CNN: "U.S. right wing extremists more deadly than jihadists"

By Michael J.W. Stickings

In case you missed it, CNN yesterday posted a must-read piece by Peter Bergen and David Sterman on how Islamic jihadism is considered to be so much worse than domestic right-wing extremism -- among the public, in the media -- even though the latter is much more deadly than the former. Here are some highlights, starting with a reference to the Kansas City KKK killer, though you would do well to read it in its entirety:

Now let's do the thought experiment in which instead of shouting "Heil Hitler" after he was arrested, the suspect had shouted "Allahu Akbar." Only two days before the first anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombings, this simple switch of words would surely have greatly increased the extent and type of coverage the incident received.

Yet the death toll in the shootings in Kansas is similar to that of last year's Boston Marathon bombings, where three people were killed and the suspects later killed a police officer as they tried to evade capture. (Many more, of course, were also wounded in the Boston attacks; 16 men, women and children lost limbs.)

In fact, since 9/11 extremists affiliated with a variety of far-right wing ideologies, including white supremacists, anti-abortion extremists and anti-government militants, have killed more people in the United States than have extremists motivated by al Qaeda's ideology. According to a count by the New America Foundation, right wing extremists have killed 34 people in the United States for political reasons since 9/11. (The total includes the latest shootings in Kansas, which are being classified as a hate crime).

By contrast, terrorists motivated by al Qaeda's ideology have killed 21 people in the United States since 9/11.

*****

Moreover, since 9/11 none of the more than 200 individuals indicted or convicted in the United States of some act of jihadist terrorism have acquired or used chemical or biological weapons or their precursor materials, while 13 individuals motivated by right wing extremist ideology, one individual motivated by left-wing extremist ideology, and two with idiosyncratic beliefs, used or acquired such weapons or their precursors.

This is to take nothing away from 9/11, which was obviously a horrendous attack, nor to suggest that jihadism is no longer a serious threat. Certainly part of the reason for its decline is that the U.S. has expended vast resources combating it, both overseas and at home, including building up the national security state. And of course America isn't jihadism's only target. Whether al Qaeda or related to al Qaeda or not, it has struck elsewhere, including in Mumbai in 2008.

But Bergen and Sterman are right that jihadism is blown way out of proportion in the U.S. and that the media deserve much of the blame for that. I suppose racial/ethnic/religious/cultural bias is to explain for that. Even a known KKK leader and virulent anti-Semite can be your friendly next-door neighbor in the mostly white and Christian parts of the U.S. He may look like you and act like you, for the most part, and in any event he may not seem all that their weird despite his extremist views, some of which, deep down, you may even share.

But anyone with even slightly brown skin, with an accent, with odd dress, with weird-smelling food, with strange religious or cultural practises, well, even it hardly matters whether that person is Muslim or Buddhist or Sikh or Hindu or whatever -- he or she is somehow the Other, and that frightens you, because difference terrifies you and because, of course, you've been told by the media -- and it's only worse if your media outlets of choice are Fox News or right-wing talk radio -- that the real threats to America, to your way of life, to you personally, are of the non-white, non-Christian, "foreign" variety.

The point, of course, is that while jihadi terrorism is very much a real thing, the more urgent danger within America's borders is right-wing extremism, which while appearing in different forms is very much a significant threat to the country and its inhabitants. Look no further if you're concerned about your way of life, about yourself personally. These are people who blow up government buildings and plant bombs and drive around major cities randomly shooting people or even targeting certain kinds of people -- people just like you in many ways, no matter your race, creed, color, or hue.

It's much easier to vilify the foreign Other, I know, to lump those "different" from you into one big huge threat from which you can cower in fear with those you think are like you. But I would say it's far more advisable to deal with the world as it is and to understand the real threats for what they are.

God, guns and Hitler

By Capt. Fogg

I have certain misgivings about hate crime laws, but we're reminded this morning -- the eve of Pesach or The Passover and a week before Hitler's birthday, that people who belong to hate-based organizations and creeds, who post virulent hate messages and calls for extermination on-line, need their constitutional right to keep and bear arms infringed.

I feel quite protective of our guaranteed right to free speech and our right to think what we think, but speech that incites to violence, that creates a mortal danger to the public, is something else and that's been established for a long time. Frazier Glenn Miller is a founding member of the Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and the White Patriot Party. That's not a crime, more's the pity, nor is shouting "Heil Hitler" from the back of a police car, but perhaps we ought to consider making it a felony to belong to groups who advocate murder because as far as I know, it's illegal for felons to own firearms.

I know -- penalties and restrictions don't prevent criminals and especially psychopathic criminals from committing crimes, but there's something wrong with Mr. Miller or Mr. Cross as he often calls himself, to own weapons. There's something wrong if the targets of hate groups need to arm themselves or to hire armed guards or to go about in fear because we elevate and protect a right to be armed above the right to remain alive. We shouldn't have to wait for people like that to run amok before we do anything. Threatening violence against groups or individuals should be sufficient to disarm someone.

Lest one think that being a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant is protection and a reason not to worry, Methodists were shot in this tragedy as well.

(Cross posted at Human-Voices)

The race, creed, color, and hue of domestic terrorism

By Michael J.W. Stickings

As if the Oklahoma City bombing weren't enough... and then so much else.

Terrorism is supposed to be about the Other, and specifically the Muslim Other, so we have been told, so have the stereotypes played out since 9/11, and actually since long before, but the evidence amounts to something different altogether.

