Outrageous!  The mainstream media and the left had their heads explode when the ignorant, racist Donald Trump called out both parties involved in the violent acts at Charlottesville over the weekend as sharing the blame for what happened.

How could any reasonable person even suggest that anyone other than the hate-spewing white supremacists be responsible for engaging in violent acts?  To hear the mainstream experts tell the story, one gets the impressions the Antifa was just strolling down the street, picking daisies and planting garden spots to feed the hungry, and they were beset upon by hordes of marching Nazi-flag carrying marauders, intent on tromping the flowers and taking food from the babies.

But, in the same paragraphs, they assert that the Antifa and its supporters went to the area to “stand up” to the racist white supremacists and stop them from spreading their message of hate.  Of course, the anti-protesters planned to stop the racists with their own version of hate towards them.

And we wonder out loud how the neo-Nazi message gets spread and infects the minds of youths and others all across the country.  Like a fire needs fuel to continue to grow and spread, so does hate and racism.  And it gets the fuel it needs from national television and press exposure.  In other words, the message the anti-protesters were trying to squelch was actually promoted by their actions to engage with the rally.

Ask yourself, what would have happened if no one attended the original protests?  Would any violent acts have occurred?  Possibly, but they would be less likely if there was no one there to argue with.  What would happen to the movement if there was no national television exposure?  Unfortunately, that can’t happen, because TV news needs ratings, and 24-hour news needs something to talk about.

I’m not saying the movement will just go away if we ignore it.  But as long as they are having rallies on the town square, and decent people are keeping their families and loved ones away from them, they are just preaching to their own choir.  Without fuel, the movement cannot spread.

But, again, the left is unable to do that.  They feel they have the moral responsibility to decide who can speak and who can march and who can rally, and it is only those who agree with the position of the left that should be allowed that privilege.

Ironically, it is more often than not violence erupts when those who are on the left take to the streets.  Many instances of rioting, looting, window-smashing and fire-starting have taken place when the left hasn’t gotten their way.  Even Trump’s inauguration prompted acts of violence across America, and there were few, if any, white supremacists involved in that lawlessness.

If you don’t believe the left is capable of rage and hate, just check out some of the websites that lean towards the progressive.  The same is true of the right as well; no one gets a free pass.  And that is why Trump’s assessment that both sides are to blame for the violence in Charlottesville needed to be said.

The Bible has a quote asking how can one offer to remove the speck from someone else’s eye, when you can’t see the log in your own.

Martin Luther King, Jr., said it another way.  “Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”  Hating those who hate only fuels the fires of hate.  Every respectable person should condemn hate groups, and should stand up to them in reasonable and practical ways.  Matching hate with hate in our city streets will almost always lead to violence.  This is not the way to solve the problem.