America's Beer Hall Putsch
Will Kristallnacht be Far Behind?
by Tamara Baker

Saturday, Nov. 25, 2000 -- SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA (AmpolNS) -- Well, it finally happened: America's very own Beer Hall Putsch. 

Fittingly, it happened in Florida, at the hands of America's very own Nazis,  the Stormfront white-power advocates -- and their allies, the Neo-Confederates and the anti-Castro 'Los Cobardes' (the cowards), who are brave in the daylight only when they are part of a mindless, violent mob.

CNN's Bill Schneider described Wednesday's putsch, while it was happening, as a 'near riot'.

Remove the word 'near' you have the truth.

Hundreds of violent thugs, their minds (or what passed for them) intent on snuffing out democracy, frightened the Miami-Dade canvassing board so much that they scared them right out of doing their duties as citizens. The cops, many of whom are themselves either white-supremacist sympathizers or members of 'Los Cobardes', refused to step in to protect the canvassing board. And, if the Gore team cannot find a court willing to force the Miami-Dade board to buy a collective spine, the mob will have won.

As the Gore campaign's brief to the Florida Supreme Court noted, "Democratic personnel were physically assaulted within yards of the vote counting while in the lobby below prominent Republicans launched vituperative attacks on the Canvassing Board members and its staff.''

This is what the Republicans call the rule of law, folks. 

The same bullying tactics have been at work across the country, though the violence has been more rhetorical than that shown in Miami. We've had Norman Schwarzkopf giving in to the same temptation that the great Marine General Smedley Butler squarely rejected nearly seventy years ago: trying to incite the troops he used to lead in battle to turn on their own elected officials and institute a military coup. We've had Montana Governor Marc Racicot all but urge his fellow militia members to rise up and bomb more Federal Buildings à la Oklahoma City. And of course, we've had the Bushies obfuscating 24/7 about everything from absentee ballots to the state of Dick Cheney's health. 

The Bushies have, through their incredibly inflammatory rhetoric, frightened more than the Miami-Dade canvassing board: even nominal Democrats like Doris Kearns Goodwin, who really should know better, are in full appeasement mode right now, whimpering that we should let Bush's handlers steal the White House because otherwise they'll go blow up a few more day care centers and post offices.

Memo to Doris Kearns Goodwin: Appeasing Nazis doesn't work. Neville Chamberlain learned this the hard way in 1939. If we give in to them now, we won't be getting our country back any time soon -- if ever. The lights will be going out on American democracy, perhaps forever.