Let’s Profile the Right Wing
By Larry Johnson on June 11, 2009 at 11:53 PM in Current Affairs
(bumped up from last night)
In light of recent terror attacks by right wing fanatics–the murder of George Tiller, a Kansas abortion doctor, and today’s assault on the Holocaust museum by a racist, retired U.S. military dude, James Von Brunn–we are left with no alternative but to profile the rightwing.
Fuck it! Let’s listen to what Daniel Pipes had to say on this subject:
These circumstances - and this is the unpleasant part - point to the imperative of focusing on Muslims. There is no escaping the unfortunate fact that Muslim government employees in law enforcement, the military and the diplomatic corps need to be watched for connections to terrorism, as do Muslim chaplains in prisons and the armed forces. Muslim visitors and immigrants must undergo additional background checks. Mosques require a scrutiny beyond that applied to churches and temples.
Singling out a class of persons by their religion feels wrong, if not downright un-American, prompting the question: Even if useful, should such scrutiny be permitted?
If Americans want to protect themselves from Islamist terrorism, they must temporarily give higher priority to security concerns than to civil-libertarian sensitivities.
Fuckin A diddy bag. Dan Pipes is right. Now I realize he was talking about the goddamn ragheads (we’ll do them too). But if profiling is good enough for the carpet huggining, Allah praying sons of Mohammed then we ought to give it a whirl with the Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity Christian fundamentalists. Let’s include guys and gals who have served in the military too. Round em up and keep an eye on them. And I guess we ought to get any krauts still in Amerika.
Shouldn’t the same logic apply? We have solid proof that conservatives are prone to violence. Hell, they favor torture and water boarding? Their boys did a number in Oklahoma City in 1995. Right?
(Okay, this is a sarcasm, irony test. We will find out if you are smart enough to understand my true meaning.)
Let me suggest an alternative. Maybe, just maybe the people who actually commit these acts of terror are the ones responsible and in no way represent a class of people. Maybe the rightwing, especially those who want to target “muslims,” might now realize the danger of the mentality that wants to punish a group of people for the actions of a few. What do you think?
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Personal responsibility - I’ll give an Amen to that!
Larry:
Yes, but…
A big part of the problem is that terrorists, from whatever part of the religious/political spectrum are interested in creating terror in the public consciousness to further their agenda. In this they rely upon the willing complicity of the news media. The news media create and sustain the hysteria of fear that the terrorists crave and, of course - because they are not really ‘news’ media but profit centers for corporate quarterly reports - try to use the acts of terror to maximize their profits on the back of horror: “Mr. Jones, your wife and children have just been blown sky high by the World Army to Free Eunuch Oppression… How do you feel?”
We know their names: Al-Queada, Hezbollah, Hamas, The Muslim Brotherhood, Operation Rescue, The American Nazi Party, John Hinckley, Pol Pot, Sirhan Sirhan, the IRA, Oswald, Sacco & Vanzetti…
The list goes on and on. We should not remember their names, we should not acknowledge that they ever breathed our air.
Breaking News: “Today an act of unspeakable horror was perpetrated on the people of Midville. Our hearts go out to the victims and their families. They are: Mr. & Mrs. Jones, Ms. Renee Taylor, Mr. Robert Bannister… the perpetrators have (or have not) been apprehended and will pay for this heinous act. This news organization will not participate in giving them any publicity nor any implicit support by broadcasting or furthering any of their agenda. May the dead rest in peace and may those responsible pay in full and be forgotten.”
When the news media routinely broadcast this kind of response we will see the beginning of the end of this particular variety of unconscionable extortion.
Reminds me of words of one E.Graham Howe (English Author and Psychoanalysist) from his book War Dance a Study of the Psychology of War, written on the eve of WW-II . “Attachment to any system whether psychological or otherwise is suggestive of an anxious escape from life. Those who are preaching revolution are also defenders of the status quo, their status quo”
You know very little of history. What terrorist act did they commit?
