Bengaluru: Congress would be uprooted from the country if the devotees of Lord Hanuman rebelled against it, Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said on Tuesday.
Reacting to the release of the Congress manifesto, in which the party announced it would ban organisations such as Bajrang Dal and Popular Front of India, Bommai also said it was improper for the Congress to draw parallels between Bajrang Dal and Popular Front of India.
“The devotees of Lord Hanuman are the Bajrangis of Bajrang Dal and the Congress Party has announced in its election manifesto that it would ban the Bajrang Dal. If the devotees of Lord Hanuman rebel, then the Congress will be uprooted from the country,” Bommai’s office quoted him as saying in a statement.
Bommai was speaking at a road show at Navalgund in Dharwad, where the party has fielded its candidate Shankar Patil Munenakoppa.
Later, talking to reporters, Bommai said the Congress would not come to power and the question of banning Bajrang Dal would not rise.
“However, such promises show their (Congress) policy. The Bajrang Dal is a social and religious service association. PFI has done work against the country, indulged in terror activities and there are many cases and evidences against them. Hence, it is not proper to compare PFI with Bajrang Dal. Already PFI has been banned,” he said.
He said there was no question of banning the Bajrang Dal because state governments did not have the power to ban any organisation. Only Centre could do it.
Bommai also called the Congress manifesto a way to mislead people.
Fox News has finally broken ties with its most popular star, Tucker Carlson. His ousting has been bemoaned by some commentators, who have taken Carlson to be a rebellious anti-war populist, evading easy political characterization. But is it really so complicated to classify Carlson’s political ideology?
In late February 2022, then Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson, in the face of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, began a pro-Russia monologue urging his audience to ask themselves the question: “Why do I hate Putin so much?” The gist of Carlson’s comments about Russia’s leader is that Putin should not be regarded as an enemy. Instead, the real enemies of America are those who call white Americans racist, those who teach so-called critical race theory in schools, business elites who ship jobs abroad, and those who imposed Covid lockdowns on the United States.
In short, Carlson urged, the real enemies of America are internal – racial minorities, doctors and politicians, professors and educators, and large corporations who shift jobs to other countries. Carlson has been resolutely against US support for Ukraine. Insofar as Carlson has since that point gone to war, it has rather been against these supposed internal enemies.
So, is Tucker Carlson hard to classify? On the one hand, he spreads tropes central to neo-Nazi propaganda, such as “white replacement” theory, suggesting that leftist elites seek to replace “legacy Americans” by foreign non-white immigrants. On the other hand, he denounces media, intellectual and political elites, as well as US intervention in Ukraine, platforming those who identify as the “anti-war left”, such as Jimmy Dore. How should we best understand this set of views? If Carlson has fascist sympathies, as do, quite inarguably, many of those who applaud him, how do we understand his firm stance against US military and financial support for Ukraine? Surely, historically speaking, fascism is not compatible with the isolationist position Carlson has urged.
We should look to history as our guide here. But the history that best informs us in this case is not European history, but American history. Before the beginning of the second world war, all of America’s pro-fascist parties opposed US intervention on the side of its allies against Nazi Germany. Often, the opposition to the US supporting Britain against Nazi Germany was represented as “isolationism”.
There were openly fascist organizations during this time, such as the German American Bund. Somewhat more ambiguous was the America First movement. As the historian Bradley Hart recounts, in a packed America First rally in Madison Square Garden in 1941, the Montana senator Burton K Wheeler denounced “jingoistic journalists and saber-rattling bankers” who were pushing the nation into war against Germany.
While the agenda of some members of the America First movement at the time might have genuinely been pacifist, it’s quite clear that the main agenda was in fact support for Hitler. The America First movement had strong support from American fascist movements of various stripes. Its most prominent spokesperson, Charles Lindbergh, published the following words in support of his anti-war position in an essay entitled “Geography, Aviation, and Race” in Reader’s Digest in 1939:
… It is time to turn from our quarrels and to build our White ramparts again. This alliance with foreign races means nothing but death to us. It is our turn to guard our heritage from Mongol and Persian and Moor, before we become engulfed in a limitless foreign sea. Our civilization depends on a united strength among ourselves; on strength too great for foreign enemies to challenge; on a Western Wall of race and arms which can hold back either a Genghis Khan or the infiltration of inferior blood; on an English fleet, a German air force, a French army, an American nation, standing together as guardians of our common heritage, sharing strength, dividing influence.