And the latest major act of domestic terrorism, committed by a white man against Sikhs, is yet more:

The man who allegedly murdered six people at a Sikh temple in suburban Milwaukee yesterday, identified in media reports as Wade Michael Page, was a frustrated neo-Nazi who had been the leader of a racist white-power band...

Wade Michael Page was a member of two racist skinhead bands –– End Apathy and Definite Hate, a band whose album "Violent Victory" featured a gruesome drawing of a disembodied white arm punching a black man in the face. In the drawing, the fist is tattooed with the letters "HFFH," the acronym for the phrase "Hammerskins Forever, Forever Hammerskins."

The Hammerskins is a nationwide skinhead organization with regional factions and chapters that once dominated the racist skinhead movement in the United States.

The Journal-Sentinel has more:

The shooter who opened fire before worship services Sunday at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek and killed six people before he was killed by police is Wade Michael Page, a 40-year-old Army veteran, U.S. Attorney James A. Santelle said Monday.

He said officials believe he purchased the 9mm handgun legally in Wisconsin.

Page, 40, served in the military approximately between 1992 and 1998, Santelle said. Other sources familiar with the investigation said Page was assigned to psychological operations, or PsyOps. He apparently was last stationed at Fort Bragg, N.C.

But I'm sure this will be treated, at least in the media, as an isolated incident, an act of inexplicable violence committed by a "lone wolf."

This is how we avoid dealing with the root causes of such hateful violence in any meaningful way.

Mitt the Bully: What Romney's high school "pranks," including physical assault, tell us about his character and values

By Michael J.W. Stickings

It's an ugly story. The Washington Post takes us back to 1965, to Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, a prestigious private school for the moneyed elite, and to a teenaged Mitt Romney, illuminating something, something essential, about Romney's character, about what kind of a person he was, and still may be:

Mitt Romney returned from a three-week spring break in 1965 to resume his studies as a high school senior at the prestigious Cranbrook School. Back on the handsome campus, studded with Tudor brick buildings and manicured fields, he spotted something he thought did not belong at a school where the boys wore ties and carried briefcases. John Lauber, a soft-spoken new student one year behind Romney, was perpetually teased for his nonconformity and presumed homosexuality. Now he was walking around the all-boys school with bleached-blond hair that draped over one eye, and Romney wasn’t having it.

"He can't look like that. That's wrong. Just look at him!" an incensed Romney told Matthew Friedemann, his close friend in the Stevens Hall dorm, according to Friedemann's recollection. Mitt, the teenaged son of Michigan Gov. George Romney, kept complaining about Lauber's look, Friedemann recalled.

A few days later, Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school's collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber's hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

In other words, Romney was a moralizing bully who physically assaulted a fellow student. As Richard wrote earlier today, this highly disturbing incident reveals "Romney's need to enforce conformity with his own views and his sense that other people who are different are a personal affront to him."

There are some who will call this a prank, excusing it as a youthful misdeed, if a misdeed at all. They will say that it was all in good fun, or, if not, that it hardly matters now, that the Romney of 1965 isn't the Romney of today. Those people, in my view, will be -- and are -- wrong. Because it shows that the privileged rich douchebag of today is very much the same person as the abusive, perhaps bigoted bully who terrorized John Lauber because he didn't like his look, because he thought he was gay.

As you can imagine, Romney's campaign has been on the defensive today, urgently trying to bring in character witnesses from Romney's high school days to tell us that their guy wasn't the abusive bully he would appear, from several independents accounts, to have been. And Romney himself was just laughing if off today -- he always laughs when he's uncomfortable, and when he's hiding something, have you noticed? -- saying he doesn't remember the incident in question. But is this credible? I think not. As Think Progress reports:

Mitt Romney was asked about the Post's story during a live radio broadcast with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, apologizing before explaining that he didn't remember many of the details of what took place: "Back in high school, I did some dumb things and if anybody was hurt by that or offended, obviously I apologize for that... I don't remember that incident," Romney said, laughing. "I certainly don't believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s, so that was not the case."

It seems odd that Romney would not recall such a bizarre event, especially since so many other students who were asked about it painted clear pictures of what transpired, but perhaps such "hijinks and pranks" were so frequent he has simply lost track of them all.

A separate incident, in which Romney ridiculed a closeted gay classmate by sarcastically praising him with "atta girl!" comments, helps paint a troubling picture for the Republican Party's presumptive presidential nominee.

It was a different time, certainly, a time when anti-gay sentiment was widespread and even in some circles completely acceptable, but what we see here is a young man who clearly had a problem with difference, and specifically with homosexuality (he's lying when he says sexual orientation was "the furthest thing" from his mind), and who was a leader, not a follower, when it came to taking out his nasty prejudices on others. And one classmate is painting a pretty clear picture of just what sort of a person Romney was:

One former classmate and old friend of Romney's – who refused to be identified by name – said there are "a lot of guys" who went to Cranbrook who have "really negative memories" of Romney's behavior in the dorms, behavior this classmate describes as "like Lord of the Flies."

The classmate believes Romney is lying when he claims to not remember it.

"It makes these fellows [who have owned up to it] very remorseful. For [Romney] not to remember it? It doesn't ring true. How could the fellow with the scissors forget it?" the former classmate said.