Actually, I know quite a bit about history S&V were anarchists (the contemporary term for terrorists) falsely accused, tried, convicted and electrocuted for armed robbery and murder in what was deemed at the time as a terrorist act. For goodness sake, go look them up at Wikipedia instead of throwing stupid accusations at me.
Wiki-now there’s a reliable source. You state they were falsely accused so why include them in your list? It was a political trial still controversial to this day.
1) If you don’t like Wikipedia (rated as surprisingly accurate by those who actually know anything about the subject) then go to the Encyclopedia Britannica which has substantially the same entry.
2) I included them for exactly that reason: these men and their memories were, and continue to be, vilified for over 80 years as emblematic of terrorism. The public hysteria, concocted ‘evidence’ and anti-immigrant bias were so egregious that the Governor of Massachusetts felt compelled to issue a proclamation excoriating the justice system for its mishandling of the case in 1977.
3) S&V were, essentially, tried, convicted and executed by the press. This is another reason to resist sensationalism by the press.
And you make my point: because of the tabloid press these are all political trials.
I’m puzzled because you are advancing a sidebar argument - the argument I see is: how does this affect our 1st Amendment rights? Do we go with the corporatist viewpoint - free speech (which of course means money uber alles)? Or do we agree that 1st Amendment rights may be abrogated to an extent by the need to starve the terrorists of their opiate: publicity. If we agree to do that, how do we persuade/control/mandate whatever rules we set out? Who decides? Who monitors the results? What are the repercussions?
Make me an argument…
Well, your “Yes but” to Larry was so incoherent and disjointed that I was and am curious of the terrorist act committed by Sacco and Vanzetti and their relationship to the others on your list.
Secondly you want me to answer a question when you’ve yet to answer the first one I asked.
Thirdly I don’t believe you come to this site to comment/interact but rather to disagree and goad persons to engage in what you are thinking without being clear about what you’re thinking.
So goodbye “Mr Yes, but..”
Curious, I was thinking the same thing about you…
-S&V were anarchists (the contemporary term for terrorists-
Actually, there are many forms of anarchism ranging from violence as a means against the apparatus of the state to social forms to pacifism (Tolstoy).
in the list of those creating “terror”
you could EASILY ad
Bill Ayers
Bernadette Dorhn
Rev. Jere(fking)miah Wright
Fr. Pfleger
oh yea also
Barack Hussein Obama
(he’s certainly terrified ME lately)
Bernadine?
jez it’s such a benign name with such a plain jane face
crazy
If only our news was like the example you gave! As it is, victims are too easily forgotten while perpetrators gain more attention the crazier they behave. I guess it’s the self-preservation instinct that draws us to that information–yet it in the wider view works against us.
In Orlando, the police have started publicizing the names of gang members who commit crimes. They have decided the public exposure targets the criminals. Previously, they could commit crime with abandon knowing their names and faces would not appear in public. So, hope this works.
I think we’re screwed no matter what we do.
Perhaps we should draw a bell curve. If you are more than two standard deviations out to the left or the right, you get scrutinized.
Is that bell curve indexed against cultral inflation?
That would keep granny right where we want her.
The hippies of yesterday drive BMWs of today. So Billy Ayers and Dorhn get 3 hours on book TV and he was complicit in terrorist acts.
Why do I hear that Pesky Perot?
Perhaps in additional to cultural inflation, we need to add an idle rich nutcase factor in as well. I’m somewhat amused at the eccentricities of the wealthy, both left and right. Now that the pendulum has pretty much exhausted itself on the Bill and Bernadette show, it’s time for a real nutcase to emerge from the wealthy right again.
Soros and Auchi are spoken for…
mmmm…Hey, come to think of it…new old or old money?
…you can count the Republican dealership moguls out , The fininancial dis-services gurus? Naw, they bailed out…Real Estate magnets? Nope they are under water and will be lucky to re-mod the last roll of TP…
your right Retired, nutcases are a dime a dozen but a rich right wing nutcase that can be a household name? For those still living in one…
I’m drawing a blank.
The Mysterious Nut Case Apr. 18, 1983
.
