The latest news from the opponents of health care reform who like to suggest that supporters should suffer for their transgressions: A day after two Virginia Tea Party activists posted the address of the brother of a congressman who voted for the bill, authorities discovered that someone had severed a gas line at the man's home.
According to The Daily Progress of Charlottesville, Va., Danville Tea Party leader Nigel Coleman was one of the two people who posted the address of Bo Pierriello, the older brother of U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello (D-Ivy), who voted for the health care bill. "This is Rep. Thomas Stuart Perriello's home address," Coleman wrote Monday, going on to suggest that others who oppose the health care bill "drop by" and "express their thanks." He added, "I ain't holding back no more."
According to the Politico website, Coleman, upon learning he had posted the wrong address, said on a blog: "Do you mean I posted his brother's address on my Facebook? Oh well, collateral damage."
Told by The Daily Progress of the severing of the line that connected a propane tank to a grill on Pierriello's screened-in porch, Coleman said he was "shocked" and "almost speechless." He claimed innocently that he was against violence, and in any case wasn't sure that the attack, which is under FBI investigation, was related to his post.
Coleman's absolutely despicable actions were remarkably similar to those of American neo-Nazi leaders who in recent years have made a practice of posting their enemies' addresses and other personal information. They, too, often suggested that their sympathizers drop by to let enemies know their feelings. But that certainly didn't stop Coleman from engaging in his own mindless and dangerous provocation.
The news of Coleman's post and its apparent result followed the boasts earlier in the week from Mike Vanderboegh, a former Alabama militia leader who last Friday called on enemies of health reform to smash the windows of local Democratic Party headquarters around the country. Vanderboegh's threatening blog post, which suggested that civil war could be around the corner, was followed by bricks or stones being thrown through party offices in three states. The offices of two Democratic congressmen in New York and Arizona were similarly attacked.
As if that wasn't enough, opponents of health care legislation demonstrating in Washington, D.C., this weekend spit on a black congressman, shouted racial slurs at two others, and shouted an anti-gay epithet at another congressman. A week earlier, a group at a Tea Party in Columbus, Ohio, taunted a man sitting on the ground with a sign saying he had Parkinson's disease. "If you're looking for a handout," one of the protesters told the health care reform supporter in a scene captured on video and posted to YouTube, "you're in the wrong end of town."
These despicable attacks and those who help foment them are unworthy of any citizen of a democracy, let alone of those who pretend to be standing up for principled conservatism. What we are seeing is the infuriated response of thugs and those who like to encourage thugs. And what may be most appalling of all is the absolute temerity, not to say cowardice, of supposedly responsible leaders of those who opposed health care reform, almost none of whom have condemned the latest round of hate. It's a sad commentary on America that this is what our political process has become.
Since you mention President Bush by name, I'll say he did a number of things which I wholeheartedly supported, including, in the beginning, our invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. In the beginning. Then came the Patriot Act; Guantanamo; no WMD's in Iraq; Guantanamo/"enemy combatants" outside any law or convention/CIA black houses/ torture/etc/; unfunded mandates (two wars; the return to the Moon proposal; a $160-billion+ tax refund -- those last three all unfunded, adding to the deficit, adding greatly.
Warrantless wire taps and suborning telecommunications programs to go with the program. Ignoring Congress and the courts. The start of the economic dive and the start of various bailout efforts -- both of which many opponents of President Obama like to date from 12:01 P.M., EST, January 20, 2009. That's flat not true.
Were the Democrats rude and obstructionist sometimes? Yes. I berated them for it. But I don't recall a single instance of any Democrat virtually encouraging violence, as have, for instance, some Tea Party followers, and certainly not *engaging* in any.
Yeah, that ol' Rip Van Winkle effect does make the rounds. . . .
Even had a Democrat thrown something at a Republican member of Congress, that WOULD NOT justify "payback time."
