Gregory Hood, American Renaissance, April 12, 2019

Democrats want a “counter-insurgency” against white advocacy. Republicans want to prove they aren’t racist. White nationalists are a serious threat to this country — and they mustn’t be allowed to speak for themselves.

These were the messages from this week’s chilling hearings on “white nationalism” in the House of Representatives. The propaganda was crude, and the statistics from the ADL were embarrassingly deceitful.

Corporate media made statements more outrageous than those from Democrats. “How pro-Trump Republicans became white nationalist apologists — and Hitler revisionists,” said Haaretz on Twitter, promoting an article accusing the GOP of “worshiping” fascism. Newsweek gave birth to this fantastic headline: “Donald Trump Jr. praises Candace Owens [of Turning Point USA] for her defense of Hitler comments.”

Congressman Tom McClintock was alone in making a principled defense of the First Amendment. He condemned the effort “to set up government or corporate officials to decide what speech is acceptable and what is not.” Otherwise, congressmen, tech executives, and most witnesses took it for granted that big business and the government must restrict speech, allegedly to prevent violence. Congressmen David Cicilline, Joe Neguse, Jamie Raskin, and Congresswoman Karen Bass all cited the Anti-Defamation League’s phony statistics to justify censorship. Not one Republican disputed them.

Others cited a dubious “rise in hate crimes.” Candace Owens was the only witness to point out this is a fluke of changed data-gathering. Elizabeth Nolan Brown at Reason has made the same case.

The hearings were not about “data” or history. They were about blame. Several witnesses and congressmen said the president was partially responsible for the rise of white nationalism because he won’t condemn it. Yet one of the witnesses read out loud Donald Trump’s uncompromising condemnation of neo-Nazism: He said “they should be condemned totally.” The Democrats ignored it.

Eva Paterson of the Equal Justice Society was among those who repeated the lie that the president will not condemn white nationalism. She also said he called Mexicans rapists, which is not true. She claimed Donald Trump had “recently called asylum seekers animals.” She was referring to a viral tweet that made this claim. The president was talking about MS-13, not asylum seekers.

Miss Paterson also called for a “joint law enforcement-civilian task force” and “an organized counter-insurgency strategy” against white nationalism. Her claim that there are no “lone wolves” and that there is instead “an organized white nationalist group around the world that is being connected” is like Cold War talk about a “monolithic Communist conspiracy.”

The sole definition of “white nationalism” came from Eileen Hershenov, who called it “one of the many euphemisms for white supremacy.” The “core ideology” is “fear of the imminent genocide of the white race,” supposedly because of mass immigration and orchestrated by Jews. Miss Hershenov obviously intended to suggest that any opposition to mass immigration is “white nationalist” and “white supremacist.” Still, it’s interesting that even according to a hostile source, “white nationalism” isn’t about ruling or hurting other people, but resisting dispossession.

The focus on emotion rather than data was typified by including as a witness Dr. Muhammad Abu-Salha, the father of two Muslim women killed by a white man, Craig Hicks. Dr. Abu-Salha’s loss was terrible; several women representatives began crying when they questioned him.

However, it’s unknown whether Mr. Hicks acted on race or religion at all. He was reportedly infuriated by a long-standing parking dispute. The ADL did not even mention the case in its 2015 “Murder and Extremism Report.”

If brutal murders that cross racial lines are reason for congressional hearings, whites have been on the receiving end for decades. Anti-white statements from journalists, academics, and politicians as well as insulting portrayals in the media certainly contributed to some of these killings. The murderer of Brittney Watts said he did it to “spread the message of making white people mend,” and is just one of countless examples. Yet there will be no hearings on anti-white messages in the media or universities, nor about open incitement to violence against whites on the internet . No Democrat congresswomen will cry for the cameras over the victims. Instead, to cite black columnist Leonard Pitts’s response to the “Knoxville Horror” murders, all we get is “cry me a river.”

Testimony over the FBI’s investigation of “black identity extremism” also reflects a double standard. This term was in a leaked FBI report to describe black groups that appear to be targeting police. Witness Kristen Clarke argued the movement is “not a real threat.” “It harkens back to the dark days of our federal government abusing its power to go after civil rights activists during the heyday of the civil rights movement,” she said. This is ironic, coming from someone who, along with many others, called for censorship, surveillance, and repression against dissidents.

Representative Karen Bass, without naming him, alluded to Rakem Balogun (legal name Christopher Daniels), a supposed “black identity extremist” and political organizer who was arrested by the police on gun charges. Despite (or perhaps because of) extreme Facebook comments, such as mocking murdered police officers, Mr. Balogun has gotten largely positive press. There are sympathetic portrayals in The Guardian, New York Magazine, and Vice, among others. Mr. Balogun may indeed have been targeted for his political views. However, many of those defending him are urging even more harsh treatment for white advocates. Vice wrote a story cheering when Facebook and other social media companies banned Faith Goldy, but Facebook still has a support page for Mr. Balogun.

Miss Goldy was specifically condemned by several congressmen. David Cicilline complained Facebook did not act quickly enough to remove her and demanded details on “proactive steps” the company could use to “identify leaders like Faith Goldy and preemptively remove them.” In response, Neil Potts of Facebook assured Congress that “there’ll be no praise, support or representation of her on our platform going forward.” She is to be a non-person, apparently. Congresswoman Madeleine Dean also complained about Faith Goldy and expressed her “disappointment” that Facebook was so slow to act.

Congressman Hank Johnson, who supported a black ethnostate in college, said “many white nationalists have used misinformation propaganda to radicalize social media users. . . . How is YouTube working to stop the spread of far-right conspiracies intent on skewing users’ conception of fact and fiction?” Alexandria Walen of Google/YouTube replied that for content “on the borderline,” certain features are removed and it can’t be recommended to users (this frequently happens to AmRen videos). Thus, the world’s dominant media corporation admits it is deliberately suppressing certain political messages. Hank Johnson even complained that there is no way to prevent people someone from using the messaging service “WhatApp” to spread “hate speech.”

With the notable exception of Congressman McClintock, the Republicans at the hearing were cowards. They repeatedly tried to change the subject and complain about Democrat Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s alleged anti-Semitism. Otherwise, they joined in the hysteria over “white nationalism.”

Republican Congressman Don Collins thanked the chairman “for the opportunity for us to once again condemn white nationalism” and cited his party’s sanctions against Congressman Steve King. “American values share nothing ideologically with white nationalism,” he added. Eva Paterson of the Equal Justice Society refuted this in her opening statement, when she claimed the “Founding Fathers knowingly and consciously embraced slavery and white supremacy,” though she did not address Congressman Collins directly.

Republican Congressman Guy Reschenthaler boasted that the first time he ever spoke on the floor of the House was “to condemn white nationalism and white supremacy,” something of which he was “very proud.” He also bragged that the Republican Party stripped Steve King of all committee seats. Democrat Val Demings replied that “it took them [Republicans] over a decade to take any action against one of their own who had a reputation of making disparaging remarks.”

During the height of the McCarthy era, Communists could speak for themselves before Congress. “White nationalists” had no voice. Black conservative Candace Owens, who repeatedly accused the Democrats of exploiting blacks, was the closest thing whites got. Based on phony statistics, half-truths, and outright lies, elected officials in a supposedly free country openly demanded the use of corporate power to censor ideas.

This was a show trial against the entire concept of white identity. If such a hearing were held in Russia or China, Americans would call it a farce to justify persecuting an unwanted group. This is what we face today in our own country. This was a day of shame — not for white advocates, but for Congress and for America.