One of my favorite columnists is Chris Kelly from The Scranton Times. Chris is smart, funny, irreverent and he and I often seem to share the same common-sense liberal world-view. So I was shocked when he ran a piece on the TSA scanners that basically said "just deal with it".
So I began to write a comment on the site. It grew longer. And longer. And I thought that it belonged here. So read Chris' piece, and then continue on....
The question isn't 'how effective are the scanners?'. The question is 'how effective are the scanners given the time, money and human cost of the scanners?'. Meaning, millions of people have been inconvenienced, embarrassed, delayed and harassed by the scanners, but what have they prevented? How many attempts have been stopped because of this civil-liberties-devouring monster we call the TSA? And more importantly, is it worth the cost?
Like it or not, the threat of terrorism is something we're going to have to live with. The goal of terrorism isn't death, it's fear. And it's the change in our lives that the fear brings. That being the metric, the terrorists have already won. We're a nation living in fear and willing to surrender our basic rights to politicians often-impotent claims to 'make us safe'. Remember what Benjamin Franklin - one of the all-time badasses of history - had to say "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety deserve neither".
We've come a long way from the Founders. They had the huevos to go toe-to-toe with the greatest military and sea power the world had ever known. We're willing to debase ourselves in the hopes of cutting the already millions-to-one chance of a terrorist striking. Is that rugged Americana? Is that what John Wayne would do when confronted with danger? Ask youself... WWTDD? What would The Duke do? I sincerely doubt that it would involve showing his genitals. Unless it's to Angie Dickinson later in the picture.
The media helps to flog this cultural acceptance that "you're gonna die if you don't let Uncle Sam rub your wee-wee or hoo-hoo". This blind acceptance of TSA procedures - let me see you naked or you have to let me get to third base - sounds like Humbert Humbert, not a governmental agency. Future people will laugh at us, at how simple and stupid we've become, living in constant fear of incredibly long odds. Why don't hand out noise-makers to passengers and have them all blow them at take-off to ward off any geese that might bring down the plane? It's happened.
In reality, the odds of dying at the hands of a terrorist are long. As tragic and terrible as 9/11 was, more people died of preventable cancer that day - and every day since - then died in the attacks.
I can say this as a semi-regular air traveler. I'd rather take the chance that figurative lightning will strike rather than debase myself to someone else's ideological goals. Which brings me to those polls. Are those polls of frequent air travelers or is it a generic poll that gets less frequent travelers and more scared moms, holding junior tight to her bosom, who haven't been on a plane ever? I'm guessing its the later.
Is terrorism a threat? Yes. Is it a real threat? Yes. Is it worth changing your life over? Is it worth giving up some of the things that make us Americans over? I'll answer very strongly: NO!
Showing posts with label terror. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terror. Show all posts
10.15.2010
Dylan Ratigan with the single most sane, coherent political diatribe about terrorism ever
Sure Dylan loses his mind every once in a while, but this is a series of brilliant observations about the nature of the war on terror and cognitive dissonance.
Mor lik dis plz.
Mor lik dis plz.
9.11.2010
5.16.2010
GOP senators in favor of allowing no-fly listers to buy guns; NRA member only believes what Fox News tells him
Two GOP senators are more concerned with gun rights than terrorism, to the point where they oppose preventing people on the government's terror-watch no-fly list from buying guns.
There is however, this beauty of an interview with one NRA member which pretty much crystallizes everything:
Huff PostThat's some good thinkin' there, hoss. Fortunately, as Think Progress reports, the average NRA gun owner doesn't agree.
New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's appeal to what he called "common sense" at a congressional hearing Wednesday morning failed to sway two Republican senators who said that giving the government the ability to block the purchase of guns by suspected terrorists would undermine the Second Amendment's right to bear arms.
"Shouldn't FBI agents have the authority to block sales of guns and explosives to those on the terror watchlists -- and deemed too dangerous to fly? I actually believe that they should," Bloomberg told senators.
"This common-sense legislation is not anti-gun -- it's anti-terrorist," chimed in Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), the sponsor of a bill that would close what Bloomberg has called a "terror gap."
But GOP Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lindsay Graham of South Carolina wouldn't go along.
Admitting that "at first blush" the bill "seems to be an obvious step that we should take," Collins said that many people on the FBI's watchlist don't belong there. "None of us wants a terrorist to be able to purchase a gun, but neither should we want to infringe upon a Constitutional right of law-abiding Americans," she said.
Graham described the bill as an instrument of those who would ban guns altogether. "We're talking about a constitutional right here," he said, explaining that he could not support a bill that would force "innocent Americans" to "pay the cost of going to court to get their gun rights back."
Graham wasn't nearly as concerned about rights when he launched into a disquisition on the treatment of American citizens accused of terrorism. "I am all into national security," he said. "I want them to stop reading these guys Miranda rights."
