What Right Wing Threat?

Right-wing threats in America? Hasn't the media jumped the gun, or shark, so to speak?

James W. Von Brunn wasn't shooting at Jews at the Holocaust Museum because he was anti-Semitic. He was there to try to shoot the actual Holocaust, under the mistaken impression he could stop it still and make up for all the white supremacist mumbo-jumbo he's been known for. The Holocaust started it; this was simply self-defense.

Scott P. Roeder, who gunned down a doctor in his church on a Sunday morning, killing George Tiller after years of personal derision from Bill O'Reilly? He was not there because he was a homicidal maniac obsessed about offing Tiller and winning right-wing approval. He was just hunting. In a church. During Sunday services. Though there were no animals technically present, the stray shot might have knocked late-term abortion instruments out of the doctor's hands while he was passing the collection plate.

When Richard Poplawski was firing his AK-47 at cops in Pittsburgh, he was only trying to impress them with his knowledge of guns, sort of like a fraternity hazing. He was wearing the bullet-proof vest to impress them and make the cops like him, so they would make him an honorary deputy and give him a job. All of Poplawski's rants about Zionist control of the country and Obama's determination to take away his guns and rights, it was just water-cooler talk. Except instead of casually catching up on anti-Semitic, anti-government chit chat around the water cooler, Poplawski was commenting on Stormfront, the biggest white power web site.

The Department of Homeland Security, founded after 9/11 to provide a heads-up on dangerous threats on American soil, recently issued some kind of report or some crap, because government agencies are like that. That report mentioned something about some far-right nuts likely to act out in 2009 and do dangerous things against the government, Jews, and abortion providers. Whatever. That report was just trying to smear the shining conservative movement, and make it easier for illegal immigrants to sneak in to our country and take our jobs at GM.

Or...maybe the DHS report actually was talking about these kinds of lone nuts that we actually have to worry about, in any state across the country. Maybe conservatives and Republicans who rush to attack a security report from the government should reconsider their knee-jerk ownership of the issues and tactics that they rush to defend.

Maybe continually over-simplifying every issue in politics into a siege upon America actually helps bring about a siege mentality in Americans. Perhaps dwelling in the continual context of an election, wherein everything is good for one side or bad for the other, is really simpleminded and stupid, and creates false choices and fallacious imperatives.

And, maybe in attacking a government threat assessment, these right-wing pundits are not just aligning themselves with dangerous supremacist kooks, but even encouraging their impulses, by draping their tattered flag around those that would be singled out for wanting to go kill people they disagree with.

Bill O'Reilly, after his continual on-air assaults against George Tiller contributed to Tiller's actual assault, defiantly went on TV and proclaimed himself a victim of the liberal media for covering what O'Reilly had been saying all along. This lack of accountability in bullies and blowhards is not really surprising, and it furthers a victim branding being desperately pursued by O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, Alex Jones, that long-haired douchebag guy on Fox Business Channel, and others.

Our country was founded on revolutionaries, so apparently acting oppressed is the fallback moral high ground. This is a curious acknowledgment and embrace of the polemics from the Left dating back to the Civil Rights Era. At some point, the legitimacy that the Right denied attributing to disenfranchised groups like gays, poor people, minorities, and women in this country became the conservative rallying cry.

We see this in the vitriolic attacks alleging prejudice against Sonia Sotomayer, from old white guys who are experts on racism. And make no mistake: the more Newt Gingrich proclaims that white people are being dethroned and Dick Cheney insists humans only respond to brutality, the more these otherwise lone nuts don't feel so lonely, and believe that they have to take some kind of violent action against, oh, anybody.

I expect that these blowhards will cry out about gun rights and the threat of FEMA camps against the coming tide of rational questions, such as, "Why is it so easy for whacko fuck-ups to get an assault rifle or six?"

In a sense, these commando cowards are doing the work of scores of progressive activists, making their leaders and causes utterly repellent to the rest of the country.

UPDATE: This piece seems to have struck a chord with people who identify with the aforementioned right wing extremist nut jobs, so I think I will just apologize to all of them now and get that out of the way.

