In what will probably become an annual civic celebration of outrage and virtue, Charlottesville preened before the TV cameras this past weekend in commemoration of the officially-contrived spasm of mayhem and destruction that killed two state troopers and an activist last August.
The White Supremists (that is generally how TV reporters now pronounce the word), have moved their act to Washington D.C. this year, and none willing to call attention to themselves were in evidence in town. Nevertheless, Charlottesville waved the bloody shirt as extravagantly as the absence of racist skinheads, bikers, neo-Confederates, gun-toting militia and other rude types permitted. Media, public and University officials, and of course Charlottesville’s swarming horde of non-profits and activist busybodies, were creative in exploiting every imaginable opportunity to fulminate against racism, fascism, and Donald Trump. These included praying for comity and understanding under the spiritual guidance of the Reverend Al Sharpton, uplifting song and soothing talk about all manner of good things at UVA, celebrating the sustainable bounty of the earth by enjoying artisanal croissants at an impromptu market, and arresting a harmless perennial Resister to the Resistance for buying razor blades at the downtown CVS -- all the while equating the army of police arrayed to protect town and university with the White “Supremists” and neo-fascists of last year’s Unite the Right! rally.
In all, Charlottesville’s First Annual Smite the Right! Festival was a huge success, and it only cost the citizens of The Commonwealth of Virginia a couple of million dollars.
Riot Gear
University of Virginia students deserve special commendation for capturing the event’s essence with a banner and a chant. Marching behind a bed sheet that read “last year they came in (sic.) torches, this year they came with badges,” students chanted at police “Why are you in riot gear? We don’t see no riot here!”
Only one public official was fleet enough to run far enough ahead of the weekend’s parade of virtue-signaling to garner some individual attention. The guy who used to be Charlottesville’s only Black City Council member and Vice Mayor has been eclipsed by a female Black Mayor and must engage with her daily in a life and death struggle for Charlottesville’s Baddest. He seized an opportunity to confront riot-clad police on UVA Grounds, where student ingrates were lamenting the police doing what they had been criticized for not doing last year. The photo op was duly memorialized by the town’s newspaper of record: “Wes Bellamy, a Charlottesville city councilor, arrived and asked officers to de-escalate, before heading to see the movie BlacKkKlansman. The officers set down their riot shields, to claps and cheers.”
The Show Must Go On
Mr. Bellamy and his comrades are right about one thing -- the Leftie/Resistance show must go on. The only defense Charlottesville’s Progressive and radical politicians, apparatchiks and running dogs in the media and local business have is ideology. Continuing sacrifice of tax dollars and good sense to the gods of Diversity, Inclusion, and eradication of Hate and White Privilege are all there is to justify the egregious incompetence and criminal profligacy and negligence that have made Charlottesville a model of misgovernment in the year that followed Unite the Right!
Sometimes the politics of illusion can have deadly consequences. It was primarily police negligence last year that left open a street that was supposed to have been blocked, permitting the driver of the car now charged with running down anti-White Supremacist demonstrators-- killing one-- to take the route he did. However, leftist fantasies also played a part. Rumors, later proved completely false, that vicious White Supremacists, their thirst for minority blood unquenched, were launching a raid on a public housing complex just off the downtown area, is why those particular activists stayed massed and took the route that put them in the path of that driver. Most Unite the Righters were, in fact, getting out of town at the time and the counter-demonstrators might have instead dispersed.
Charlottesville merited some attention this year because of the anniversary of Unite the Right! But as the self-destruction of the city and its local institutions continue, and their reputations dim, the place is in danger of becoming the kind of predictable bore that all entities and people who refuse to pull themselves away from an inexorable downward spiral eventually do. The Charlottesville dogs may continue to bark, but the caravan soon may just pass it by.
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