Raging Christian Asshole Of The Week

That would be the American Family Assn.’s Bryan Fischer, who directed his intolerance toward Native Americans:

In a post published Monday on the Rightly Concerned blog – a project of the AFA – Fischer railed on native peoples for not being Christian, claiming it’s their own fault that they lost their land and were forced onto reservations to cope with terrible living conditions.

“Superstition, savagery and sexual immorality” morally disqualified Native Americans from “sovereign control of American soil,” Fischer said. That, plus the superior battle skills of Europeans gave the latter “rightful and legal sovereign control” of American land through what he delicately described as “the right of conquest.” Fischer went on to blame poverty and alcoholism on Indian reservations on Native Americans themselves, because they “continue to cling to the darkness of indigenous superstition” and refuse to come into “the light of Christianity” and assimilate “into Christian culture.”

Sure, ‘cause as we all know, there aren’t any Christians who experience poverty or alcoholism.

And I have to say, this notion that genocide, pillage and plunder are perfectly okay because you believe yourself culturally superior is a unique interpretation of Scripture. Sadly, the history of Western Civilization is filled with examples of genocidal monsters who believed exactly as Fischer does. Fortunately, today we hold up people like this to scorn and public shame, for that is surely what they deserve.

For their part, the Native American Rights Fund responded:

NARF declines to comment because the article is not worth dignifying with a reply.

I can appreciate that stance: when you’re on the receiving end of something so outrageous I can see the necessity of turning the other cheek, which is a piece of Scripture Fischer apparentoy hasn’t read. But the rest of us need to be aware that Bryan Fischer attitudes are still out there and being disseminated across the airwaves.

I do wonder how influential the AFA is these days. One failed boycott after another (Home Depot, Walt Disney Co., 7-Eleven, American Airlines, etc. all seem to be doing just fine, thank you) would seem to indicate, not very much. Then again, last month Newsweek called Bryan Fischer “a media darling.” Fischer, of course, is the same nutwagon who back in December claimed “President Obama wants to give America back to the Indians.”

And of course, you have presidential hopefuls like Tim Pawlenty appearing on Fischer’s radio program last month. I’d like to be fair to T-Paw and point out that this was before Fischer’s inflammatory comments about Native Americans but I can't. Because Fischer has a history of making equally inflammatory, hateful comments about gays, Muslims, the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, etc. (a nice little run-down of Fischer’s hate speech can be heard here.)

I really find it astonishing that conservative candidates like Tim Pawlenty turn a blind eye to this hateful rhetoric in a craven effort to reach out to Fischer’s audience. Really? Really? You want the homophobic, intolerant vote? Seriously? You really feel the need to suck up to a guy who repeatedly makes inflammatory, intolerant statements?

What does this say about you? And what does this say about your party? What, have you folks not alienated enough minority groups? You've got to find more ethnic groups to drive away from the Republican Party? Is that it?

I really don't get it.

Loose Lips & Peer Pressure

[UPDATE] 2:

This is a nice start but what about the rest of us? What about all of the folks who are targeted by other kinds of hate speech -- the Muslims, the gays, the Hispanics, the African Americans, etc. etc. etc.? Still, I'm encouraged that a Republican is at least thinking along these lines.

Adding .... The more I think about this idea, the more pissed off I get. It's like how in Tennessee you can take a gun anywhere except the state house. If legislators and "government officials" don't want guns near them, why are they so quick to make sure the rest of us have to come in constant contact with them. What makes you guys so special?

------------------------

[UPDATE]:

What the hell were you thinking, local edition.

Go read it ... excellent reminder that "passion" on local issues can easily be turned into intimidation, too.

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The Tucson shootings have prompted me to revisit this column by Rick Perlstein, which I linked to back in September.

Perlstein was responding to the Koran-burnings a couple of right-wing pastors were planning. He observed:

The problem is that elite media gatekeepers have abandoned their moral mandate to stigmatize uncivil discourse. Instead, too many outlets reward it. In fact, it is an ironic token of the ideological confusions of our age that they do so in the service of upholding what they understand to be a cornerstone of civility: the notion that every public question must be framed in terms of two equal and opposite positions, the "liberal" one and the "conservative" one, each to be afforded equal dignity, respect — and (the more crucial currency) equal space. This has made the most mainstream of media outlets comically easy marks for those actively working to push public discourse to extremes.

At the time I agreed with Perlstein, and noted just because people are going on about FEMA camps and Koran-burning pastors, that doesn’t mean the media has to cover it ad nauseum. But now I’m not so sure.

Perlstein, a historian, revealed that back in the early ‘60s there were anti-JFK rallies promoting fear and lies about Communist infiltration of America; some of these rivaled today’s Tea Party rallies in numbers. As Perlstein pointed out, the national media thought better of reporting on this “fringe” in the interest of "civil discourse." But let’s remember what happened to JFK, shall we? It’s not as though not covering the anti-JFK fringe kept a lid on violent acts and prevented tragedy.