Politically, this story alone won't sink him, but it adds an ugly, violent element to the "privileged rich douchebag" narrative that has been building around him for some time now. He became super-rich as a vulture capitalist destroying jobs and ruining lives, and back in high school he liked to abuse others, both verbally and, it seems, physically. I acknowledge that people can change, but there's a common theme to Romney's character here, exposed in those old "pranks," both this assault and others, as well as in how he has behaved both in business and in politics -- and, for all I know, in his personal life. As Jon Chait writes:

My cautious, provisional take is that this portrait of the youthful Romney does suggest a man who grew up taking for granted the comforts of wealth and prestige. I don't blame him for accepting the anti-gay assumptions of his era. The story does give the sense of a man who lacks a natural sense of compassion for the weak. His prankery seems to have invariably singled out the vulnerable — the gay classmate, the nearly blind teacher, the nervous day student racing back to campus. It's entirely possible to grow out of that youthful mentality — to learn to step out of your own perspective, to develop an appreciation for the difficulties faced by those not born with Romney's many blessings. I'm just not sure he ever has.

I'm not sure either, but the evidence that he hasn't keeps piling up. And while it may not be fair to blame him for "accepting the anti-gay assumptions of his era," there's a difference between having generally anti-gay views common to many at the time, including to those of his socio-economic ilk, and physically assaulting and otherwise abusing those he suspected of being gay -- and otherwise singling out the vulnerable for abuse.

We'll have to see to what extent, if at all, this story sticks, adding to the Romney narrative, to the general perception of Romney as an arrogant prick, but to me he ought to be held accountable for his character, and for what these "pranks" say about his character, as well as for his values, and for how those values have manifested themselves in his actions over time, including in high school. Saying that he doesn't remember, or that he "might have gone too far," isn't nearly good enough.

Mitt Romney has spent his life being a bully, and worse. The American people deserve to know just what sort of a person he really is.

In Colorado, two gay soldiers brutally beaten by anti-gay bigots

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Yes, hate remains rampant despite the great strides American has made. And the victims can even be those in uniform courageously serving America:

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- Police are investigating a suspected hate crime after a group of men beat two gay Fort Carson soldiers and others while shouting anti-homosexual and racial slurs.

The victims told KRDO-TV they believe they were targeted at a fast food restaurant early Saturday because they're gay.

The victims have asked to remain anonymous. (Despite the repeal of DADT, homosexuality "is definitely frowned upon," said one of them.)

And they weren't just pushed around:

"I ended up getting kicked in the head and in the ribs several times," John said. "I have six bruised ribs. And my right eye was completely swollen shut for about nine or 10 hours."

According to police, another victim was treated for a facial fracture. His jaw had to be wired shut. 

Yes, it certainly appears to be a hate crime. Hopefully the bigots will be found and confronted with the full force of the law.

Targeting Muslims, inciting violence

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Conservative fearmongers and hatemongers, including Newt and Sarah and all you Fox News propagandists, this, along with other such incidents, is at your feet:

In the latest in a spate of anti-Muslim incidents over the last two days, an intoxicated man entered a mosque in Queens on Wednesday evening and proceeded to urinate on prayer rugs, New York police officials said.

The man, identified as Omar Rivera, reportedly shouted anti-Muslim epithets and called worshippers who had gathered for evening prayer "terrorists." One witness told the New York Post the man was "very clearly intoxicated" and had a beer bottle in his hand at the time.

"He stuck up his middle finger and cursed at everyone," Mustapha Sadouki, who was at the mosque at the time, said. "He calls us terrorists, yet he comes into our mosque and terrorizes other people."

This, and worse, is what happens when you target Muslims, insinuating, or even outright declaring, that they're all a bunch of America-hating terrorists (including American Muslims who love America), that anyone who would attend a mosque or community center, near Ground Zero or elsewhere, must be a jihadist of some sort. You are stoking fear and inciting violence, and we will only see more of this as you continue to pollute the airwaves, and the air itself, with your relentless bigotry.

Hating Haitians

By Carl

One of the joys of scuba diving is it offers the chance to take vacations in exotic locales off the beaten path (Bon-where, now?).

One of the embarrassments of scuba diving is having to explain Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson to people from more civilized and sophisticated societies like France, England, the Netherlands, and "Bon-where, now?"

Often, I'm tempted to shrug my shoulders and simply say they're snake oil salesmen who have entire swaths of morons bamboozled by both bilking them for tens of millions of dollars, all while off-putting the blame to someone else. Of course, there's much evidence that even the more mainstream Republican factions are con artists, which makes this not only a tempting trope to leave with, but a facile explanation to boot.

I mean, come on! When a dunderhead like Erick Erickson finally begins to see the light about the movement he's helped spawn and launch, it's like Capt. Renault finding gambling at Rick's Cafe Americain!

But that's nothing compared to the massive scam being pulled by Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson over Haiti. If Sarah Palin and Michael Steele are pulling in long money over a few books and a convention, you can rest assured that every time Rush Limbaugh or Pat Robertson open their mouths and say something blitheringly, blindingly idiotic, their accountants are grinning from ear to ear.

For example, when Robertson says that the earthquake was a "blessing in disguise," was he really referring to religious reform in Haiti? Well, sort of, but the blessings were not for Haitians and not for the afterlife, but for the hundreds of evangelicals and other Christian missionaries who would be getting beaucoup bucks to keep piling on the indigent population to attempt to convert them to a brand of Christianity that is both judgemental and better suited for people with little intelligence.

