How much violence will the ultraright have to commit?
09 Nov 2010, 11:56 pm
Until "mainstream" American conservatives recognize that there is a problem?
For starters, let me say that I will admit that in other countries (particularly developing countries) and in the past (particularly the 1960s) there was quite a bit of violent and immoral behaviour from the ultraleft. True, racists were brutalizing African Americans in the South and LBJ was slaughtering the Vietnamese, and true some of it may have been provoked by COINTELPRO, but that still doesn't mean the violence that was committed is in any way justified. The Democratic leadership didn't accept this fanaticism, in fact they even tried to undermine it with heavy-handed tactics (COINTELPRO).
Flash forward to 1993 and America has a Centre-Right DLC Democrat as president. Far-right militias start springing up, Christian terrorists start murdering abortion providers and their clients, and Timothy McVeigh commits the Oklahoma City bombing. This is all when the economy is sound (well, compared to now, though more than a decade of a debt-fueled service economy cannot be labelled as truly sound).
Now, flash forward to the centre-right (by any sane standard) Obama Presidency. Thirty years of bad economic policies and the massive expansion of a foreign (particularly military) oriented corporate welfare state at the expense of the vestigal social welfare state is costing America. The conservative dream of redistrubting income upwards in an increasingly unstable way has finally led to economic collapse. People went crazy in much of the developed world last time a downturn of that size happened.
A physician who provides abortions is murdered. A national commentator who called him "Killer Tiller" later lies about his use of the insult - claiming he never directly used it. Glenn Beck is insinuating that Obama wants to round you up and put you in FEMA Camps. Near the election, in 2008, rightwing eliminationist rhetoric had motivated one down on his luck man to shoot up a Unitarian Church. Now, cop killings are being planned and an extremist has unsuccessfully attempted to shoot up the TIDES Foundation & ACLU in California. Tea Partisans have chucked bricks through the windows of Congresspeople's offices for voting for "Obamacare".
Now, what type of intolerance is America's rightwing fearing? The intolerance of those mean liberals who said mean things and called them racist!
NEWSFLASH: This is the internet. I've been called derogatory homophobic names by conservative posters on a different forum site (which is ironic, as I'm not gay) and that was when I was fourteen. The violence, eliminationism, and extremism of the rabid right is much more serious than any conversational intolerance any lefist with a sturdy enough spine has the moral clarity to give you.
Last edited by Master_Pedant on 10 Nov 2010, 12:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
Jacoby
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10 Nov 2010, 12:09 am
So you're calling people like "Let's shoot up the TIDES Foundation" Bryon Williams a mere, harmless rednecks?
10 Nov 2010, 12:10 am
^this is false.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutaree
Also, please cite examples of left-wing violence and/or terrorism against living people to back your claim that leftists are more violent.
10 Nov 2010, 12:14 am
The problem, namely speaking, is that the violence of the ultraleft fringe (assorted animal rights activists and the like) is pretty much rejected and ostracized by mainstream progressives. You don't see leaders of the Progressive Democrats of America encouraging people to armed revolt or the slaugher of vaguely identified "tyrants".
10 Nov 2010, 12:20 am
By the way, Jacoby, I don't know who the hell the "radical statists" are in your ideology, but I did point to the very serious problem that the US corporate welfare state has increasingly expanded at the expense of social welfare state programs.
10 Nov 2010, 12:20 am
Jacoby: The worst terrorism commited by fringe lunatics on the left typically stops at petty vandalism. And those people are denounced and rejected by everyone on the mainstream left. The right-wing fringe kills people, and they are encouraged and defended by leaders within the mainstream right.
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WAR IS PEACE
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10 Nov 2010, 12:24 am
Now, now, Orwell. They don't defend them for committing violence, they just insinuate to good law-abiding patriots that socialists have taken over the government and that it's time to grab your guns and start a REVOLUTION!! ! Or else Obama will pour Gasoline on you and chuck a match at you.
Clearly, there's no pro-violence insinuations there!
^^^^ FOR THE SARCASM IMPAIRED, I WAS BEING VERY SARCASTIC.
Jacoby
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10 Nov 2010, 12:26 am
The attempted mail bombings that happened in Greece was done by communist groups. Joe Stack ended his life with the communist creed. Radical environmentalist and Malthusian James Lee took the Discovery Channel hostage and got himself killed. That's just this year.
The thing is, whenever some right wing person does something, it's an indictment on the whole movement but whenever someone left wing does something it's because they're a lone nut.
As for Timothy McVeigh, the reason he left the "militia" movement was because he didn't think they were hardcore enough.
10 Nov 2010, 12:45 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutaree
Also, please cite examples of left-wing violence and/or terrorism against living people to back your claim that leftists are more violent.
Look up Bill Ayers whom Barack Obama started his political campaign in his house.
Yeah that Bill Ayers whom is a Domestic Terrorist.
Jacoby
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10 Nov 2010, 12:52 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutaree
Also, please cite examples of left-wing violence and/or terrorism against living people to back your claim that leftists are more violent.