There is however, this beauty of an interview with one NRA member which pretty much crystallizes everything:
Notably, one NRA member found news of the “terror gap” so incredulous that he did not believe the fact that potential terrorists are allowed to purchase firearms. He called news of the GAO report “false information,” and when ThinkProgress tried to show him a Washington Post article reporting it, he remained unconvinced:
NRA MEMBER: The Washington Post, I think that’s part of like the Communist News Broadcasting and everything. … The Washington Post lies on everything. … I don’t know how I can believe the Post. You need to find better facts than the Washington Post. … I wouldn’t believe a word I read in the Washington Post. It’s one of the worst papers in the whole country, from what I’ve heard.
TP: Oh, then which newspaper would you believe?
NRA MEMBER: Which newspaper? I don’t know I would stick to Fox News over everything.
4.09.2010
Right-wing violence: IRS agents getting death threats in response to Newt's lies
In response to Newt Gingrich's wildly inaccurate, willingly deceptive and outragously, purposely false comment about 16,000 new IRS agents being hired to enforce health care:
Fox News via Media Matters
The federal government is investigating dozens of death threats to IRS employees that have been posted online since the House passed the health care bill, FoxNews.com has learned.
The health care law has sparked protests on radical anti-tax and anti-government Web sites and within their private, password-protected e-mail lists and message boards. Some writers have labeled March 21 -- the day the House passed the bill – "Bloody Sunday," and they see it as a call to violent action against IRS workers.
In the days following the House vote, animosity toward the IRS intensified, and many heated online protests included specific discussions about the best way to go about killing tax agents.
Hundreds of comments were posted in response to an incendiary story on infowars.com, the radical far-right Web site owned by radio host Alex Jones. The story, entitled, "The Cost Of Defying Obamacare: $2,250 a Month And IRS Goons Pointing Guns At Your Family," focused on the “increasing militarization of the IRS” and its expansion of powers under the new health care law.
One commenter wrote: "If they actually try to do this, there is going to be a whole lot of thugs start vanishing. This is the last line in the sand. Those fools have just signed their death warrants!!!"
"theres gonna be alot of IRS agents needing healthcare if they try to terrorize us Americans," another comment read. Yet another wrote, "Come and take them…….they will have to hire so many IRS agents because…well when 10 a day get killed….you do the math."
3.26.2010
The end result of the right-wing violence movement
Let’s talk about the “violence movement” on the right. Let’s assume that they truly believe everything they’re saying about the government taking over their lives. It’s not true, of course, but let’s run with their assumptions for a minute.
Conservative blogs are running the violence angle. Hardcore blogs like Conservative Yankee are suggesting "[H]ave a swing" at "your Congressman". CY owner Bob Owens says “Jackasses" who call health care a right "deserve to be drawn and quartered."
His blog comes within a hair’s breadth of advocating treason: “I have some hope that the courts will respond favorably to the many states suing to eradicate this unconstitutional scheme… The thought of the morally-required alternative is almost too much to bear.”
Glenn Beck speaks of “armed insurrection”, “get your gun” and being the conservative equivalent of a Jewish Nazi hunter, a “progressive hunter”.
Erik Erickson asks "At what point do the people ... march down to their state legislator's house, pull him outside, and beat him to a bloody pulp?"
These people are advocating turning on their fellow American citizens. Not because they’ve been denied the right to vote (they haven’t), not because they’ve been denied the right to petition or assemble (they have legally done both frequently), not because they have been enslaved (they have not, despite their protests, which just show they don’t understand slavery or hyperbole).
They’re proposing turning their fists and their guns on fellow Americans because they lost an election, because there is a black man in office and because they lost a contentious vote in Congress.
What other reasons can there be? George W. Bush was appointed to his first term, not elected, and once in office he stripped away rights with the blessings of conservatives. He eliminated posse comitatus, opening the door to federal troops being used as domestic law enforcement – martial law. He weakened the Great Writ of due process. He allowed the government to spy on its own citizens without a warrant.
They didn’t cry a word of dissent when their rights were truly removed. It’s only now, once they’ve lost a fair vote after a fair election, that they cry oppression.
If they're serious about arming for a revolution (and cutting gas lines, etc...), their only option is to start eliminating their “enemies”. I know it sounds over-the-top and hyperbolic, but they don't need arms to vote. They're obviously talking about going past the political process.
How does this work? History gives us a roadmap for how this usually proceeds.
I’d guess that they first go after the government. Actually, I don't guess. The right-wing blogosphere has openly said it. They'd go after members of Congress who voted yes on health care. Drag them into the street and shoot them. Beating them will do no good, it will only harden resolve. They must be killed. Shot in the street. What happens to spouses and children?
Then what? Kill the President? I’d think they’d have to. If this is really a revolution, the king must die. Be very careful here. If you’ve followed this far, you now stand on the precipice of treason, if you already haven’t crossed it.
Then what? Round up members of the media who disagree with them? Are the Olbermanns and Maddows and Schultzes taken out and shot as well? What about the scholars, intellectuals, professors, artists and poets who disagree?
