"What has passed for objectivity in our industry has been reverence for power...truth is not partisan."
Great speech by @nhannahjones this morning at the inaugural Democracy Summit.
Now, we've got Steven Levitsky, co-author of How Democracies Die, describing the electoral road to authoritarianism, and the characteristics of political parties that are edging toward autocracy.
"We believe this is a reaction to multiracial democracy."
"Either the United States will be a multiracial democracy in the 21st century, or it won't be a democracy." — Steven Levitsky
"The cult of personality... and victimhood is central to authoritarians... The double image of the victim and the brute."
"First, pay attention to patterns. Stop acting like stuff is new when it's a pattern. Second, no false equivalences..."
@jasonintrator begins his remarks with five key points. Too many words for one tweet, but good stuff.
"There are no neutral words...there is no neutral language... What is the neutral term for lying or fascism?" — @jasonintrator
"Be very careful with the language you use because there are people who are trying to get you to adopt language that erases the real problems." — @ruthbenghiat
"We are losing skilled people who understand how to administer elections...nobody wants to be threatened and have people come to their home...I don't know if we have figured out how to grapple with that fear and brain drain." — @SIfill_
"We need to reestablish accepting electoral loss as a democratic norm... We should not be congratulating people for conceding defeat. That should be the basic expectation." — @AveryElections
What an incredible resource. Learning about the @hu_blackpress archives from Brandon Nightingale.
"American democracy is threatened by theocracy," @AntheaButler says.
"Religion is a foundational piece in the destruction of democracy in America," @AntheaButler says. "And if you don't understand that, maybe it's time for you to get a new job."
Ta-Nehisi Coates speaks at the inaugural Democracy Summit.
"When we talk about a center for journalism and democracy, I don't know where else you'd want to be other than an HBCU...the tradition of Black journalism is the tradition of truth telling."
Now at the inaugural Democracy Summit, we are hearing from @JodiRave, @krforde, and @Maria_Hinojosa on the issue of the ways mainstream journalism has mishandled the issue of white nationalism.
.@krforde is describing a number of examples of newspaper leaders actively engaging in terroristic campaigns to end Reconstruction in post-Civil War southern states. Absolutely essential and horrifying history.
"We need a journalism that is clear and transparent on our values...to be pro first amendment is to take a political stance." — @WesleyLowery
"We are talking about having a single standard of supporting democracy and how it operates for both parties, and if in the application of that standard one of the parties has turned anti-democratic, it's incumbent we report that." — @jayrosen_nyu
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
Police are investigating homophobic and antisemitic flyers that were recently distributed in Flower Mound. The flyers are a product of the Goyim Defense League, a neo-Nazi organization with active members in North Texas who I recently identified. 1/
While it's still unclear exactly who distributed the Goyim Defense League flyers in Flower Mound, there's a solid chance that these guys would know who did.
NEW: A new coalition of Christian nationalist groups, the Remnant Alliance, is mobilizing congregations to take over Texas school boards. Several leaders of the coalition are members of the Council on National Policy.
The Remnant Alliance is an amalgam of independent organizations that share goals and sometimes personnel. Its political activism is framed as spiritual warfare against satanic evil in the pursuit of realizing the kingdom of God on earth.
According to @TaylorMatthewD, a scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies, the Charismatic Christian language of spiritual warfare has become a sort of lingua franca for the broader Christian nationalist movement, which is increasingly locally focused.
SCOOP: the Princeton school district in Collin County is considering a school voucher program in partnership with Texas Foundation for Education Rights, a nonprofit led by megadonor Monty Bennett—who donated thousands to the campaigns of two Princeton school board trustees.
1/
In addition to Bennett, other Texas Foundation for Education Rights board members include Chris Putnam. Putnam, in addition to being the finance committee chair for the Tarrant County GOP, is the current CEO of the Dallas Express, Bennett's right wing website.
2/
Aaron Harris, another Texas Foundation for Education Rights board member, is a longtime ally of Bennett. He and Bennet are on the board of Texans for Educational Reform, which previously tried to push a voucher scheme in Wimberly, per @Forrest4Trees.
I've seen no credible reporting of actual antisemitic incidents at the UT Austin protest. What I can tell you is that I've reported on numerous neo-Nazi events and Greg Abbott never once tried to put any of them in jail.
NEW: Early voting for some school board elections in TX starts today, including the Grapevine Colleyville school district where sitting board president Shannon Braun recently made a false police report claiming people who shared some of her old QAnon style posts faked them.
1/
Shannon Braun, a right wing school board trustee in the Grapevine Colleyville district who was elected with the help of big money PACs and GOP consultants, publicly claimed on April 6 that someone manufactured fake tweets and posted them on Facebook. But the tweets are real.
2/
Here's one of the tweets Grapevine Colleyville school board president Shannon Braun posted in response to a QAnon account on July 17, 2020. I was able to find it on Web Archive. It's a real post. Per the police report above, Braun admitted it's real.
I'm at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas where Gov. Greg Abbott is about to give the keynote address to the annual Young Conservatives of Texas convention. I guess they let anyone in here!
Despite the press advisory Gov. Greg Abbott sent out about his speech I'm the only member of the press here at the Young Conservatives of Texas convention where he's about to speak. The lighting on stage is terrible.
Abbott starts his speech by thanking Steve Munisteri, founder of YCT. "When he founded it...he got paid exactly zero...Now he gets to continue advancing those conservative values...inside the office of Governor of the great state of Texas and now he gets a big fat paycheck."