The “Other” Violence Against Biden

To be fair, I was already aware of what the New York Times was talking about before I read its headline.

Hours After Biden Inauguration, Federal Agents Use Tear Gas in Portland

Did federal agents go off on some random gassing spree in Portlandia? Not quite.

Protesters who spent months in the streets over racial injustice and inequality said they don’t expect immediate change from President Biden, who they declared “will not save us.”

No, they aren’t insurrectionists, as they did not attempt to breach the Capitol and prevent Congress from performing its duty. But no, they weren’t quite protesters either, not that the Times concerns itself with such nuance.

Protesters in the Pacific Northwest smashed windows at a Democratic Party headquarters, marched through the streets and burned an American flag on Wednesday in a strident challenge by antifascist and racial-justice protesters to the new administration of President Biden, whose promised reforms, they declared, “won’t save us.”

There was grave concern about violence by crazed Trump supporters at Biden’s inauguration. It didn’t happen. Not in Washington. Not in state capitols. Nowhere. Instead, it was a lovely American experience, highlighted by the radiant Amanda Gorman, our Poet Laureate. I thought we had dodged a bullet, literally, as the day’s glorious traditions of the transfer of power to a new regime demonstrated that democracy survived.

But the concern expressed here numerous times, that while the left wing of the Democratic Party, and the radical left that considers the Dems reactionary conservatives, might do whatever they can to make sure Trump loses, they are not Biden supporters, or supporters of the Democratic Party. They just hate Trump more than Biden. But once he’s gone, they will turn their attention to Joe.

Their complaint, that Biden “won’t save us,” is certainly correct. He’s not the president of anarchy, but of the United States. And that isn’t close to being good enough for the rioters of Portlandia.

In Seattle, about 150 people marched through the streets. Some spray-painted buildings with an anarchist symbol and broke windows, including at a federal courthouse. They chanted both anti-Trump and anti-Biden slogans.

First, they trashed the new locus of evil, the Democratic Party headquarters. Then they went after the federal courthouse, which has seen its share of attacks. That New York Times tear-gassing headline omitted these little details. Maybe it was just to give the new administration a honeymoon before admitting that it needs to look both right and left before crossing the street.

One member of the group handed out fliers to people on the street that said, “Biden won! And so did corporate elites!” The fliers explained that a “Democratic administration is not a victory for oppressed people” and that “Biden will not save us.”

“I came out here because no matter what happens, Biden and Kamala aren’t enough,” said one of the protesters, Alejandro Quezada Brom, 28, referring to Vice President Kamala Harris. He said the new president needs to know that “the pressure’s not off” for progress on immigration and policing reforms.

When Trump was president, it was all his fault. Now that there is a new president, it’s all Biden’s fault. And the ongoing “mostly peaceful” riots are now Biden’s problem. They may not hate him as much as Trump, but they still hate him (and his trusty sidekick, Kamala the Cop). No amount of Executive Orders will change this, unless they dissolve the Union and close up shop.

Even as the crazy Trump cultists are disavowing him as a weak cuck for leaving the White House, there are similarly crazy and violent people from Biden’s left to take their place, and there is nothing, no progressive agenda, no stentorian proclamation that gravity will be rescinded in furtherance of racial justice, that will make angry Portlandians dressed in black stop hating Joe Biden now that Trump is gone.