What about ordinary dissenters from your movement, like me? My dissent from your beliefs is what has led us to this place. You can’t possibly allow beliefs like mine, as dangerous to the nation as they are, to resurface, could you? I must be removed.
If I am to die, will I be given a trial first? On what grounds? I’ve broken no law. I’ve only voted, petitioned, and advocated. Under the Constitution you claim to love, what laws have I broken? If I am to be imprisoned for being a progressive dissenter, do I get a fair trial first? Can you risk my acquittal? Perhaps a military tribunal would be better.
Would they allow free and fair elections? Would a progressive be allowed to run? Would they allow the progressive to actually win, or would a popular progressive be assassinated before they could capture a fair vote? Would the vote just be rigged?
It would now seem that our Patriots have established a puppet government, one comprised of only those they’ve allowed to live. Those that agree with them and will be controlled by the mob. Puppets. Cantor, Boehner, Palin.
What next, you ask?
Then they run the government. What kind of government? I don't know, but what we've seen is not democracy, it's mob rule. Would they adhere to the Constitution? While I'm sure they'll claim otherwise, I’d say no. If they were Constitutionalists they’d have worked the ballot box, not the chambers of their guns.
What we appear to be left with is a totalitarian regime.
I am sure that any Patriot who has read this far is saying “no, no, no, that’s not what we’re about, we’re Constitutionalists’”. The language you’re using, the ideas that the most extreme among you espouse, say otherwise. History has shown us this path, over and over and over. You don’t speak of armed revolution without meaning to seize power, eliminate enemies and install the rules you have been otherwise unable to obtain by free and fair elections.
When you speak of armed revolution, you speak of overthrow. In 1776, it was to remove the rule of a king who had denied Americans the rights of speech, assembly, and petition. A king who had taxed them without letting them vote.
You, however, already have these rights. Your rights have not been abrogated. This Congress and this President were freely and fairly elected. The health care and stimulus votes in Congress were done openly and conducted by established rules.
You’re mad that you have been outvoted.
I know you’ll argue (mostly misquoted) polls. We can argue polls, but regardless, Congress is not bound to govern by polls.
If this totalitarianism that is the logical conclusion of your statements is not what you want, then what is the goal of those statements? What other end do you see?
I hope that some of them will read this and say, “No, you’re wrong, this is not what we want”. Good. I hope so. I have to ask: then what is the point of this talk of armed violence? You have your rights, so what else is it that you want?
Is it to get by force what you couldn’t attain by election? If not, how else do you propose to get what you want? Once you speak of revolution and guns, you have by definition abandoned the electoral process. What else could be the point?
If this is not the end you seek, then tell me – what other end do you see by advocating violent armed revolution against a government that has not violated your rights, that preserved your rights to assemble, petition and vote?
This is madness.
Conservative blogs are running the violence angle. Hardcore blogs like Conservative Yankee are suggesting "[H]ave a swing" at "your Congressman". CY owner Bob Owens says “Jackasses" who call health care a right "deserve to be drawn and quartered."
His blog comes within a hair’s breadth of advocating treason: “I have some hope that the courts will respond favorably to the many states suing to eradicate this unconstitutional scheme… The thought of the morally-required alternative is almost too much to bear.”
Glenn Beck speaks of “armed insurrection”, “get your gun” and being the conservative equivalent of a Jewish Nazi hunter, a “progressive hunter”.
Erik Erickson asks "At what point do the people ... march down to their state legislator's house, pull him outside, and beat him to a bloody pulp?"
These people are advocating turning on their fellow American citizens. Not because they’ve been denied the right to vote (they haven’t), not because they’ve been denied the right to petition or assemble (they have legally done both frequently), not because they have been enslaved (they have not, despite their protests, which just show they don’t understand slavery or hyperbole).
They’re proposing turning their fists and their guns on fellow Americans because they lost an election, because there is a black man in office and because they lost a contentious vote in Congress.
What other reasons can there be? George W. Bush was appointed to his first term, not elected, and once in office he stripped away rights with the blessings of conservatives. He eliminated posse comitatus, opening the door to federal troops being used as domestic law enforcement – martial law. He weakened the Great Writ of due process. He allowed the government to spy on its own citizens without a warrant.
They didn’t cry a word of dissent when their rights were truly removed. It’s only now, once they’ve lost a fair vote after a fair election, that they cry oppression.
If they're serious about arming for a revolution (and cutting gas lines, etc...), their only option is to start eliminating their “enemies”. I know it sounds over-the-top and hyperbolic, but they don't need arms to vote. They're obviously talking about going past the political process.
How does this work? History gives us a roadmap for how this usually proceeds.
I’d guess that they first go after the government. Actually, I don't guess. The right-wing blogosphere has openly said it. They'd go after members of Congress who voted yes on health care. Drag them into the street and shoot them. Beating them will do no good, it will only harden resolve. They must be killed. Shot in the street. What happens to spouses and children?
Then what? Kill the President? I’d think they’d have to. If this is really a revolution, the king must die. Be very careful here. If you’ve followed this far, you now stand on the precipice of treason, if you already haven’t crossed it.