It is simply inarguable fact that American racial fascism has a clear isolationist tradition, especially when the wars in question are against fascist opponents.
But is Putin’s Russia fascist? In Russia, opposition politicians and journalists are regularly imprisoned or murdered. Russia has passed harsh laws against LGBTQ+ communities. Russia’s ideology is based on a militarized Russian nationalism, and its war against Ukraine is quite clearly genocidal in nature. Just as Nazi Germany represented itself as the defender of Christianity and Europe’s classic traditions against an existential threat posed by leftist atheist Jews, Putin represents Russia as the sole defender of the European Christian traditions against similar existential threats, such as “gender ideology”.
Putin’s Russia is the international leader of the global far right, promoting ultra-nationalism, religious traditionalism and anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment across the world. If Russia is not fascist, then even Nazi Germany in the 1930s was not fascist. As the historian Timothy Snyder has urged, “we should finally say it”: Russia is fascist.
Just as claims to be isolationists by American inter-war fascists were quite rightly taken to be expressions of support for Nazi ideology, there is good reason to take Carlson’s similar claims not as denunciations of American militarism but as expressions of support for Putinism, which he seems largely to share.
What about Carlson’s scorn for the media, intellectual, financial and political elite, which he lacerates with regularity on his show? Here too there is little ambiguity. Carlson does not scorn all elites – after all, he himself was making as much as $20m a year from Fox news. He only targets certain elites. In the ideology of American fascism, the elites he targets are associated with liberal democracy and Jewish control.
American fascists have always denounced the media, intellectuals and politicians. Carlson is careful to avoid explicitly antisemitic statements. But his show is the home of anti-Soros conspiracy theories. The antisemitism in his programming is clearly dog-whistled, and Jewish organizations have been among the first to cheer his ousting. Indeed, if Carlson did not regularly denounce media, intellectual, financial and political elites, regular targets of Nazi ideology, the case for calling him an American fascist would be much less clear.
Nazi ideology supported strict gender roles – one of the central targets of the first mass Nazi book burning on 10 May 1933 was Magnus Hirschfeld’s collection of LGBTQ+ literature, the largest in the world and the largest documentation of gender fluidity (Hirschfeld coined the term “transsexual”). Carlson has used his platform to denounce transgender Americans as existential threats to Christianity. Fascists target cosmopolitan ways as existential threats to masculinity – a viewpoint Carlson also clearly shares.
Finally, fascism praises violence against democracy, valorizing violent street mobs attacking democratic processes and institutions as martyrs to the nation. Here too Tucker Carlson fits perfectly into the tradition.
It is not difficult at all to classify Tucker Carlson’s political ideology. He is an American fascist, only the latest in a long historical line.
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
Bengaluru: JD(S) leader H. D. Kumaraswamy on Saturday called upon the people of Karnataka to oppose the move to sell Amul milk in the state.
“Amul is being pushed into Karnataka from backdoor with the support of the Central government. The Amul is strangulating the Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) and the farmers. Kannada people should rebel against Amul,” Kumaraswamy, the former chief minister, stated.
“We as Kannadigas should oppose Amul and protect the interest of Karnataka farmers unitedly. Our people and customers should use Nandini products on priority and save the livelihood of farmers,” he stated.
The Karnataka government had allotted a big plot to Amul in Koramangala of Bengaluru for cheap price. When the government here had shown such a magnanimous gesture, Amul is “conspiring” against milk producers and KMF, he charged.
Amul had to be obligated to as during the tenure of former Prime Minister Deve Gowda, special ice cream unit was established in Yelahanka and KMF is till date producing large quantity of ice cream for Amul, Kumaraswamy maintained.
It is very clear that BJP’s double engine government is planning to push milk producers to streets and “enslave” them to people of Gujarat. The “suspicious silence” of the Karnataka BJP government and KMF has led to many suspicions, Kumaraswamy stated.
Amul is planning to give competition to Nandini which is not required and weaken Nandini brand. The “unhealthy” competition between two cooperatives is uncalled for, he said.
“The Amul management is bent on finishing off Kannadigas and KMF. Amul wants to stop its only competitor Nandini on its own turf. One nation, one Amul, one milk , one Gujarat seems to be the official stand of the Central government,” Kumaraswamy alleged.
Moscow: Warning Ukraine and NATO against an “provocation” in the Moldovan breakaway region of Transnistria, Russia on Friday said that any action that poses a threat to Russian peacekeepers or nationals there will be seen as an attack on Russia.