Conversely, today we have “pastor” Fred Phelps presiding over a group of about 90 people who are primarily members of his own extended family, spreading their hate all across the national news media. But Phelps is universally reviled. Both right and left find his protests of funerals repulsive and the Southern Baptist Convention has condemned Phelps and his “church.” Sunlight is the best disinfectant, or so the saying goes, and perhaps making the nation aware of the fringe factor is actually the first step to confronting it.

The second step, of course, is what Perlstein called "stigmatizing uncivil discourse." Ed at Gin And Tacos wrote this morning:

[...] We need people in general, and Republicans in particular, to take a more active role in condemning this kind of rhetoric – before something terrible happens, not when the body count starts rising.

There is a very simple, useful question that we do not often enough ask in the United States, especially where politics are concerned. The GOP, in the last several years, has avoided it altogether. We need to make a concerted effort to stop excusing or encouraging insane behavior and ideas with one question: "What in the hell is wrong with you?"

No one asks that anymore, which is odd given how often the need to do so arises.

That's precisely the type of question which has shoved Fred Phelps and his cult of merry hatemongers off to the fringe and completely deflated his anti-gay message. You're going to protest a soldier's funeral? What the hell is wrong with you! You're going to protest Elizabeth Edwards' funeral? What the hell is wrong with you!

As I stated yesterday, our problem is not violent rhetoric, it is our violent culture from which this rhetoric springs. But when violent rhetoric does enter the discourse, why does the Right always go on the defensive? The Left, after all, is the group that held a Rally To Restore Sanity two and a half months ago -- which was derisively mocked (and misrepresented) by Righties like the folks at Fox & Friends. Ironically the mere concept of a "Million Moderate March" completely confused the mainstream media. So, you know, it's not like anyone is listening to us on the Left. The Right needs to quit its reflexive wagon-circling and call out its own when they do things like bring an assault rifle to a presidential event.

At one time I had hoped my own Senator Lamar Alexander would be that person. He's an elder statesmen of the Republican Party, a man who has served his country in a variety of capacities and has a long, distinguished career in public service. I begged him during the whole "death panels" brouhaha to come forward and tell everyone to calm down and quit the lies and misrepresentation so we could have a real conversation about healthcare. Sadly, I got crickets.

So yesterday Sen. Alexander told CNN's Candy Crowley that we need to stop talking about Sarah Palin’s “cross-hairs” ad and remember that, unlike the Tea Party, Jared Loughner had “The Communist Manifesto” and “Mein Kampf” on his reading list. The implication being, of course, that such books are on liberals’ reading lists (and he ignored more benign books on Loughner’s reading list like “Aesop’s Fables” and “Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland.”).

So I’m calling out Sen. Lamar Alexander: what the hell is wrong with you? If you won’t step up and condemn this stuff, who will?

No Thanks, Georgia, We Have Enough Nuts Already

Seriously, WTF?

Georgia man accused of traveling to Tennessee for armed takeover of courthouse

A Georgia man has been arrested in Tennessee--authorities say he headed to Madisonville, armed and prepared to take over the courthouse.

Darren Huff stands charged of traveling in interstate commerce with intent to incite a riot and transporting in commerce a firearm in furtherance of a civil disorder.

The FBI says Huff traveled to Tennessee armed with a pistol on his hip and an assault rifle in his truck, intent on carrying out citizen's arrests of 24 federal, state, and local officials, and on seeing that another man did not face trial for trying to do the same.

This story is unbelievably bizarre. Crooks & Liars has more information, including the information that Huff is a member of “Oath Keepers,” one of those ultra-paranoid right-wing militia groups which crop up every time there’s a Democrat in the White House (C&L has also posted an incredibly bizarre video from this group).

It’s truly strange and I don’t really know what to think about it. Apparently Huff told everyone from the FBI to a bank manager to the acne-faced kid at the local Taco Bell that he and

8 or 9 other militia groups were headed to Madisonville on April 20 to "take over the city." The bank manager said Huff told him he'd see Huff's actions on the noon news.

He was just screaming for attention. And apparently several heavily armed people did show up in Madisonville on April 20 and gathered around the courthouse.

WTF? Did we hear about this, Tennessee?

Their beef seems to be that one of their members was arrested for previously trying to implement an armed takeover of the courthouse at the beginning of April. That guy was pissed that the Grand Jury wouldn’t indict President Obama on charges of treason.

Seriously, Madisonville? Why Madisonville? Did they think an ultra-red county in an ultra-red state would be sympathetic? Do you even file this kind of charge in a county courthouse? Wouldn’t it be the federal courthouse?

Anyway, until now Madisonville was apparently most famous for being the birthplace of Estes Kefauver. Some of you young’uns might need to Google that.

I’m just trying to wrap my head around the idea that a group of right wing militia folks from Georgia were trying to pull off an armed takeover of the Madisonvile courthouse. A teeny weeny town in Zach Wamp’s district, with fewer than 4,000 residents according to the 2000 Census. Isn’t this domestic terrorism?

