I set the record straight for my post - period. It was accurate. I do not defend or endorse the Tea Party.Quote:
Originally Posted by Havakasha
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I set the record straight for my post - period. It was accurate. I do not defend or endorse the Tea Party.Quote:
Originally Posted by Havakasha
Joe Wilson 'You Lie' Slogan Etched Onto Line Of Assault Rifle Components
First Posted: 01/11/11 05:52 PM Updated: 01/12/11 10:41 AM
Rep. Joe Wilson's (R-S.C.) health care-era "you lie" interruption of President Obama is now reportedly being commemorated with a place on a new, limited edition line of assault rifle components.
The Columbia Free Times reports that the words are being engraved on a series of lower receivers manufactured for popular AR-15 assault rifles. Lower receivers are one of the primary pieces of the firearms.
"Palmetto State Armory would like to honor our esteemed congressman Joe Wilson with the release of our new 'You Lie' AR-15 lower receiver," the weapon manufacturer's site writes in the product description. "Only 999 of these will be produced, get yours before they are gone!"
Wilson caused a commotion in September of 2009 when he disrupted a key health care speech by Obama in which the president claimed that the impending health care reform legislation wouldn't provide coverage for undocumented immigrants.
The South Carolina Republican later apologized.
Also check out South Carolina blog Fits News for more on the commemorative gun units, as well as how they could play into Obama's planned visit to the Palmetto State later this year.
WATCH Joe Wilson's "You Lie":
Quote:
Originally Posted by SiriuslyLong
I never said anything about the tea party. The right wing claimed a "bullseye
ON congresswoman Giffords" on daily kos. That implies to me it was the same
as Sarah Paliin's. I believe that is false. Words matter.
Analysis: Sarah Palin's use of 'blood libel' sparks new controversy
By Karen Tumulty
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 12, 2011; 11:23 AM
Sarah Palin's Facebook page essay and video in response to the Tucson shootings - a tragedy in which she found herself the centerpiece of a debate over civility in political discourse - was crafted as both a defense of her own actions as part of the grand tradition of "our exceptional nation," and a strike against her critics.
That she waited four days and then issued such a delicately calibrated and polished statement also displayed a trait not normally associated with the former Alaska governor: discipline.
In Palin's version of events, her controversial actions represented common cause with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), who a few days before being critically wounded in the mass shooting had read the First Amendment on the House floor.
"Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own," Palin said in the statement. "They begin and end with the criminals who commit them, not collectively with all the citizens of a state, not with those who listen to talk radio, not with maps of swing districts used by both sides of the aisle, not with law-abiding citizens who respectfully exercise their First Amendment rights at campaign rallies, not with those who proudly voted in the last election."
Palin's statement contained an instance of provocative religious imagery that might be missed by more secular voters who read her statement, but which likely will be recognized by the religious conservatives who constitute such an important part of her following.
"Within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn," she wrote. "That is reprehensible."
"Blood libel" is a phrase that refers to a centuries-old anti-Semitic slander - the false charge that Jews use the blood of Christian children for rituals - that has been used as an excuse for persecution. The phrase was first used in connection with response to the Arizona shootings in an opinion piece in Monday's Wall Street Journal and has been picked up by others on the right.
Palin's defensiveness was apparent in the indirect reference to criticism of a map on Palin's Web site during the midterm elections that showed districts of congressional Democrats she had targeted for defeat marked with crosshairs.
Giffords, whose district was one of those 20, had publicly complained that this was an invitation to violence.
"She's her own best spokesperson and she wanted to talk about this," said Tim Crawford, the treasurer for Palin's political action committee. "The reason we did the video was we wanted the statement in total out there. We wanted the video to be seen in its entirety."
Palin's statement comes as President Obama is headed to Tucson to speak at a service for the victims, and guarantees that her perspective will be part of the storyline of the day.
In its careful timing and deliberate language, it also represents a departure from her previous attention-getting Facebook posts and tweets, many of which were reflexive spasms to even small criticisms.
On Thanksgiving, for instance, as most of the nation was still sleepily digesting turkey dinners, she issued an angry blast at Obama and the media, recalling a gaffe the president made during the 2008 campaign. It was an apparent reaction to the fact that she herself had been ridiculed for a slip of the tongue in which she referred to North Korea as South Korea.
"The one-word slip occurred yesterday during one of my seven back-to-back interviews wherein I was privileged to speak to the American public about the important, world-changing issues before us," Palin wrote. "If the media had bothered to actually listen to all of my remarks on Glenn Beck's radio show, they would have noticed that I refer to South Korea as our ally throughout, that I corrected myself seconds after my slip-of-the-tongue, and that I made it abundantly clear that pressure should be put on China to restrict energy exports to the North Korean regime."
Those kinds of outbursts could be fatal in a presidential campaign, and stand as a stark contrast to the statement that Palin released Wednesday.
The new level of political professionalism to her approach - if that indeed is what this represents - also might not be merely a coincidence in its timing.
Republican operatives report that Palin has been calling around in recent weeks to seek advice not only on whether but how she should run for president in 2012. This statement might suggest she is not only seeking that counsel, but taking it as well.
