RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://amgreatness.com/2020/08/29/meet-the-democrats-newest-strategist/

Her name is Vicky Osterweil. It’s a pity that she is only emerging on the scene now. Had her ideas enjoyed broad circulation even a month ago, she could have made a major and clarifying contribution to the Democratic Party’s platform.

Many commentators, from the Left as well as the Right, grumbled that the Democrats’ convention lacked a clear policy agenda. Sure, we all knew in general outline what they were about—they were “against racism,” “against white supremacism,” above all, they were “against Trump.” 

But the policy particulars that flowed from these sentiments were more adumbrated than stated directly. Vicky Osterweil (formerly Willie) fills in some blanks. Too bad she didn’t have a spot speaking at the convention. She sums up so much of what the Democrats are about today.

Like Joe Biden (and like his mentor Barack Obama), she is passionately committed to “fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” Peeking out of his basement in May, Joe Biden saw “an incredible opportunity to transform America.” 

Vicky Osterweil agrees. “[W]e need a total transformation of our society,” she writes in her new book. “This society we live in under capitalism is entirely structured around the production [and] circulation of commodities. It is a cruel system, built for the creation and revocation of things not for the flourishing of people.”

In her interview with Stephen Colbert earlier this month, Joe Biden’s running mate Kamala Harris cheerfully noted that the “protests” coruscating across the country were “not going to stop.” “This is a movement,” she explained, smiling. The riots “are not going to let up and they should not and we should not.” 

Osterweil sees Harris’ bet and raises it. She, too, regards the riots as part of a “movement for liberation,” a movement that is just getting started. 

I mentioned Osterweil’s new book. It is called In Defense of Looting: A Riotous History of Uncivil Action. I should note that the word “riotous” as used here does not mean “uproariously funny.” In means “having to do with riots,” i.e., violent insurrectionary action: looting, destroying property, burning things down. These are the actions that Osterweil recommends to bring about that “total” or “fundamental” transformation of society that she, like Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, long to bring about. 

https://pjmedia.com/columns/tyler-o-neil/2020/08/29/new-book-provides-a-terrifying-glimpse-into-how-antifa-justifies-looting-and-rioting-n864754

After the police killing of George Floyd, mobs descended on major cities, rioting, looting, and burning down buildings. Yet left-leaning journalists, commentators, and politicians insisted that the riots were “mostly peaceful protests.” A new book seeks to justify looting, in particular, and taxpayer-funded National Public Radio (NPR) published a lengthy interview with the author. Among other things, the author defends looting as a way to undermine the “white supremacy” behind the idea of property and that the value of small businesses is a “right-wing myth.”

NPR’s Natalie Escobar introduced the subject by claiming “there has been a lot of hand-wringing about looting.” In the newly-released book In Defense of Looting, (published by Hachette Book Group, which has published books by Joel Osteen, J.K. Rowling, Newt Gingrich, and others) Vicky Osterweil “argues that looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society. The rioters who smash windows and take items from stores, she says, are engaging in a powerful tactic that questions the justice of ‘law and order,’ and the distribution of property and wealth in an unequal society.”

Indeed, in an interview with Escobar, Osterweil claimed that looting — which she defined as “the mass expropriation of property, mass shoplifting during a moment of upheaval or riot” — is a tool for justice that doesn’t really harm anyone. She also dispelled certain “myths” about looting, like the idea that rioters and looters are disconnected from a peaceful protest.

Attacking the idea of property