Then what? Round up members of the media who disagree with them? Are the Olbermanns and Maddows and Schultzes taken out and shot as well? What about the scholars, intellectuals, professors, artists and poets who disagree?
What about ordinary dissenters from your movement, like me? My dissent from your beliefs is what has led us to this place. You can’t possibly allow beliefs like mine, as dangerous to the nation as they are, to resurface, could you? I must be removed.
If I am to die, will I be given a trial first? On what grounds? I’ve broken no law. I’ve only voted, petitioned, and advocated. Under the Constitution you claim to love, what laws have I broken? If I am to be imprisoned for being a progressive dissenter, do I get a fair trial first? Can you risk my acquittal? Perhaps a military tribunal would be better.
Would they allow free and fair elections? Would a progressive be allowed to run? Would they allow the progressive to actually win, or would a popular progressive be assassinated before they could capture a fair vote? Would the vote just be rigged?
It would now seem that our Patriots have established a puppet government, one comprised of only those they’ve allowed to live. Those that agree with them and will be controlled by the mob. Puppets. Cantor, Boehner, Palin.
What next, you ask?
Then they run the government. What kind of government? I don't know, but what we've seen is not democracy, it's mob rule. Would they adhere to the Constitution? While I'm sure they'll claim otherwise, I’d say no. If they were Constitutionalists they’d have worked the ballot box, not the chambers of their guns.
What we appear to be left with is a totalitarian regime.
I am sure that any Patriot who has read this far is saying “no, no, no, that’s not what we’re about, we’re Constitutionalists’”. The language you’re using, the ideas that the most extreme among you espouse, say otherwise. History has shown us this path, over and over and over. You don’t speak of armed revolution without meaning to seize power, eliminate enemies and install the rules you have been otherwise unable to obtain by free and fair elections.
When you speak of armed revolution, you speak of overthrow. In 1776, it was to remove the rule of a king who had denied Americans the rights of speech, assembly, and petition. A king who had taxed them without letting them vote.
You, however, already have these rights. Your rights have not been abrogated. This Congress and this President were freely and fairly elected. The health care and stimulus votes in Congress were done openly and conducted by established rules.
You’re mad that you have been outvoted.
I know you’ll argue (mostly misquoted) polls. We can argue polls, but regardless, Congress is not bound to govern by polls.
If this totalitarianism that is the logical conclusion of your statements is not what you want, then what is the goal of those statements? What other end do you see?
I hope that some of them will read this and say, “No, you’re wrong, this is not what we want”. Good. I hope so. I have to ask: then what is the point of this talk of armed violence? You have your rights, so what else is it that you want?
Is it to get by force what you couldn’t attain by election? If not, how else do you propose to get what you want? Once you speak of revolution and guns, you have by definition abandoned the electoral process. What else could be the point?
If this is not the end you seek, then tell me – what other end do you see by advocating violent armed revolution against a government that has not violated your rights, that preserved your rights to assemble, petition and vote?
This is madness.
3.25.2010
Fox Excuse Machine: the right trivializes, questions, dismisses threats of violence
Media Matters
Amid reports that several Democrats in Congress have been the targets of death threats, racial and anti-gay epithets, and have had their offices vandalized for their votes on health care reform, several Fox News personalities have been quick to first condemn the threats but then immediately make excuses for the threats. Others have appeared to dismiss the seriousness of the threats.
Doocy: "So why are people angry? Maybe because they didn't want this bill?"
Kilmeade: "Are Democrats using" threats of violence "to their advantage to marginalize Republican opposition?"
Carlson agrees it's "disappointing" that Democrats are making threats so public and says "they should just stop discussing it all together."
Beck: Obama is "poking and prodding" people to commit violence. ... "They need you to be violent. They are begging for it."
Hannity: "So do you think that this is just an effort to smear conservatives?"
Cupp: Democrats "want us to feel sorry for them that they've gotten a couple of ... angry voicemails."
Fox Nation: "Are Threats Really Elevated, or Are Dems Playing Politics?"
Fox Nation: "Was Tea Party Story a Racial Rant or a Set Up?"
Charles Krauthammer: "I'm sure a lot of this is trumped up. ... You are always going to have a kook and a nut here and there."
Stephen Hayes: "This happens all the time," "counterproductive" for GOP to condemn them again.
And the blogs.....
NewsBusters: "The Media's Myth of Right Wing Violence."
Confederate Yankee: "[H]ave a swing" at "your Congressman" instead
Gateway Pundit: "Suddenly the State-Run Media is Horrified that Politician's [sic] Home Addresses Are Published on the Internet."
Big Journalism's Walsh: Media "never once stops to question whether the Alinsky Party is, you know, exaggerating or even lying."
Big Government: "We doubt these threats are actually real and, certainly wouldn't condone them."
More GOP hypocrisy, this time while condemning violence. In other words, it's Thursday.
