A Republican county committee in Idaho says it’s just trying to help one of its constituents get married. She happens to be an alt-right YouTuber who promotes “white genocide” theories, and she’s engaged to an Austrian white nationalist leader with alleged ties to the New Zealand mosque shooter.
The Kootenai County Republican Committee, representing the GOP in Idaho’s third-most-populous county, unanimously passed a resolution Monday to pressure the federal government to reinstate travel abilities for the Austrian fiancé, Martin Sellner, who leads the right-wing “Identitarian Movement Austria.” Sellner is engaged to Brittany Pettibone, an alt-right YouTuber who lives in the solidly-red county, and the two hope to wed in Idaho this summer.
Sellner says he lost his travel privileges after he was investigated by Austrian authorities following the two mosque shootings in Christchurch last month.
The Birchers, neo-confederates, nazis and neo-nazis, klansmen, and lost causers have always existed in American society, bubbling below the surface, every now and then belching up some noxious bile, but now that the Republican party has started to openly embrace them rather than just pander and dogwhisper to them, I don’t know how we put this genie back in the bottle. We’re going to be a majority minority nation with a petulant, armed, and violent minority causing problems for a century if we don’t crush this shit. There’s a reason these fuckers all worship Rhodesia and South Africa.
rikyrah
The only good Nazi is a dead one.
It amazes me that people have moved away from this.
I thought that it was all settled 1939-1945.
chopper
it’s definitely going to get worse before it gets better.
Baud
Why doesn’t she moved there?
TenguPhule
A match made in Hell. Or as we now call it, Tuesday.
rikyrah
@Baud:
One does wonder…
NobodySpecial
@Baud: They don’t speak English.
TenguPhule
Unfortunately we don’t get the third wish.
TenguPhule
@Baud:
The EU refused to let her in?
trollhattan
“We’re full.”
hitchhiker
As one of the twitter versions of God says, it would be great if the worst person in the world and the president of the USA were not the same guy.
It would be great if horrifying human beings had no power at all to do their horrifying things. This is just one more example, and I am dead sick of it. We can be done with Nazis! Somewhere between 70 and 85 million people died because of the war they started. What the actual fuck is wrong with people?
Raoul
Add to all this the layer of bullshit from people like Bari Weiss and Bret Stephens who bemoan the rise in anti-semitism, but for hideous ideological reasons and grossly obvious Islamophobia lay it at the feet of Ilhan Omar and other quotably misquotable Muslims, brown people and liberals.
misterpuff
Argentina is pretty this time of year.
And stay there.
germy
MelissaM
But they just want to get maaaarried! Why can’t you let them be haaaappy?
Idaho. Can we snapture the asshats out of there? Whose got some infinity stones?
Raoul
@rikyrah: 1945 may as well be 1492 in the living memory of too many on the earth now.
I was born in ’65, so WWII still seems like it’s within reach, as both of my parents were teens/young adults then, and my uncle and my grandfather fought in it. I heard stories from my parents about life during WWII. I worked for a time in London with a woman who was one of the child evacuees who was packed off to live on some random farm, separated from her parents for safekeeping from the Blitz. But younger generations aren’t likely to have that first-hand access any more (through no fault of theirs but the passage of time and the passing of a generation).
hells littlest angel
@Baud: It’s full of foreigners.
hells littlest angel
One good reason not to eat potatoes is all those calories. Another is fuck Idaho.
Duane
More like slime back under the rock. Realistically, governments that won’t pander, even embrace these hateful bastards would help.
Cacti
As noted above, history has shown that forceful pushback is the only way to defeat fascist movements.
That means be ready to fight in the literal sense, not the figurative one.
Villago Delenda Est
Thank you, Kootenai Republicans, for demonstrating conclusively that you are racist scum.
NotMax
Creep de coeur. Nothing stopping her from traveling, AFAIK.
Villago Delenda Est
@germy: Der Stürmer‘s publisher, Julius Streicher, was hanged at Nürnberg.