Dear Georgia, please keep your nuts in your own state. For one thing, Tennessee is a little busy right now dealing with things like massive floods and unemployment and coal ash disasters. For another, we have enough nuts of our own to deal with.

A Little Too Close To Home

Disturbing that this happened in my neighborhood:

Road rage, accident centers on Obama bumper sticker

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A Nashville man says he and his 10-year-old daughter were victims of road rage Thursday afternoon, all because of a political bumper sticker on his car.

Mark Duren told News 2 the incident happened around 4:30p.m., while he was driving on Blair Boulevard, not far from Belmont University.

He said Harry Weisiger gave him the bird and rammed into his vehicle, after noticing an Obama-Biden sticker on his car bumper.

Duren had just picked up his 10-year-old daughter from school and had her in the car with him.

"He pointed at the back of my car," Duren said, "the bumper, flipped me off, one finger salute."

But it didn't end there.

Duren told News 2 that Weisiger honked his horn at him for awhile, as Duren stopped at a stop sign.

Once he started driving again, down Blair Boulevard, towards his home, he said, "I looked in the rear view mirror again, and this same SUV was speeding, flying up behind me, bumped me."

Duren said he applied his brake and the SUV smashed into the back of his car.

He then put his car in park to take care of the accident, but Weisiger started pushing the car using his SUV.

Duren said, "He pushed my car up towards the sidewalk, almost onto the sidewalk."

Police say Harry Weisiger is charged with felony reckless endangerment in the incident.

Harry Weisiger is 70 years old, according to a story that was e-mailed to me. That story also said he was charged with driving under the influence, though I didn’t see that information in this story.

You know, if a 70-year-old man can’t be a grown-up, who can?

Years ago when Mr. Beale and I were youth advisors at our church I was driving through the dreaded Williamson County to take our youth group to play Laser Tag. I had our church’s associate pastor and four teenagers in my car. I also had some anti-war bumper stickers and one of those W’s with a line through it on the back of my car.

An SUV driven by a young guy rushed up to my bumper and tried to push me off the road. The incident fell short of what Mark Duren experienced, thank God, but it left us all shaken.

Perhaps people should take a cue from Chris Reichert, the guy who threw dollar bills at a Parkinson’s patient:

"I snapped. I absolutely snapped and I can't explain it any other way," said Chris Reichert of Victorian Village, in a Dispatch interview.

In his first comments on an incident that went viral across the Internet and was repeatedly played on cable television news shows, Reichert said he is sorry about his confrontation with Robert A. Letcher, 60, of the North Side. Letcher, a former nuclear engineer who suffers from Parkinson's, was verbally attacked as he sat before anti-health care demonstrators in front of Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy's district office last week.

"He's got every right to do what he did and some may say I did too, but what I did was shameful," Reichert said. "I haven't slept since that day."

"I made a donation (to a local Parkinson's disease group) and that starts the healing process."

Good for Chris Reichert.

What really struck me is that Robert Letcher, the guy who was berated for being for healthcare reform, is a former nuclear engineer: someone who went to college, got advanced degrees, worked in a field that requires a lot of experience and training. Not, as the Glen Casada’s of the world would have you believe, some lazy person who just never lived up to their potential and are now looking for a handout. He’s a professional who was felled by a powerful disease.

I think we need to hear more of Letcher’s story, and everyone’s stories. It is easy for the Harry Weisigers and Chris Reicherts to dehumanize those with opposing views when our discourse is polluted with hate speech from talk radio and viral e-mail campaigns, 24/7. Our corporate media profits handsomely from caricaturing the opposing sides, and there is money in keeping the nation divided. How many fundraising e-mails hit your inbox this week?

Maybe if we all turned off the radio and turned off the TV and actually talked to one another and heard each other’s stories instead of letting the media and political groups profit from its divide and conquer strategy, we’d all be better off.

I dunno, just a thought.

Dodging The Blame

Two things today have me really pissed off. First of all we have Eric Cantor’s ludicrous, outrageous claim that Democrats are “fanning the flames” of hate speech.


Really!

You know, sorta like how the wife-beater says “she asked for it.”

Cantor claims that he, too, received threats because he’s Jewish. I have no reason to doubt him, though I wish he’d release some information about these supposed threats, just so we know what we’re dealing with. Regardless, he goes on to say that:

“I've received threats since I assumed elected office, not only because of my position but also because I'm Jewish. I've never blamed anyone in this body for that, period.”

Yeah, well maybe that’s because no one in Congress, certainly not Democratic leaders, ever claimed that your being Jewish represents “the death of freedom” and “Armageddon.” I mean, come off it already. Enough of this childish, schoolyard “He did it toooo!!!” nonsense. If anyone is fanning the flames it’s you guys, and you damn well know it.

The other thing that killed me is John Boehner’s rather tepid statement about the threats to members of Congress, which included the lovely little dog whistle that liberals said and did mean things at Iraq War protests. Right, just like we spit on Vietnam Veterans and other things that may or may not have happened but we don't really know since there is no documented evidence of it. Yet it has become such a part of American lore that it's assumed to be true.