I never knew Google had a sense of humor. when googled ‘nutcase’ this was the 6th link down.
TGIF.
Lets not forget the Japanese internment camps, authorized by Obama`s hero, FDR. Oh, that`s right, FDR was a Democrat.
HARP: I think it’s not possible to understand the fear engendered during WWII when Japan actually attacked us and western civilization across the globe was under attack. These people should not have been mistreated, but I really don’t see anything wrong with keeping an eye on them. It only happened after sabotage was discovered on the part of population groups with the same ethnic identity as the people we were fighting. The same thing happened in WWI with Germans. They were not interred (under Wilson–another Democrat–so let’s let up on the stupid evil liberals theme), but Germans were watched and many of them changed their names and stopped speaking German, even at home.
It seems like there is a direct relationship between ease of identity/separation and degree of treatment of a population targeted as an internal security threat, wouldn’t you agree? When they’re easy to find, we go after them whole hog. When they can blend into the mainstream, well…
I see this as an entirely separate and less serious threat than Islamic extremism, nevertheless you do have a track record with this guy, McVeigh and others.
I think part of the problem is that with the web and with different media channels on the left and the right you are getting more and more segmented, biased views of the world. Commentators and bloggers have an incentive to post the craziest, more outrageous content to drive ratings or page views and it becomes a race to the bottom.
Unfortunately the end result is that people end up actually believing all kinds of crazy shit that might motivate them to do stupid things. The birther theory that this Neo Nazi was involved in promoting is a good example of that.
Have a look at Wikipedia’s list of thwarted domestic terror plots. Muslims are well represented, but they’re not responsible for the majority.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_the_United_States#Alleged_and_Proven_Plots
As the family of the slain security guard whether they feel that this is “less serious”.
Larry: I tried making the same point when Dr. Tiller was killed. Many if not most of the comments were along the lines of “I’m pro-choice but the doctor was killing babies” or “I’m pro-life and don’t condone shooting a doctor but he was killing babies.” I’m sure that there are people out there who hate the government as much as McVeigh or Jews like the Holocaust Museum shooter. A terrorist is a terrorist. Period.
And there’s all sorts of denial about the potential for violence among returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. Many of them have severe PTSD and have not received the treatment they desperately need. So sorry to break this to all the folks who got bent out of shape when Napolitano made her statement, but the fact is that government negligence has created a whole class of people who are in fact a danger to their families and society.
And before people go off and accuse me of Not Supporting The Troops, by “a whole class of people” I obviously don’t mean every single war veteran. But instead of diefying these people and pretending that they all return home intact, isn’t it time to see them for what they are? Human beings who if they don’t have their mental problems treated can, and in many cases have, been a danger to themselves, their families and others.
DC: I think, too, one has to remember the calibre of recruits in the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars. Many of these people are felons and other categories of unsavory people. Give them guns and power in a foreign country and atrocities will happen and spill over back home as well.
Government negligence doesn’t just include returning veterans. There is now talk that the feds were keeping an “eye” on James Von Brunn but didn’t feel he was a danger since he was too old. Well, these same people were keeping an eye on the terrorist who shot the Army soldier last week and probably the killer of Dr. Tiller too. So obviously, negligence is evident in our policing groups who are supposed to recognize and stop these kind of attacks because they haven’t done a very good job lately.
Also, if the government can’t properly help returning veterans to treat obvious & dangerous PTSD, do you think they will do much better treating the average citizen with diabetes?
There is the real story in there somewhere. If only it would come out, if only it could come out. It would be darn interesting to know what “keeping an eye on” really entails, and if it entails any infiltration or significant interaction at all.
I believe that Hillary Clinton was correct in her assessment of a vast right-wing conspiracy against the Clinton administration. I also believe that paranoid Richard Nixon was probably right about Communist or left-wing interests inciting student riots and violence during the Viet Nam era. But that doesn’t mean there are not crazy people out there with guns looking for some excuse to shoot someone.