In other words, it benefits Robertson and other Christian Coalitionites.

And when Rush actually campaigns against giving to relief efforts (particularly those emanating on the White House website, like, you know, the American Red Cross?), cui bono? Who benefits?

As for his ridiculous comments that American taxes go to pay Haitian relief efforts, yes, to the extent that they pay the salaries of officials and soldiers on the ground there, it's true. Those salaries would be paid anyway, however so its not like no earthquake would have magically removed a line item from the budget.

Indeed, one could make the argument that Rush himself benefits from those same taxes, ergo he should not be allowed to charge for advertising on his radio program since the airwaves are free. So cui bono is now answered.

But now try explaining to some fellow diver who's Swiss or Italian the whole phenomenon of a man who rails against taxes or one who calls innocent people "devils" in a free society, not only with little repercussion (the tragedy having far outweighed the outrage, a tactic both Rush and Robertson rely upon) but with the full faith and credit of a significant percentage of Americans supporting them, and not conjure up images of Il Duce or worse.

I'm sure I got defensive when discussing them. For that, I apologize, just as I was forced to offer up simple puling of "well, there's a place for all beliefs in America" as explanation.

Which I shouldn't have had to. Your not allowed to shout fire in a crowded theater. It's about time we found some way to hold people responsible not only for their actions, but for their words.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

Pat Robertson: Christianity as hateful bigotry

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Consider what fascist-theocrat Pat Robertson said about the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act, a bill, signed into law by President Obama the other day, that extends hate-crime protection to sexual orientation:

The noose has tightened around the necks of Christians to keep them from speaking out on certain moral issues. And it all was embodied in something called the hate crimes bill that President Obama said was a major victory for America. I'm not sure if America was the beneficiary. [...] We have voted into office a group of people who are opposed to many of the fundamental Christian beliefs of our nation. And they hold to radical ideology, and they are beginning put people sharing their points of view into high office. And not only that, they not only have control of both houses of Congress.

Consider Robertson's "logic" here: The legislation silences Christians. Apparently, it is Christian to be hateful. Apparently, anyone or anything that prevents Christians from being hateful, or speaking hate, is anti-Christian, and anti-American. America is Christian. Since Christianity is hateful, so is America.

Just so we're all clear.

Christians, and Americans, should be disgusted and outraged.

Hypocrisy, hate crimes, and the apparent bigotry of John Boehner

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Check out this CBS News article. House Republican Leader John Boehner opposes a bill that would expand hate crime legislation to include gender, sexual orientation, and disability. Currently, the legislation includes race, color, religion, and national origin. His rationale is that hate crimes legislation should only cover "immutable characteristics." Apparently, sexual orientation is not immutable. And yet, the very idea of immutability is stupid. What is immutable? Is gender immutable? No, it's more complicated than that, isn't it? So, too, sexual orientation, which, while natural, isn't always so black and white. And national origin? To a point, but many people these days don't really have one single national origin. But religion certainly isn't immutable, and yet Boehner supports the current legislation. And so we must conclude that he's a hypocrite, and worse: His objection to the bill likely stems from his objection to gays and lesbians generally. Opposition to hate crimes legislation generally at least shows consistency, and I can respect that. (In an ideal world, one without hate, I'd object to hate crimes legislation, too. We're not there yet, though, not even close.) But picking and choosing which groups deserve to be protected and which ones don't, as the pro-religion, anti-gay Boehner is doing, is simply despicable.

Hate crime

By Capt. Fogg

Race, religion, and gender are "immutable characteristics," said a spokesman for John Boehner. The House Minority Leader feels that existing federal protections are okay for people born with such handicaps as being female or dark-skinned but not for people who against nature and for entertainment purposes choose to be gay or in a wheelchair.

He does not support adding sexual orientation to the list of protected classes,

said Boehner spokesman Kevin Smith in an email to CBS News. It's important to note that he includes religion as something worthy of special protection. Of course, gender is not currently given special protection, and religion is hardly "immutable" or innate or the product of genetics, but we're quoting Republican leaders here, people who can't be expected to be rational or consistent, or to be normal human beings.

Rep. Tom Price, who heads the GOP conservative circus caucus, cites the slippery-slope fallacy to predict that such legislation would lead to "thought crimes" while felonies of intent which account for a good part of our prison population would not. Sounds dishonest to me, and it's apparent that the real opposition comes from the fear that some preacher might be called to task for preaching hatred against infidels or "sinners" or witches even though no violence can be traced directly to him. Don't tell me it doesn't happen, I've endured many a sermon that prompted me to leave in disgust, and I don't mean those by Pastor Muthee. The danger of exposing the inherent anti-Semitism in certain foundational documents must seem very real to people like Price.

We believe all hate crimes legislation is unconstitutional and places one class of people above others,

said a spokesman for Buck. Perhaps this is all about principle, despite all appearances, yet it seems like yesterday to me when segregation was the backbone of American conservatism and the exclusion of ethnic groups from neighborhoods and hotels was de regueur and fiercely defended by people like Barry Goldwater. Of course, I think it's not about egalitarian sentiment at all. I think it's that if you took the license to preach hate away from the far-right religious faction that owns the GOP, it'd be out of business.

(Cross-posted from Human Voices.)

