we have violent right wing political movement developing in this country

[Derechos]

Taken from posting digby

All morning I'm hearing the media and the politicians decrying the rhetoric on "both sides" with Matt Bai leading the charge in his NY Times article in which he dredges up the bogus "Move-On Hitler" nonsense (thus proving the case that there is very little equivalence on the left.) It's maddening.

Meanwhile, last night, Erick Erickson of Redstate tweets this:


The left and media, in perpetuating the lie that the shooter was a tea party activist, may wrongly incite violence against the right.

I kid you not.

There are certainly left wing people who spew incendiary and violent rhetoric. But they are few and far between compared to the drumbeat of hatred and consequential acts of violence we've seen over the past two years and none who make the kind of profit at it that the right wing noise machine does. There is no comparison, it's ridiculous to frame it that way. And it ends up distorting the truth, which is that we have a violent right wing political movement developing in this country with the help and acquiescence of a major political party which refuses to police its own.

This is the kind of thing Democratic office holders have been facing at every public meeting since Barack Obama was elected:

It is a photo of a sign that states "we came unarmed this time." (I don't know how to post photos.)


They sell t-shirts that say this at tea party rallies. Google it.

Perhaps the meaning of that has finally sunk in after yesterday's horror. I'm sure it crossed the minds of the congresspeople who were targeted with those signs at Townhall meetings. And since the media are continuing to normalize these statements by suggesting that it's all part of some incoherent left/right extremist rhetoric rather than a very specific intimidation tactic by a newly powerful right wing faction, they'll undoubtedly succeed in intimidating a few. The fact that some impressionable, mentally ill kid did the dirty work doesn't change that.


Update: If they succeed in forcing Sheriff Dupnik to resign because he told the truth, we are well and truly fucked, my friends.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/rhetorical-excess.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

[xchrom]

1. remember oklahoma city. and the vile things said about clinton when he called attention

to the universe of hate swirling out there.

[Kingofalldems]

2. I saw a poster here demanding he not do press conferences

[treestar]

3. When I see the "we came unarmed this time" signs I usually do

assume it's a right wing or teabagger rally. But the photo itself doesn't always confirm that.

[geckosfeet]

4. Sheriff Dupnik will be able to find a job almost anywhere in the country.

[patrice]

5. As one of those who stood on street corners holding anti-War signs for a few years, starting in

2002, I assure you that threats, deeply felt threats, have long been part of the Reich-Wing strategy.

More currently, if you have ever participated in certain kinds of FaceBook threads, threats are constantly implied in some types of comments, one relatively recent one comes to mind, because it repeated references to cattle prods and rape, supposedly as a case, in the news, against Islam. It's weird how those who make these kinds of references too so as to maintain plausible deniability. I'm no stranger to flagging comments in FB, but some of it is stuff that is so "indirect" that it's difficult to support a case against it aside from the fact that it is repeated too often.

[Zen Democrat]

6. It developed in the 60's and has ebbed and flowed since then.

There undoubtedly a scary violent underbelly in the "Evangelical Christian Conservative Anti-Communist" movement.

[Paladin]

7. "Developing," Hell. It's Already In Place.......