I was listening to the radio when Boehner made this claim and then, swear to Goddess, 15 minutes later as if on cue Norah O’Donnell repeated the same charge that the threats Democrats have received is similar to what Republicans faced during the runup to the Iraq War.

So here we go again. Is there anyone in the media who would ask if John Boehner knows the difference between “harsh words” and cutting the fuel line to a Congressman’s brother’s house?

Can anyone tell me which Republican members of Congress were targeted with physical harm by liberals during the Iraq War protests? Home addresses published on the internet? Bricks thrown through district office windows? Which liberal blogger told their readers to break windows at Republican Party offices nationwide?

Anyone??

I’m not saying it didn’t happen, I honestly don’t know. I don’t recall hearing it happening, and if it did, surely it would have happened to Democrats too -- after all, the Republicans are constantly reminding us that Democrats voted for the war too!

So: which members of Congress did we dirty fucking anti-war hippies who spit on war veterans target with acts of violence? Please name me one.

To our snooze media, I would ask you to please find that skepticism bone, the one that's supposed to be attached to your press pass. Just because John Boehner said it doesn't make it true.

And then please also learn the difference between mean words and actions.

Palin We Have A Problem

Much is being made of Sarah Palin’s Facebook page featuring Congress Critters like Bart Gordon in the crosshairs and her related Tweet to not retreat but “RELOAD!” In light of escalating violence and threats against pro-healthcare legislators, it is indeed irresponsible to egg on the thugs of the Tea Party movement.

Of course, the Palin crowd says she didn’t really mean to “target” certain members of Congress, those crosshairs on her map are just a graphic, ya big sillies, and when she said “reload” she meant to “reload Congress.”

Uh, yeah. You do realize that Bart Gordon isn’t running for re-election, right? So why is he in your crosshairs? Ditto with Vic Snyder and Brad Ellsworth -- indeed, that little fact is even mentioned on the map. Which makes the statement “Already retiring at the end of their terms. 17 more to go!” sound even more creepy.

Amygdala America is out of control. Try as they might to mainstream their movement, there is no hiding the hate in the Tea Party.

Nut Allergies

Here’s where I apologize to my readers for politicizing something that shouldn’t have been politicized. John Patrick Beddell suffered from bipolar disorder, a brutal disease that knows no politics. I was wrong to label him a right-wing nut.

I jumped on that Christian Science Monitor story because frankly I was pissed off. Pissed off that we had yet another senseless shooting, pissed that yet another unhinged person managed to get their hands on a gun, pissed that yet another symbol of the United States government was targeted. After weeks of wall to wall media coverage of the conservative hate fests known as the Tea Party Convention and CPAC, both of which peddled in paranoia about birth certificates, immigrants, America-hating liberal “socialists,” death panels, terrorists, etc., I reacted. So I’m sorry.

And here’s where I piss you all off again.

If this incident proves anything it’s that everyone has nut allergies. No one wants to claim their nuts, and it’s been interesting to see where people draw the line here. Beddell espoused virulent anti-government views on his podcasts and politically claimed Libertarian affiliations. So we lefties have labeled him a right-winger.

Meanwhile, the right-wingers claim that because he was a 9/11 Truther, he must have been a lefty. As an aside, it’s news to me that 9/11 Truthers are lefties--we’ve always associated the 9/11 Truthers with the far right fringe--the anti-Semitic, Stormfront, Klan crowd who claim Jews were tipped off not to go to work at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11. And for crying out loud, the Tea Party candidate for Texas governor was a Truther. So I learned that no one wants to claim the Truthers, either.

So listen, folks. I’ll be the first to admit when I’m wrong but that street goes both ways. John Patrick Beddell suffered from mental illness, end of story. So did all of them, that's obvious. I mean, anyone who does something irrational like shooting up a Unitarian Universalist Church production of “Annie” because they hate liberals is nuts. But it seems to me that we have more nuts getting off their sofas and actually taking action these days. And I have to wonder why that is.

We live in a time where there’s inflammatory hate speech dominating the airwaves and the vast majority of it is coming from the right. Hannity, Limbaugh, Beck and the rest pollute the airwaves on a daily basis with outlandish lies blaming Democrats, liberals, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi etc. with every imaginable sin against God and country. I don’t see anyone standing up to that, in fact, your politicians have embraced it.

So I want to see a scintilla of responsibility from your side of the aisle. Your grassroots movement is hawking stuff like this, and your protestors are showing up with signs like this one (and they aren’t even true since several of you made a point of bringing your warm gun to an anti-government protest). Your leadership conference features a Pelosi pinata and Harry Reid punching bag. You’re breeding paranoia, filling peoples' heads with bizarre conspiracy theories about FEMA re-education camps and the U.S. Census and claiming liberals are attacking Christianity and all sorts of irresponsible crap that isn't remotely true. No one on the right has said that any of this goes too far, in fact, y'all are pumping your fists in the air going "fuck yeah!"

