Juan Cole: White Terrorism

[marmar]

Professor Juan Cole, University of Michigan


Jared Lee Loughner,the assassin of Federal judge John M. Roll and five others and attempted assassin of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), was clearly mentally unstable. But the political themes of his instability were those of the American far Right. Loughner was acting politically even if he is not all there. He is said to have called out the names of his victims, such as Roll and Gifford, as he fired. As usual, when white people do these things, the mass media doesn’t call it terrorism.

It is irrelevant that Loughner may (at this point we can only say “may”) have been a liberal years earlier in high school. If so, he changed. And among the concerns that came to dominate him as he moved to the Right was the illegitimacy of the “Second Constitution” (the 14th Amendment, which bestows citizenship on all those born in the US, a provision right-wingers in Arizona are trying to overturn at the state level). Loughner also thought that Federal funding for his own community college was unconstitutional, and he was thrown out for becoming violent over the issue. He obviously shared with the Arizona Right a fascination with firearms, and it is telling that a disturbed young man who had had brushes with the law was able to come by an automatic pistol. He is said to have used marijuana, which would be consistent with a form of anti-government, right-wing Libertarianism. I don’t think we can take too seriously the list of books he said he liked, as a guide to his political thinking. They could just have been randomly pulled off some list of great books on the Web, since there is no coherence to the choices.

The man who had most to do with Loughner after his arrest, Pima County Sherriff Clarence W. Dupnik, was clearly angered by what he heard from the assassin: “When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry … it is getting to be outrageous. And unfortunately, Arizona, I think, has become sort of the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry." ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.juancole.com/2011/01/white-terrorism.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+juancole%2Fymbn+%28Informed+Comment%29&utm_content=FaceBook

[Fire1]

1. All of the "tea party" members are "unstable," including

Sara Palin. The Sherriff is describing acts of sedition! These people need to be held accountablem before more are killed.

[Horse with no Name]

4. You'd have to be at least a little unstable to ascribe to that POV

It is amoral.

[Catherina]

2. Rec'd. n/t

[DCKit]

3. Thanks marmar. Great catch.

Let the refudiations begin.

[snagglepuss]

5. K and R nt

[bemildred]

6. I think we are finally getting back to where we were in the 60s and 70s.

Illegitimate government, failed wars, eroded economy, rising civil disorder, international chaos. Only this time we are bankrupt too. The first time was the tragedy, this is the farce.