Op-Ed: Bolshevism Comes To Pocatello

For a year and a half now, I have been writing about the postmodern invasion of American society.  I often use terms like neo-Marxism to describe this invasion.  This postmodern invasion isn’t the in-your-face/fly the hammer and sickle you often see from groups like AntiFa or Black Lives Matter.  It’s a more subtle and subversive cultural movement that controls people with public shame and derision, similar to the social credit system of the Communist Party of China.  Now, this cultural movement is taking root right here in Pocatello.

For several years now, I have watched the unending drama unfold between the executive management of the City of Pocatello and its City Council.  In full discretion, I live outside of the city limits, and so even though my wife runs a business within city limits and pays city taxes, we do not get a say in how they run their operations.  I have generally ignored the city administration drama that headlines local papers.  However, the latest drama has caught my attention, and it deserves a response.

Several current Pocatello City Council members are the target of a campaign seeking their recall.  This is based on a comment made by Councilman Roger Bray regarding Pocatello’s relatively low crime and the cultural homogeneity that enables it.  The other two members in question are Claudia Ortega and Chris Stevens.  The accusation is that Mr. Bray is a bigot because he associates diversity in some form with high crime rates, and his sort of bigotry has no place in Pocatello.  For defending Mr. Bray, Councilwoman Ortega and Councilwoman Stevens must also be sacrificed on the altar of the thought police.

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Clarification from Mr. Bray was a fair request, and I accept his explanation that diversity is not a term exclusive to race.  I’m not a member of the LDS Church, yet Pocatello and surrounding communities are generally greater than fifty percent Mormon.  Having lived in Salt Lake City before moving to Idaho, I can attest that one of the values that the LDS Church and its members contribute to society is a wholesome and family-oriented culture. Does this lack of religious diversity reduce the need for policing?  Absolutely!

As an openly America First guy, you’d be hard-pressed to find many things that these three council persons and I agree on. As a columnist who consistently complains about the tactics of using identity politics to impugn the character of political opposition, I must say that these same tactics being deployed locally are an embarrassment.

During the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, the Marxists would routinely bully the opposition into silence so that their ideas wouldn’t be challenged.  It wasn’t about having the right ideas, it was about having the might.  In this tactic, thought crimes fall outside of approved thought, and the only remedy is ostracism from society.  For this tactic to work, it requires assuming the worst of your opponent or leading others to believe the worst of your opponent with no recourse.  Can you see how this strategy is being deployed in this scenario?

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For those on the outside looking in, a recall in this scenario looks like a solution looking for a problem.  It looks like an attempt to rid the city council of these members, and the means of accomplishing it is to paint the opposition as irredeemable bigots.  No attempt to get clarification or understand Councilman Bray’s statement is sought.  Those who are deploying this strategy are clearly in the wrong.  They should be called on it.

There is a way to go about things, and a recall based on Councilman Bray’s statement on crime and diversity is not only unwarranted, but it also is not the right way.  I would discourage the people of Pocatello from signing this petition based on this nonsense and instead put your efforts into putting forth better candidates for city council elections.

UPDATE: Since publication, the three city council members in question have resigned from their posts, citing dysfunction and a hostile and unresponsive executive city administration.  Councilwomen Ortega and Stevens have supposedly sold their homes and are relocating from the area.  

This Op-Ed was submitted by Brian Parsons. Op-Eds do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of those at the Idaho Dispatch. This Op-Ed first appeared on Withdrawconsent.org.