Huff Post (my comments in red:)And then, after suggesting that these issues are best settled politically, Eric Cantor, Minority Whip, attacked Democrats for daring to be political. They are, he said: "dangerously fanning the flames by suggesting that these incidents be used as a political weapon."
"I know many Americans are angry over this health care bill, and that Washington Democrats just aren't listening. So the anger that we've fueled for a year with talks about socialist takeovers and losing America is justified because we lost an up-or-down vote. But, as I've said, violence and threats are unacceptable. That's not the American way. Good. About time. We need to take that anger and channel it into positive change. Call your Congressman, go out and register people to vote, go volunteer on a political campaign, make your voice heard - but let's do it the right way." Yes! Fight it out at the ballot box.
I get it, Republican anger at losing a fair vote is OK, but Democratic anger at being threatened with violence (and with some threats followed up on) is not.
Right. Gotcha.
Cantor then attempted to diminish the attacks: "To use such threats as political weapons is reprehensible," said Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., who added that security concerns have been overhyped in media coverage of the debate.
What I notice is that NOWHERE do Cantor or Boehner mention that it's the members of their own party have been the ones creating this atmosphere for the last year.
The DNC has responded: "Let's be clear: calling on Republican leaders who have contributed in part to this anger by wildly mischaracterizing the substance and motives of health reform to condemn these acts is entirely appropriate."
Perrielo, whose brother's gas line was cut Tuesday after right-wing anarchists posted the wrong address, responded:
And yet, the wingnuttery continues as Rp. Louie Gohmert of (where else?) Texas called for the repeal of the 17th Amendment and suggesting taking the power to elect Senators away from the people and giving it back to the states. A direct attack on..... Democracy.
Keep going kids. This will all come back at you in November.
3.24.2010
Cokie Roberts (rightly) compares Glenn Beck to a terrorist
"Actually, Beck is worse than a clown. He's more like a terrorist who believes he has discovered the One True Faith, and condemns everyone else as a heretic. And that makes him something else as well -- a traitor to the American values he professes so loudly to defend."Interesting insight. Similar to the post from earlier this week "The Republican party is an abusive alcoholic promising things will be different".
-- Cokie Roberts on Glenn Beck
The real shame is that a party as great as the GOP was has sunk to such seditious levels. And not just on the fringe, because the center and the base cheer this on.
Wingnuts WAAAY off the reservation, deep end and other sanity metaphors of your choice
For the second time this week, I'm addressing the topic of the growing trend of right-wing terrorism. It's real.
Then there are the real nutcases at sites like Confederate Yankee who have gone as far as to suggest the military turning their guns on their fellow countrymen because of the boogeymen created by the wingnuts.
Some of the commenters have suggested armed revolution, disclosing the home address of congresspeople who voted yes on HCR, assaulting congresspeople.... it's insane. Literally. These are domestic terrorists.
Sarah Palin is identifying legislators who voted yes on a map marked with GUNSIGHTS.
Glenn Beck is repeatedly using violent rhetoric to oppose health care.
Don't forget the noose fax sent to Congressman Clyburn, and the disgusting voicemail messages left for Bart Stupak. But the right takes one of two approaches. One, "We don't know for sure who did it. Maybe progressives did this to blame us". Or two, "This is what happens when you take our liberty, enslave us and kill America".
Lunacy.
Madness.
Criminal.
Terrorist.
Daily Beast
On the heels of health care, a new Harris poll reveals Republican attitudes about Obama: Two-thirds think he's a socialist, 57 percent a Muslim—and 24 percent say "he may be the Antichrist."
EzraAnd then a local Tea Party leader will write: "Oh well, collateral damage." Of course, he'll later remove the comment, when called on it.
There is a danger to the sort of rhetoric the GOP has used over the past few months. When Rep. Devin Nunes begs his colleagues to say "no to socialism, no to totalitarianism and no to this bill"; when Glenn Beck says the bill "is the end of America as you know it"; when Sarah Palin says the bill has "death panels" -- that stuff matters.
And the stuff on talk radio, of course, was worse. So take the universe of people who really respect right-wing politicians and listen to right-wing media. Most of them will hear this stuff and turn against the bill. Some will hear this stuff and really be afraid of the bill. And then a small group will hear this stuff and believe it and wonder whether they need to do something more significant to stop this bill from becoming law. And then a couple will actually follow through. And one will cut the gas lines leading to house of Rep. Tom Perriello's brother after seeing a tea partyer post the address online.
Then there are the real nutcases at sites like Confederate Yankee who have gone as far as to suggest the military turning their guns on their fellow countrymen because of the boogeymen created by the wingnuts.
We live in a nation full of freshly-experienced combat veterans and graying patriots alike that still remember their oaths to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. The taste of liberty is much sweeter for them, having been to parts of the world where such things cannot be taken for granted. Pray that we are not required to call upon their service in a struggle against our own countrymen. God protect us all if we are forced to such extremes by a power-mad clique intent on transforming citizens into dependent subjects.
I have some hope that the courts will respond favorably to the many states suing to eradicate this unconstitutional scheme, or that November's elections will destroy the Democratic majority and lay the ground for a full repeal of a bad law designed purely for one party's political gain.