01/12/11 11:04
the more we learn about the young man accused of this horrific tragedy, the more we can temper our judgment; however, for me, the larger question for our country which includes the state of arizona, is what did we think when we first heard about this tragedy?
for many of us who have had to endure the last two years of mostly right-wing/tea party/gop rhetoric calling this president and democrats who supported him, along with fox news pundits, limbaugh, palin, bachmann and others with their gun-filled, hatred and violent imagery, it was not a hard leap to think that which we have feared had come true.
as we have all unfortunately become all to aware the last years since 2001, terrorism works by instilling fear. fear to speak out, fear of one's own personal safety, fear of one's government. from in-your-face confrontation at town hall meetings, to phone threats and objects thrown through legislator's offices; acts of terrorism have been about instilling fear here in our country. vote for this or that, and we will "target" you, if we do not get our way we will take up "second amendment remedies," be "armed and dangerous" if this bill passes.
so we come full circle to this sad tragedy where a beautiful, innocent, young child, along with a federal court judge, a republican grandmother, a pastor saving the life of is wife, a congressional aide,and other innocent citizens who loved their country enough to come talk with their democratically and constitutionally elected representative were killed.
so again, perhaps it is more important to ask ourselves, what did we think when we first heard about this tragedy that says more about our country today.
The Daily Kos article from June 2008 is posted above. Whatever words are there, are there.Quote:
Originally Posted by Havakasha
After Giffords Shooting, Several AZ Republicans Resign Amid Fears of Tea Party Violence
What the Arizona Republic calls a "nasty little battle" has broken out among Republican members of Arizona's Legislative District 20 in the wake of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting. Several Republicans have resigned, citing fears that local Tea Party supporters will harm them or their families for not being conservative enough.
Now-former Chairman Anthony Miller was among those to resign. A former campaign worker for Sen. John McCain, Miller sent an email to state Republican Party Chairman Randy Pullen just hours after Saturday's shooting, saying, "Today my wife of 20 yrs ask (sic) me do I think that my PCs (Precinct Committee members) will shoot at our home? So with this being said I am stepping down from LD20GOP Chairman...I will make a full statement on Monday."
Miller said he faced "constant verbal attacks" from the Tea Party after being elected to his second term last month. Many of those attacks centered around Miller's involvement with McCain's bid last year against Tea Party darling J.D. Hayworth.
The first and only African-American to hold the party's precinct chairmanship, Miller said he has been called "McCain's boy," and during the campaign saw a critic form his hand in the shape of a gun and point it at him.
"I wasn't going to resign but decided to quit after what happened Saturday," Miller said. "I love the Republican Party but I don't want to take a bullet for anyone."
After Miller's announcement, three other District 20 Republicans quit: newly-elected secretary Sophia Johnson, first vice chairman Roger Dickinson and former district spokesman Jeff Kolb, who said in an email, "This singular focus on 'getting' Anthony [Miller] was one of the main reasons I chose to resign."
By Lauren Kelley | Sourced from AlterNet
Posted at January 12, 2011, 9:26 am
From Kos of Daily Kos.
Last October, Glenn Beck was musing on his radio show about the prospect of the government seizing his children if he didn't give them flu vaccines. "You want to take my kids because of that?" he said. "Meet Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson."
Last April, Erick Erickson, the managing editor of the right-wing RedState blog and a CNN commentator, was questioning the legality of the Census Bureau's American Community Survey on a radio show. "We have become, or are becoming, enslaved by the government. . . . I dare 'em to try to come to throw me in jail. I dare 'em to. [I'll] pull out my wife's shotgun and see how that little ACS twerp likes being scared at the door."
Do right-wing talk show commentators incite violence against the government? Feel free to draw your own conclusions - but to dwell on the rise of violent rhetoric on the right is to miss an even bigger, though connected, problem. Let's focus, rather, on the first part of Beck's and Erickson's observations: The government wants to take away Glenn Beck's (and by extension, your) kids. The government wants to take a census and will throw Erick Erickson (and by extension, you) in jail if he, and you, don't comply.
Can we see the hands of all the kids taken from their parents because they didn't get flu shots? How about all those people rotting in jail because they didn't cooperate in compiling the census?
The primary problem with the political discourse of the right in today's America isn't that it incites violence per se. It's that it implants and reinforces paranoid fears about the government and conservatism's domestic adversaries.
The Fox News culture permits on-air personalities to fantasize about assassination and other forms of violence against deemed enemies.
� Note: This is a re-post of a November 10, 2010 piece from Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR) which is particularly relevant to the conversation about the shooting spree in Arizona on Saturday.
Bill O'Reilly's "joke" in November about decapitating Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank was only the latest example of a demented Fox News culture that permits on-air personalities to fantasize about assassination and other forms of violence against those deemed enemies of the station, its personalities or their worldview.
During the cable channel's 2008 election coverage, in what she later called an attempt at humor, Fox News contributor Liz Trotta linked Osama bin Laden to Barack Obama as people who both should be assassinated:
And now we have what some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Osama, uh Obama. Well, both, if we could.
