Trump claims them, all of them. i remember one instance when they became "very fine people" who just happened to be marching with torches at night and chanting that they "would not be replaces by Jews" (I think). Trump always finds a way to send the signal that these are his people.

This, as far as I am concerned, also means that everybody that supports Trump are just more folks supporting Racism.

Whenever I meet one I always try and ask some questions because I really want to know. It usually goes something like; "I understand that you are angry with those people because their skin color is different. My problem is that I don't understand why". That usually engenders stuff like; "You don't understand" (that one is right), "You will never understand" (I guess), or they want to fight me (I flee). It still doesn't make any sense to me!

It all comes down to tribalism: "People who don't look like me should die. And our chief should get the hottest women and be the richest among us."

Each of those racist and fascist rightwing ex-cops sounds pretty disturbed enough to participate in a race war.

The U.S. Military Has a Boogaloo Problem



Why do Rightwingers hate America?

Far-right groups like the “Boogaloo” and “O9A” continue to attract troops and veterans

It is always sad and deeply worrying to be reminded just how deplorable a huge portion of the American population is.

These days, we get stark reminders multiple times a day.

Was it better when these horrid humans remained hidden in plain sight? Or is it better that they identify themselves to the entire world as the murderous, bigoted, devils* that they are?



*They are all, of course, “good, god-fearing, Real American, Christians” in their own eyes.

Donald Trump has given these losers in life permission to crawl out from under their rocks. Better to know who they are and deal with each one of them accordingly.

If you reduce this to 'gangs' it gets pretty interesting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_presence_in_the_United_States_military

It didn't take much enticing after LBJ signed the Equal Rights Act of 1964. They automatically became republicans.

That sounds nice, but I think it's wrong. I don't know about other states, but most folks who were Democrats in the 1960's here in Georgia remained Democrats into old age and death. Presidential wise Georgia only went Republican in 1972 when Nixon won 49 states, in 1984 when Reagan won 49 states, then in 1996 to present. 1972 and 1984, Georgia went the same as the rest of the country with the Republican winning 49 states. So there's no difference there.

The most telling that most Democrats remained Democratic was Georgia didn't elect our first ever Republican Governor until 2002 along with our first ever republican state legislature. Georgia had elected only 4 Republican House of Representatives member from our inception until 1994. Newt Gingrich was the lone Republican congressman in 1994, all the rest were Democrats. As late as 2004, we still had two Democratic senators Max Cleland and Zell Miller.

The thing here, at least Georgia is the state remained loyal to the Democratic Party. I look on 2002 as the turning point when Republicans took over Georgia, although one could go back to 1996 the year we voted for Dole as president and our congressional delegation went from majority Democrat, 9 D's to 1 R to majority Republican 7 R's to 3 D's.

My point is at least in Georgia, those who were Democrats in the 1960's remained Democrats. There was no mass migration from Democratic to Republican in either the 1960's or the 1970's. The best possible reason for Georgia switching from Democratic to Republican in either 1996 or 2002 was the addition of new, younger voters to the rolls and the influx of folks who fled the north for the south.

For most of my life here, the winner of our elections was decided in the Democratic primary, not in the general election. The general election was just for show. That began to change in 1996 and finally the general election meant something real by 2002.