The thought of the morally-required alternative is almost too much to bear.
Some of the commenters have suggested armed revolution, disclosing the home address of congresspeople who voted yes on HCR, assaulting congresspeople.... it's insane. Literally. These are domestic terrorists. Sarah Palin is identifying legislators who voted yes on a map marked with GUNSIGHTS.
Glenn Beck is repeatedly using violent rhetoric to oppose health care.
Don't forget the noose fax sent to Congressman Clyburn, and the disgusting voicemail messages left for Bart Stupak. But the right takes one of two approaches. One, "We don't know for sure who did it. Maybe progressives did this to blame us". Or two, "This is what happens when you take our liberty, enslave us and kill America".
Lunacy.
Madness.
Criminal.
Terrorist.
3.23.2010
More right wing calls for terrorism disguised as patriotism
This is terrorism, pure and simple. I know that for this nutjob, terror is something that brown-skinned people with names he can't pronounce do. However, threatening your fellow citizens with gun violence because you don't like the way a vote or a law turned out is terrorism.
It's no different than the Iraqi squads who cut off people's thumbs that were stained purple because they voted. These jackasses are no better than Saddam's Republican Guard.
This guy Vanderboegh is a dangerous lunatic. Not a patriot, not a revolutionary. Patriots protested specifically because the rule of law was not followed nor enforced. Health care passed because a majority of the freely and fairly elected Congress deemed it worthy. This mean and his "militia" are criminals. Nothing more.
Well, actually, they are something more. They're stupid and bad students of history.
Jail them for terroristic threats.
It's no different than the Iraqi squads who cut off people's thumbs that were stained purple because they voted. These jackasses are no better than Saddam's Republican Guard.
This guy Vanderboegh is a dangerous lunatic. Not a patriot, not a revolutionary. Patriots protested specifically because the rule of law was not followed nor enforced. Health care passed because a majority of the freely and fairly elected Congress deemed it worthy. This mean and his "militia" are criminals. Nothing more.
Well, actually, they are something more. They're stupid and bad students of history.
Jail them for terroristic threats.
Media Matters
Authorities in Wichita and some other cities across the country are investigating vandalism against Democratic offices, apparently in response to health care reform.
And on Monday, a former Alabama militia leader took credit for instigating the actions.
Mike Vanderboegh of Pinson, Ala., former leader of the Alabama Constitutional Militia, put out a call on Friday for modern “Sons of Liberty” to break the windows of Democratic Party offices nationwide in opposition to health care reform. Since then, vandals have struck several offices, including the Sedgwick County Democratic Party headquarters in Wichita.
...
Vanderboegh posted the call for action Friday on his blog, “Sipsey Street Irregulars.” Referring to the health care reform bill as “Nancy Pelosi’s Intolerable Act,” he told followers to send a message to Democrats.
“We can break their windows,” he said. “Break them NOW. And if we do a proper job, if we break the windows of hundreds, thousands, of Democrat party headquarters across this country, we might just wake up enough of them to make defending ourselves at the muzzle of a rifle unnecessary.”
3.03.2010
Playing footsie with treason
Mother Jones
When people in positions of great power play footsie with those who advocate treason—or claim that the elected commander in chief is a bastard foreigner with no claim to the office—they are not just engaging in a lively debate. They are actively negating a fundamental principle of American politics: that the government, no matter how much you might disagree with its representatives, is of, by, and for the people.
Indeed, to a growing number of celebrity conservatives, this administration is no longer simply an adversary with whom you cross swords—it is an enemy you must destroy. In a paranoid culture, as Hofstadter recognized, the enemy is "thought of as being totally evil and totally unappeasable [and] must be totally eliminated." A government as villainous as the one portrayed on sites like WND (WorldNetDaily) cannot be debated or negotiated with, or even accorded the most basic respect. It must be vanquished.
2.28.2010
2.24.2010
Rep. Steve King sympathizes with domestic terrorist killer
ThinkProgress
ThinkProgress caught up with Rep. Steve King (R-IA) at CPAC to talk about the attack in Texas. Asked if the right-wing anti-tax rhetoric might have motivated the attack, King implicitly agreed, noting that he had been a leading opponent of the IRS for some time. He noted that although the attack was “sad,” “by the same token,” it was justified because once the the right succeeds at abolishing the IRS, “it’s going to be a happy day for America.” He sidestepped the question of the legitimacy of the terrorists’ grievances, but sympathized by saying that “I’ve had a sense of ‘why is the IRS in my kitchen.’ Why do they have their thumb in the middle of my back”:
TP: Do you think this attack, this terrorist attack, was motivated at all by a lot of the anti-tax rhetoric that’s popular in America right now?
KING: I think if we’d abolished the IRS back when I first advocated it, he wouldn’t have a target for his airplane. And I’m still for abolishing the IRS, I’ve been for it for thirty years and I’m for a national sales tax. [...] It’s sad the incident in Texas happened, but by the same token, it’s an agency that is unnecessary and when the day comes when that is over and we abolish the IRS, it’s going to be a happy day for America.