JaySinWA
@Baud:
Probably to escape his legal troubles. I am not sure how the Idaho white enclave project is coming, but there is at least one kind of immigration that the local Republicans support.
JaySinWA
@Villago Delenda Est: But they are in favor of young (white supremacist) love.
Yutsano
Wait…so the issue is that the EU won’t let him leave? What the fuck all does that have to do with the State Department? He’s not a US citizen. What the ever loving frack are they supposed to do?
Also: I know why they want to get married in the US, but the US does recognize European marriages. He just wants the spousal visa so he can spread bullshit under the First Amendment without running afoul of EU authorities. I see them.
EDIT: okay the article says that the US won’t let him in. Fine. She can haul her white butt to Austria where there’s more white folks who think like her.
NotMax
@Villago Delenda Est
Love is a many-delenda’d thing.
Or something.
;)
Sherparick
@rikyrah: Unfortunately, a lot of Nazis escaped destruction & the Conservative Movement became a safe incubator for these people the last 40 years.
mrmoshpotato
@Raoul: @rikyrah: It may be a somewhat distant event, but anyone who paid attention during world history class can’t help going “WTF? Wasn’t this question answered back in May and September of ’45?”
WhatsMyNym
@Raoul:
I was born just before you and my uncle was killed fighting German soldiers in 1940. It was not that long ago.
trollhattan
Took some small comfort in Spain not reanimating and reinstating Franco last week. However, their far right Vox party has been given life, so need watching like a hawk.
WhatsMyNym
@hells littlest angel:
We grow potatoes in Washington too!
Villago Delenda Est
@Raoul: Three of my uncles fought in the ETO and my dad was in the Pacific, so it’s close to me, too, even though I was born 12 years after the fighting stopped.
ruemara
@germy: I hope she bankrupts them utterly. I want them in the streets.
And regarding the lovebirds mentioned in the op, I hope they find a solution that involved mutual drinking of bleach. Let’s call it “The Romeo”.
NotMax
@WhatsMyNym
Approximately four generations’ passage of time is relatively far back. Roughly speaking, as far removed from today as the Civil War was during WW2, as far removed from the Revolution as was the Civil War.
The passage of time, however, ought not dim and dilute the lessons learned as severely as appears to be happening.
trollhattan
O/T Get a load of the funny looking dog poking his head out of the CHP cruiser.
Duane
@mrmoshpotato: They know the history.They learned the wrong lessons. Lots of “Hitler was bad but….” thinking out there.
Re-education programs might help. Seem more humane than some alternatives.
mrmoshpotato
@trollhattan: I’m sure it politely asked the police the entire ride why it was in their back seat.
WhatsMyNym
@NotMax:
Your family must have children at a young age – it’s been only 74 years since the end of WW2
TenguPhule
@NotMax:
Republicans worked very hard to ensure that all the wicks in the lamps of truth were quietly snuffed out.
Ignorance has always been their strength.
TenguPhule
@WhatsMyNym:
20 years is an average generation.
scav
They’re enough “white” “working class” ‘merkans who could fulfill — if are not actively seeking — active employment as supremicist agitators. Don’t need to import any,
TenguPhule
@Duane:
They believe the good guys lost.
TenguPhule
@scav:
Foreigners coming to take their jobs? //
Martin
@rikyrah:
Nah. We’ve been in a racial cold war since June 19, 1865. It heated up in the 60s and at a few points before then, then cooled down, now heating up again.
scav
@TenguPhule: Well, it’s alas not one of the jobs ‘merkans won’t do.
Barry
Yutsano: “Wait…so the issue is that the EU won’t let him leave? What the fuck all does that have to do with the State Department? He’s not a US citizen. What the ever loving frack are they supposed to do?”
I’ll lay dollars to donuts that the problem for him is that he can’t get a visa to enter the USA. In which case (a) he can enter illegally, or (b) she can leave the USA (hopefully never to return).
Yutsano
@WhatsMyNym: Fun fact: Washington grows more Idaho potatoes than Idaho does. Gotta love brand names.
