Right Wing Violence -- time to freak out about it, or let them hang themselves with their own ropes?

[Denninmi]

This is my first "real" post here on DU, even though I've lurked a long time, and posted a little bit in a couple of lifestyle/hobby groups.

Is America about to come apart at the seams due to these whacko's? The Hutarees were a couple of counties over from me here in S. Michigan. ABC had a report about the Idaho Militia on the news tonight, a fine group of (dangerous racist whacko nutjob)upstanding citizens (NOT) who are all worried about "what will happen when the government can't pay the welfare class anymore" and who, it appears, would love to see President Obama, Majority Leader Reid, and Speaker Pelosi put up against the wall and shot.

Militias, Teahadists run amok, Sarah Palin taking here HateTalk Express tour to cities near you (and me, she'll be here in Detroit sometime next month, oh, goody!) and telling her minions to pull us over if we have an Obama bumper sticker on our cars. Oh My!

What is up with all of this? Is it time to really get concerned about this? Maybe its my lack of sleep, and the fact that I've been putting in extra days at work for months now and I'm just kind of worn out, but I'm sort of nervous about these issues.

Or, will these people push it too far, and face a backlash when something bad happens? Are they all going to hang themselves with their own ropes? And, if so, how do we help them along? -- for example, I see a couple of Teahadists are out there saying that Social Security and Medicare should be repealed -- I say, let them trumpet THAT loud and clear from the rooftops - that should go over really well with average voters, especially seniors, IMO (NOT!).

I keep telling myself that I really don't see anything different, that daily life goes on as it always had -- but perhaps many people felt that way in Germany in 1933-1935, too.

What do you think?

[KharmaTrain]

1. Keep A Light On The Rats...An Eye On The Lone Wolves...

There's no question the right wing rhetoric has reached dangerous levels and their lack of civility and reason makes it difficult to get them to cool their jets. The rushpublicans are in a death spiral as the most radical and opportunistic have taken control of a major political party and made it totally dysfunctional. That dysfunction is what we see vent in their frustration...the rebels without a clue who throw around words like "freedom" and "socialism" with no idea what they really mean or how hypocritical their words ring.

It's not fair to broadbrush all those spewing the venom as being a physical threat, but their words surely could instigate. I don't see a massive teabagging uprising developing as most of these basement keyboard commandos can type up a storm or call the hate radio stations or spew on facebook, but when going gets tough, they get some cheetohs. While the videos looked haunting and if they had been left undetected, the Hutarees could have murdered some innocent people but in the bigger scheme of things, they'd be hardpressed to stand up to an organized state militia or army. Thus the private militias are a nusance but the day they go from playing Rambo in the woods to taking to the streets their shelf life will be very short.

The problem are the lone wolves...the truly unhinged individual who won't think twice driving a van loaded with fertilizer into a federal building or an airplane for that matter. It's the one or maybe two who lurk under the radar and whose attacks are hard to detect and thus have a much more terrorizing effect. You can make things difficult, but someone hell-bent on creating mayhem can in a "free" country. And there's your real question...do we continue to spy, restrict individual privacy rights and profile if one feels that threatened?

Welcome to DU...

[Hubert Flottz]

2. "What do you think?"

I think you should post your thoughts more often.

I think that the bully boys will keep on pushing until somebody pushes back. A bloody nose usually will send a bully home crying to his Mommy.

Welcome to DU...

[zbdent]

3. about the only way that the "liberal media" will truly turn against these groups would be

if there was another "Oklahoma City" ... not so much that it was a federal building blown up and that American citizens died in a "domestic terrorist" attack ...

more along the lines that there was the image of the fireman holding the lifeless body of a toddler, a victim of the attack. That was pretty much the wound to the militias in the 90s, which put them in the critical care ward.

Without the "smoking gun" of a graphic image of the body of a child, the media will let these people become the martyrs to their cause ...