The violence in Charlottesville, Va., on Saturday at the “Unite the Right” protest against the proposed removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was irrefutably rooted in racism, and bore disgusting echoes of Nazism. For evidence, look no further than the Hitlerian “blood and soil” and “Jews won’t replace us” chants during a pre-protest rally Friday night by a Tiki torch-bearing parade of overwhelmingly white men. And to erase further doubt, former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke watched the violence unfold Saturday and declared that the white supremacy movement — which is what he represents — was at “a turning point.” Added Duke, “We are going to fulfill the promises of Donald Trump. That’s what we believed in. That’s why we voted for Donald Trump, because he said he’s going to take our country back.” Some might quibble with that analysis, but they do so either as apologists for hatred, or as naifs. Because the violence in Charlottesville clearly was the product of the rise of racism as a political force in this country. And we can only hope that Charlottesville was the culmination of that rise and not, as Duke seems to hope, the first flames of a wildfire. Read more http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-charlottesville-racism-trump-20170812-story.html
Car Hits Crowd After White Nationalist Rally in Charlottesville Ends in Violence Violence erupted on Saturday as hundreds of white nationalists had gathered here for a rally and clashed with counterprotesters, resulting in at least one death and prompting the governor to declare a state of emergency. After the rally at a city park was dispersed, a car plowed into a crowd near the city’s downtown mall, killing at least one person and injuring at least 19 others, according to a spokeswoman for the University of Virginia Medical Center. The authorities did not immediately say whether the episode was related to the white nationalists’ demonstration, but several witnesses and video of the scene suggested that it might have been intentional. Emergency medical personnel treated eight people, the Charlottesville Police Department said. It was not immediately clear how severely they had been hurt. Several area hospitals did not return telephone calls seeking information. Read more https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/12/us/charlottesville-protest-white-nationalist.html