Revelations: Who are the hate groups and why we should be very afraid

By (O)CT(O)PUS

(Hate groups are everywhere. There are more of them than we think and they are more powerful than we know. And they don't just dress up in Nazi uniforms or white sheets. Some of them, some of the larger ones, are major players in Washington and around the U.S., and specifically key players in the Republican Party, where they are prominent both in the base and in the leadership. It's essential that we know who they are... and what they're up to. -- MJWS)

To more fully grasp the potential for domestic terrorism, I am posting this list of known hate groups, most operating as far-right-wing Christian ministries. If you missed Capt. Fogg's article, "Holocaust," or my post, "When 'pro-life' means pro-death," you might want to read those first.

Here is a very partial list of radical hate groups that support anti-abortion violence, anti-Semitism, homophobia, racism, sexism, white supremacy, and the overthrow of our constitutional form of government:

American Center for Law and Justice. Headed by Marion "Pat" Robertson, this group advocates the assassination of foreign leaders, the subjugation of women, and the oppression of gays.

America's Promise Ministries. An anti-Semitic group that claims white people as the "chosen ones."

Army of God. An underground network of terrorists who believe violence is an acceptable way to end abortion. In 1984, Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun received death threats by mail from this group. Several members, Eric Rudolph, James Kopp, and Clayton Waagner, are serving prison sentences for bombing, murder, and anthrax threats, respectively.

Aryan Nations. A group that advocates anti-Semitism and the murder of homosexuals.

Bill Bright, Campus Crusade for Christ. A hate group that seeks to replace the Constitution and establish their own theocracy.

Christian Association of PrimeTimers. This group scams senior citizens out of their retirement money to finance the abolition of the U.S. Constitution and the installation of a theocracy.

Chalcedon Foundation. Seeks to abolish the Constitution and install themselves as leaders of a theocracy.

Christian Coalition of America. Once headed by Ralph Reed, this anti-abortion, pro-school prayer, pro-creationism group seeks the replacement of public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools supported with tax dollars.

Christian Reconstructionism. This hate group seeks the overthrow the U.S. Constitution and the establishment of a theocracy. Advocates the execution of racial minorities and homosexuals.

Citizens for Excellence in Education. Another pro school prayer, pro creationism group that seeks the replacement of public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools paid with tax dollars.

Collegiate Network. An anti sex education group that seeks the replacement of public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools paid with tax dollars.

Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church (Ft. Lauderdale FL). Led by D. James Kennedy, this hate group advocates violence towards gays and women and seeks to establish their own brand of theocracy.

Council for Conservative Citizens. Foments racism with a special focus on anti-Semitism.

Council for National Policy. Seeks to abolish the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and impose their own theocracy.

Focus on the Family. One of the most vocal, best-known homophobic groups in America.

Jack Chick Publications. Publishes bizarre comic books that allege a world-wide conspiracy of "Satanists" and "witches" who kidnap, torture, murder, and eat babies.

Jim Wickstrom. The leader of a cult with strong ties to "Posse Comitatus," a group that blames abortions on "Jewish Doctors" who then blast aborted fetuses into outer space [not a joke!].

Ku Klux Klan. This infamous hate group has participated in anti-abortion demonstrations in Melbourne and Pensacola Florida. Perhaps an obvious point: Many terror and intimidation tactics used against abortion clinics have been borrowed from the Klan.

Landmark Legal Foundation. Advocates the replacement of public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools paid with tax dollars.

Lifeline Long Distance. Finances domestic terrorist organizations like Operation Rescue and the so-called Army of God.

Operation Rescue. A domestic terrorist organization linked to the murder of abortion providers. Currently headed by Troy Newman, a front man for Randal Terry, this group preaches hatred and the submission of women to male masters. The cult's leadership advocates the overthrow of the Constitution and the removal of women from the work force.

Parental Freedom in Education. Their goal is to replace public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools financed with tax dollars.

Pete Peters. Claims Jews are conspiring to control the world with the United Nations taking over the United States.

Policy Research Institute. Demands the creation of tax-subsidized religious schools and the replacement of all public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools.

Phineas Priesthood. Advocates the murder of mixed race couples. The "Phineas" title is used by numerous Christian hate groups in the United States.

Promise Keepers. Advocates the violent "taking back" of male dominion over women.

Rodney O. Skurdal. Advocates the removal of women from the workplace.

Stormfront White Nationalists. Last week, this online hate group praised James von Brunn, the gunman who killed a security guard at the Holocaust Museum. The scariest part: Stormfront has a huge following... estimated to be in the millions.

The Army of God. Like Operation Rescue, this is a domestic terrorist group that has claimed responsibility for several abortion clinic bombings, including the infamous double-bombing intended to murder rescue workers aiding victims of the first blast.

The Bradley Foundation. Advocates the replacement of public schools with fundamentalist Christian schools paid with tax dollars.

The Church of Jesus Christ Christian. Similar to Aryan Nations and the Ku Klux Klan, this anti-Semitic group that advocates violence.

The Heritage Foundation. Finances racist research.

The Institute for Historic Review. An anti-Semitic hate group that denies the Holocaust.

The Order. A hate group that focuses on racism and abortion.

The Sword and the Cross. An anti-Semitic hate group that operates worldwide.

Traditional Values Coalition. An anti-homosexual hate group that denies the separation between church and State.

U.S. Tax Payers Party. Supports the domestic terrorist group, Operation Rescue.

Westboro Baptist Church. Headed by Fred Phelps, this group pickets churches, schools, businesses, and military funerals to rail against homosexuality. Unbelievers are labeled as “faggots."

