Politics – More Zonkyness

The Reaction to the Charlie Kirk Killing

Sep 142025

So some nutter has killed Charlie Kirk, the well known right-winger. This is obviously bad (and I’m a left-winger), but the reaction to his killing is interesting to say the least …

“He’s Not Right-Wing”

And in come the denials as if “right-wing” is something to be ashamed of – now I think it’s something to be ashamed of, but his fellow right-wingers would presumably think it’s fine. But they’re denying it. So let’s have a look at the signs :-

“Charlie Kirk addressed and acknowledged the Great Replacement.“. The “Great Replacement” is a white supremacist theory that there is some conspiracy to “replace” white folk. Charlie once claimed “If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like, boy, I hope he’s qualified,” – plainly racist. Normally racist is a sign of a right-winger at least amongst reasonable folk.
Raging misogynist: “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”. Again most reasonable folk classify hatred of women as right-wing.
Kirk on vaccine mandates: “a form of medical apartheid.”. Now this is isn’t right-wing; it’s just nuts. And evil nuts at that.
Most ironically: “I think it’s worth having a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights,”.

And there’s more, far more.

Does this make him right-wing? Well yes, but more so – he was a toxic extremist holding views that effectively regarded “others” (women, black folk, homosexuals, etc) as sub-human with fewer rights than the classic rich white men.

Opposing such extremists is something folk should be celebrated for doing. But killing? No that’s just wrong.

The Left Killed Him

As we don’t currently know the motives of the killer, claiming that the left killed him is a bit premature.

One of the related strands is the strange notion that the left is violent whilst the right is peaceful. However a US government survey of political violence shows something very different :-

Ideology		1,563	—	Percentage
	Islamist			17.6
	Left-wing			23.4
	Right-wing			59

(source: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9335287/ )

So the 59% of all political violence is right-wingers – exceeding both left-wing and islamists.

Surprised? No wonder – the right-wing is very good at lying.

They (the right) were very quick to start blaming the left even claiming Democrats were effectively urging the murder of Kirk. Well, for a start, the Democrats aren’t leftist – they’re far too right wing for this leftist.

And even if the left in general (and Democrats) criticise Kirk for some of his positions, that isn’t encouraging political violence.

But ultimately we don’t know what motivated the killing of Charlie Kirk. There’s just as many hints that he was right-wing as hints that he was left-wing. But let’s stop pointing fingers until we know.

Even if that’s less fun.

Were The Nazis Socialists?

Politics No Responses »

May 302025

No.

There’s a popular meme around to categorise the Nazis as socialists because they want to paint all socialists with the colour of murderous dictators. You do have to wonder why given that Stalin existed.

But It’s In The Name!

To be picky it’s not the word “socialist” that exists in the name of the party but the German word sozialistische. The full party name was: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei.

At least it was after the renaming of the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei; a far right party dedicated to fighting the communists (which were quite popular in Germany after the first world war). The renaming (which Hitler initially opposed) to include the word “sozialistische” was ‘intended to draw upon both left-wing and right-wing ideals, with “Socialist” and “Workers'” appealing to the left, and “National” and “German” appealing to the right.’

How About Their Policies?

If you look at some of the policies of the early Nazi party, they do appear to be influenced by the left: anti-capitalist, anti-big-business, etc. These policies later disappeared as the Nazis grew closer to power and they started to need the support of industrialists.

Another way of looking at it was the association with the militant far-right – the Freicorps (both a generic term and a term applying to a specific group of far-right paramilitary thugs). The Nazis were quite happy to associate in their early days with the Freicorps thugs until they became inconvenient and were “disassociated” during the Night of the Long Knives.

Dachau

The first concentration camp (Dachau) was created for Hitler to punish his political opponents – chiefly communists, socialists, or trade unionists. Some will point at Lenin’s suppression of his political opponents to illustrate that this is not an indication that Hitler wasn’t a socialist.

Only Lenin didn’t suppress leftists initially – for example Emma Goldman was free to visit the Soviet Union, observe, and then return to criticise the revolution. Probably necessarily too – Lenin’s Bolcheviks were probably a minority of leftists in Russia at the time.

Authoritarian

Sometimes those who say “Nazis were socialists” are really grasping for the word “authoritarian” working on the basis that some socialist regimes have been authoritarian. Well “socialist” is the wrong word then – there have been plenty of socialist regimes that were not authoritarian – the UK Labour government of 1945 onwards is a good example.

Fin

Labelling Nazis as socialists is a right-wing deception to hide the fact that the far right come down to evil policies, and to blacken the name of socialism.