The real problem, as far as I am concerned, is lack of transparency in government and law enforcement, meaning everything is confidential, a big secret, and who in the blazes knows what these people are doing. The media is probably the greatest problem for the general public because, as other commenters suggest, it likes to sensationalize everything, and, at the same, as Sibel Edmonds discusses in her website, is very susceptible to pressure to suppress real news. Also, after having recently immersed myself in the writings of David Ray Griffin, nowadays I am always looking for false flag operations and provocateurs. So that complicates the picture.
Yes, we live in a complicated world.
Lily: I agree. I attended “peace” and anti-war demonstrations myself, and I can say absolutely, communist agitators had a hand in those events.
I love the idea of profiling the right-wing! We need to figure out what a physical description would look like. Before the 2008 elections, I would have said that the typical right-winger is white. Since the 2008 elections and Proposition 8, I’m not so sure that all of the right-wingers are white. I’ll have to give the description more thought.
Sorry but his views and hatreds are those of a 9/11 Truther, he hated Bush and neo-cons. His writings show more commonality with extreme Left wing thought than right. But never let a good opportunity to bash Republicans go to waste,right?
He hated the neocons because the neocons were too liberal for him.
Let’s face it, “crazy” is fashionable in this country. Restraint is seen as being weak and integrity isn’t even heard of….I’ve recently decided to stop watching most movies and most TV. It is all formula and designed to stir up ones anxieties and passions, not to stimulate thought, introspection or compassion. We are a countries of adolescents and we continue to pay the price–on all fronts–for our lack of maturity and lack of concern for anyone, but ourselves and our immediate needs and desires. Of course, violence has become our hallmark….
Well said… And unfortunately we have the same ‘juvenile, self-serving attitude’ in the WH.
I think we should seek to encourage voices of tolerance, and shame the voices of hate. Of course, government leaders set the tone of the language. But the people can insist and demand that their society be civil, and fair, by not tuning in to the voices of hate.
More censorship, more authoritarianism, more police-state policies, in order to “protect” us, only makes us a paranoid culture full of fear of “the other” whoever that might be.
There is not one thing to stop the hate-mongerers except you. Each person in a society bears the responsibility to examine their contribution to a continuing discourse of hate and fear and intolerance.
More voices shaming people like Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, and others like them, and more social pressure applied to government leaders for policies of tolerance, is the only way our culture and social mileiu will weed them out.
There’s no easy answer for mentally ill people who go on rampages. They are there among us everywhere. They come from all corners of our society. But we do not want to go the way of Britain–I assure you–which has become a complete police state with neighborhood informers, and spies everywhere, even to the point of ordinary people having the authority to stop people on the street to investigate and detain them.
We are headed in that direction, I’m afraid. Already, the 4th Amendment is so eroded in this country that we literally have no protections from being stopped, searched, and having our property seized at any moment. There’s a 100-mile buffer zone around our entire border, where the 4th Amendment NO LONGER EXISTS.
These people have taken a life. Not a jewish life, not a muslim life, not a doctors life, not a officers life, BUT a HUMAN LIFE! You cannot defend pro life by killing somebody. You cannot defend Christianity and walk in the path of Jesus by killing a Jew. You cannot defend fundamentals of Islam by becoming a terrorist and bringing destruction of hundereds or thousands.
But you can do all those things if one crazy zealot who spews his or her hateful beliefs by casting his net out and finding a hand full who will jump on the band wagon and believe in the cause enough to do these things.
Well, gee wiz Larry if you’re going to be logical/reasonable about it.
I agree with you.
I think there is a difference between gathering information where it is more likely to find one of these nuts than to generally profile.
You are more likely going to get information on one of this crazies in a mosque that already preaches hate than at a Red Sox game (well maybe that’s not the best example).
You are more likely to find out about a potential crazy through some skinhead website than on Daily Kos (again, probably not the best example).
One of the prices we pay for having our freedoms is that we can’t fully protect ourselves from an individual crazy.
But we could enforce our existing immigration laws and the processes of screening who can and cannot enter this country. True, we have our own homegrown freaks and they do not need any help from the others from other nations.