Look up Bill Ayers whom Barack Obama started his political campaign in his house.
Yeah that Bill Ayers whom is a Domestic Terrorist.
An unrepented one I might add too. His only regret was that he didn't do enough.
10 Nov 2010, 1:11 am
Did you even read my post? I think I made it pretty damn clear in the first paragraph that ultraleft violence does happen in foreign countries. The problem with your false analogy here, of course, is that the Socialist Party of Greece (which is barely social democratic, let alone "socialist" - yet still counts as the mainstream leftwing party in Greece) doesn't legitimize or constantly downplay the violence conducted by their Communist Party foes.
So? Many non-Communists (including conservatives) quote the communist manifesto, while Stack may have been something of an anti-(state) capitalist, what he intended to replace it with is unknowable.
He also had strong anti-immigrant sentiment and was condemned by the mainstream environmental movement.
So basically you've listed two syncretic radicals and one far-leftist from a country many, many thousands of kilometres away from North America.
The thing is, whenever some right wing person does something, it's an indictment on the whole movement but whenever someone left wing does something it's because they're a lone nut.
As for Timothy McVeigh, the reason he left the "militia" movement was because he didn't think they were hardcore enough.[/quote]
10 Nov 2010, 1:20 am
Did you even read my post? I think I made it pretty damn clear in the first paragraph that ultraleft violence does happen in foreign countries. The problem with your false analogy here, of course, is that the Socialist Party of Greece (which is barely social democratic, let alone "socialist" - yet still counts as the mainstream leftwing party in Greece) doesn't legitimize or constantly downplay the violence conducted by their Communist Party foes.
Bill Ayers' Weather Underground was in the United States.
So? Many non-Communists (including conservatives) quote the communist manifesto, while Stack may have been something of an anti-(state) capitalist, what he intended to replace it with is unknowable.
Highly unlikely, considering communism and capitalism doesn't usually mix very well.
He also had strong anti-immigrant sentiment and was condemned by the mainstream environmental movement.
So basically you've listed two syncretic radicals and one far-leftist from a country many, many thousands of kilometres away from North America.
A radical leftist doesn't have to be leftist across the board to be a radical leftist.
10 Nov 2010, 1:22 am
The thing is, whenever some right wing person does something, it's an indictment on the whole movement but whenever someone left wing does something it's because they're a lone nut.
As for Timothy McVeigh, the reason he left the "militia" movement was because he didn't think they were hardcore enough.
Let's please keep it to the United States?
Joe Stack: point granted. Maybe not Marxist, but definitely into the class warfare rant in the 'my problems are not my fault!' sense.
James Lee: point granted. Totally delusional, but environmentally-based.
Joyce Kaufman: conservative
Bill Ayers: so-so. The bombs planted by the Weather Underground caused property damage exclusively, IIrc, except for an accident in which several Weathermen themselves were killed.
I have to concede the point that left-wingers are not exclusively property-damagers based on the two above.
I do think that the right wing's rhetoric is far more violent now than the left wing's, and one did not even in the BushII years see left-wingers going to presidential speeches with loaded firearms strapped to their legs.
10 Nov 2010, 1:22 am
http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008 ... ayers.html
Even the description of Ayers as a "terrorist" is a matter of interpretation. Setting off bombs can fairly be described as terrorism even when they are intended to cause only property damage, which is what Ayers has admitted doing in his youth. But for nearly three decades since, Ayers has lived the relatively quiet life of an educator. It would be correct to call him a "former terrorist," and an "unapologetic" one at that. But if McCain means the word "terrorist" to invoke images of 9/11, he's being misleading; Ayers is no Osama bin Laden now, and never was.
....
The Weather Underground continued setting off bombs, including one in a men's lavatory in the Capitol building in 1971 and another in a women's restroom in the Pentagon in 1972. Nobody was killed, due to evacuation warnings the Weathermen sent out in advance.
After the Vietnam War ended, the group's activities petered out. In 1980 Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, another member, surfaced and turned themselves in to police. Because of illegal federal wiretaps, pending charges against Ayers for allegedly inciting a riot and conspiring to bomb government sites had been dropped. Dohrn pleaded guilty to separate charges of aggravated battery and jumping bail; she was fined $1,500 and given three years' probation. Ayers and Dohrn, who had had two children together while in hiding, married in 1982.
....
Despite the fairly mainstream life he lives now, though, Bill Ayers' image took a hit with an article that appeared in the New York Times on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. Ayers was quoted in the lead paragraph as saying, ''I don't regret setting bombs'' and "I feel we didn't do enough." The interview had been conducted earlier, in connection with the publication of Ayers' memoir of his years as a fugitive. But when the quotes appeared on the same day thousands died at the World Trade Center and elsewhere, they enraged his critics.
Did David Adkisson warn the children in advance of the people before shooting up the Unitarian Church? Before planning on shooting up the TIDES Foundation, was Bryon Williams planning to send a warning phone message?
Why do righwingers continue lying about Obama's very loose relationship with Bill Ayers?