Comments

[ProgressiveVoice]

The logical conclusion to the use of fear to manipulate the population is violence. The fear mongers are exactly the people to blame for the recent shootings. Regardless of how ridiculous or irrational the fears may be, the persons committing these atrocities believe they are fighting back, protecting the country's values, doing "good". We would be celebrating these same people as heroes if their fear came from legitimate threats and their actions were rational responses.

It's been 500 years since Machiavelli wrote "The Prince". Isn't it about time we Americans recognize the manipulative value of fear? Remember that almost every action we, as a country, have taken and later regretted as a mistake, was prompted by fear? Learn that public fear mongering is always a sign that government­/politicia­ns are up to no (public) good??

[GardenerNorCal]

This country under Bush/Cheney made the term hero as useless as that of terrorist.

Fear is the means of manipulation and it's time we all woke up and stopped being tools.

But these right wing extremists should not forget that they too can be targetted and surveilled as enemies of society. Their party does not give them a free pass.

[jsgaetano]

Why does everyone forget about Jim Adkisson's terrorist attack on a Unitarian Church in Knoxville TN?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/28/jim-d-adkisson-charged-in_n_115281.html

It wasn't this year, but that doesn't make it any less of an example of right wing terrorism.

[darr]

"Our country was founded on revolutionaries, so apparently acting oppressed is the fallback moral high ground."

Very excellent point there. They keep talking about class war as if Obama and us lefties are the oppressors and they the downtrodden. Since the reign of Reagan, the working and middle classes have been totally ignored, harassed or bullied. We tried to raise our voices to protest but were sluffed off as unimportant. We were angry, we wanted change, we wanted our rights back and we wanted a government who would listen. Did we go about this by encouraging violence and domestic terrorism? No, we did not. We had, as I like to put it, a bloodless coo. We decided that after years and decades of bad policy that we needed to have a fresh new outlook.
They had their chance, now it's ours. Just sit down and shutup and take notes on how diplomacy works.
I know this won't happen though. It seems that the party has been reduced to only thinking in terms of getting back in power, not with working with the current administration to fix what they helped break.
Believe it or not, but the slow downslide of the GOP saddens me. I believe a true democracy NEEDS a two party system. We need that check and balance to stay a fair and free country. Unfortunately, the republicans in Washington today seem hell-bent to completely drive their party into an early grave.

[MrsManarlican]

We're so busy pointing the finger at the other guy, blaming liberals, conservatives, Whitey, Blacks, Jews, Mom and Dad, Churches, Schools, Gays, Straights, Neocons, immigrants, etc, anything and anyone but ourselves for what is going on in our country. We need to stop dividing ourselves along party and ideological lines and do the much harder work of having mature conversations like civilized adults regarding the things that affect us, lest we inspire a far more inspeakable horror than mentally ill madmen killing in the name of _____(insert victimhood here)__, and that unspeakable horror would be civil war. I am tired of hearing one side blame the other, WE ARE ALL AMERICANS AND AMERICA IS BROKEN and no one person or party is to blame. Get used to it and do something constructive instead of finding scapegoats. The only person responsible for killing Dr. Tiller was the person who killed Dr. Tiller. The only person responsible for the Holocaust Museum shooting was the shooter. That doesn't excuse idiots like O'Reilly for spewing their rot all over the country, but he just needs to shut up in general, he has nothing good to contribute and should be henceforth ignored.

[BlackJAC]

Unfortunately humanity has always had a compulsion to delineate itself into subgroups, and every one of those subgroups has been maligned at some point.

[killpack]

"That doesn't excuse idiots like O'Reilly for spewing their rot all over the country, but he just needs to shut up in general, he has nothing good to contribute and should be henceforth ignored."

It was refreshing to read what you had to say until that last sentence. You call for maturity and discussion, but make a blatant personal attack at the end. Don't get me wrong, I rarely watch Bill O'Reilly nor am I a fan, but those kinds of personal attacks are a SIGNIFACANT part of the problem you addressed above. If you have a problem with something in specific that Bill O'Reilly has said or done, by all means, let us know. But, "he has nothing good to contribute" is such a generalized, non-specific, personal attack that has little credible value. That's like saying "liberals are just a bunch of hippies" or "GOP hates America." Your post overall was still more substantial than 95% of the posts on this website, but you aren't quite there yet.

[onepotatotwopotato]

Of course we will never hear about the murder of Private William Long, United States Army, killed by a Muslim terrorist on United States soil, will we?