So don't act shocked when your movement gets blamed when someone of any political stripe goes off the deep end. Y'all need to dial back your rhetoric a couple notches.

This Terror Attack Brought To You By Another Right Wing Nut Job

[UPDATE]:

Turns out the parents had warned authorities that their mentally deranged son may have bought a gun.

Wow, if only it weren't so damn easy for crazy people to get their hands on guns.

Of course, we have no "national registry" for mentally ill people, nor would we want one. Problem is, people are snapping all over the place. You never know who is gonna snap. Like this guy. Or this guy. Could be this guy. Or this park ranger, who just snapped and killed his whole family. It's not just guys: some folks think the Alabama researcher snapped.

Yep, people are snapping all over place, like rubber bands, just snap snap snap. And I don't want to be around the next gun nut when he or she goes snap.

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Nobody could have anticipated this:

John Patrick Bedell, whom authorities identified as the gunman in the Pentagon shooting on Thursday, appears to have been a right-wing extremist with virulent antigovernment feelings.

If so, that would make the Pentagon shooting the second violent extremist attack on a federal building within the past month.

As someone recently commented, “I can’t imagine where they get their ideas.”

Indeed. One really must wonder.

Let’s also not forget Virginia post office hostage taker Gator Taylor, the unhinged right wing shooters from last year, and the rednecks preparing to live out their “Red Dawn” fantasies like the Texas Taliban’s David Grisham and Louisiana’s Operation Exodus. Seeing how tenuous your grip on reality is, let me say I really don’t feel safer knowing you folks are looking out for me.

And by all means let’s not be so impolite as to refer to John Patrick Bedell and Joseph Stack as terrorists, which as we all know is a term used to reference brown, Muslim-y people who attack government buildings, not honest hard-working white Merkins.

Funny, we aren't even at the one-year anniversary of last year's outrage over a Dept. of Homeland Security report looking at right wing extremist groups. Remember that? I didn't think so. No one remembers anything that happened longer than two weeks ago. Hell, if I didn't have this blog I'd probably have forgotten it, too.

Another Quickie

I dunno, but if I managed a nuclear bomb facility, I'd be a tad concerned that a nutjob like David Grisham worked for me as a security guard.

Wounded Nation

When I read this story in yesterday’s paper I thought: this is so rife with cliches about Southern rednecks that if I met Warren "Gator" Taylor in a movie, I’d complain the writers had cooked up a character offensive to Southerners.

Taylor is the 53-year-old, wheelchair-bound resident of Sullivan County, Tn., who this week took people hostage at the Wytheville, Va., post office. Why Wytheville? No reason except it reminded him of Gatlinburg. Why hostages? Oh, the usual reasons:

The gunman said he had no money, and his 2007 red Dodge diesel pickup truck was about to be repossessed. Mostly, he railed against the government — high taxes, gun control, and President Barack Obama.

"He was really down on the government," Oliver said. "About the government taking over the right to bear arms ... he was angry at the government overtaxing us."

This man lives in a state where they’ve just loosened a host of gun carry laws. And then there’s this:

Taylor, who has a criminal record and was registered as a sex offender in Florida, didn't argue for bail but had his lawyer ask about accommodations for his health conditions. He has a prosthetic leg and diabetes, public defender Randy Cargill said.

Wondering if he had a CCW permit or was mad because he couldn’t get one because of his criminal record. We’ll probably never know. But there seems to be a huge disconnect here. You know, the surest way to lose your Second Amendment rights is to take folks hostage.

And then there’s this:

A woman who answered the door at Taylor's trailer in the Beverly Hills Mobile Home Park in Bristol, Tenn., said she was his girlfriend and they spent a lot of time talking about the Bible and religion. Her Christmas gift to him was going to be an index to the Bible.

I’d say Gator Taylor is one of those right wing nut jobs we find in our rural communities who has bought every wacko conspiracy theory talk radio and Glenn Beck-types dish out. But I think there’s also more at play here beyond the irresponsible rantings of people behind the microphone pushing the Gator Taylors over the edge.

Gator Taylor claims his son was recently killed in Afghanistan (the AP could not verify that) and also says he himself is a veteran (also unverified). He certainly was in financial distress, was about to lose his truck, and had health issues. That's a lot of hurt for one person to shoulder.

We’re a wounded nation, people. The past decade has seen war, war profiteering, bankers and corporations stacking the deck in their favor, and political parties exploiting a divided nation. The result: ordinary people feel increasingly isolated and powerless.

The Gator Taylors of the nation are a symptom of a deeper wound. The question is, do we have the will to resolve these deep divisions? Do we even know how to do this? Or do those in power prefer to exploit our divisions to pursue their own agenda, and let the Gator Taylors of the country suffer the consequences?

At what point do we say “enough”?

Right Wing Hate, FL GOP Edition

It’s the Republican Party way. Even among their candidates for congress:

Fla. GOP members shoot Muslim targets at gun range

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. -- South Florida Republicans held a weekly meeting at a gun range, shooting at targets including cut-outs of a Muslim holding a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

The GOP candidate to replace U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz fired at a full-body silhouette with "DWS" written next to its head.