White Aryan Resistance. A hate group led by Tom Metzger, who advocates abortion for non-white mothers and forced birth at gun point for white mothers.

Virginia Trinitarian Pro-Nomian Alliance (VTPA). A hate group seeking to overthrow the Constitution and remove the Bill of Rights to install their own theocracy.

Source: The Skeptic Tank

When I first presented this list at The Swash Zone, several readers questioned the preponderance of Christian ministries cited above. Why were ministries engaged in so-called "good works" (i.e., James Dobson) included on the same list as rabid homophobes such as Fred Phelps?

As you can see, this website underwritten by Dobson promotes a clear anti-gay message. His opposition to all gay rights is infamous, and most mental health professionals reject his views on homosexuality (including his views on physical punishment as a means of disciplining children).

Rarely does a blogger receive a comment as dramatic, contextual, and convincing as this:

A few days ago a young man (16) killed himself because he was tired of hiding his gayness. I knew him because he mowed my yard and he mailed me a letter the day he hung himself (…) That young man was a handsome, decent intelligent young man and I will cherish his letter for the rest of my life [see comment @ 5:44 PM, June 12, 2009].

To underscore my point, the suicide rate among gay and lesbian youth is disturbing and heartbreaking: LGBT youth are two to three times more likely to commit suicide compared with other young people. Predisposing risk factors include homophobia within our culture, gender uncertainty with respect to sexual orientation, social ostracism among peers, and parental rejection. Thus, anti-homosexual attitudes of far-right-wing ministries abuse our underage and vulnerable young people struggling with issues of self-identity.

Indeed, there is a regrettable preponderance of Christian ministries cited in this post, but my intent here is not to disparage faith and good works. All too often, religious fervor degenerates into demonization, fear-mongering, scapegoating, and Apocalyptic aggression. Or, as Chip Berlet states in Toxic to Democracy: Conspiracy Theories, Demonization & Scapegoating:

People who believe conspiracist allegations sometimes act on those irrational beliefs, and this has concrete consequences in the real world. Angry allegations can quickly turn into aggression and violence targeting scapegoated groups (…) Even when conspiracist theories do not center on Jews, homosexuals, people of color, immigrants or other scapegoated groups, they still create an environment where racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, xenophobia, homophobia, and other forms of prejudice, bigotry, and oppression can flourish [p. 47].

If faith and good works mean changing laws to deprive women of private and legitimate health-care rights, returning women to the days of back room abortion butchers, forcing them to bear dead babies against their will, forcing them to forgo life-saving chemotherapy just because they are pregnant, discriminating against our gay brothers and sisters and turning them into second-class citizens, denying any class of citizens equal protection under law, forcing school prayers on people who do not want it, using public tax money to finance private religious education, and demanding the imposition of one religious doctrine over believers and non-believers alike, then those groups on this list BELONG on this list.

(Cross-posted at The Swash Zone.)

Minuteman -- what's in a name?

By Capt. Fogg

The right-wing trolls have been parading their mock outrage recently about suggestions that the last 8 years have marked a new high ( or low, if you prefer) in Republican hatemongery -- unless, of course they're allowed to blame it either equally or entirely on "Far-Left Liberals," which group is comprised of anyone who criticized George W. Bush's presidency before the economy hit the fan.

Were the doctor murderer and the museum shooter secret FLLs? is the question they're pretending to ask themselves in order to avoid the appearance of complicity, says Majikthise. Of course, yesterday's arrests for home invasion and murder by leaders of one of the "Minuteman" groups who pose as well-regulated militias doing what "the government refuses to do" will have to be integrated into the program of denial and blame passing. It's going to get more and more difficult, I predict, to discuss any question of responsibility.

Shawna Forde, leader of Minutemen America Defense, aptly called MAD, is a graduate of San Diego terrorist Camp Vigilante. She's been arrested along with two other terrorist border patrol volunteer group members for having shot up a Hispanic family in their own home, leaving a father and his nine year old daughter dead. One of the other vigilantes is also a product of a Minuteman training camp, but of course the argument is being steered away from culpability and toward which of several groups get to use the Minuteman name, as the dance of denial and evasion begins.

Of course, by suggesting that the rabid barking about Mexicans from Lou Dobbs on down to the self-appointed defenders of America's borders and undiluted bodily fluids has had any effect on the overall climate of murderous rage amongst the "conservatives," exposes me to accusations of playing the "Blame Game" and being ranked as another Far-Left-Liberal hate-shouter in the false equivalence World Series and probably an America-blaming, crypto-terrorist, Fascist-Marxist follower of the false and foreign-born Messiah Obama as well.

Really, I should just go back to writing about boats before my sense of guilt becomes overwhelming.

(Cross-posted from Human Voices.)

Truth in Comics

By Creature


If it's Sunday, it's Truth in Comics.

Not alone

By Mustang Bobby

The smoke had barely cleared from the scene at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. yesterday before we found out that the man, James von Brunn, who is accused of opening fire with a shotgun and killing security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns, is a white supremacist with a long history of hatred towards anything that didn't fit the Nazi definition of the Master Race. He has a lot of writings and web postings that blame every minority he can lay his hands on for his troubles, he subscribes to the belief that President Obama is not a citizen of the United States, and he saw such things as the Holocaust memorial as "the enemy".

