Call them Nazis

 

Do you find the above photo confusing? You should know that the letters "NSC" stand for "National Socialist Club."

 

Joe Biden said that the invaders of the Capitol were not protesters but rioters. I don't think that his terminology is strong enough. From the start, I've called them fascists. We've now identified a number of unabashed Nazi sympathizers within the mob.

Members of far-right groups, including the Proud Boys, joined the crowds that formed in Washington to cheer on President Trump as he urged them to protest Congress’s counting of Electoral College votes confirming President-elect Joe Biden’s win.

Then they headed to the Capitol. Members of smaller white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups also were spotted in the crowds. Police were photographed stopping a man identified as a leading promoter of the QAnon conspiracy theory from storming the Senate floor.

The QAnon conspiracy theory is an updated version of the Protocols hoax, as explained at length in this earlier post. Thus, the phrase "Save the Children" should be interpreted as an anti-Semitic slogan, since the Q qooks believe that George Soros is the head of the conspiracy to rape and kill children. 

 

Other Nazis in the Capitol Building have been identified.  

Tim Gionet, known as "Baked Alaska", is a white nationalist activist who was part of the group that entered offices in the Capitol.

A well-known online personality from Alaska, he livestreamed himself from inside an office and talked to others about what they were doing in the Capitol.

During the livestream, watched by 16,000 people on blockchain service DLive, he said he might sleep inside the office and use the landline to call Donald Trump.

He is known for holding neo-Nazi and white supremacist views, supporting Mr Trump and promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories online.

Yeah, but Antifa made him do it.

A man standing by the Capitol steps wearing a hoodie branded with "Camp Auschwitz: Work brings freedom" on the front, and "staff" on the back was trending on Twitter the following day as people condemned him.

He was then seen inside the Capitol building.

Oren Segal, vice president of the Anti-Defamation League's Centre on Extremism, said he saw members of several white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups among the pro-Trump crowds in Washington.

The New Jersey European Heritage Association and Nationalist Social Club members were among them, he said.

Also see here.

Members of far-right groups, including the violent Proud Boys, joined the crowds in Washington DC, and members of white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups were also were spotted in the crowds.

At least four people died and several others were seriously injured during the violent siege.

As violence erupted between pro-Trump rioters and cops, online forums lit up with gleeful posts from neo-Nazis and white supremacists in response to the chaotic scenes.

The posts called for "more violence" and hailed the takeover of the Capitol, according to reports.

In a post on social media site Gab, a neo-Nazi called for "more violence".

"Escalations are a good thing. More violence is a good thing. The peaceful process has failed," the post said.

One of the invaders wore a t-shirt emblazoned with the cryptic message "6MWE." This means "Six Million Weren't Enough." 

 

Any Jew who supports the Trump movement is incomprehensible to me.

 

These Nazis were the exact same people addressed by Trump and Giuliani before the attack on the Capitol. They were the people to whom Trump addressed the words "We love you."  

For a good guide to the Nazi symbology on display in our Capitol Building, see here. 

Nooses played a big role in the "festivities" of January 6. In the influential neo-Nazi book The Turner Diaries, the fascist takeover is called "The Day of the Rope." 

 

In the above image, we see the "Don't Tread On Me" flag -- called the Gadsden Flag -- which is favored by followers of economist Hans-Herman Hoppe, a staunch opponent of democracy and a hero to neo-Nazis in both Germany and America. The Gadsden is also revered by the neo-Nazi Boogaloo Bois.  

 

We also see a Proud Boy flashing the White Power hand sign. He was hardly the only one of Trump's thugs photographed making the same sign. Trump's best friend Roger Stone has often used the White Power symbol -- and has done so while in the company of the Proud Boys. Before the insurrection, a Proud Boy leader visited the White House and reportedly met with Donald Trump.

The Proud Boys played a leading role in Trump's attempt to overthrow the government. Although reports conflict, some news accounts say that this group was recently taken over by a thug named Kyle Chapman.  

“We will confront the Zionist criminals who wish to destroy our civilization,” Chapman wrote after using other bigoted language. “We recognize that the West was built by the White Race alone and we owe nothing to any other race.”

From the Jewish News:

On 4chan, an alternative social media network, a photo of a police officer in the Capitol building was met with the comment “KILL ALL [N-word] AND COPS AND JEWS”, in further evidence of how the incident triggered a wave of online racism.

Elsewhere, an Israeli journalist from Channel 13 was subject to antisemitic abuse from a pro-Trump supporter whilst reporting outside Capitol Hill on Wednesday, as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) reacted to the “absolutely despicable” scenes.

“A rioter was harassing an Israeli reporter with vicious, grotesque antisemitism,” the ADL tweeted. 

We all saw the Confederate battle flag being carried through the Capitol. I would argue that the Confederacy represented the first fascist dictatorship. 

From the NYT: 

As the authorities try to identify those in the mob, some will be less hard to pin down than others. The group included some well-known figures from the conspiratorial right, including Jake Angeli, who has pushed the false QAnon claims that Mr. Trump was elected to save America from deep-state bureaucrats and prominent Democrats who worship Satan and abuse children. He was pictured sitting in Congress in a viking helmet and furs. Mr. Angeli, who is known as the “Q Shaman,” has been a fixture in the pro-Trump protests in Arizona since the election, and there are indications that he and other right-wing activists had planned to spark a confrontation with authorities ahead of Wednesday’s rally.

There were also leaders from the Proud Boys, a far-right group whose participants have espoused misogynistic and anti-immigrant views, such as Nick Ochs, a failed Hawaii state legislature candidate and member of a collective called “Murder the Media.” Chris Hood and members of his National Socialist Club, a neo-Nazi group, posted photos on Telegram from outside the Capitol on Wednesday. And the Three Percenters, a far-right armed group, were seen gathered in Washington’s Freedom Plaza on Tuesday night, most wearing helmets and Kevlar vest adorned with the group’s symbol, a Roman numeral three.

A hellish digression. Let's speak further about the slogan "Work brings freedom," as seen on a Trump supporter's idea of haute couture: Most of you know that this is a translation of phrase Arbeit macht frei, which appeared over the front gate to the first Auschwitz camp. 

 

(I probably should not admit this, but I will. Decades ago, I used to tell people that my brother was the world's toughest Burger King manager: "He put the words 'Arbeit macht fries' over the entrance to the kitchen.") 

 

On his show last night, Lawrence O'Donnell said that every Jew saw those words as they entered Auschwitz. That's not correct: The sign was over the entrance to the first Auschwitz camp. The majority of victims died in the much larger second camp, Auschwitz Birkenau. They entered via train, and I do not believe that this entrance ever displayed the words "Arbeit macht frei." If you Google "Auschwitz," you will see many photos of both entrances.

 

I suggest a visit to Auschwitz (a.k.a. Oswiecim) via Google Earth, which is probably the best way to grasp the sheer horrifying scale of Auschwitz Birkenau. The Gate House (the entrance) and a small part of the train tracks still exist. 

 

A few years ago, Google Street View would not take you near Auschwitz Birkenau, but now you can get closer. The Gate House is just barely visible in the background of the photo embedded above. Yes, suburbia is creeping toward the most evil place on earth. I believe that the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign still hangs over Auschwitz I, although I could not find it on Google Earth.