TP: So some of his grievances were legitimate?
KING: I don’t know if his grievances were legitimate, I’ve read part of the material. I can tell you I’ve been audited by the IRS and I’ve had the sense of ‘why is the IRS in my kitchen.’ Why do they have their thumb in the middle of my back. … It is intrusive and we can do a better job without them entirely.
Steve BenenTo anyone who says that the news media treats Democrats better/easier than Republicans, let me ask this: what would the firestorm have looked like if Barney Frank had said "Well, Osama did have a few legitimate gripes."?
King is, however, feeling at least some heat over this. Yesterday, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) took King to task on the House floor.
"The fact of the matter is that the gentleman that lost his life in that building, Vernon Hunter, is from -- was from Orangeburg, South Carolina, that I proudly represent in this body," said Clyburn. "He spent two tours in Vietnam and was about the business of carrying out his duties and responsibilities to this great country of ours. If anybody is a hero, it is this victim. And I find it appalling that a member of this body would call his death a noble happening."
The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents I.R.S. workers, also called on King to apologize for his remarks, saying the lawmaker showed "an appalling lack of compassion over [Vernon Hunter's] death, as well as a lack of respect for the lives of federal employees nationwide."
Representative King should retract and apologize for his ill-conceived statements concerning the tragic event that took place in Austin and pledge, as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, to do everything he can to ensure that the safety of federal employees remains one of our government's highest priorities.
But in order for King to suffer any real consequences for his sympathies for a suicide bomber, the media is going to have focus some attention on his lunacy. Yesterday, Washington Post journalist Ben Pershing told a reader in an online chat that King's comments "probably deserve more attention from the media. They are striking remarks."
To date, the Washington Post has not reported on King's comments at all.
Just answer that, please. Would it be ignored like this?
2.20.2010
SRSLY? Bush official criticizes Obama for killing too many terrorists
It appears that the President can't win for trying.
He relies on the teleprompter, critics cry from their prepared speech read off of a teleprompter.
He won't cut spending, they wail, as they refuse to participate in a panel to help cut the deficit.
And now, he's soft on terror, they moan, as they complain that he's killing too many terrorists.
What is so astonishing is that the public buys anything the GOP is selling.
He relies on the teleprompter, critics cry from their prepared speech read off of a teleprompter.
He won't cut spending, they wail, as they refuse to participate in a panel to help cut the deficit.
And now, he's soft on terror, they moan, as they complain that he's killing too many terrorists.
What is so astonishing is that the public buys anything the GOP is selling.
via HuffPost
At a panel on national security policy at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday, a prominent lawyer from the Bush administration's Department of Justice said he was concerned that the higher number of terrorist executions taking place under Obama was compromising U.S. intelligence operations.
"Why have executions increased?" asked Viet Dinh, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center and one of the authors of the USA Patriot Act. Citing a recent Washington Post article on the increased targeted killing of terrorists, Dinh complained that "the president and vice president expound this fact as a fact that they are actually successful in war."
2.16.2010
Fear-monger THIS: Taliban’s 2nd-in-command nabbed in Pakistan
And buried in 6 point type in the middle of the MSNBC.com homepage (gotta flog the Olympics) is this:
Soft on terror, my ass.
Taliban’s 2nd-in-command nabbed in PakistanNote the last paragraph. The announcement of his arrest was delayed because HE WAS BEING INTERROGATED.
Bin Laden associate is most senior Afghan Taliban leader caught since ’01
Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the No. 2 behind Afghan Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar and a close associate of Osama bin Laden, was captured in a joint CIA-Pakistani operation in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi
...
His capture represents a significant success for the administration of President Barack Obama, which has vowed to kill or seize Taliban and al-Qaida leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It follows the ramping up of CIA missile strikes against militant targets along the border between the two countries that have reportedly killed many midlevel commanders.
"This is a major terrorist who has been at the core of Taliban operations for years. Having him off the battlefield means the near-term disruption of plotting against coalition forces in Afghanistan," a U.S. counterterrorism official told NBC News.
...
The New York Times said it learned of the operation against Baradar last Thursday but delayed reporting it at the request of White House officials who argued that publicizing it would end a valuable intelligence-gathering effort by making Baradar's associates aware of his capture.
Soft on terror, my ass.
Terror fear-mongering: truth vs. fiction
Excellent article from Daniel Klaidman in Newsweek:
Jostling before the midterms has begun, and so too has the GOP's ritualistic hazing of Democrats on national security. At every turn Republicans are hammering the Obama administration for "capitulating" in the fight against terrorism. But their macho rhetoric actually sends a message of weakness: we can't try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in the same civilian courts that have convicted dozens of other international terrorists because Al Qaeda might attack New York. (When since 9/11 has New York not been a target of Al Qaeda?) Our criminal-justice system can't deal with a failed underwear bomber. The GOP assault may be smart politics, but in the long run it damages U.S. security by undermining our confidence and resiliency in the face of certain attacks to come.