As far as we know now, Mr. Von Brunn acted alone; it appears that he spent a lot of time stewing in his own hatred, seeing the conspiracies piling up against him until something set him off on his solo mission from his home in Annapolis to the museum in downtown Washington. This fits the pattern of the "lone wolf," as described in the memo released by the Department of Homeland Security -- and immediately attacked by conservatives who, for some odd reason, thought that they were being singled out as being perpetrators of extremist violence. The howls of protest, including a speech on the floor of Congress by Rep. Michele Bachman (R-MN) against the Obama administration and DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano neglected to take into account two details: the report was initiated by the Bush administration, and there was a similar report released at the same time that also warned about attacks from left-wing extremists.

The smoke had barely cleared before the cable shows were wall-to-wall with commentators and reporters making the connection between the ravings of Mr. Von Brunn and the heated rhetoric that has been coming out of a certain corner of the commentariat for the last year or so against Barack Obama and that has only intensified and gotten granular since his inauguration. And while no one is directly accusing the loudest right wingers of being behind Mr. Von Brunn's attack or supporting his views -- no matter what you may think of Rush Limbaugh's self-obsessed blather or Pat Buchanan's nostalgia for Joe McCarthy, they're far too liberal for the likes of the hard-core haters like Mr. Von Brunn -- the response so far from some on the right, including Debbie Schlussel and Michelle Malkin has been an over-reaction of defensive denial that they had anything to do with it even though no one has said they did, leading me to remember the quote from Queen Gertrude in Hamlet; "The lady doth protest too much, methinks." (Ms. Schlussel, in what could only be described as pretzel-logic, blames the shooting on tolerance of Islam in America. And President Obama.)

But this stuff doesn't happen in a vacuum, and the folks who caution against lumping the likes of Mr. Von Brunn in with their points of view would do well to remember that jumping to conclusions works both ways. After all, they are forever warning us about "Hollywood liberals" and the Radical Homosexual Agenda; a brief glimpse of Janet Jackson's nipple or two men kissing on TV inevitably lead to the decline of the western world into sin and debauchery. If Glenn Beck carrying on about socialism and fascism doesn't have any impact on the actions of viewers, than neither does mindless sex and violence on TV. And while people like Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh will warn the liberals not to use the "isolated incidents" as an excuse to crack down on free speech (which begs the question as to why they think anyone is talking about them) or institute more gun control (nobody was, but thanks for reminding us), the fact is that these aren't isolated incidents. We have these acts of terror on a regular basis, and it doesn't matter what adjective -- "Muslim" or "domestic" or "right-wing" -- we put in front of the word. If it's not the incitement of the words that gin up the paranoia of the disturbed that does it, what is it?

Certainly we can't monitor every website or shut down every nutball that rants about Jews and Negros controlling their life. But Mr. Von Brunn's beliefs were well-known and documented over decades; he first acted out against the Federal Reserve in 1981. And yet people stood by and basically let him carry on until he blew his cork. I'm not suggesting that he should have been arrested before he committed a crime (like in Minority Report) and I sincerely doubt that even had someone tried to get him to climb down would have had any impact, but perhaps it might do well to remember that just standing by and letting this kind of madness percolate isn't an exercise in democracy or freedom of speech; it's enabling the madness.

(Cross-posted from Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Holocaust

By Capt. Fogg

When James von Brunn was sentenced to jail for the armed kidnap attempt of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors it was only because the Judge was a Jew and the jury was black. No doubt about it. He's been raging about Jews and Black people since most of you were children and he sees something called the Aryan race as victims of such inferior groups.

It's tempting, as a person who despises the growing culture of hate and defamation in the US, to tie this man and his hundreds of thousands of supporters to the hate shouters we're all too familiar with, but in good conscience, I cannot. Even so their endless derision of fabricated scapegoats has inured us to the danger of the terrorists out there among us. Their hate talk legitimizes and breeds more hate talk and we become habituated to it. Those standard scapegoats tend to include Jews, Blacks, and the Federal Reserve Bank, all of which are also targets of people like James von Brunn.

Von Brunn has written that the "Holocaust Religion" is destroying Western (by which he means White) culture. It's common amongst people who would like to re-invent themselves as victims of relentless persecution to resent those who have actually been victims and so it's not surprising that the elderly hatemonger chose the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC for what was surely intended to be a suicide attack.

I'm probably less surprised about this than my Christian countrymen, since I've been listening to all the old calumnies and fantasies about baby-eating, blood-drinking, Christ-killing, warmongering, bank-controlling Jews all my life while many of them are just now beginning to accept that the vilification of Jews has been, if not the very backbone, at least a major buttress of Christianity. Certainly not all however and certainly they are not the only ones. Muslim vilification of the Jews in all their fantastic stereotypes is second to none and many of them consider the Jews to be in control of the United States, if not Europe, Canada, and Australia as well.

There is a lesson here and it is that we have not only tolerated such people, but made heroes of some of them to a degree: men who will stand up to a government we blame for all our own excesses and deficiencies. They are not and their acts of terrorism are warnings that we should examine our own angers and stop blaming a host of straw men for having messed up our country.

BREAKING NEWS: Obama assassination plot uncovered

By Capt. Fogg

MOVED UP

The ATF has announced that they have broken up a white supremacist plot to kill Senator Obama along with over a hundred black people in a Tennessee murder spree.

Who knows how far they would have got, but who knows what other evil lurks in the hearts of such people, stoked up on campaign libel and "Joe Six-Pack bigotry."

