The current unrest convulsing our nation certainly does reflect treason, sedition, and insurrection, though some may wonder how many are noticing. But President Trump certainly noticed, tweeting Thursday that a Black Lives Matter (BLM) leader who threatened to “burn down this system” if the government doesn’t “give us what we want” is guilty of just those things.
Illustrating how emboldened the BLM terrorists have become is that their threat-issuing leader, Hawk Newsome, didn’t shout his warning during an impassioned street riot. Rather, the Greater New York BLM president made his comments, soberly, while being interviewed Wednesday on the Fox News Channel:
If this country doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it. All right? And I could be speaking figuratively, I could be speaking literally. It’s a matter of interpretation. Like, let’s be very real and let’s observe the history of the 1960s. When black people were rioting, we had their highest growth in wealth, in property ownership. Think about the last few weeks. Since we started protesting there’ve been eight cops fired across the country.
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Of course, what Newsome didn’t mention is that giving BLM its way would also mean replacing the system — because that’s what they want.
Either way, it spells overthrow of the system, as President Trump noted in his Thursday tweet (below).
Black Lives Matter leader states, “If U.S. doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it”. This is Treason, Sedition, Insurrection!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 25, 2020
Unfortunately, despite its terrorist, Marxist nature — just five years ago BLM mobs were calling for dead cops, and its platform prescribes the Western family’s dissolution — the organization’s star has risen. Corporations have donated millions of dollars to it, politicians and other prominent figures have bowed before it, and a recent poll found that 62 percent of Americans view BLM favorably.
Also troubling is what was predicted: that not quelling the insurrection, but rewarding the violence, would lead to more violence. And sure enough, Newsome signaled that BLM has received this message when he spoke of how the rioting has led to their agenda’s implementation. “What is this country rewarding?” he asked his Fox News interviewer, Martha MacCallum, rhetorically. “What behavior?”
In fact, Newsome implicitly approved of the rioting. When addressing how the violence has advanced his cause, he stated, “I don’t condone nor do I condemn rioting. But I’m just telling you what I observed [about its effectiveness]” (video below).
Newsome certainly is good with the sophistry, such as when he justified his call to violence by saying that the United States “is built upon violence.” Of course, this could be said of any nation and thus could be used to justify rioting and insurrection anywhere. So what’s the distinction?
What should guide this is Just War Doctrine. For violence is much like chemotherapy: It’s destructive and should only be resorted to when absolutely necessary. And when the disease you claim to be treating is imaginary, Mr. Newsome, your cure is the disease.
Speaking of which, the latter was noted by some social media users responding to Trump’s tweet. One example is #WalkAway movement founder Brandon Straka (tweet below).
Let’s not give them what they want. Let’s give them what they DESERVE. Take down BLM!
— Brandon Straka (@BrandonStraka) June 25, 2020
Well-followed Twitter user Lori Hendry agreed (tweet below).
Black Lives Matter is a domestic terrorist group and must be stopped!
— LORI HENDRY (@Lrihendry) June 25, 2020
Yet criticism such as the above is being silenced via social pressure and threats of reputational and career destruction — and for good reason. Something that can’t be criticized can’t be properly vetted — and vetting is the last thing BLM wants. Just consider its past actions. In the video below, BLM protesters can be heard chanting “What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want them? Now!” in 2014, and “Pigs in a blanket. Fry like bacon!” in 2015.
Moreover, BLM’s official positions are every bit as ugly. Aside from wanting the abolition of police, they also demand the “repeal of all immigration restrictions,” “the legalization of sex work,” “the destruction of the nuclear family,” and “the forced reallocation of farmland” (à la Zimbabwe), according to a June 15 report by Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson.
There’s more, too. BLM also wants “race-based reparations specifically, quote, ‘in the form of a guaranteed minimum livable income for all black people,’” the host also informed. But this wealth transfer wouldn’t just be for descendants of slaves, but also for African and Caribbean immigrants, “who on average now earn more than native-born Americans,” Carlson added (video below).
Many of BLM’s radical positions can be seen at its website (as of this writing) here. Its older “Guiding Principles” page, now removed from its site, can be found via an archiving service here.
The bottom line is that the current unrest has nothing to do with George Floyd, the criminal suspect whose death in police custody was used as a catalyst for the insurrection. Nor is this about saving black lives. This should be obvious with ideologues who wink at the 90-plus percent of black homicide victims murdered by fellow blacks and the 300,000 black babies killed yearly in the womb. This is about power-craving and hateful people who aim to destroy Western civilization and replace it with a leftist dystopia.
Interestingly, Hawk Newsome may not fully grasp this, but could be playing useful idiot. The irony is that he sported in his Fox interview a cap stating, “SOUL NOT FOR SALE.” Surely not — and the discerning know who owns it, too. Does he?
Photo (police car after being set on fire in Boston): AP Images
Selwyn Duke (@SelwynDuke) has written for The New American for more than a decade. He has also written for The Hill, Observer, The American Conservative, WorldNetDaily, American Thinker, and many other print and online publications. In addition, he has contributed to college textbooks published by Gale-Cengage Learning, has appeared on television, and is a frequent guest on radio.