...
Americans are historically a tough lot. But the policies and rhetoric of the Bush-Cheney years, which set the tone for the current GOP attacks, are infantilizing: be very afraid, we're told, and let the government take care of you. The tough-guy bluster has led to a permanent state of anxiety—and a slew of counterproductive policies, from harsh visa restrictions to waterboarding. Our politicians rail about apocalyptic threats while TSA officers pat down toddlers at the airport. The irony is that many potentially lethal terror attacks—from United Flight 93 to Richard Reid to the underwear bomber—have been foiled by regular citizens. The aim of terrorists is to make people feel powerless and afraid. Un-fortunately, not every plot will be foiled. But if that's the standard we and our leaders set for ourselves, we are doomed to perpetuate dumb policies that flow from irrational fears. Just what the terrorists want.
2.12.2010
Lawrence O'Donnell tears into Bush speechwriter over torture
(HuffPost)
Fireworks erupted on the set of "Morning Joe" Friday, after MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell took umbrage with former Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen's claim that President Obama is inviting a domestic terrorist attack.
Things started off rocky after Thiessen -- in the process of justifying the coercive counter-terrorism techniques used under the Bush administration and condemning Obama for "eliminating the CIA's interrogation program" -- insisted that his former boss was required to essentially start from scratch.
"You gotta think back to the period after 9/11," he said. "We didn't even know who hit us. We didn't know that Khalid Sheik Mohammad was the mastermind of 9/11 or the operational commander of al Qaeda. And then we started rounding up these terrorists..."
O'Donnell responded quickly, barking out his bewilderment with Thiessen's assertion that there was no pre-9/11 warning that an attack was coming.
"Isn't it true that the president you worked for invited the first attack by having no idea what was going on with al Qaeda? You just admitted that when you were hit on 9/11, you just said, 'We didn't know who hit us'. You were told who was going to hit you before 9/11. And your administration invited the first attack, for which you should live in shame."
Those charges were some of the milder in the heated exchange. Later in the segment, O'Donnell told Thiessen that he was hopelessly ill-equipped to talk about terrorism or torture.
"Marc, I'm wondering about your own personal experience with torture. I know you grew up in the richest zip code in America, in the Upper East Side. You went to the only boarding school in all of Connecticut that I know of that has its own golf course... And then you went to Vasser. And like all the torture-mongers in the Bush White House, the Cheney family included, you never served a day in the military. Never considered that. I'm wondering, with that background, what is it that gives you an expertise on torture? What makes you love it so much?"
Thiessen replied: "First of all, one, it is not torture. Second of all, [the New Yorker's] Jane Mayer said the other day I never had a security clearance... I had a security clearance. I was read into the CIA program. When President Bush did a speech in December 2006 to reveal this program, I was taken into a secure room in the National Security Council. I was given access to all of the intelligence this program produced. And I actually met with the actual interrogators who interviewed Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and got the information to stop attacks."
Fireworks erupted on the set of "Morning Joe" Friday, after MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell took umbrage with former Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen's claim that President Obama is inviting a domestic terrorist attack.
Things started off rocky after Thiessen -- in the process of justifying the coercive counter-terrorism techniques used under the Bush administration and condemning Obama for "eliminating the CIA's interrogation program" -- insisted that his former boss was required to essentially start from scratch.
"You gotta think back to the period after 9/11," he said. "We didn't even know who hit us. We didn't know that Khalid Sheik Mohammad was the mastermind of 9/11 or the operational commander of al Qaeda. And then we started rounding up these terrorists..."
O'Donnell responded quickly, barking out his bewilderment with Thiessen's assertion that there was no pre-9/11 warning that an attack was coming.
"Isn't it true that the president you worked for invited the first attack by having no idea what was going on with al Qaeda? You just admitted that when you were hit on 9/11, you just said, 'We didn't know who hit us'. You were told who was going to hit you before 9/11. And your administration invited the first attack, for which you should live in shame."
Those charges were some of the milder in the heated exchange. Later in the segment, O'Donnell told Thiessen that he was hopelessly ill-equipped to talk about terrorism or torture.
"Marc, I'm wondering about your own personal experience with torture. I know you grew up in the richest zip code in America, in the Upper East Side. You went to the only boarding school in all of Connecticut that I know of that has its own golf course... And then you went to Vasser. And like all the torture-mongers in the Bush White House, the Cheney family included, you never served a day in the military. Never considered that. I'm wondering, with that background, what is it that gives you an expertise on torture? What makes you love it so much?"
Thiessen replied: "First of all, one, it is not torture. Second of all, [the New Yorker's] Jane Mayer said the other day I never had a security clearance... I had a security clearance. I was read into the CIA program. When President Bush did a speech in December 2006 to reveal this program, I was taken into a secure room in the National Security Council. I was given access to all of the intelligence this program produced. And I actually met with the actual interrogators who interviewed Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and got the information to stop attacks."
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