Aleta
OT, Daily Beast
Wjs
Hard to believe a white nationalist would have 145, 000 Twitter followers in this day and age…
Oh, right.
Yutsano
@Barry: Technically, he doesn’t need a visa to enter the US. The US and the EU are part of the no visa compact. But that’s not the same as a do not enter list. Granted there would be nothing keeping him from getting a good fake passport and entering the US illegally. At least until the wedding when his real name hits the county records and shows up.
The Moar You Know
@Barry: Hey! They’re tryin’ to pull one of them chain migration scams the Preznit warned us about!
Cacti
@Yutsano:
Eastern WA is pretty much West Idaho culturally.
Nelle
@TenguPhule: I’m out of the law of averages by a long shot. My grandfather was born in 1863 and grandmother in 1872. My father in 1912. I was born in 1951, and my son in 1990.
NotMax
@WhatsMyNym
This September it will be 80 years since the war’s beginning. ~20 years (plus or minus a few depending on who is doing the defining) is a generally acknowledged marker of a generation.
Also, full disclosure: My father was in the Seabees during WW2.
raven
@NotMax: So was my FIL.
oatler.
@Cacti: Every bit outside every city is. I lived in southern OR and anywhere you saw greenery there was a “UN OUT OF US” sign as well as shave-skulled meth addicts.
SRW1
@Yutsano:
The EU has nothing to do with baring someone to leave or enter its territory. That is on the individual member countries themselves. Mr Sellner is in trouble with the Austrian authorities after they discovered that the ‘Identitarian Movement took money from the NZ shooter.
Aleta
Software engineer Brianna Wu wrote about w supre -ists and 8 cha a few days ago. (She’s now running in MA District 8 for US House in 2020. She lost the 2018 primary to Lynch.)
(edited to avoid moderation)
NotMax
@raven
What are the chances one of them knew Kevin Bacon’s father, who was also in the Navy then, aboard the USS Shoshone?
:)
TenguPhule
At Trump golf course, undocumented employees said they were sometimes told to work extra hours without pay
This is my surprised face. : |
Its snakes all the way down.
MomSense
@hells littlest angel:
Do you have something against Maine potatoes?
ruemara
@Aleta: Is this an article or from her twitter feed?
Mo MacArbie
@Barry: Isn’t “dollars to doughnuts” pretty much the going rate now? I think I can get better action for my pastry elsewhere. //
Kay
@TenguPhule:
Wage theft lawsuits are actually effective – ordinary people can bring them. They should sue the Trumps for the pay that was stolen from them. It sends a message to white collar criminals.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Cacti:
Thank you – this is the point that “principled civil libertarians” are either naive about (or in the case of Greenwald, deliberately, maliciously misleading about).
If you’re dedicated to the oppression of people based on racial, ethnic or gender status, that jump to senseless violence is a hair’s width away. The provision of rhetorical space in the public realm simply allows them to gather the like-minded and harden the sympathetic; it doesn’t cause epiphanies.
NotMax
@MomSense
When was a kidlet there were still lots of potato farms on Long Island, some within ready bicycling distance of the home base.
TenguPhule
@MomSense:
Susan Collins?
jamey
The only thing that could make this better is if they sued a gay Jewish baker for not making their wedding cake.
TenguPhule
@Kay: I’m just disgusted that this didn’t get reported earlier. Like in 2015. Or 2016. When it mattered.
Trump doesn’t even try very hard to hide the fact he’s a fucking crook. All it takes are a few light pokes through the facade and there are crimes galore all over the place.
NotMax
@NotMax
Per Wikipedia, the Shoshone’s initial deployment with a full load of cargo and troops was from Maui. So the degrees of separation from Kevin Bacon are lessened.
;)
NotMax
@TenguPhule
A thousand points of blight.
;)
(Far more than a thousand, but you get the idea.)
Immanentize
@Aleta: People have to run where they live, but I will be very surprised if she can beat Lynch in 2020 if she couldn’t in 2018.
