This past week thirteen people have been killed in acts of terrorism by white nationalists.

Eleven people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh:

Joyce Fienberg, 75
Richard Gottfried, 65
Rose Mallinger, 97
Jerry Rabinowitz, 66
Cecil Rosenthal, 59
David Rosenthal, 54
Bernice Simon, 84
Sylvan Simon, 86,
Daniel Stein, 71
Melvin Wax, 88
Irving Younger, 69

Two people in the grocery store shooting in Louisville, Kentucky:

Maurice Stallard, 69
Vickie Jones, 67

That’s this week. White nationalists have murdered others this year:

Robert Miller, 40 of Murfreesboro, TN
Blaze Bernstein, 19 of Orange County, CA
MeShon Cooper, 43 of Kansas City, MO

As well as the victims of the Parkland, Florida school shooting:

Alyssa Alhadeff, 14
Scott Beigel, 35
Martin Duque, 14
Nicholas Dworet, 17
Aaron Feis, 37
Jaime Guttenberg, 14
Chris Hixon, 49
Luke Hoyer, 15
Cara Loughran, 14
Gina Montalto, 14
Joaquin Oliver, 17
Alaina Petty, 14
Meadow Pollack, 18
Helena Ramsay, 17
Alex Schachter, 14
Carmen Schentrup, 16
Peter Wang, 15

The murderers names will not be listed here, but every one of them has been identified as a white nationalist or white supremacist. Some belonged to white nationalist militias. Some carried white nationalist iconography. Some explicitly stated their white nationalist views in confessions. These murderers are tied together by their ideology and their influences. They watch the same news programs. They listen to the same radio hosts. They visit the same websites. This is no different from a Muslim perpetrator of violence who is tied to terrorism because he has visited Al Qaeda websites or viewed propaganda from Muqtada al-Sadr. We treat it differently because it’s Tucker Carlson and Michael Savage. We treat it differently because we still don’t take reddit and 4chan and Twitter and Facebook seriously as rallying places for genuine real-world terrorists. We treat it differently because these killers are white.

White nationalist violence has increased dramatically since the inauguration of our current president. Statistics show a twofold increase in white nationalist violence in 2017. This same week the president proudly proclaimed himself a “nationalist,” a favorite brand of identification for the modern Neo-Nazi.

These murders will continue as long as we, as a society, are willing to allow them. White nationalists love to talk about the “marketplace of ideas,” and we have granted them legitimacy within it. Ethnic cleansing is now routinely discussed on talk shows and in university panels with the same level of detachment as tax policy or welfare reform. Freedom of Speech does not mean treating all ideas equally, nor all ideas as legitimate. We know this. Need proof? When was the last time a representative of Nambla was invited on television to defend the merits of pedophilia? But we grant advocates of Nazi-style white nationalism that freedom regularly.

As long as Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham and InfoWars are shaping this discourse this will continue. As long as liberals defend Steve Bannon’s right to the spotlight, he will continue to encourage the terrorists in his audience. As long as Twitter and YouTube and Facebook embrace content by and for white nationalists, they will have a recruiting ground. Everyone of their advertisers is paying to serve white supremacist propaganda to eager incipient white supremacists. You have a voice in that as a voter and as a consumer. Will you use it?

I’ve talked about poverty from time to time since I grew up on public benefits. But you should be reading Linda Tirado if you want to understand poverty in the United States. It’s been a while since I’ve been truly poor because welfare, food stamps, Pell grants, etc. put me in a position to be financially independent.

Instead, I want to say a little bit about wealth and what it is and what it means. My spouse and I both work full time. We drive used cars. We have 401(k)s and a mortgage. Our house is in the suburbs. We have a two-car garage and our kids have their own rooms. We have broadband internet, basic cable, and Netflix. We have satellite radio. We haven’t been able to take an out-of-town vacation since we had kids, but we’ve been to Europe and around the United States.

We’re pretty much the picture of middle class American life, right? Consider this:

There is a family wedding coming up, so we’re having some guests next week. Since we have jobs and kids, we hired a woman who has worked with us before to clean before family arrive. Today she didn’t have childcare and brought her tween daughter with her. And the same thing happened that happens every time someone outside our social circle comes into our home.

The little girl ran around playing with the cats and our youngest child, and said things like “Wow. Your home is so beautiful! You have so many rooms! You have ANOTHER bathroom?!” This isn’t the first time this has happened. It isn’t the second or the third. It makes me uncomfortable every time – it forces me to come to admit something that I don’t like to:

We are not middle class. Not even upper middle class. We are objectively WEALTHY.

I don’t have a $40m yacht or a house in the Hamptons or a cottage on Lake Michigan, but all that stuff I mentioned above is so much more than many Americans have.

The median household income in the United States is $59,000. That’s for a whole family. Those of us with much higher earnings have a responsibility: to stop lying to ourselves about our wealth and to use that money and the influence it gives us to make things better for our communities. My community has food banks and free clinics and refugee centers that all need more funding and I have a responsibility to do more than I am.