This is already being done, but excuse me if I don’t trust the competence of the DHS who have, in the last several months, wrongfully removed (deported) several US citizens, neglected medical care for detainees resulting in several deaths (penalties for overstaying an authorized stay should not include death). I don’t feel any safer because the DHS denied entry to seventies recording artist, Cat Stevens (he has since been admitted and even performed on The Colbert Report).
Rob: I’m sorry, but it’s hard to feel sorry for the illegals since they are willfully committing a crime in many cases so they can get into the U. S. and commit more crimes. The hispanic citizens in this country support them to a man, so if they get caught up in the mess, they can blame themselves.
The Cat Stevens thing is stupid. But I object to the continual idea in this country of “solving” problems by just giving in to them. It’s hard to deal with illegal immigration, so let’s just let them all in. Stupid.
The msm went nuts yesterday attacking the right and trying to link them soley to hate speech.
Reverend Wright is full of hate speech. Coincedentally, he recently made a hateful comment. The msm is silent when it comes to the left. Here’s Wright’s recent rhetoric:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bm0zt6CyPgg
This is a dangerous path the msm is moving toward; this is nothing more than trying to silence critics of this administration.
The holocaust museusm killer was NAZI, which means he was national socialist, which means he was collectivist, which means he grouped people by race, religion and gender, just like the Left does today.. Since he is a socialist which means he believed the government should own the means of production. Doesn’t that sound like today’s socialist, commnunist, statist and progessive and today’s democratic party? The Right wing (conservative)today belives in limited government, freedom,private property, etc. How does a Nazi and conservative equate? Somebody who is extreme right wing would be liberterian who belives in very little government Somebody please explain to me why a NAZI then is right wing extremist? Is it because they a racist? There seems to be more anti semitism on the left since so many of them have aligned themselves with Islamic extremist. I just don’t get it and and am sick and tired of being lumped with a bunch of people who resemble the Left and Democratic party today!
Doctors are already profiled in NY State.
Muder info from FBI is from 2000…but I doubt if things have gotten any better. 15,517 murders in 2000. 65% murders committed using guns and 76% of the murder victims were males. So why the hour after hour reports on TV of the murder at the Holocaust Museum? I think it was totally overdone.
http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel01/cius2000.htm
Murder
* There were an estimated 15,517 murders in 2000, virtually no change from the 1999 murder estimate of 15,522. The number of murders was 21 percent less than in 1996 and 37.2 percent less than in 1991.
* Murder trends for the Nation’s cities collectively indicated murder increased by 0.7 percent from 1999 to 2000. Murder declined 3.8 percent in the suburban counties and 3.5 percent in rural counties.
* Based on supplemental murder data provided for 12,943 of the estimated 15,517 murders in 2000, males comprised 76.2 percent of the murder victims. By race, 49.0 percent of the victims were white, 48.5 percent were black, and other races accounted for 2.5 percent of the victims. Adults, persons aged 18 or older, made up 89.7 percent of the murder victims.
Bob Somerby sums it up quite nicely with his Shirts and Skins analogy.
“Our tribe is better than your tribe, therefor you merit what ever cruelty may come your way.”
eg The anti Hillary/Palin lies nastiness you saw on places like Kos.
The Old Media is complicit in this too especially conservative talk radio.
The White House has a pretty good crop of hate mongers today too.
The media:
If the victim is a minority (or member of previously oppressed group) the crime is automatically a hate crime.
If the perpetrator is from the ‘majority’ then the rest of that majority group is guilty, as well.
If the roles are reversed in either of the two above (generalized) statements…the conclusions aren’t considered to be true, therefore it’s not news.
Who instigated all this hate in the presidential campaigns? Who brought racial and ethnic profiling into that campaign and by extension into the daily discussions of today?
We all know the answer to that. But to discuss that brings out the big ol’ LABEL machine.
It’s part of the media predicament. The more we critical thinking folk (of both aisles) turn off the corporate media, the more the corporate media turns to the other, younger (dare I say less critical thinking) crowd….which means competing with American Dipstick and Wipeout.