Wasserman Schultz declined comment, but the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee called the Tuesday event "extremist" and "sexist."

Robert Lowry, who's vying for Wasserman Schultz's seat, initially described his target as a joke. Minutes later, he called it a mistake.

Others refused to apologize for the Southeast Broward Republican Club event, featuring assault rifles and handguns. A conservative activist said they should stand up for their beliefs in the heavily Democratic county.

This is a sick bunch of puppies, that's all I can say.

It was bad enough when a healthcare reform protester hung a Congressman in effigy. It was easy for groups like the GOP-supported Americans For Prosperity to distance themselves from the act (though that’s debatable).

But there’s no backing away from this. None.

Another Victim Of Right Wing Hate?

The FBI is looking into it:

The FBI is investigating whether anti-government sentiment led to the hanging death of a U.S. Census worker near a Kentucky cemetery. A law enforcement official told The Associated Press the word 'fed" was scrawled on the dead man's chest.

The body of Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old part-time Census field worker and teacher, was found Sept. 12 in a remote patch of the Daniel Boone National Forest in rural southeast Kentucky. The Census has suspended door-to-door interviews in rural Clay County, where the body was found, pending the outcome of the investigation.

Investigators are still trying to determine whether the death was a killing or a suicide, and if a killing, whether the motive was related to his government job or to anti-government sentiment. An autopsy report is pending.

It will be interesting to see how this investigation unfolds. Suicide seems unlikely, and the fact that Sparkman’s body was found on 9/12, the day of the big Tea Party rally in D.C., is suspicious. But it could be a coincidence.

Clarksville Mayor Defends Anti-Muslim E-Mail

Clarksville Mayor Johnny Piper embarrasses Tennessee with an anti-Muslim hate e-mail, which he thinks is perfectly fine:

Johnny Piper, the mayor of Clarksville, TN, recently forwarded an anti-Muslim email urging all “patriotic Americans” to protest a U.S. Postal Service stamp that commemorates an Islamic holiday. Piper’s email falsely claims that the creation of the Eid stamp was ordered by President Obama. In fact, the stamp was first issued in 2001, during the Bush administration. It was reissued in 2002, 2006, 2007 and 2008. Nevertheless, Piper is defending his email:

“I don’t see any reason why it would be inappropriate,” Piper said.

He said he forwarded the e-mail to provide “information” that others could make up their own minds about.

“I was surprised at a stamp being developed, and would have thought others would be, too,” he said. He added that he did not know what the stamp was commemorating.

Funny how hate works. The e-mail makes the false assumption that a stamp commemorating a Muslim holiday would be initiated by President Obama, harkening back to the “Obama is a secret Muslim” lies from last year’s campaign. And the e-mail also makes the false assumption that anything “Muslim” would also be un-patriotic, as if it’s not possible for a Muslim American to be patriotic.

I’m just sick of this ignorant crap. Snopes debunks the Eid stamp e-mail and notes:

The EID stamp is also not the first or only governmental or commercial recognition of these Islamic holidays in the U.S. The American greeting card manufacturer Hallmark produces a variety of holiday cards celebrating Eid al-Fitr, and the President of the United States, George W. Bush, extended official greetings, issued messages, participated in commemorations of both Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha (even after the September 11 attacks), and promoted the EID stamp via the White House web site.

The American right wing has gone insane. You really have to hate the current president an awful lot to circulate a hate e-mail blaming him for something that your hero George W. Bush actually did -- and which you never even noticed at the time.

I would love to know the source of these kinds of e-mails. And I would love to know why anyone believes anonymous e-mails that arrive in their in box.

The fact that Johnny Piper sees absolutely nothing wrong with circulating an e-mail like this without even checking a resource like Snopes.com makes him look like an ignorant hick. This definitely is not the image we'd like to present to the world as big manufacturers like Hemlock semi-conductor move into the region.

You're All Gonna Die

At the hands of liberal bloggers, no less. Liberal bloggers with funny, "foreign" sounding names. Muslim-y names. I'd laugh at this video, except it doesn't take much to push some right wing nutters over the edge.

It’s Just About Hating Obama

Apparently “dozens” showed up for the fire David Letterman rally in New York: about 100 people, estimates the Village Voice, if one includes the media, “rubberneckers” and counterprotestors like these guys:



Among the protestors was PUMA Harriet Christian, one of the disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters who endorsed John McCain in the last election rather than support an "inadequate black male" (her words, not mine). Air America interviewed her at the rally:



She was substantially more subdued than the last time we saw her, ejected from the DNC rules and bylaws meeting shouting “God damn the Democrats!” and telling Neil Cavuto that Obama’s nomination was invalid because “99% of the blacks don’t even know why they’re voting for him.”

Okie dokie.

