In 1919 the U.S. seemed poised on the brink of violent upheaval from anarchists inspired by the Russian Revolution. The anarchists sent at least 36 mail bombs. A month later eight American cities were struck with terrorist bombs. During the 1930’s the German American Bund paraded through U.S. streets praising Hitler. Beginning in 1969 the Weather Underground bombed more than 30 targets across the U.S. including the U.S. Capitol Building. In April 1995 Timothy McVeigh bombed the Murrow Federal Building in Oklahoma.
Violence is not unheard of in the history of U.S. politics. Fortunately, violent incidences are uncommon. Nancy Pelosi and more recently columnist Thomas Friedman have spoken and written of their fears that the current political climate could produce violence. I believe violence is a possibility if Conservatives, and Liberals (yes – you folks too) don’t work to shut down the extremists within their groups.
Tuesday, Thomas Friedman wrote, “I have no problem with any of the substantive criticism of President Obama from the right or left. But something very dangerous is happening. Criticism from the far right has begun tipping over into delegitimation.” To this, RNC Chairman Michael Steele said, “Where do these nut jobs come from? Come on, stop this…To make those equations, examples and put that out there that way, to me is just crazy and yeah, I’m sorry, but if you’re going to approach this discussion, approach it from a rational position.”
A week ago I would have wrote that Friedman was being silly. I would have agreed with Steele, because; while I oppose almost everything President Obama has said and tried to do, I never imagined someone would put a poll on Facebook asking, “Should Obama be killed.” A week ago I would not have expected Newsmax to run a piece suggesting justification for a military coup in the U.S. The Facebook poll and the Newsmax article have been taken down but it takes a special disregard of our Constitution to come up with this garbage.
I don’t think the people that have expressed concerns about violence are nut jobs as Steele suggests, nor am I willing to put it all on the right wing by glossing over the left’s role in this environment, as Friedman did. There is plenty of blame to go around. If you don’t see the left’s role along with the right’s, you need to open your mind. The vicious left wing rhetoric is out there and it’s common, from the New York Times’ Paul Krugman to Huffington Post bloggers.
Yesterday, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan nailed the controversy precisely by holding up liberal cable talk show host Ed Schultz and right-wing radio talker Alex Jones as examples of the problem. Schultz recently said, “The Republicans lie. They want to see you dead. They’d rather make money off your dead corpse. They kind of like it when that woman has cancer and they don’t have anything for us.”
Alex Jones claimed that the U.S. military’s security efforts at the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh show them to be agents and lackeys of the New World Order. “They are complete enemies of America. . . . Our military’s been taken over. . . . This is the end of our country.” Later, “They’d love to kill 10,000 Americans,” and, “The republic is falling right now.”
Do you agree with either of those statements? Do you understand why both statements are dangerous?
It will take sensible people from both the left and the right to make sure this angry rhetoric remains on the extreme, and harmless. I suggest we step back, calm down, and consider how we can ease the anger now, before people get hurt.
• If you disagree with the President, bear in mind that we still have processes in this country for limiting his power and removing him from office – a legal process.
• We need a press that understands and respects multiple political views, or the extremists will prevail. If you don’t think the mainstream media is liberally biased you are not spending any time studying the breadth of opinions on the various issues. The same is true if you don’t think that Conservative media is over-reacting to Obama’s every action. The biased media of both camps frustrates people by hiding real news – see New York Times and ACORN, and creating news where it is not, look at the recent controversy over the New Jersey school children and their song honoring Obama.
That children sang a song in honor of President Obama during Black History month is really not a big deal. The lyrics of the song appear to be more of an example of the lyricist’s ignorance than any socialist conspiracy.
• Conservatives need to lead the attack on racists, secessionists, and anyone advocating the overthrow of the government. Conservative talk radio needs to turn its most intense venom on the scum that talk of assassinating the President, even if that talk is in jest.
• Liberals need to recognize their own vitriol and hate mongering from the Bush years. Hate is hate even if your side is spewing that hate and you are certain your side is correct.
• Further, liberals owe it to the democratic process to recognize that while some of the Obama opposition is racist or efforts to hurt Obama’s presidency, most of it is legitimate concerns and anger that would be directed at any president trying to change the fundamental economic structure of the U.S.
I wish that Americans from both the left and the right would recognize that: those that disagree with your views are not necessarily bad. They might have valid ideas. Listen.
The current, hostile political climate is the result of years of hostility between liberals and conservatives. The political debate that has been raging recently reminds me of children fighting; I hit him because he hit me.
This vicious cycle has to be broken.
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