A week before Trotta's "joke," Republican primary candidate Mike Huckabee was apologizing for his own Obama assassination quip. Addressing a gathering of the National Rifle Association, Huckabee joked that a loud thud heard backstage during his address was Barack Obama diving to the floor to avoid gun shots. Months later, Huckabee was given his own Fox News show.
With its biggest new star, Glenn Beck, Fox News hired a host well-known for on-air death fantasies--for instance, chattering about killing filmmaker Michael Moore with his bare hands and hoping out loud that Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D.-Ohio) would burn to death. In a Fox News skit in September 2009, Beck portrayed himself poisoning Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
It's a culture that apparently filters down to Fox News viewers and supporters. Over the years Fox Nation, the Fox News "owned and operated" fan website, has regularly featured comments expressing the desire to see Barack Obama's assassinated.
News Hounds (11/8/10) published a collection of such quotes, some of which can still be read at on the Fox site. Fox Nation purports to be self-policing, to depend on readers to report inappropriate and irresponsible remarks for removal. Apparently presidential assassination fantasies fall short of Fox Nation's standards for inappropriate or irresponsible commentary.
Recent examples of these assassination fantasies on Fox Nation include comments calling for President Obama to "get what Kennedy got," for the CIA to "take this pres down" and a warning to the president that the Koran "ain't thick enough to stop a .308 round."
There is some evidence that Fox's murder fantasy culture has already helped to spark violent action. Reporting for Media Matters, journalist John Hamilton tells the story of Byron Williams, a Beck devotee who engaged in a shootout that injured two California Highway Patrol officers in July. After his apprehension, Williams told police he'd intended to travel Oakland California to kill people at the offices of the Tides Foundation and the ACLU.
In a jailhouse interview in which he described the right-wing media sources that informed his views, Williams returned again and again to Glenn Beck:
I would have never started watching Fox News if it wasn't for the fact that Beck was on there. And it was the things that he did, it was the things he exposed that blew my mind.
Among the things Beck did, according to Hamilton, was attack the Tides Foundation in 29 separate Fox News shows in the 18 months leading up to Williams' foiled mission to Oakland.
Moreover, as the ADL reports, Pittsburgh's Richard Poplawski was so inspired by Beck's anti-government conspiracy theories, he reposted to a neo-Nazi website tape of Beck suggesting the government was building concentration camps for dissidents--before he was arrested after a shootout with police that left three officers dead.
If this all wasn't so deadly serious it would be seriously funny, because O'Reilly has spent years accusing liberal and progressive websites of fomenting hate speech. O'Reilly's crusade largely targets the comment and open forum sections of such websites, highlighting comments that generally pale in comparison to those broadcast on Fox and posted on Fox Nation. To add to the irony, when O'Reilly is called out for failing to make distinctions between the editorial content and comment sections of these websites, he argues that the groups are responsible for everything on their websites:
Open forum is bull.... You can regulate what’s on your website.
When it comes to hypocrisy and Fox News, you really can't make this stuff up.
The hostility behind O'Reilly's creepy Milbank beheading joke was on display when the host appeared to make a veiled threat toward Milbank's boss in an appearance on another Fox show. Apparently angered that Washington Post editorial page editor Fred Hiatt permitted Milbank to publish columns critical of Fox News, O'Reilly had Fox host Megyn Kelly put a picture of Hiatt up on the screen, and told her audience:
This is the editor, Milbank's editor, Fred Hiatt. And Fred won't do anything about Milbank lying in his column. I just want everybody in America to know what the Washington Post has come to. All right, you can take Fred's picture off. Fred, have a nice weekend, buddy.
(Later in the same appearance, O'Reilly suggested that the host join him in physically assaulting Milbank: "I think you and I should go and beat him up.")
O'Reilly's veiled threat toward Hiatt recalls one made in a recent interview with an Australian paper by Fox boss Rupert Murdoch (Australian Financial Review, 11/5/10):
People love Fox News.... We said to the cable operators when we put the price up, we said, do you want a monument to yourself.... Cancel us, you might get your house burnt down.
Perhaps the fish does rot from the head.
ABC News' Ashleigh Banfield filed a fascinating report on the Arizona Shooting Tragedy today, but it was unfortunately missed by many in NYC because of snow coverage. And its a shame, because the brief interview with alleged assailant's former "best friend" Zach Osler reveals some insight into the troubled mind of Jared Loughner. "He did not watch TV, he disliked the news" Osler averred, shortly after becoming quite emotional when faced with the unsettling mug shot of his former friend.
Osler continued, "he didn't listen to political radio, he didn't take sides, he wasn't on the left, he wasn't on the right." Instead, Banfield reports that Osler pointed to a web-based documentary called Zeitgeist, that focused on currency based economics that "poured gasoline on his fire" as Banfield reports. "The Zeitgeist documentary had a profound impact on Jared Loughner's mindset" Osler claimed.
Does anyone know anything about the "Zeitgeist" documentary and currency economics?