MomSense
@NotMax:
My grandfather used to pay is a penny for each potato beetle we picked and killed. He gave us each little mason jars with a half finger of kerosene in them. We would drop the beetles in to their doom!
I don’t think he expected us to be so motivated because he decided it was cheaper to take us all out for ice cream. We were out there picking beetles from sun up to sun down.
JPL
@trollhattan: That was so cute and I’m pleased the pup is okay. Everyone needs some happy news.
Roger Moore
I’m starting to think this is also a reason they are so interested in Israel. They may be antisemites, but they recognize an effective Apartheid government when they see it.
Jay
@Kay:
The story notes that he’s an “undocumented worker”, so fileing a lawsuit or complaint with Labour Relations would get him deported.
That’s why they hire undocumented workers and temporary visa holders, so they can be used, abused, cheated and deported.
Brachiator
@mrmoshpotato:
I recall seeing comments about the recent Wonder Woman movie where people thought the trench warfare scenes took place during World War 2. To some young people, both World Wars are ancient history, or at best, the setting for a video game.
Roger Moore
@Kay:
If any of Trump’s undocumented employees tries to sue him, you can bet your last dollar ICE will show up at the courthouse to arrest them and have them deported. Denying undocumented immigrants access to redress through the courts is one of the major goals of anti-immigrant people. They don’t really oppose immigration; they just want immigrants to remain powerless and compliant.
NotMax
@MomSense
Beetlemania!
:)
rikyrah
Well, this is frightening ??
https://twitter.com/fordm/status/1123043476562743296
Yutsano
@Roger Moore: To be fair, the evangelical interest in Israel has existed since its founding. The coming End of Days requires the Jews to be restored to Israel. The more the Israelis try to purify their population the more excited they get. But the hardcore racists can look past a little anti-Semitism when it comes to those that share their ideas.
Roger Moore
@rikyrah:
Apparently, though, one should take Indonesia’s threats to move their capital with a kilo or two of salt. Promises to move out of Jakarta have been a staple of every administration for a good long time, and none of them have done it.
Yutsano
@MomSense: Isn’t that still cheaper than pesticide?
mrmoshpotato
@rikyrah: Lizard people/pod people/Loch Ness monster/Chtulu hoax!
NotMax
@Yutsano
Regardless of cost, much more preferable to take the tykes out for ice cream than for pesticide.
:)
MomSense
@Yutsano:
Especially with child labor! They had an organic farm so no spraying. I actually think there are some cancer clusters on Long Island (Montauk?) because of the pesticides they sprayed on potato fields there.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
When a wee lad all the dads had fought in WWII and/or Korea. Grampas and Real Old Guys fought in WWI. Simple!
RAVEN
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: NY AG is investigating. Some of the workers have sued him, I don’t know exactly for what, though.
trollhattan
@RAVEN:
The open letter from his family is heartbreaking.
trollhattan
@NotMax:
Sharpie note on hand: “Do NOT get them confused, again.”
Jay
““At this point, given all we know about how extremists organize across platforms, there’s no excuse for Facebook,” Ryan said. “Facebook still sees this as a PR problem and not a human lives problem. They have to be shamed to enforce their own policies. Until they actually see this as a human-centered problem, they’re always going to be reacting instead of working to stop these things from happening.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/synagogue-shooting-unfolded-extremists-congregated-facebook-page-connected-gunman-n999856?
NotMax
Apoplexy on the menu.
rikyrah
???
Mr. Weeks ?? (@MrDane1982) Tweeted:
Bernie Sanders has been an elected official since 1981, claim to be Civil Rights activist since the 1960s yet he hasn’t hired anyone of color until Aug 2015 when he realized thr Black vote is important to winning the Democratic party presidential nomination. This is problematic. https://twitter.com/MrDane1982/status/1123348355994783750?s=17
rikyrah
???
Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) Tweeted:
Sen ERNST on Stephen Moore: “No, he does not have the votes.”
“He would not have enough votes. Don’t bother sending (the nomination) up, that’s all I gotta say,” she says. https://twitter.com/frankthorp/status/1123353275858849794?s=17
Omnes Omnibus
@mrmoshpotato: 1933.
rikyrah
chris evans (@notcapnamerica) Tweeted:
Biden’s climbing.