So that means that all the clowns that voted for oblahblah are not responsible for his actions, (ie the downfall of America)??
Just wondering…
It’s all about the narrative.HT Instapundit
If you want to do a better job profiling the white supremecist nut, James Von Brun, who killed Officer Johns at the Holocaust Memorial, you can look at his writings which show that he hated Bush, McCain, Neocons; thought 911 was an inside job and hated Christianity.
So, if you were politically motivated, you could easily build a case that he was a far left terrorist, couldn’t you?
http://www.whatswrongwiththeworld.net/2009/06/antichristian_white_supremacis.html
Or was anti-government, anti-establishment…which is typically RIGHT-wing.
Which is Larry’s point…you can make shit up about who we want to attach this guy to.
But in the end, he was one sick old man who did this ON HIS OWN.
Very well stated.
All indications are that he performed the DEED on his own, but in another sense he wasn’t on his own at all. He’s only one of many dangerous, potentially violent extremists, whose ideology and actions are validated and encouraged by an extensive national support network that exists on the internet, on AM radio, and to some extent is finding support on televised media. He wasn’t just a person motivated by what he was hearing and reading; he was himself a motivator. Consider his book, his blog, etc. Now he’ll probably become a role model for other extremists like him.
I actually agree with you that he is one of who knows how many lone wolf nuts who reinforcement for their hate by Internet sites among other things.
To categorize them in political philosophy terms is of course ignorant. To hear that from pundits on MSNBC is disturbing and a reason why their ratings are so poor - they are a looney farm.
These lone wolf assasins don’t think in terms of liberal or conservative. They are anarchists opposed to government authority, have some kind of rigid biased beliefs, and are consumed with hate.
blame each individual for their crimes,not the whole community.
there are sickies every where.
Wasn’t the credo of Weather Underground anti-government and anti-establishment? Weren’t they domestic terrorists as well? And are they left wing?
Strawman.
You’ll find anti-government radicals from ALL political persuasions.
Unless you want to say it’s not the individual, but the group or ideology that causes murder, as in, it’s not the person holding the gun, but the gun industry. And I don’t think you want to go there.
The guy was off his rocker (probably literally) and was definitely NOT liberal or left wing.
excellent point oxy………..
Sounds something like what Jesse Ventura has said actually. Good point.
There’s something very dangerous going on with all of this “enemy list” business. When societies are under stress, economic, wartime, etc., we often see [after the fact] this circular firing squad mentality–let’s find the scapegoats–be it Jews, Muslims, right or left wingers, you name it.
The Republicans have turned this into an artform–enemies around every corner, the Big Bad Wolf under every bed. And now the Dems are doing the same damn thing: it’s a right-wing conspiracy.
No. It’s a whacko who was hellbent on violence and hate. Whether the whacko walks into a church and blows away a doctor or a guy walking into a museum with a vendetta or a converted Muslim with payback on his mind, the result is the same. We feed this stuff with our own intolerance and spite and endless excuses.
So yes, the Republican spin machine should be put on notice. But the Dems better get their own house in order before pointing fingers.
I agree. On a number of levels, the Dems (or as I like to believe, “the people holding the Dem party hostage”) have become the thing they said they hated. If you take the museum guard murder and the abortion doc murder and compare the coverage they are receiving vs. the coverage of the converted muslim hit on the recruiting officer, the first two win out big time. And they are stories that generate spin for a number of groups. But the soldier who also lost his life is on the back burner. The media cannot spin that story to match the President’s agenda. Three lives lost, but one seemingly valued just a little less. Maybe obits in the near future will mention the deceased’s Neilson ratings. Then we will know for sure just how important they really were.
I don’t believe it’s a matter of valuing any life less, so much as the clarity with which we see a particular act of violence as deliberate and calculated extremist ideological expressions.
Dr. Tiller’s murder was clearly a ideologically motivated act with calculated consequences. They didn’t just finally manage to kill Dr. Tiller; they killed a clinic and eliminated an entirely legal medical service that a certain segment of society finds abhorent on religious grounds. They accomplished with bombs and bullets what they couldn’t accomplish through democratic process and the law. In my opinion, they’re our f-ing domestic equivalent of the Taliban.
