Journalist Leonard Pitts discussing our horror when Timothy McVeigh blew up the Murrah building in Oklahoma City:
And maybe you remember, too, that sense of vertiginous shock some people felt when we got our first look at the man who planted the bomb and discovered him to be, not a swarthy Muslim with a heavy beard and hard-to-pronounce name, but a clean-cut, apple pie-faced young white man named Timothy McVeigh. People could not have been more nonplussed if Richie Cunningham had shot up a shopping mall.
But the tragedy was to contain one last surprise. It came when we learned why McVeigh committed his atrocity. It seems he hated the government.
That revelation was our introduction to a world whose very existence most of us had never suspected. Meaning the so-called patriot movement, the armed, radical right-wing extremists who refuse to recognize the authority of the nation's duly constituted and elected government. Maybe you remember the news reports of how they spent nights and weekends drilling in the woods, playing soldier in anticipation of the day ZOG -- the Zionist Occupied Government -- ceded the country to the United Nations and soldiers of the New World Order came rappelling down from black helicopters to seize everybody's guns. Maybe you remember how crazy it all sounded.
But that was then. Twenty years ago, the idea of anti-government resistance seemed confined to a lunatic fringe operating in the shadows beyond the mainstream. Twenty years later, it is the mainstream, the beating heart of the Republican Party. And while certainly no responsible figure on the right advocates or condones what he did, it is just as certain that McVeigh's violent antipathy toward Washington, his conviction that America's government is America's enemy, has bound itself to the very DNA of modern conservatism.
Pitts goes on to quote a number of politicians and pundits who are now spouting the exact same language that once issued forth from the likes of Timothy McVeigh, Ted Kaczynski, and Randy Weaver of Ruby Ridge fame.
It is not often that I read something that is so obviously true that I am shocked I did not realize it myself, but this is one of those articles.
Yes that is exactly what is happening today, the ravings and rantings of paranoid lunatics has now become the language used, not just by Tea Party protesters, but also supposedly serious candidates for public office. Including candidates running to be the next President of the United States.
Gee no wonder some of these conservative candidates have argued so aggressively against DHS for identifying the sovereign citizen groups as the most dangerous to the American people. They already know that, but they don't want the rest of the country to recognize that their supporters are also our greatest threat.
He was ahead of his time! Today he would be a hero of the right wing. Also, too, look what happened to the Dixie Chicks for simply stating that they were ashamed that Dumbya was from Texas. Now every racist ass in the government speaks out about their personal views, with no backlash whatsoever.
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DeleteNewly elected Iowa Senator Joni Ernst: "Joni Ernst, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Iowa, said during an NRA event in 2012 that she would use a gun to defend herself from the government.
ReplyDelete“I have a beautiful little Smith & Wesson, 9 millimeter, and it goes with me virtually everywhere,” Ernst said at the NRA and Iowa Firearms Coalition Second Amendment Rally in Searsboro, Iowa. “But I do believe in the right to carry, and I believe in the right to defend myself and my family — whether it’s from an intruder, or whether it’s from the government, should they decide that my rights are no longer important.”
Time to call these folks what they are: neo-confederate, anit-federalist, secessionist radicals. ....have they not all signed a pledge to kill the federal government?
1) Listen to what they are saying and have said and done,
2) Take them at their word and action,
3) Respond accordingly
Bet it doesn't go with her on to the Senate floor/
Delete5:47, they didn't respond accordingly to Hitler's actions when he began acting on his plans from mien Kampf and I bet they won't now.
DeleteI am a voter, I've lived was born and raised in rural Iowa. I'm astonished at how Joni Ernst got elected. I... didn't think it would happen. Seriously.
DeleteUnfortunately, there are plenty of citizens who think just like them. I seriously fear for this country after President Obama leaves office.
ReplyDelete2008 = AIP = Palin = GOP VPOTUS nominee = GOP mainstream.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how the GOP will tweet about this anniversary since they did such a stellar job tweeting last week about the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's assassination.
ReplyDeleteWell he got one thing right, we do have a ZOG. AIPAC runs our govt. Israel gets BILLIONS, plus loans that are subsequently forgives, of dollars from us annually to enjoy all the socialisms we can't get here with our own damn tax dollars.
ReplyDeleteSo here we are on the raggedy edge. Those of us who remember history are condemned to watch as those who don't repeat the mistakes of the past. So happy to be living in interesting times.
ReplyDeleteMcVeigh's support of the patriot movement and fear of a Zionist-occupied government exposes what's at the root of these domestic terrorists.
ReplyDeleteHow some mainline churches, like John Hagee and ilk, who are rabid and insist on inserting themselves in foreign politics in the Middle East, taking side, and being avid supporters of Israel, shows a contrast between these and McVeigh's anti-government philosophies.
Not only are these domestic terrorists dangerous, but they don't even line up with the idealogy of the TeaParty, Ring-Wing Christian coalition, etc. in regards to Israel.
One thing we should ask, does the TeaParty and the RW REALLY support Israel? Or is all this talk of theirs a big hoax, where they are lying to the public and themselves? Both groups love their guns, their rights to protect themselves, love the idea of less government interference, love their god, religion, pushing a state/church solution.
The only schism it would seem the Domestic Terrorists have and the political christian right-wing have is "Zion".
Are these minority christians going to join hands with domestic terrorists and drop their support of Israel at the drop of a hat? I always had a feeling their support was fake; it never had a genuine sentiment of love for 'people', but rather it was an agenda to usher in a supernatural prophecy that benefits them, or that they actually don't believe the rapture, but have another nefarious agenda.
Thanks, G!
ReplyDeleteI want my country back, is that too much to ask for? Stop the hate, wounding and killing just because your angry at the world or want to live in colonial times when the constitution meant something totally different.
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