Bernie is collapsing.
It’s only April 2019.
Bernie has 100% name recognition and no room to gain new voters.
They are having meltdowns.
It will only get worse, and they don’t care if their tantrums re-elect Trump. https://twitter.com/notcapnamerica/status/1123356117294362624?s=17
TenguPhule
@NotMax:
Someone was obviously very upset and decided to express it.
Jay
On the bright side, once the lights were turned on, all the Nazi Enabling ReThug Idaho Cockroaches scuttled away and hid under their rocks,
https://www.wonkette.com/idaho-republicans-very-sad-for-lovelorn-austrian-nazi-and-us-sweetheart
trollhattan
@rikyrah:
Imagine this, spoken in the Bernie voice: “I try, believe me, to hire minority staffers but we’re still looking for candidates living in Vermont. That’s why we have to dismantle the Democratic Party establishment!”
dr. luba
@NotMax: I’d always heard it was 25 years for a generation. Apparently I was wrong. From an ancestry site:
Cacti
@rikyrah:
Both Biden and Warren seem to have taken a bite from Wilmer’s support.
If they can get him to crash and burn in Iowa and New Hampshire, Wilmer likely never recovers.
Omnes Omnibus
@dr. luba: But that is Canadian years. Aren’t they about 75% of American years?
NotMax
@dr. luba
The fluidity of description is one reason I was careful to write “approximately four generations” above.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
IIRC Thomas Jefferson defined a generation as being 19 years.
Roger Moore
@dr. luba:
My suspicion is that the “25 years to a generation” rule of thumb was based on looking at prestigious families like monarchs. That would result in a relatively short time estimate because you’d be looking only at the oldest surviving son rather than the average one.
Amir Khalid
@NobodySpecial:
She’s engaged to a German-speaker. You’d think she’d have considered learning the language at some point. It’s not hard for an Anglophone.
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Q: How can you tell it’s an Anglophone?
A: The H has been dropped from the dial.
:)
Another Scott
@Roger Moore: (Not picking on you; this just seems a convenient place to comment.)
I never realized there was any controversy about what a “generation” is. It’s pretty clear if one is talking about, say, fruit flies – it’s the average age of a female when she reproduces for the first time.
Or, the average maternal age:
Cheers,
Scott.
Ksmiami
A syllogism-
All Nazis are evil
Most Republicans are Nazis
Most Republicans are evil
Sloegin
Nazis in Northern Idaho? GTFO! I grew up right off the last exit before you hit Idaho on the Washington side. I remember seeing burning crosses up in the hills on the Idaho side as a wee lad and asking my folks about them; they told me ‘devil worshippers’ were up in the hills (rather than trying to explain white supremacy, racism, and all of the other ills of this country to an 8 year old.) I’m 54 now, and I’m starting to think ‘devil worshippers’ wasn’t really that bad an answer.
Kent
@Raoul:
WWII is as far in the past today as the Civil War was for those living in 1945.
Likewise, the Vietnam war is further in the past today, than WWI was for those living in during the peak of the war in 1968.
And there are very few HS students who were alive during 9-11, and few college students who have any living memory of the event. My daughter is a college junior. She had just turned 3 years old when 9-11 happened and remembers nothing of it.
Time marches on.
Kent
@rikyrah:
OFFS…
At this point in the 2004 election cycle Joe Lieberman was leading the polls and Dick Gephardt was in 2nd. At least according to Pod Save America. We are a LONG way until the first votes start happening. We are even a long way until the first debates.
Dr Ronnie James DO
The Rhodesia and apartheid era South African flag on Roof’s jacket remind me of a Rand Paul nut job who used to live in my neighborhood and rocked the Star and Bars on his car IN PHILADELPHIA – he no doubt chickened out of the Confederate battle flag, saving himself a few beatings. But hey, if bunch of failures want to valorize failed states, let ‘EM.