government as a bludgeon against their enemies. Angry people on the other side elected Trump in hopes that he would use the government as a bludgeon against the people who had declared them to be enemies. (Let me offer credit where credit is due. At least to this point, from what I have seen, President Trump has not in fact used his office, as many followers had hoped, to bludgeon the other side, but has contented himself with tearing down regulations and releasing trapped power back into the wild.)
Now I want to go back to the first takeaway that I referenced about the Civil Rights movements. I have come to believe that the people on Trump's side against whom I have set myself are actually the people and their descendants who left the Democrat Party, not because the Democrats were using the government as a bludgeon, but because they were bludgeoning the "wrong" people.
So in this Charlottesville matter, I find myself set against the white supremacists who are anti-Constitution, who march because they want Trump to use the government as a bludgeon against their enemies. I find myself also set against the "antifa" groups who are anti-Constitution, who counter-march because they want the government to be used as a bludgeon against their enemies. Both sides engaged in violence. Both sides insist that we consider their side blameless. Both sides are very eager to assume that I am on the other side if I refuse.
I don't want either of them.
Am I a Conservative Republican? Am I a Conservative Christian? Am I a Christian Libertarian? Am I a Conservative Libertarian? Am I a Conservative Christian Libertarian Republican? I haven't figured that part out yet.
I'm the one who joins with those who don't hate "the other side" more than we fear government control over us.
I'm the one who doesn't want anybody, even myself, to have the power to use the government to bludgeon another group of fellow citizens.
No matter how much I don't like what they have to say.