Similarly, the Holocaust Museum shooting. It was an obvious ideological hate crime with deep historical roots that has touched the lives of every Jewish American. It was a statement of belief and intent. It put a hateful theory that has poisoned the mind for centuries ahead of fundamental American principle and simple human decency.
The shooting of the innocent soldier was tragic, but the ideological motivation and calculated effect far less clear. That one strikes me more as the impulsive acting out of a single psychologically imbalanced individual, whose ideology served more as rationalization than motive. He fits a profile, I’m sure, but not that of the others. His action might have a stronger psychological component behind it than a ideological component.
I don’t know how you can say the soldier’s murder was any less ideological than the others. The perp is pleading not guilty because he believes his cause justified his crime.
“The shooting of the innocent soldier was tragic, but the ideological motivation and calculated effect far less clear.”
What isn’t clear? The man is a converted Muslim extremist who in a premeditated fashion killed this Army private in cold blood. Israel has lived for decades with this kind of terrorism and it was a matter of time when it would hit our shores. Prisons are a hornets nest of extremist muslim conversion and those people are no different therefore than the terrorists that struck on 9/11. The only difference is instead of 3,000 people the man killed one person and there could be other future incidents involving larger groups of people.
The Tiller and the Holocaust shooters is that they are lone crazy wolves who committed a hate crime. They are not a member of an organization that is at war with us. The killer of the recruitment center private says he is part of the larger radical Islam enemy although more details have to emerge to conclude that.
Lone wolf assasins are nothing new to this country and there is no way of 100% protecting ourselves against them. It is an unintended consequence of the freedoms we have.
For groups to politicize these lone wolf assasins in terms of politics is ignorant and dispicable. For those who regard the holocaust shooter as “far right extremist” does that mean that Al Qaeda are “far left extremists?” It’s a dumb dialogue.
The term “lone wolf” only serves to break apparent connections of legal responsibility between the fanatic who actually pulls the trigger or detonates the bomb, and the extremist collective that supports and actively promotes the thinking that motivates the violence. “Lone wolf” is a sort of code phrase among right-wing extremists. I suspect you might not be aware of that point. For clarification, consider what the term implies in extremist documents such as The Turner Diaries. Wikipedia has a brief and to-the-point discussion of the term here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_wolf_(terrorism)
I realize of course that to some extent this argues against my own suggestion that the recruitment office shooting falls into a different category. It’s possible that the shooter there was every bit as ideologically driven. It may come out that his actions were carefully calculated rather than impulsive. It is frightening to think that Islamic extremism could begin to take on this form within the United States. Isolated individuals and small groups networking anonymously within larger extremist communities of thought, but acting outside of larger structures of command and control, are far more difficult to guard against.
The hightened concern about domestic right-wing terrorism is a recognition of the fact that they’re already following this model, and that political and economic conditions are conducive to an increase in their activities. We’re already seeing the results in the news.
Profiling is only permissible for Muslims. Only group in America that gets judged for the actions of extremists. Muslim is the new black.
Horseshit, arch.
GFY.
Disagree all you want, but it’s true.
The only thing that separates these recent murders, which are DWARFED in number by the THOUSANDS that occur every year, is that the perps have an irrational attachment to a political cause. So I guess it’s to be expected that [the overabundance of] political pundits weigh in, ad nauseam. Or that politicians seize the opportunity to grandstand.
These recent murders where the perps (or the victim, as in the case of the physician) were actually on law enforcement’s radar screen to varying degrees illustrate the limitations and failure of profiling and surveillance, which obviously can’t prevent all crime from occurring. But do I think profiling is wrong per se and should never be one of the tools law enforcement employs? I have to say no, for to deny there are sometimes predictable patterns when it comes to criminal behavior is to deny reality. But it’s vital that probable cause be given MORE weight if we want to avoid the tyranny of a police state.