With news and controversy coming so quickly during this administration, some of this administration’s strategic choices pass without comment. We often see hear the president and his surrogates repeating the claim that they are just enforcing the laws of the land. We have seen this most recently with the zero tolerance policy at the border and the policy of family separation. They claim that this kind of enforcement is a matter of longstanding law and cede responsibility to previous administrations. This is a STRATEGY, undertaken in part because of limits upon the executive branch, but also, perhaps primarily, it is done for the purpose of undercutting dissent.

Imagine you live in a small town in Indiana. You’re between Indianapolis and Chicago and your town has a reputation as something of a speed trap. On your little segment of the highways, the speed limit drops 10mph and folks traveling through get tickets. It’s unpleasant, but it’s a fact of life. You’ve gotten used to it. You live around there and you know to drive exactly 55mph and you rarely get tickets.  Now imagine that the factory in the next town over closed – moved overseas. It employed a lot of people and contributed a lot in taxes. There’s a big hole in the budget and your town is falling into disrepair.

But the new mayor has a solution: get all those out-of-towners who drive through your nice little town to fill out the budget. Now, it would be a big undertaking to pass new laws, but it’s trivial to order the local police to enforce the current laws even more strictly. It’s also trivial to raise the standard fine to the maximum allowed by the state. If someone is driving 11mph over the limit, the police start hitting them with a $300 fine instead of $150, adding on a reckless op charge when possible.

They start making arrests on people with expired tags or multiple offenses. They search the cars of anyone they stop. The more people they put in jail, the more money they make for the community. At first it seems okay. You’re a local. You always drive the speed limit. No one bothers you. But pretty soon it starts to affect you anyway. Your brother-in-law gets arrested coming to visit. Your son was drag racing, and gets nailed with a $1200 fine. How are you going to pay that?

Now, people start to get angry. They start to organize and you show up to complain at the town council meeting, but the mayor has a ready made excuse: “It’s always been this way. We’ve always enforced the traffic laws here. I didn’t make the law. Take it up with the state government.” And suddenly, people coming out of the woodwork to defend this process. “The old mayor did the same thing. My son got a ticket ten years ago and no one complained then. I don’t even go that fast and I got tickets!”

This is exactly what we see going on in Washington. As a conscious strategy, this administration takes an existing policy or procedure and increases enforcement and punishment to an extreme degree. When people complain, the president’s mouthpieces say “We’re just enforcing the law. It’s always been this way. Obama did the same thing. The Democrats passed this law in 1997.”  They re-frame a matter of justice and morality as a question of tradition and of hypocrisy. Then they start asking why you weren’t complaining before. They ignore the difference in severity. If you were objecting before, they ignore that too. They call you a hypocrite for supporting previous governments but not this one. It’s a conscious tactic to undermine opposition. This is a tactic to make opponents feel foolish, doubt their own beliefs and silence their objections.

Taking away and imprisoning people’s children is wrong. Even if Obama did it. Don’t be side-tracked. Focus on the issues at hand. That the previous administration separated families at times, does not in ANY way mitigate the widespread abuse of the current president’s “zero tolerance” policy. Don’t allow the right wing to change the subject. Don’t get drawn into a debate over who did what when. You’re not going to change the mind of a true-believer, so focus on people who are not engaged, and of course, write and call your elected representatives.

Last night I was on Twitter instead of sleeping (because apparently I hate myself), and I came upon some threads by Linda Tirado (@KillerMartinis) about the proposed Medicaid work requirements and the U.S. Healthcare system. It got me thinking.

We often hear from conservative know-nothings about how the United States has the best healthcare system in the world and how awful it would be to make any changes to that.

And in some ways, we do have very good healthcare, or at least very good healthcare is -available- in the United States. There are stories every few months about foreign leaders and wealthy citizens of other countries traveling to the United States for medical care as if that proves something about our healthcare system. Here’s one from 2012 about a Saudi Prince coming for tests at the Cleveland Clinic. And it’s true, the Cleveland Clinic is one of the finest facilities in the world for cardiac care. But that says nothing about the healthcare system in the United States.

Let me explain, with an analogy to something that we Americans love: CARS. Someone might say “Italy has the best driving environment in the world! Take a look at the cars they have over there!”

Take a look at the cool cars they have in Italy!

And it’s true, Ferraris are awesome. And they do come from Italy. But that’s not in any way typical of what the experience of driving in Italy is like. A more common car in Italy is this:

A more realistic Italian car

Lots of people just have scooters.

And traffic looks like this:

Doesn’t this look like fun?

So when someone says “The United States has the greatest healthcare system in the world, that’s why people come here for medical care!” understand how spectacularly bad of an example that is. It’s taking a very specific example (like a Ferrari) that is not available to the overwhelming majority and presenting it as typical.

The reality is that the level of care that Saudi prince received is not typical. Most communities do not have a world-class hospital. And, even in those communities that have such facilities, poor Americans, the self-employed, and anyone without a healthcare plan heavily subsidized by their employer are not able to afford treatment at them. These people don’t have a Ferrari. They don’t even have a scooter.