In a statement on Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry, citing data from the Defence Ministry that Ukraine has amassed considerable numbers of military personnel, as well as hardware and artillery on its border with Transnistria, warned the “US, NATO member states and their Ukrainian underlings against any further adventurous steps”, RT reported.
While Russia favours “political-diplomatic” ways of resolving issues, “no one should have any doubt that the Russian armed forces will react appropriately to any provocation by the Kiev regime,” the statement read.
It stressed that it is determined to protect its citizens, peacekeepers, and military personnel stationed in Moldova’s breakaway region, and any actions posing a threat to their security will be viewed, according to international law, as an attack against the Russian Federation.
The report of a Ukrainian military buildup along the country’s border with Transnistria was issued by the Russian Defence Ministry on Thursday.
The territory on the left bank of the Dniester River proclaimed independence from Moldova in the early 1990s, shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Around 1,100 Russian soldiers are stationed in Transnistria as peacekeepers in order to monitor a 1992 ceasefire between Moldovan and local forces.
Amaravati: Rebel MLA of Andhra Pradesh’s ruling YSR Congress Party (YSRCP), Kotam Sridhar Reddy has complained to the Union Home Ministry about phone tapping.
The MLA from Nellore Rural constituency, who raised a banner of revolt against the party with the allegation of phone tapping, said on Wednesday that he has written a letter to the Union Home Ministry, seeking a probe.
He said after getting an appointment, he would visit Delhi and personally meet home ministry officials to submit the details.
Sridhar Reddy said ever since he stated that his phone was being tapped, ministers and YSRCP leaders started criticising him. He alleged that he was receiving threatening calls.
Alleging that false cases were being booked against him, the MLA said he was not afraid of cases and was determined to continue his fight without bothering about the consequences.
The MLA reiterated that his phone tapping started after he raised people’s issues and spoke about roads, drinking water and other civic problems in his constituency.
He had earlier stated that phone tapping was not possible without orders from the chief minister.
He claimed that four months ago an Indian Police Service (IPS) official had told him that his phone was being tapped but he did not believe this as he was not indulging in any illegal business or anti-party activity. He said he later found evidence of his phone being tapped.
Sridhar Reddy also made it clear that he would not stay in the party where he was looked with suspicion.
YSRCP leaders have dismissed the allegation of Sridhar Reddy and claimed that he was trying to join Telugu Desam Party (TDP).
Amaravati: Nellore rural MLA Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy, who has raised the banner of revolt against the ruling YSR Congress Party (YSRCP), alleged on Sunday that though he has been receiving threatening phone calls, the government has scaled down his security.
The MLA, who created a sensation recently by alleging that his phones were being tapped, said his security was scaled with orders from the top.
Sridhar Reddy said the government had given him four gunmen (security guards) and on Saturday it issued orders to take back two of them.
He said the gunmen were taken back to mentally harass him. He said ever since he spoke about phone tapping he had been receiving threatening phone calls.
“In this situation, I need additional security but even the existing security was withdrawn. This would not have been done without orders from the top,” he said
“The government took back two gunmen but I am surrendering the remaining two as a gift to it. I am not afraid of anybody. I will go around alone,” he said.
Sridhar Reddy said he was not afraid of threats or false cases being booked against him.
The police had Saturday booked Sridhar Reddy and two others with the alleged kidnapping of a ruling YSRC corporator and attempting to compel him into resigning from the party.
A case was registered against them for trespassing into the home and kidnapping M. Vijayabhaskar Reddy, a corporator of Nellore city, with criminal intent.
The ruling party corporator, in his complaint, said Kotamreddy tried to persuade him to leave YSRCP and join him. When he refused, the corporator alleged, one of the MLA’s followers, along with driver Ankaiah, intimidated and abducted him from the Padarupalli area on Friday between 2.30 p.m. and 3 p.m. and took him to the MLA. The corporator stated that he, however, managed to flee and filed a case against the MLA at Vedayapalem police station.
However, Sridhar Reddy clarified that he went to corporator Vijayabhaskar’s house to talk to him. For that, a kidnapping case has been filed against him.
On Saturday, an audio tape of a phone call between Sridhar Reddy and one Borugadda Anil went viral on social media. In the audio, Anil warns the MLA to be careful in his public speeches regarding the YSRCP chief. Anil is heard threatening the MLA that he (Sridhar Reddy) and his brother would be chained to a vehicle and dragged through the streets of Nellore if they continue to criticise Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy and YSRCP party leaders.