Larry–absolutely correct! We need to emphaisze the man’s own personal culpability, not his ethnic, religious, or political contacts.
I am afraid, however, that asking for our media talking heads to quit targeting initiating causes as excuses for persons who do terrible crimes like this would mean they would have to give up their jobs. They make their living finding ways for people to blame everything bad in their lives on someone else.
We need to work more also on asking everyone to quit listening to the media, to learn to listen to the “still small voice” instead. I know that is a passage from the Bible, but I think it’s a metaphor that all can understand, no matter what their upbringing.
What to I think, Larry?
I think the media and the left-wing blogs have focused on exactly the narrative they wanted to, to reinforce their own Village dogmas.
And frankly, I’m a little PISSED that the young Army recruiter who was killed by a young Black Muslim recruit who said the recruiter deserved it, because he was part of the “government’s” killing machine, has gotten very short shrift with our manipulative media.
WHICH ideological “side” helped convince that young Black Muslim that our soldiers overseas were killers, slaughtering women and children, and it was his DUTY to punish him, as in Eye for an Eye?
Olbermann? Maddow? NYTimes pundits? Jeremiah Wright? Bill Ayers? The View?
I suspect the parents of that young recruiter are feeling very, very bitter right now.
And I damn well don’t blame em.
Rip my head off for it. I give a shit anymore.
Frankly, I give a rat’s ass about ole “Them Jews” Rev. Wright, hiding behind his “I’m a Christian pastor” schtick.
And I give a rat’s ass about all the MSNBC ass-kissers who never even mentioned the slaughtered 23-year-old recruiter, so they could milk the crap out of bashing only the “rightwing haters.”
Fuck that.
I couldn’t agree with you more. Can’t generalize regarding groups that are “protected?” but can railroad the “right” because they are everyone’s straw man? I think that is the height (or depth) of hypocrisy, but hey, I’m a former LIBERAL so I guess I am now just misled and need re-programming?
O.K. think on this one. Since this Muslim shooter was trained in Yemen and carried a Somalian passport… forget he was originally an American, as he had a Somali passport and we don’t have an embassy in Somalia I don’t think. So, technically by taking a Somalian passport is it not true that this man surrendered his U.S. citizenship by doing so and is now and forever a foreign terrorist. So, is this then not the first assassination of a member of our armed forces on U.S. soil by a foreign terrorist? It happened on Obama’s watch. Or, is this not technically correct?
Hmmmm…interesting point.
foreign terrorist
Isn’t that out of the 0bama lexicon? Surely someone has read him his f^cking Miranda rights?
According to Obama he made a boo-boo and should get detention in an island paradise of his choosing.
This started with Bush and is getting worse with Obama. It seems to me that when one country engages in battle with another country (in this case a multinational forien organization) when they take prisoners on “the battlefield” they become prisoners of war and are held until hostilities are over. Since when have we ever taken POWS and put them on trial, let alone read them Miranda Rights?
Also, isn’t it true that when a U.S. citizen joins or at least assists the enemy, aren’t they considered traitors and tried as such?
-realize the danger of the mentality that wants to punish a group of people for the actions of a few-
this is the answer, to use reason and not devolve into a primitive state.
Personally, I’m in favor of profiling. But I would rather see illegals and gang members profiled. Maybe we could get rid of a boatload of crime in this country.
I would like to know why the feds are allowed to spy on average Americans but they don’t spy on criminals to keep us all safe? Maybe the feds are complicit in domestic crime? Or, maybe it’s not an advantageous political issue, or maybe they don’t give a rat’s a** about Average Americans?
How can you see who is a terrorist? What gives them away? Is it their dress, their conduct, their religion? All I know is that Islam scares the hell out of me and I DO NOT like their treatment of women - period. You will have to go a long way before I object to being extra careful about Muslims and their mosques. No other religion has dedicated themselves to the destruction of everyone who doesn’t follow their belief system. Thank you, but I’ll be happy that an extra eye is kept on them.
what scares me is they just love to blow things up.and i don’t want it to be me..