Don’t get me wrong – there’s plenty to criticise about socialism but the whole “Look how many folk socialists have killed” thing is really a criticism of authoritarian regimes. Many of which (frequently overlooked by the right) were right-wing regimes: Franco’s Spain, Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin, …

You’ll find some will say “but Stalin killed far more”. Which is true enough, but although Stalin killed an astounding number deliberately, incompetence was also a factor especially when it comes to the famines (and yes there’s a debate to be had about how much was incompetence and how much was maliciousness).

But the key thing is that no serious political historian will classify the Nazis as left-wing. You have to go a lot further than pointing at the name without the audience laughing.

“AntiZionism Is Not AntiSemitism”

Politics No Responses »

Dec 202024

Quoting a university poster from many years ago written by the Jewish (student) society. Which is not quite what this is about but close enough.

In recent weeks it has become the trend to accuse those who criticise Israel’s policies in Gaza, as antisemitic. It is possible of course – the dumber out there are genuinely antisemitic. But there’s a whole other bunch of reasons :-

They’re anti-zionist and anything that Israel does can be condemned.
They’re anti-certain kinds of government policies and Israel uses those policies.

Always accusing critics of Israel of antisemitism is essentially saying that Israel cannot be criticised no matter what they do. Is that right?

Sure Israel has to defend itself from Hamas terrorist attacks, but it has to be done right without breaking international law. And even if you think Israel’s response is “reasonable”, you can’t reasonable silence criticisms of Israel by using the antisemitism label – it’s dishonest.

Ultimately what Israel wants is to be in a privileged position where none dare criticise them because any criticism will be seen as antisemitic. It’s equivalent to the British claiming that anti criticism of the British Empire is just anti-British.

Brian Won’t Be The Last CEO Killed

Politics No Responses »

Dec 102024

I’ve missed most of this story – how someone gunned down the CEO of UnitedHealth. That’s because I’ve had my own healthcare issues ironically enough. And was taken care of by the NHS.

I’ve even missed most of the social media response which was apparently less than totally sympathetic.

Killing someone is wrong; even if you see it as some form of justice. Justice involves a trial with members of the community involved in the decision of guilt or innocence. Without that it becomes just personal revenge.

But what if the community won’t prosecute and judge someone’s crimes? The US health insurance business has plenty of incidents that victims could easily perceive as a crime – for example health care bankruptcies.

It just becomes a little harder to condemn someone seeking revenge if there is no real chance of getting justice.

It’ll be interesting to see the trial of the alleged killer – it could well result in Jury Nullification where the jury finds the defendant not guilty because whilst they have broken the law, the jury feels it was justified.

Invasion of Southport By Racist Thugs

General, Politics No Responses »

Aug 022024

Last week as the residents of Southport were holding a vigil in memory of the three little girls who were killed and of those kids who are still in hospital, Southport was invaded by racist thugs who tried attacking the vigil and also tried attacking the mosque.

There was no indication that the murderer was a muslim; the instigators just assumed that.

There was no indication that the murdered was an asylum seeker; the instigators just assumed that.

The false name of the murdered was invented to make it sound muslim; it’s rumoured that it actually translates as “My Apartment”. The instigators didn’t care about that.

The Instigators

It’s all very well blaming the “useful idiots” who were rioting in Southport last night – and they certainly deserve to be locked up. But who instigated their visit?

There are plenty of possible candidates who posted vile assumptions about the murderer on 𝕏 clearly trying to sway the narrative in the direction of inciting hatred for immigrants and asylum seekers. I won’t name them here except to say they are easily recognisable as frothing at the mouth loons of the far-right.

Yes, far-right.

They may attempt to deny it, and the “useful idiots” at the riot may well claim they’re ordinary British working-class (they’re not), but the instigators are definitely far-right.

The EDL

Some of the reports name the EDL as being behind the riots yet some will instantly point out that the EDL no longer exists as an organisation.

Well, perhaps.

But the easiest way to keep an organisation from being banned is to “disband” it; an organisation doesn’t need a public face, a web site, or a corporate identity. Particularly if it is intent on pursuing illegal activities – such as rioting.

Russian Involvement?

This is pure speculation, but it is interesting to see that Europe (and the USA) has a problem with far-right thugs just when it would be helpful to distract us from what the Russians are doing to Ukraine. And we know that the Russians like interfering in the West.

If any of those instigators are taking money from the Russians (and to be fair, I don’t know that they are), then they’re not just guilty of incitement to riot, but also guilty of treason.

But there is alleged links between the “News” channel that first published the disinformation on the murderer : here, here, and probably other places too.

Conclusion

Unless we want thugs fueled up on cheap lager touring the country rioting in random places, we need to take action. And not just locking up the thugs – whilst their actions are inexcusable, they are still just “useful idiots”.

No, we need to go after those who incited the violence by spreading disinformation … and no, an apology isn’t enough. They should be charged with “incitement to riot” and for certain of those in parliament, also “mafeasance in office”.

And we need a far more in depth investigation of just what the Russian intelligence services are up to in our country.

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