Air America also interviewed a conspiracy theory nutter who rolled David Letterman, Air America and George Soros into one big soup-pot of liberal fascism. However, he knew the correct pronunciation of “Soros” with proper Hungarian inflection.

I repeat: okie dokie.

Jim My Conservative Commenter® has been trying, with great difficulty, to conflate the lame Letterman joke with the racist Goforth e-mail, as if the two are flip sides of the same coin. Even though plenty of feminists (including NOW) have decried the joke as in poor taste, he's trying to use this as an example of liberal hypocrisy. It's not working very well, though, and even Jim doesn't seem to have his heart in the argument.

Still, the two events are alike in one respect: the racist e-mail and the fauxtrage about David Letterman both reflect partisan hatred of President Obama. After all, we haven’t seen any racist e-mails about Michael Steele circulating around Tennessee state legislative offices; of course not, he’s a Republican. A year and a half ago when we were all blogging and e-mailing about misogyny at "liberal” MSNBC these folks outside The Ed Sullivan Theater were absent. Where was Harriet Christian? She said she was protesting Letterman to make a stand for women's equality. Where was she in Feb. 2008? Where were any of the PUMAs?

Really, the one thing that unifies this group is their hatred Obama. Any fake controversy, fauxtrage, boycott, offensive e-mails, you name it can boil down to that one fact. We saw it at the tea parties, where organizers tried to say their movement was "bipartisan" while telling cameras not to film the "Obama Is A Socialist" signs.

It’s partisan BS targeting the Democratic president. There is so little substance behind these right-wing activists it’s shocking.

More Vigilante Violence From Extreme Right

The fact that these people are armed to the teeth doesn’t make me feel safer:

Head of a minuteman group arrested for double homicide

TUCSON, AZ - Three people have been arrested in connection with last months deadly double homicide in Arivaca that left a nine-year-old and her father dead. One of the people arrested for the homicide is the National Executive Director of the Minuteman American Defense group (M.A.D.), a group known for patrolling the border, and is dedicated to "Defending America's Borders" according to their website - http://minutemenamericandefense.org/

Jason Eugene Bush, 38, Shawna Forde, 42 and Albert Robert Gaxiola, 43, were all taken into custody and charged in connection with the murders of 29-year-old Raul Flores and 8-year-old Brisenia Flores. Both were killed during an alleged home invasion.

M.A.D. is a separate group from the better-known Minuteman Project, but according to the Southern Poverty Law Center’s dossier on Forde, she has appeared at anti-immigration events with that group’s founder, Jim Gilchrist.

Writes the SPLC of Forde:

As head of Minutemen American Defense, or MAD, she straps on a yellow armband and carries a two-way radio to patrol the U.S.-Canadian border "against unlawful and unauthorized entry of all individuals, contraband, and foreign military." Acting on what she claims are "insider personnel tips," the group also has assigned members to patrol the Everett, Wash., main branch public library in search of suspicious-looking Middle Eastern men. Fortuitously, the library's windows overlook the Port of Everett, which MAD deems a high-profile terrorism target.

[...]

Forde's belief that in two years undocumented immigrants will "outnumber real Americans" is mild compared to other statements on MAD's website, such as a claim that Al Qaeda terrorists are recruiting U.S.-based members of the violent Latino street gang MS-13. A photo of the Ford Foundation's New York building is captioned, "This is where La Raza gets money to help destroy the U.S."

Lovely. Anti-immigrant and completely crazy. These wackos get nuttier by the day. And I do mean that in the clinical sense: According to the KVOA story:

"If you look at her history closely, and you know what we know, she is at best a pyschopath," says Sheriff Dupnik referring to Forde during a press conference Friday.

The Anti-Defamation League has its own dossier on Forde, and it’s even more alarming. It’s alleged she has fabricated claims about being violently attacked by Hispanic gangs, even alleged that her daughter has been targeted by Hispanic gangs.

And of course, Forde and her army of vigilantes are armed to the teeth:

One of Forde's activities has been coordinating vigilante border patrols in Arizona.  In an Internet radio interview in January 2009, Forde explained, "I have many weapons that I borrow when I go down on the border…All of our Minutemen all have weapons and long arms and all that kind of stuff."

The woman is clearly delusional, a wackadoodle just primed to go off with all guns blazing.

Would love to know why she was allowed to get within 10 feet of a gun.

Don’t answer that, I already know: she has a “right” to “defend herself” against the imaginary Hispanic gangs she is convinced have attacked her. Looks like she went too far and a young child was killed as a result.

Nobody Could Have Predicted ...

... that the right wing nutjobs would start to crack under the pressure of a black president:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The suspect in Wednesday's shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum is James von Brunn, an 88-year-old white supremacist from Maryland, two law enforcement officials told CNN.

Oh, wait. Someone did predict it. And folks were offended. Imagine that.

I take some comfort in the fact that the shooter was 88 years old. As Atrios says here, I'm hopeful that there aren't too many of these crackpots left in the country.