Bob Schulz Announces CC2009 Location, Statement of Purpose
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w57ybaPmV3U
Schulz: We The People Lawsuit Against AIG Bailout
http://www.cc2009.us/archives/44-nov13/105-we-the-people-lawsuit-against-aig-bailout
Dickstein: Tax Clause Violations
http://www.cc2009.us/archives/45-nov14/113-dickstein-tax-clauses
Coffman: Property Rights Violations
http://www.cc2009.us/archives/48-nov17/118-coffman-property-rights
http://www.givemeliberty.org
"Never did I hear any type of racial slur," said William Owens, a black Tea Party activist from Nevada who joined in the D.C. protests Saturday.
"They were just shouting, harassing," Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a legend of the civil rights movement, said.
However, U.S. Capitol Police said the protester was never arrested. He was only detained and put in handcuffs, then released.
Sgt. Kimberly Schneider, spokeswoman for the Capitol Police, told FoxNews.com the individual was released because Cleaver couldn't identify him.
"There were no elements of a crime, and the individual wasn't able to be positively identified," she said. "(Cleaver) was unable to positively identify."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,589776,00.html
As I heard it, from other news sources, the Congressman did not prefer to press charges.
Where is YOUR video for this claim?
I have SEVERAL videos t back my claims.
The Wash event
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7wYt9jee2U
Tea Party Protesters Assaulted by Pro-Amnesty Socialist Group
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AteV2L9pc-U
Shuster gets owned by Black Tea Partier
Tea Bagger Tries To Say Democratic Operatives Are Doing Damage To Democratic Buildings
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIgOidrzidc
The last time the democrats here claimed that tea partiers vandalized their offices here in Colorado it turned out that it was a democrat. [The Colorado Democratic Party headquarters in Denver was vandalized this past week in what party officials say was a protest against President Obama's health care agenda. UPDATE: Newsradio 850 in Denver reports that alleged Colorado Democratic Party headquarters vandal Maurice Schwenkler had done work for Democrats in the past. Schwenkler was paid $500 last November to knock on doors for the Colorado Citizens Coalition, a 527 that supported mostly Democratic candidates in Colorado. The Denver Post also reports that Schwenkler was charged with misdemeanor unlawful assembly on the final day of the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.
By Philip Rucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 25, 2010; 3:52 PM
The call to arms was issued at 5:55 a.m. last Friday.
"To all modern Sons of Liberty: THIS is your time. Break their windows. Break them NOW."
These were the words of Mike Vanderboegh, a 57-year-old former militiaman from Alabama, who took to his blog urging people who opposed the historic health-care reform legislation -- he calls it "Nancy Pelosi's Intolerable Act" -- to throw bricks through the windows of Democratic offices nationwide.
"So, if you wish to send a message that Pelosi and her party [that they] cannot fail to hear, break their windows," Vanderboegh wrote on the blog, Sipsey Street Irregulars. "Break them NOW. Break them and run to break again. Break them under cover of night. Break them in broad daylight. Break them and await arrest in willful, principled civil disobedience. Break them with rocks. Break them with slingshots. Break them with baseball bats. But BREAK THEM."
In the days that followed, glass windows and doors were shattered at local Democratic Party offices and the district offices of House Democrats from Arizona to Kansas to New York. At least 10 Democratic lawmakers reported death threats, incidents of harassment or vandalism at their offices over the past week...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/25/AR2010032501722.html
- Tolerance
- Respect for differing opinions
- Priding ourselves on our ability to see "grey areas" and complexities
- Reluctance to cause offense as a part of common courtesy
Meanwhile, so many on the right, turning more and more to Rush Limbaugh and Fox News, came to view us not as holding differing opinions - but rather as evil, immoral, and all the rest of it, and they were not afraid to say so, so confident were they in their rightness (and, usually, their righteousness in the eyes of God as well). They usually felt free to spout off while we held back - then if we disagreed, we got a quick "but talking about politics is a bad idea." They were easily offended.