No comment has been obtained from Palin headquarters yet as to whether these are some of the "real" Americans she's been talking about.

The return of McCarthyism

By Libby Spencer

Apparently mistaking a recent Hardball appearance as an audition to become the latest face of reckless demagoguery, Rep. Michele Bachman gave voice to the most rabid and vile imaginings of the increasingly violent GOP base. She hints darkly of widespread anti-Americanism within the Congressional chambers. The video is at the link, I can't bring myself to repeat it here.

Immediately after the segment, Katrina Vandenheuvel issues the appropriate, and surprisingly impassioned, rebuke.

Chris, I fear for my country. I think what we just heard is a congresswoman channeling Joe McCarthy, channeling a politics of fear and loathing and demonization and division and distraction. Not a single issue mentioned. This is a politics at a moment of extreme economic pain in this country that is incendiary, that is so debased, that I'm almost having a hard time breathing, because I think it's very scary.

Bachman's hateful remarks are not only scary, they verge on criminally irresponsible. I think she should be immediately censured by her peers. If you agree, join concerned Americans and sign the petition and pass the link on. The signators have already doubled in number in the last few hours.

(Cross-posted at The Impolitic.)

For the pipes of the Lord have spoken it

By Capt. Fogg

You know the "reverend" Phelps and you've heard about the Westboro Baptist Church, which consists mostly of his family. They're the creeps who picket military funerals with "God hates fags," "Thank God for 9/11" and "thank God for dead soldiers" banners and tell mourners their lost sons and daughters were killed by God because our country doesn't actively persecute homosexuals.

They appeared in Stuart Florida today to picket a Memorial Day ceremony honoring, as we do on this holiday, the fallen in our many wars: it wasn't a good choice of venue. Local motorcycle clubs, which in this area include many, many veterans, pledged to turn out and they did, the distinctive rumble of V twins rumbling up East Ocean Drive past the county courthouse and to the band shell and park where the array of white crosses was set out in the 92 degree heat.

Interviewed by the local paper, some tattooed and leather-wrapped bikers expressed their support for freedom of speech and for a country that allows such vermin to exercise it. Like Michelle Obama, I felt really proud for once. There was no violence, just words and signs blaring "don't listen to these idiots."

Asked by a reporter whether he liked what the "church" was doing today, a Phelps offspring of perhaps 5 years of age replied "yes" and "because it makes the Lord happy." like most opinions about what makes God smile, there was no evidence for it.

Whether or not God hates homosexuals or kills soldiers of countries that fail to punish them is something no one can know, but oddly today a drought of many months was broken in the city of Stuart by a heavy tropical thunderstorm, and the rain fell hard enough to bring a man to his knees; pouring down on the crosses, on the Phelps family, on the protesters and veterans alike, drowning the hate slogans of the Phelps', while thunder roared like Yahweh in his glory, blipping his throttle into wide open pipes.

(Cross-posted from Human Voices.)

Who are the Dems afraid of?

By Edward Copeland

I do believe you've laid a curse on North America
A curse that we now here rehearse in Philadelphia
A second flood, a simple famine
Plagues of locusts everywhere
Or a cataclysmic earthquake
I'd accept with some despair
But, no, you sent us Congress.
Good God, sir, was that fair?
...
You see, we piddle, twiddle, and resolve
Not one damn thing do we solve
Piddle, twiddle, and resolve
Nothing's ever solved in
Foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy
Philadephia!

I felt it was more than a little bit appropriate today to begin with some excerpts from the great Broadway musical 1776, specifically the exasperated John Adams dealing with an ineffectual Congress unwilling or unable to take steps toward declaring independence from England. The more things change...

Now today, as the House takes up legislation already approved by the Senate in an astounding 92-3 vote Monday to give Dubya billions more to sink into the Iraqi hole (which Dubya still plans to veto because they tacked on hate-crimes legislation), it's time again to call the Democrats to task. The Democratic leadership trot out their usual hue-and-cry of "next time" and "we don't have the votes to override his veto," etc. Democratic "why is he running again?" presidential candidate Mike Gravel made a valid point in the debate last week when he said Congress should just bring everything to a stop to force hands instead of quaking in their boots.

Joe Scarborough made another valid point on his MSNBC show this morning that when the Republicans took over Congress during the Clinton administration, they didn't have a clear enough Senate majority to override either, but they put pressure on Clinton until they got a lot of what they wanted.

Still, what makes all of this particularly mind-boggling is the poll in today's Washington Post that indicates that not only do an overwhelming majority of Americans want this Iraq madness to end, 3% support ending funding for the war, 23% back reducing the funding slightly and 43% want to sharply reduce the funding. That's a total of 69% who back funding cuts or elimination. A mere 27% want Congress to give Dubya everything he wants.

The poll also shows that Congress' approval has dipped further, though not as far as Dubya's, who has tied his all-time low in this poll with a 33% approval rating. It also indicates public support for the expansion of the children's health insurance bill that has been the victim of another veto threat.

Overall, 55 percent of Americans want congressional Democrats to do more to challenge the president's Iraq policies, while a third think the Democrats have gone too far. The level of agitation for more action in opposition to the war has not dissipated since August 2005, when Democrats were the minority party in Congress.
Lee Martin, an information technology consultant from Chicago, said that after last year's midterm elections, he and others anticipated a change in Iraq policy. "The reason Congress is down is they're [Democrats] in there and basically nothing is changing," he said.