Fake Outrage = Fauxtrage

The predictable right-wing pearl clutching over a Dept. Of Homeland Security report about extremist groups has put my bullshit meter into overdrive. The fact that the report was initially requested by the Bush Administration, although the Malkintents refer to it as the “Obama report,” was my first clue.

The fact that they completely ignored this January 26, 2009 report on left-wing extremists was my second clue.

But, facts be damned, this is a made-for-prime-time, right-wing talking point, neatly manufactured and packaged by the conservative echo chamber to reinforce the stereotype that Democrats/liberals hate the troops, Obama is gutting the military, and ZOMG we’re all gonna diiiiiiieeeee!!!!!!!11!!1!

So why the hell DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano is apologizing, when no apology was necessary, is beyond me. Have you people not been paying attention for the past eight years? At all? No?

Here is the predictable pattern of these things: Drudge, Malkin, Reynolds et. al. get in high dudgeon over some imagined slight, Rush and the Fox-heads flog it mercilessly, Democrat apologizes, and it’s all filed away in the collective unconscious as another case of liberals behaving badly. So what have we learned, people?

Here are the facts of the story, which Napolitano or one of her underlings could easily have trotted out. From the memory hole, 2006:

A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed "large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists" to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines.

Give the Bush Administration credit for doing the requisite follow-up with its own report--begun last year!--to determine what impact this may have on domestic security.

Does it mean all veterans are racists or white supremacists? No. Does it mean serving your country in the military makes you susceptible to hate group indoctrination? No.

Does it mean anyone even said any of those things?

No.

It’s all just manufactured, more Kabuki theater for the gasbags to chew over, and people in the Administration and Democratic Party in general need to quit apologizing for the right-wing’s insistence on getting their facts wrong and spinning lies.

What’s that famous quote from Adlai Stevenson? “I’ll stop telling the truth about Republicans when they stop telling lies about Democrats”? Something like that.

Anyway, it’s time everyone got a clue. Stop empowering the lies and the lying liars who tell them, Democrats.

"Little Hussein"

There are no words.

Andy Martin: The Source Of The Smear

Today’s New York Times has a front-page, below the fold profile of Andy Martin, the right-wing wackadoodle who is now believed to have originated the “Obama is a secret Muslim” fabrication.

Martin started the story by posting a press release on the FreeRepublic in August 2004, just as Obama was coming to national attention for his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention. The story took on a life of its own, embellished telephone-tree style each step of the way with more lies (“he took the oath of office on a Koran,” etc. etc.) until the lie has become like a persistent, hacking cough that Obama can’t seem to shake.

It’s a fascinating piece which you can read here. When I say Martin is a right-wing wackadoodle, I’m not joking. The state of Illinois denied him admission to the bar for psychological reasons:

He is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of “moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.”

Though he is not a lawyer, Mr. Martin went on to become a prodigious filer of lawsuits, and he made unsuccessful attempts to win public office for both parties in three states, as well as for president at least twice, in 1988 and 2000.

So, persecution/martyr complex--sounds like the entire Republican Party.

What’s really fascinating to me is the amount of bigotry and entrenched hatred that pervades this group of folks who peddle in character smears. Martin is a notorious anti-Semite--ironic, since his “secret Muslim” lie has found traction among some Jewish voters:

A motion he filed in a 1983 bankruptcy case called the judge “a crooked, slimy Jew who has a history of lying and thieving common to members of his race.”

In another motion, filed in 1983, Mr. Martin wrote, “I am able to understand how the Holocaust took place, and with every passing day feel less and less sorry that it did.”

In an interview, Mr. Martin denied some statements against Jews attributed to him in court papers, blaming malicious judges for inserting them.

But in his “48 Hours” interview in 1993, he affirmed a different anti-Semitic part of the affidavit that included the line about the Holocaust, saying, “The record speaks for itself.”

When asked Friday about an assertion in his court papers that “Jews, historically and in daily living, act through clans and in wolf pack syndrome,” he said, “That one sort of rings a bell.”

Meanwhile, Martin’s kindred spirit Jerome Corsi, recently expelled from Kenya, is a notorious Muslim and Catholic-hater.

I find it amazing that the Republican Party will give a wink and a nod to these hateful crackpots and let them do their dirty work. Martin needs to see a psychiatrist, not be handed a microphone. Yet, Fox News featured him in their anti-Obama “documentary” last week where they

allowed Mr. Martin to assert falsely and without challenge that Mr. Obama had once trained to overthrow the government.

This is supposed to be a news program?

Regardless of what happens with this election, the day will come when the Republican Party will have to answer for its actions. By embracing bigots like Corsi and Martin, the GOP is sowing the seeds of its own destruction. We’re seeing it now in the vitriol unleashed at McCain-Palin rallies; the bigotry is out there, Martin, Corsi and their ilk are feeding it, and the Republican Party, because they see a political benefit, is encouraging it.

But no matter what happens in November, this kind of ugliness at the heart of the GOP will destroy the Republican Party. And guess what: they won’t be able to blame Bill Clinton or the Democrats this time.