American patriots: Stand up to bullies, and they’ll cower
Enlightened America is stirring.
A glimmer of hope excites after years of what has led to another dark age in which a kind of Muzak of madness has dominated what can be charitably described as the “public discourse” in the dis-United States.
A trusted gallery of rich, spoiled bullies posing as “journalists”, politicians and “free speech” apostles, until recently enjoyed the license – which money and position afford – to shout and walk around with impunity.
Enlightened America has had enough and now seems happy to understand that beating a bully means confronting the bully.
What a joy it was to watch the election technology company, Dominion Voting Systems, take a righteous stand against the rich, spoiled bullies at Fox non-News.
Rather than flinching or objecting to a fight, Dominion embraced the need to defend the truth and his name after both were attacked by the prime-time bullies in the employ and wages of a billionaire Australian alpha bully.
Since Dominion launched its libel suit in 2021, the once-obscure company has done a marvelous job of exposing how the bullies at Fox non-News not only repeatedly lied about the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, but also knew that they lied all the time. appease their fact-allergic audience and, of course, make a nice profit.
Opening statements, which were scheduled to begin Monday in a Delaware courtroom, have been postponed. Both parties are said to be trying to reach a settlement before the sensational case goes to trial.
Besides getting Dominion an oh-so-satisfying mountain of cash, Dominion wants Fox non-News to apologize for lying over and over about his fictional role in a fictional plot to flip votes from Donald Trump to Joe Biden.
Whatever the outcome – inside or outside a courtroom – Dominion has already triumphed by embarrassing a cocky band of TV studio toughs who no doubt believed they were untouchable, irresponsible.
The bullies at Fox non-News share that defining sense of immunity and entitlement with Trump, a career bully they publicly defended but privately mocked.
Like Fox boss Rupert Murdoch and his swaggering company, Trump has had to endure a legal reward he could have avoided until earlier this month as a modern day reincarnation of the sleazy mobster, Al Capone.
“Don” Trump’s reliance on procrastination and distraction to evade impeachment did not work this time. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg finally did what frustrated prosecutors in his office thought they had amassed enough ammunition to do years ago: sue Trump.
Too late, Bragg took on the chief. Enlightened Americans and the country’s frayed idea of the rule of law thanked him for that.
For once, Trump’s tantrum-trigger trap was closed as he sat in a New York courtroom flanked by lawyers. Trump looked small and defeated, the trademark roar emanating from him in the remarkable moment by a terse judge who will decide his fate in time.
The doubters and naysayers who dismissed the charge as slimy missed the point. In challenging the bully, Bragg had invited other prosecutors and special counsel to follow his historic example and affirm that no one, including former presidents, is above the law.
This is important.
Yet bullies attract bullies. So it came as no surprise that full-time flamethrower, Marjorie Taylor Greene, traveled to New York to take the opportunity to assert her MAGA-spewing credentials.
Enlightened New Yorkers were having none of it. Armed only with whistles, they surrounded and drowned from the Georgia Congresswoman, trying in vain to be heard with a megaphone over the glorious din.
Beaten, Taylor Greene retreated to a large SUV and hurried off, as bullies tend to do when challenged face-to-face. Her troop of supporters broke into a limp chant of “USA, US” that, like their irked patron, faded into irrelevance.
Perhaps echoing irate New Yorkers, Bragg also notified Congressman Jim Jordan, a Trump attack dog. Bragg, playing politely with so-called “legislators,” was more interested in protecting a hush-paying felon than in upholding the U.S. Constitution.
Bragg is suing the chairman of the House Judiciary for what the prosecutor describes as a “transparent campaign to intimidate and attack his office’s case against Trump.”
Good for him. Message delivered: Bullies will no longer be tolerated. Meet you in court.
The same message was conveyed by enlightened voters in Wisconsin, who turned to the polls in record numbers in early April to remove an election- and abortion-rights-denying bully in a black robe.
Dan Kelly was crushed by former judge and prosecutor Janet Protasiewicz. Her sweeping victory ends 15 years of control of the Supreme Court by archconservatives as it hears a lawsuit calling for the repeal of Wisconsin’s 19th-century abortion ban.
The same message of defiance was delivered by three Tennessee lawmakers who took on the state’s Republican supermajority for failing to protect schoolchildren from being dismembered and murdered by auto-armed assassins.
Two of the three members who happen to be black — Justin J Pearson and Justin Jones — were kicked out of the Tennessee House of Representatives on April 6 by racist Republican bullies seeking to silence dissent.
The gamble failed. Enlightened citizens flooded the streets and legislatures in a strong show of solidarity with Pearson and Jones. Days later, the couple returned to their seats at the State House.
The bullies had once again fled.
Then, last week, PBS and NPR editors-in-chief told electric car salesman Elon Musk and his money-bleeding, social media vanity project, Twitter, to take a well-earned walk.
Musk, the bully with a bulging bank account, had tried to discredit NPR’s journalism by labeling it “state-affiliated media” on his popular Twitter accounts.
To its credit, NPR responded to Musk’s blatant untruth and smear by announcing it was leaving Twitter.
PBS did the same after Twitter also added “government-funded media” to its accounts. Both news organizations were annoyed by the implication that their newsrooms are staffed by propagandists, not journalists.
Awesome.
Journalists are supposed to stand up to bullies. Sorry for the pun, but bullying for NPR and PBS. I hope more journalists and news organizations follow this laudable example.
Piece by piece, enlightened America is, to use a phrase, reclaiming its dazed and disoriented land from the hobos and charlatans who have disfigured it for fame and money.
That is the definition of patriotism.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial view of Al Jazeera.