{"id":1287,"date":"2025-06-17T11:35:57","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T11:35:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/06\/17\/with-trumps-military-on-los-angeles-streets-tom-cottons-got-his-wish\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T11:35:57","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T11:35:57","slug":"with-trumps-military-on-los-angeles-streets-tom-cottons-got-his-wish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/06\/17\/with-trumps-military-on-los-angeles-streets-tom-cottons-got-his-wish\/","title":{"rendered":"With Trump\u2019s military on Los Angeles streets, Tom Cotton\u2019s got his wish"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Republican Senator Tom Cotton ought to be a happy MAGA-camper these days.<\/p>\n

The rebar-right American lawmaker took a controversial turn as a writer in 2020, publishing a provocative opinion piece in The New York Times that caused quite the stir.<\/p>\n

Cotton\u2019s column<\/a> came to mind because it seems that US President Donald Trump may not only have read the missive, but snipped it out of the newspaper for safekeeping and future inspiration.<\/p>\n

At the time, America was roiled by demonstrations in the raw residue of the murder of 46-year-old George Floyd \u2013 and the killing of other Black men and women \u2013 by police officers.<\/p>\n

Most of the rallies across a seething country were peaceful. But, in some places, the combustible mixture of grief, anger and frustration, coupled with columns of charging police wielding batons, stun guns, and tear gas, erupted into running battles. There were also reports of isolated looting.<\/p>\n

It was in this already incendiary context that Cotton lobbed his slightly more than 800-word grenade into the flammable mix \u2013 courtesy of America\u2019s so-called \u201cpaper of record\u201d.<\/p>\n

Cotton trotted out the usual hyperbolic cliches, claiming that several American cities were confronting \u201can orgy of violence,\u201d had been \u201cplunged \u2026 into anarchy,\u201d or \u201cdescended into lawlessness\u201d by \u201cbands\u201d of \u201cnihilistic criminals [and] cadres of left-wing radicals like antifa\u201d.<\/p>\n

Grim, apocalyptic-sounding stuff.<\/p>\n

Cotton\u2019s solution to the \u201corgy of violence\u201d was, of course, to invite even more violence.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne thing above all else will restore order to our streets: an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers,\u201d Cotton wrote.<\/p>\n

Citing precedent, history and the commander-in-chief\u2019s duty, Cotton argued that it was time for the president to send in the troops \u2013 the Marines, if necessary, as backup for the cops.<\/p>\n

Cotton\u2019s pernicious prescription to \u201crestore order\u201d in the face of a bourgeoning Black Lives Matter movement triggered a revolt at the Times and a sharp rebuke more broadly.<\/p>\n

After first defending the decision to post Cotton\u2019s commentary, the Times did<\/a> a careening volte face, insisting, belatedly, that it had not met the paper\u2019s editorial \u201cstandards\u201d.<\/p>\n

James Bennet, the Times\u2019s opinion editor, resigned.<\/p>\n

Trump watched the kerfuffle unfold, tweeting his support for the \u201cgreat senator\u201d from Arkansas and his \u201cexcellent Op-Ed\u201d.<\/p>\n

Five years later, it is clear that Trump has adopted Cotton\u2019s \u201cexcellent Op-Ed\u201d as his blunt blueprint to tame California and potentially other states where enlightened Americans are gathering to resist his brutish immigration raids and designs to use the military to suppress dissent.<\/p>\n

California Governor Gavin Newsom has accused<\/a> a \u201cderanged\u201d president of orchestrating<\/a> a \u201cmilitary dragnet\u201d across Los Angeles, America\u2019s second-largest city.<\/p>\n

Beyond his rhetorical broadsides, Newsom has asked a federal judge to stop the Trump administration from using the National Guard and Marines to bolster immigration raids \u2013 arguing it would only fuel tensions.<\/p>\n

Legality aside, Trump sent in the troops knowing that generations of Americans have long agreed with Senator Cotton \u2013 the use of \u201coverwhelming force\u201d to \u201ckeep the peace\u201d is a patriotic act to protect the republic from an ever-changing cast of \u201cagitators\u201d \u2013 citizen or not.<\/p>\n

Newsom\u2019s claim that Trump\u2019s gambit amounts to \u201cthe deranged fantasy of a dictatorial president\u201d misses the blatant point.<\/p>\n

The stubborn construction that Trump\u2019s edicts and conduct are the work of a \u201cmad\u201d president, realising his \u201cdictatorial fantasies\u201d, absolves millions of like-minded Americans who approve of what their industrious leader is doing in Los Angeles and throughout the United States.<\/p>\n

It is politically convenient and expedient for an ambitious politician considering running for president in 2028 to point an accusatory finger at one culprit, instead of a complicit nation.<\/p>\n

Recent polls show<\/a> that a good majority of Americans \u2013 largely Republicans \u2013 are cheering on Trump\u2019s draconian deportation orders since the alleged aim is, as Senator Cotton once wrote, \u201cto maintain public order and safety\u201d.<\/p>\n

I suspect that, despite the predictable \u201coutrage\u201d given full and ample vent across a variety of cable news networks, which air their derivative pantomimes day and night, Trump\u2019s popularity on immigration will perk up.<\/p>\n

It appears that a lot of Americans have preferred a performative \u201ctough guy\u201d who enjoys putting on a good show of official power or exercising his First Amendment rights, despite the lethal consequences, over voices encouraging caution and restraint.<\/p>\n

For evidence of this demonstrated fact, here is video<\/a> of an appearance last April by Kyle Rittenhouse on the campus of Kent State University.<\/p>\n

On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard opened<\/a> fire, unprovoked, on Kent State students, killing four and wounding nine others during an anti-Vietnam War protest. That same National Guard is patrolling the restive streets of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

Rittenhouse was invited to speak not despite the university\u2019s grim history, but because of it.<\/p>\n

His presence there was a deliberate provocation \u2013 an attempt to recast the memory of state-sanctioned violence not as a cautionary tale, but rather as a moment to be reinterpreted through the lens of righteous force and personal valour.<\/p>\n

Rittenhouse is known \u2013 exclusively \u2013 for shooting three men, killing two of them, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August 2020. A jury acquitted him of all charges, accepting his claim of self-defence.<\/p>\n

The three men were part of a large crowd condemning police brutality \u2013 and all three were shot by a teenager who appointed himself, like Trump and Cotton, as guardian of the streets.<\/p>\n

So, it is not surprising that Rittenhouse was embraced as a \u201chero\u201d by an enthusiastic, overflowing audience in a lecture hall.<\/p>\n

This is the country Trump and Cotton understand well: where \u201claw and order\u201d is preserved by theatrics and armed muscle, not fairness and temperance.<\/p>\n

The applause for Rittenhouse and the polls girding Trump are not outliers \u2013 they are proof that the appetite for raw authority is deep and durable.<\/p>\n

Trump has not hijacked America \u2013 he mirrors it.<\/p>\n

Cotton\u2019s column, Rittenhouse\u2019s celebrity, the martial display \u2013 none of it is an aberration. It reflects an attitude that celebrates domination and obedience, endorsing aggression so long as it is draped in self-preservation or framed as \u201cdefence\u201d.<\/p>\n

And far too many Americans are just fine with that.<\/p>\n

The views expressed in this article are the author\u2019s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera\u2019s editorial stance.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Republican Senator Tom Cotton ought to be a happy MAGA-camper these days. The rebar-right American lawmaker took a controversial turn as a writer in 2020, publishing a provocative opinion piece in The New York Times that caused quite the stir. Cotton\u2019s column came to mind because it seems that US President Donald Trump may not … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}