Clearly Nebulous avers “They keep talking about “all the rhetoric” — but they never cite a single specific example.” I appreciate the anxiety and in my original post I had hoped to avoid exactly the tit-for-tat left right citations and actually suggest that it is much more complicated. But since CN seems honestly unsure here, let me make some suggestions.
Part of the issue is what counts as violent rhetoric? CN refers, I believe, to the exam”ple of SarahPAC using the hunter’s rifle scope in its imagery suggesting that certain members be “taken out.” This webpage has since been taken down but here is an article that preserves the original.
I am unaware that those on the left or democrats have used similar imagery, but if so (again, I am unaware of such but I will grant the point), is the violence in the former excused by the use by the latter? I think not, rather each escalates. But is there any doubt the rifle scope imagery is violent in nature? If the imagery is not enough, what of the infamous Tweet by Sarah Palin “don’t retreat, reload.” This is not the obscure blogger but a former half term Governor and Vice Presidential candidate, and further see what can be done with it.
Or consider even Rep Giffords former opponent who used the same imagery about her and actually offered the opportunity to shoot “her” at a campaign event. And even at a campaign event for Rep Giffords a citizen opposed to her attended with a weapon that dropped out of his pants.
Another example? What to make of Sharron Angle, Republican Party nominee for US Senate who gave a very serious challenge to Senate majority leader Harry Reid when she suggested that if she lost, it might be time for “2nd Amendment remedies?” Can armed insurrection be any other implication?
Is there any question of the violence of the rhetoric when Michele Bachman suggested in 2009 that she wanted people “armed and dangerous” on the issue of cap and trade legislation?
I am not clear what to do with the absence of commentary. I agree that it doesn’t count as rhetoric itself, but what to do with the number of times that people have attended Tea Part events armed, or with the signage of the need to feed the “Tree of Liberty with the Blood of Tyrants.” But what responsibility do the leaders of the right or Republicans have to speak out against such threats of violence as a response to political differences within the mainstream of American politics.
One can suggest the left and progressives have been guilty of excesses as well, although again I am unaware of nominees for the Senate and prominent elected representatives of the Democrats saying the sorts of things that Gov. Palin and Rep. Bachmann have said. One would have to be not watching and listening or willingly obtuse not to be aware of these hints and implications of violence. What to make of it, and issues of equivalency are another matter.
Perhaps one last thing to consider. It may be that some on the left were reckless with their words during the Bush administration; if so, one bit of evidence that they are from less prominent and persuasive sources is their limited effect. Can one think of any recent violence perpetrated by those on the left equivalent to the shooting of Rep Giffords, the murder of abortion doctor George Tiller in his church, the attack on the IRS building by Joe Stack?
– Lawrence Spaulding
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More from Lawrence Spaulding:
On Wisconsin: Mr. Goose, Meet Ms. Gander by Lawrence Spaulding
Thoughts on Clearly Nebulous’ Query by Lawrence Spaulding
More (or Less, Really) on Words and Violence, by Lawrence Spaulding
Words and Actions, Words as Actions, by Lawrence Spaulding
On Political Writing and Reading… and Kinda Obama… by Lawrence Spaulding
Lame Ducks and Legitimacy, by Lawrence Spaulding
Will Progressives Treat BHO Better than Conservatives Treated GHWB?, by Lawrence Spaulding
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