MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan implored his viewers not to normalize Donald Trump's veiled calls for violence.
There has been an ongoing debate about giving Trump attention when he issues calls for protests, uprisings, or his allies' calls for outright civil war. Hasan doesn't care if Trump ends up getting more attention. He explained, political violence must be denounced, even if the Republican Party won't do it.
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"I mean, can you imagine if any other presidential candidate in recent decades, [George W.] Bush, [Barack] Obama, [Bill] Clinton, [Mitt] Romney, [Joe] Biden had multiple supporters using their candidates language, being violent and threatening, getting killed by law enforcement while attempting violent crimes?" he asked at the top of his Sunday show. "Those candidates' campaigns would have been over before they began. But with Trump, we shrug. We accept it as just the way things are now. We should not. We cannot. We have to call it out. We have to condemn the violence and the incitement of violence. We have to take steps to prevent it from escalating out of all control. The threat of civil war of domestic conflict is no longer hyperbole. And so we just cannot afford to normalize political violence, and the threat of political violence in this country just because Donald Trump benefits from it and the Republican Party seems totally fine with it."
Barbara F. Walter, author of "How Civil Wars Start" penned an op-ed in The Guardian warning that the United States is a lot closer to such a conflict than the world seems willing to acknowledge.
Speaking to Hasan, she explained that most internal wars aren't like the U.S. civil war in the mid-1800s with two powerful armies attacking each other.
"In fact, the majority of civil wars, especially in the 21st century, or more, are what we call insurgencies," she said. "They are unconventional wars fought by multiple different militias. They use terrorism tactics. They don't try to engage the military. Instead, they take violence off into civilians, opposition leaders and judges who might be sympathetic with the opposition. That is the norm for civil wars, and we have been seeing an uptick in this type of violence for a number of years."
She went on to say that when people hear about attacks being "portrayed in the media as idiosyncratic or isolated or the result of someone who is unhinged or a bit crazy," they likely aren't as isolated as thought.
"Most of them since 2008 have been part of the far-right, and they are often times targeting minorities: African Americans, Latinos and Jews," she said.
Walter also said that most people understand who starts such wars and they're not the everyday working person. They typically are those who can afford financially and professionally to rebel.
See the conversation in the video below or at the link here.
Hasan assails Trump's veiled calls for civil war and political violence: 'It's no longer hyperbole'www.youtube.com