The continuous stream of men accused of sexual misconduct has taken many people by surprise. Even those who are not surprised that sexual abuse is so common have often by surprised by the specific individuals who are facing accusations. He could not have acted that way. He is a good man. Lena Dunham, anointed by the media as the voice of her generation fell into this trap. A friend was facing an accusation of rape. She wasn’t there, but she knew he didn’t do it. She knew that he was a good man.

Let me tell you something: there are no good men. Don’t get me wrong. Despite dubious arguments about evolutionary psychology, rape and sexual assault are not intrinsic elements of maleness. There are absolutely men who are not sexually abusive. Moreover, there are men who never would be sexually abusive. But goodness never stopped kept someone from committing sexual harassment or sexual assault.

Despite the recent popularity of dark anti-heroes and troubled imperfect heroes, as a culture, we still think of goodness as something innate. A good person does good things. A person who does good things is good. Superman. Luke Skywalker. Captain America. In cartoons and comic book movies it’s very simple. In the real world, people are not so consistent. A person who does good things, may also do bad things, sometimes very bad things. Senator Franken has helped people. He has opposed bigotry and discrimination. According to multiple sources, he is guilty of sexual assault. Bill Cosby was an inspiration for generations of people. He has been a tireless advocate for education and supported it with his money. He changed how black families can be perceived in the United States. He drugged and raped multiple women across decades.

Goodness is not a merit badge that, once earned, indemnifies someone from bad actions. Beneficial acts do not cancel out bad ones, and potential good actions do not justify ignoring the harm done by bad actions. Goodness is aspirational. It is something that must be earned continually.  Whether you blame the patriarchy, human nature, or Original Sin, all men take bad actions. And when those bad acts include transgressions like sexual harassment or assault, there must be consequences. Those responsible cannot be trusted with positions of power, whether as a high school band director or a United States senator.

Stop calling for unity. Since the 2016 election, and especially following the NFL protests during the national anthem, individuals and organizations on every side of and no side have made statements calling for “unity.”. To be sure, some of those statements are offered with good intentions. Nevertheless, this bland platitude has run its course. “Unity” is rarely the actual goal, rather the word is used as a rhetorical dodge, a way to express an one of three basic sentiments without having to argue its specifics:

1.  Ignore our problems

   This type of call for unity will make a modest acknowledgement of some kind of difficulty and then will brush it aside with emotional appeals to common heritage. There is no need to address our flaws and disagreements if we just hold hands and remember how much we have in common.

   Example: “The issue of race has been a difficult one in our history, but both sides need to realize that we have more in common than we have differences. We need to come together in unity.”

2.  Support my cause

   There is also a call for unity that equates a particular cause with common values or common heritage. Typically no evidence to tie that cause to shared history is offered and the cause itself isn’t defended. It’s a bait and switch tactic to encourage the viewer or listener to agree that real unity means supporting me and my cause.

   Example: “Since the founding of our nation, we have been united against foreign threats. That unity is vital now more than ever. We must all stand together.”

3.  Just shut up

   The third type is really a combination of the prior two, but directed at someone with a message and anyone who might support that message. It’s a call for opposition to that person and the cause by paying no attention to it. Supporting that status quo is taking a position, but by filtering that through a call for unity, one gets to avoid taking solid stance on a topic while still appearing to have taken action.

   Example: <In response to EITHER an explicitly racist or anti-racist statement> “That kind of divisive language is not helpful and is contrary to our shared history. We need to remember our shared values that bring us together.”

Stop calling for unity. By itself, unity is hollow and empty. Standing unified with people who are causing harm causes further harm. And standing together but standing for nothing is a photo op, not an olive branch. Instead of calling for unity, call for what you actually want. Bring people together in common cause to oppose racism and against injustice, not just for the sake of unity. And when others are calling for “unity,” think about which kind of unity they’re asking for.

In his defense of white supremacists, the president compared statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. This comparison accomplishes two things: It equates Confederate generals with heroes of the American Revolution. And it changes the subject from whether Confederate monuments should remain, to whether monuments to Washington, Jefferson should.

This subject change is an attempt to force opponents to defend Washington and Jefferson’s slave-owning or advocate their removal. The key difference is the purpose of the monuments: Washington and Jefferson are honored for winning independence for the United States, freedom for (some) Americans. Whatever their actions in their own households, their actions as statesmen are the subject of monuments to Jefferson or Washington. The Confederate monuments are also honoring the subjects’ public lives – careers defined by the defense of slavery. That these statues were erected during the Civil Rights era reveals them to be monuments not to great leaders, but to White Supremacy.

Whatever you think of Washington or Jefferson, they’re not being honored FOR owning slaves or FOR maintaining white supremacy. For Lee and Jackson, white supremacy is why they fought. White Supremacy is why they are honored. And White Supremacy is why they must come down.

1/ In his defense of white supremacists, the president compared statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson to Washington, Jefferson

— Auctoritas (@auctoritatem) August 16, 2017