A Muslim convert who said he was against the U.S. military pleaded not guilty Tuesday to capital murder in connection with the shooting of two soldiers outside an Arkansas recruiting center.

One soldier died in the attack Monday, police said.

Abdul Hakim Mujahid Muhammad, 23, was ordered held without bail at a hearing Tuesday in Little Rock. He is charged in the death of Pvt. William Long, 23, of Conway, outside the Army Navy Career Center in Little Rock.

"This individual appears to have been upset with the military, the Army in particular, and that's why he did what he did," Little Rock Police Lt. Terry Hastings said.

"He has converted to (Islam) here in the past few years," Hastings said. "We're not completely clear on what he was upset about. He had never been in the military.

"He saw them standing there and drove up and shot them. That's what he said."

Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, 18, of Jacksonville was wounded in the shooting and in stable condition, Police Chief Stuart Thomas said.

The suspect, who is from Little Rock, was previously known as Carlos Bledsoe, Thomas said.

[BlackJAC]

And why do you not wish to hear of all the other soldiers killed by terrorists in Iraq? Why is that one death more important to you than the 5000 others?

[GardenerNorCal]

I believe I remember reading the news stories about it and the first thing they mentioned was the suspect's religion. It was on the front page of my paper. So what's your point?

[Lexx-2]

If there's one thing that's dawned on me out of the past few years of partisan sledging, it's this: everyone sees themselves as a victim. Doesn't matter if you're part of a minority or not, we now live in an era where rich white Christian conservative men cry persecution just as much as anyone else. Doesn't make it true of course, but the politics of victimhood have become a powerful tool on both sides of the politcal divide, thus creating a sense of oppression and persecution, and creating a narcisisstic sense of self-righteouseness in the people who fall for it.

This is a great article, and perfectly illustrates just how tainted political discourse has become by identity politics and punditry.

[tom ellison]

Reports are now coming out that he also despised Neocons. Should we blame Liberal bloggers, newspapers, and talking heads for creating an atmosphere of vitriol? Are they partly to blame for the shooting, just like Liberals wanted to blame O'Reilly for T i ll er's death?

[treboi]

Why do conservatives make the dumbest comparisons? So basically you're saying this nut watched a liberal program, which created an atmosphere of vitriol for him to hate neocons, and then he goes to kill jews...LMFAO, WTF are you talking about?!?!?! It's like the synapses are firing but there is nothing on the other end. Do you really not see there is absolutely no logical connection to what you just said?

Yeah, I bet faux news and all the other conservative hate sites are putting out a story to defelect criticism of their complicity in these crimes.

[tom ellison]

I'm just presenting the flip side of the argument Liberals made regarding O'Reilly and Dr. Til1er's death. They said that the words of O'Reilly and other conservative commentators created an atmosphere which "inspired" someone to commit violence. Some of them went so far as to blame O'Reilly for Til1er's death.

Well, when we look at the vitriol of many of the left-wing commentators concerning Bush and the Neocons, I ask: are they to blame for this man's act since reports are surfacing that he loathed Neocons?

[tom ellison]

"which created an atmosphere of vitriol for him to hate neocons, and then he goes to kill jews"

Yes, because Neocons are fiercely pro-Israel. Investigators later found the address of the (conservative) Weekly Standard magazine in his possessions. The building was not far from the shooting scene. There is also evidence he harshly criticized and hated Neocons (probably because of their support of Israel).

[Beefcake]

This was a fantastic post, and I hope it gets play outside of just this website. More and more of our leaders need to speak out about what's been happening, because the path we've started to head down is not pretty:

http://www.tremblethedevil.com/my_weblog/2009/06/overtaken-by-events.html

[Katie101622]

As the lone liberal in a family of conservative apologists, your description of the conservati­ve/Republi­can characteristic of the denial of provable reality resonates.

After years of the loud LOUDNESS from the right, I know that conspiracy theories are true when my father says they are, that all gays are evil child molesters except for his sister, that Obama has a Muslim prayer rug in the Oval Office, and that any actual proof against any of these were cooked up by MSNBC.

It's like getting a wall to ask you to a dance. Why? How? Doesn't matter, as long as you BELIEVE the wall will talk eventually, then you will stand there in front of it until it does. If you believe killing one, ten, or thousands of Americans will put your party back in power, then BY GOD, you must do it! Faith always triumphs over reason!

