Dems disavow Antifa: Collective blame works!

After an unusually stark display of collective violence against Trump supporters and even neutral journalists in Berkeley on Sunday, Antifa soon found themselves out of favor among their Establishment enablers.

First came a euphemism-free headline to an in-depth article from the Deep State's own newsletter, the Washington Post: "Black-clad antifa members attack peaceful right-wing demonstrators in Berkeley".

Then on Tuesday no less a liberal Establishment mainstay than Nancy Pelosi herself issued a rebuke that also called them out by name:

Our democracy has no room for inciting violence or endangering the public, no matter the ideology of those who commit such acts.  The violent actions of people calling themselves antifa in Berkeley this weekend deserve unequivocal condemnation, and the perpetrators should be arrested and prosecuted.

Other liberals and Democrats have begun to follow suit, including the Mayor of Berkeley who had been content to let them rampage all they wanted to, and is now saying they should be treated instead as a gang.

At last the efforts by the Trump movement to cast collective blame on the other side are starting to pay off, something I've been writing about for months. We don't isolate the problem down to the narrowest groups and individuals who are committing violence on the Left -- we just say "the violent Left," and then everyone who isn't a violent Leftist has to disavow the Antifa types, or get successfully branded as a sympathizer of Leftist group violence against first amendment exercisers.

The individualist focus and overly developed sense of fair play had led the conservative movement and Republican mainstream to only decry the extremist members of the other side. But now that we are locked in group vs. group struggle, the only option is to blame the entire other side, and let them clear their own good names by disavowing and shutting down the extremists on their side.

As I wrote in an earlier post, collective blame prevents the rise of an extremist minority, by causing the mainstream of the other side to impose costs on their side's super-intolerant minority.

After Charlottesville, I floated the plan that Trump should invite a high-profile Democrat to a joint press event, where each side would disavow and call for an end to violence in general, but would specifically call out the extremists on their own side. If the Democrats refused, it would prove they are enabling Leftist collective violence. If they agreed, it would shut down their attempt to frame only the Right as a source of collective violence (both sides, many sides, etc.).

Now that Pelosi has come forward, she would make a natural choice for Trump's partner in that press event. It's hard to tell in such polarized partisan times, but it just might humanize each one -- at least a little bit -- to the supporters of the other. Each one would enjoy a little brand rehabilitation.

The sudden souring on Antifa by elite Democrats means that the Establishment is beginning to tire of using these useful idiots as a covert arm of the police state to attack political enemies of the Establishment. That's why elite Republicans don't denounce Antifa -- they too hate Trump supporters, and are fine with deranged Leftists being used to punish Trump supporters for holding the wrong values and making the wrong decisions.

I picked up on this dynamic back in April, around the time I read more and more so-called revolutionary Leftists cheering on regime change in Syria (and later, Venezuela). I'm convinced that after decades of infiltration by federal agencies, groups like Antifa and the International Socialist Organization are effectively being run for Deep State goals.

In recent comments, I summarized the evidence showing that Antifa is not some far-Left version of the Bernie movement. The actual progressives, socialists, etc., who formed the hardcore of the Bernie movement spend as much time, and often more, attacking the centrists and corporate Democrats on their own side, in the same way that the hardcore Trump movement trains most of its fire on the Paul Ryan and John McCain types on its own side.

Yet Antifa never beats up Hillary Clinton supporters, or formed a gauntlet outside of an Obama rally. They didn't even bother trying to shut down the Democrats' National Convention last summer, unlike the crowds of angry Bernie people both inside and outside the venue.

With so much impossible-to-spin negative coverage last weekend, Antifa may have worn out their usefulness to the Deep State as a counter-revolutionary paramilitary group meant to stop the populist-nationalist uprising. No different from the failed jihadist militias in southern Syria, who were serving as proxy armies for the CIA until Trump stopped it. But by that time, they had worn out their usefulness anyway, so the CIA did not bother fighting the decision.

But unlike the jihadists in Syria, who have little means to strike back at the CIA that has abruptly abandoned them, the psychotic freaks who make up the Antifa foot soldier ranks may start to wake up to the fact that they were just being manipulated by the Establishment and police state. Maybe they'll resent getting disavowed by the Mayor of Berkeley and by one of the most liberal Democrats in Congress, who hails from the Bay Area.

However, it's unclear how well these guys can organize themselves without the backing, financial and otherwise, of high-placed Democrat operatives like those who were exposed by Project Veritas' undercover videos last year. So while particular Antifa freaks may lash out violently at a Democrat, I doubt we'll see mass riots where hundreds or thousands are present, since their Soros checks may be drying up, and their political and media enablers are cutting them off as well.