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Antifa Starts 2021 With a Bang in Portland
Mayor Ted Wheeler may have finally had enough of the violence.
“A gathering in downtown Portland has devolved into a riot. Participants have thrown multiple firebombs at officers and launched commercial-grade fireworks at the Federal Courthouse and Justice Center,” was how the Portland Police Department greeted the New Year.
Rep. Jerry Nadler dismissed Antifa as a myth this summer, even as peaceful daytime protests devolved into dangerous riots nightly in cities across America. The New Yorker romanticized Antifa in November; the New York Times marshaled its considerable powers of editorialization to protect Antifa in July.
What firebombing police officers, committing arson and vandalizing private commercial property in predominantly poor neighborhoods had to do with civil rights, even prominent Civil Rights leaders were never quite sure.
“We have to make sure we do not allow ourselves to play the other person’s game,” said the late Rep. Jim Clyburn in June. “Peaceful protest is our game. Violence is their game. We cannot allow ourselves to play their game.”
Yet even since the presumptive election of Joe Biden, Antifa, whether organized under a central authority or not, has not responded with a reduction in violence. Antifa slogans displayed during post-election protests…