Intellectual poison. Thanks for pointing it out.

[alenaspoppa]

No one seems to be linking this one to the recent spate of shooting, so I'm happy to do so:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-kim/right-wing-tn-church-shoo_b_115789.html

Right-Wing TN Church Shooter is Fan of O'Reilly, Hannity, Savage

A report from the local Knoxville news details the findings from Adkisson's home, along with key statements from a document written by Adkisson related to an apparent motive behind the violent attack that rocked the suburban community:

"Adkisson targeted the church, [Investigator Steve] Still wrote in the document obtained by WBIR-TV, Channel 10, 'because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country's hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of media outlets.'

"Adkisson told Still that 'he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them in to office.'"

If any of that sounds familiar, it’s because you’ve been hearing the exact same claims coming from the right wing's most prominent stars and spokespeople for years. It’s all there: liberals are ruining the country, Democrats are letting the terrorists win, liberals hate America, the liberal media is bamboozling the nation.

[djkrlsn]

I remember Err America making the flip side of the same claims all through the Bush years--including the heroine of the left--Cindy Sheehan (who went hysterically histrionic because her adult son made choices she did not like--was his death a tragedy--y­es--Bush's fault--not really_

[showmescience]

What War on Terror?

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/06/ap_recruiter_shootings_060109/

[John Wellington Ennis - Huffpost Blogger]

As if to further my case that conservative ire ought to be restrained and distanced from the homicidal actions of far-right extremists, some irate reader felt compelled to call my production company just now talking about how I reap what I sow.

Thus, I will reiterate my above points even more simply:

If you are conservative or Republican, there is nothing to gain by disputing the circumstances around these crimes with any ideology. You should not even feel the need to relate or defend the killers.

If you are a pundit scaring your audience into believing that the government is seizing their rights, their guns, their children, then you are partly responsible for the extreme actions that fringe members of your audience take.

No matter who you are or what your views are, violence or intimidation will only set back your cause and make many more people believe you are wrong, unreasonable, vicious, and a bully.

Anyone else who would care to debate this with me, I request you keep the discourse online, to both create a record of the exchange as well as to exhibit your opinions and thoughts so that others can appreciate them.

[carolr51]

John, the hate from the right is wearing me out! I can hardly stand to watch any more.

[djkrlsn]

And I suppose all the President Select Bush hogwash was legit? That SCOTUS decision was based in law--Florida would not have been in play had Tennesse (the state that Gore and his father had represented as Senators) and W Virginia voted for Bush which Clinton DIRECTLY ATTRIBUTED TO GUN CONTROL

[Rogan]

I'm so scared of those people I don't go out any more. I really don't.

Yesterday I was toying with the idea of going with my wife to a museum this weekend. I really was. It would be the first time I've left the house for any reason other than necessary shopping, since the election. I've been scared to.

I guess I won't be going to a museum this weekend, either. I'm scared to.

I hope you fine folks at HuffingtonPost, will let me know when the madness has passed, so I can come out and play.

[transformative]

Come out and play. Remember they use fear to keep you inside.

"There is nothing to fear, but fear itself"

Walking tall, knowing yourself, owning your human rights and your voice make them cower.

Join the people who won't self-censor and speak the truth.
Together we are unstoppable.

[treboi]

I was planning on going to DC pride this weekend, but I'm getting really nervous with all these crazies walking around.

I wish the families of some of the victims would file a lawsuit against Bill and others...even if the case has no merit just to make a point.

[djkrlsn]

That is the downside of the DC laws--the only people that are armed are the crazies and the criminals--the lawabidin are disarmed by government fiat

[treboi]

btw great article, very well written and reasoned!

[Roger Glover]

(looks under desk)

I don't see any right-wing threat here!

[ThoughtfulDavid]

Actually, your last sentence is an important point that I have been trying to make. I wonder if these nutjobs realize how counterproductive their actions really are? Do they think that if they are worried about Obama taking away their guns, and that if they go out and shoot some policemen, that suddenly the public will like them and want to make sure they have more guns? Really?

Actually, I don't wonder about whether they realize they're being counterproductive. Of course they don't. That would require thinking. They're wingnuts, and wingnuts don't ever bother to think.