We allowed them to call themselves the "moral majority" and claim that rhetorical territory. It has taken 8 years of Bush, and now Obama and the health insurance reform bill, to remind us that WE stand for values - compassion, innovation, responsible use of the military, and reasoned debate - and it's time to start saying so.
We need not stoop to their level. But enough of allowing name-calling and demonization, incoherence and exaggeration, and foolish absolutism, to be "OK." Tolerance of intolerance is no virtue.
I just wish fewer people would fail that test of yours. When debate becomes impossible, there is only one other way to settle things, as the article above shows: thuggery.
You have summed up what a lot of us have been thinking. Thank you.
I love your work. My department receives your SPLC updates and I read them fervently. But as you often point out in the publication, threats of violence are not simply an issue of the right.
I read the following in an article published in the Washington Post Monday morning:
"I know how the "tea party" people feel, the anger, venom and bile that many of them showed during the recent House vote on health-care reform. I know because I want to spit on them, take one of their "Obama Plan White Slavery" signs and knock every racist and homophobic tooth out of their Cro-Magnon heads"
Perhaps this doesn't sound like a violent proposition to you. But it certainly sounds that way to me. Personally, I think that anything like this, no matter what political persuasion speaks it, is disgusting, and offers nothing of the civil discourse of which you speak.
I dread what's next ....?
You would be mistaken. I wouldn't presume to advise people on how to live their personal lives (unlike others). Owning a firearm is a personal decision. One that I choose to do. As for the status quo, well, you seem to indicate that you're fine with that. I am not. And if you really think the statement is just one isolated incident, you're foolish. There is as much hateful rhetoric on the left as there is the right.
You need to break out of your myopic bubble and see the world for how it really is.
These guys are a lot scarier than some of the people in prison.
Dear MoveOn member,
Last weekend, anti-health care protesters were out in force in Washington—and some of their behavior was deeply disturbing.
A crowd of tea partiers shouted the "n word" at Congressman John Lewis, a former civil rights leader who marched with Dr. King. They yelled homophobic epithets at Rep. Barney Frank, an openly gay congressman. And one protester actually spat on a Black member of Congress.1
Then this week, Democrats who voted for reform began receiving death threats—one had a coffin left on his lawn and another was told snipers would kill the children of lawmakers who voted yes.2 Several Democrats had their district offices vandalized, and a gas line was cut at a home that tea partiers mistakenly believed belonged to Rep. Tom Perriello.3
A few Republicans have spoken out against the racism and violence, but most are still treating them as "isolated incidents."4 They are not isolated. They've been part of Republican-supported tea parties for almost a year and they're a natural consequence of telling people that reform is a totalitarian plot.5
It's an outrage, and no American should tolerate it. So we're joining with our friends at Color of Change to stand up to the hate. Can you add your name to this letter asking Republican leaders to unequivocally condemn bigotry, hate, and violence among their supporters?
http://pol.moveon.org/condemnhate/?id=19573-9193653-JrfUjzx&t=3
Thank you for this.
(READ MORE http://dh1976.wordpress.com/2010/03/24/the-tea-party-more-like-the-taliban-by-the-day/ )
"actongue" ... Dude, do you EVER know what you're talking about or do you just sit down and start typing words that you see from the liberal magazines and newspapers you have lying around in front of you? I haven't seen you around for a couple of weeks and I was truly hoping you were "out there" doing some actual research on the various issues you have (attempted) to talk about in the past ... oh well. I guess it's a good thing for some that we can use aliases instead of our real names - I bet there would be far less idiotic drivel if that were the case. ////////////........ Now look in the Mirror Panther hunter and honestly ask if Beck and Rush and Michael Savage do not subtly preach hate and violence. I have done way more research then you could ever fathom on health care and I go by facts. Where some of the things I said wrong...of course they are and I have admitted it. the vast majority of what I have stated though is accurate.
Just because you and others do not want to accept facts does not change the facts. ..With That I wish you a great day and hope you get a chance to enjoy it.
http://thefiresidepost.com/2010/03/25/why-fear-matters/