Month: January 2011

A reader writes:

Per your reader's context for Sarah Palin's alleged satire of sports/battle conflation, it's worth noting that Miami tight end Kellen Winslow's "I'm a soldier. I'm a warrior" rant earned him immediate, near-universal, and long-lasting mockery even within the context of football (which is a significantly more violent sport than college basketball, and a sport where he, unlike Palin and the NCAA Tournament, is an active participant). Perhaps the sports world has a better sense of who can plausibly use "battle imagery" than does the political world.

And unlike Palin, Winslow apologized for his violent rhetoric:

After speaking with the press, I immediately regretted my comments and felt embarrassed for my family, my team, the University of Miami, our fans, alumni and myself.

Increasingly connected with that part of her identity, Congresswoman Giffords seems, from press accounts, to be almost a model for that deep part of the Jewish inheritance: public service. Michelle Goldberg wonders if the evidence will emerge that anti-Semitism might have played some part on Loughner's deranged motives:

Giffords was vocal about her Judaism, which she embraced as an adult. (Her father, who is a first cousin of Gwyneth Paltrow’s father, is Jewish, while her mother is a Christian Scientist.) Given Loughner’s fixation on currency and his nod to Hitler, it certainly seems possible that Jew-hatred played a role in his terrible mixed-up fantasy world.

Loughner was probably too insane to have really participated in anti-Semitic politics, or, for that matter, in the Tea Party. But it is important to note that Giffords has been relentlessly demonized by the right, the rhetoric around her charged with violence. And such rhetoric is dangerous precisely because of the effect it can have on the unhinged. Loughner was crazy, but he was also responsive to certain real-world political currents, particularly the right’s nightmare vision of federal power run amok.

"Your federal judge is dead and your (fag-promoting, baby-killing, proud-sinner) Congresswoman fights for her life. God is avenging Himself on this rebellious house! WBC prays for your destruction–more shooters, more dead carcasses piling up, young, old, leader and commoner–all. Your doom is upon you!" – hate group, Westboro Church, which seeks to attend the funerals of the murdered, in the name of Christianity.

Stephen Budiansky won't let the right off the hook:

The unstable young man who opened fire …, it is already clear, was more of a nut than a political agent. But to those who would suggest that political violence is just some random occurrence, a meteorite falling from the sky and claiming its victims by chance, I would suggest they look to the way that delegitimization of democratic institutions, inflammatory and demagogic appeals to what our founders called "passion" over reason, and glorification of brutality have ever been the handmaidens of the descent to hell of once-civilized societies.

… Never mind even the childish braggadocio about "second amendment solutions" and "lock and load"; the daily inflammatory rhetoric about "tyranny" and "the end of freedom as we know it" and even the name "tea party" itself, invoking revolutionary resistance to despotism, have accelerated an unprecedented delegitimization of the democratic process itself, a suggestion that those who advance opposing viewpoints are not just political opponents but usurpers.

It is not enough for Eric Cantor and his ilk to express consternation that the tiger they tried to ride has got away from them, and what a bad tiger it is. They're the ones who need to put the tiger back in its cage, and in a hurry.

This is not the same as guilt. It's called responsibility. So far, not a single leading Republican has offered even the slightest remorse for the atmosphere they stoked to win back power. If they do not, they will make the fire next time even more destructive, by emboldening the very forces they claim to have nothing to do with.

(Photo: Kevin C. Cox/Getty.)

The intern who helped save Giffords' life, Daniel Hernandez, becomes an instant role model.  A reader writes:

The hero intern is Hispanic and gay. This means he could be stopped anytime in Arizona and asked to produce proof of citizenship. And, until a few weeks ago, he would have been barred from military service. Hernandez was involved in gay issues and counted the congresswoman as an ally. I would love to see him as Obama's guest at the State of the Union address.

Me too.

 

Of all the details that have emerged from Arizona this past weekend, this leapt out at me this morning:

Last summer, Ms. Giffords’s Republican opponent, Jesse Kelly, had a campaign event in which voters were invited to “shoot a fully automatic M-16” with him to symbolize his assault on her campaign.

There is one word for this kind of worship of gun violence: sick. There are two very powerful and competing notions of conservatism at play here: one is about violence; the other is about non-violence. And the reaction on the right so far suggests they have not the slightest notion that there is anything wrong about their fixation on physical force.

"Actions can’t be placed on anyone’s doorstep. But if Governor Palin doesn’t want to be criticized then she should continue her commentary but dial back the anger,” – John Weaver, longtime Republican operative.

There is a distinction between guilt and regret. Sarah Palin is not responsible for this latest excrescence of violence. But if Sarah Palin does not regret the fact that she put a gun-sight cross-hair on a public figure who was subsequently shot in the head, then she is telling us something important about her moral character.

Gideon Rachman makes the connection:

Events in both Pakistan and America suggest what happens when you not only disagree with your political opponents – but when you demonise them as enemies of the faith or the nation. At that point, some may conclude that it is legitimate to end the argument with bullets.

Lexington counters:

[Y]es, America could become like Pakistan if people concluded that it was legitimate to settle arguments with bullets. But in America, where guns are plentiful and political and religious feelings intense, the telling thing is that almost no one at all considers political violence to be legitimate. The killings have been met with universal condemnation by ordinary Americans and the whole political class. The violent act of one probably deranged individual doesn't show that America is heading down the same road as Pakistan. And the response to it suggests that the political cultures of the two countries are fundamentally different.

 

Dallas, Texas, 1.15 pm

Noah Millman debates military intervention:

We want to avoid counter-insurgency situations. But sometimes they are “thrust upon us” – and then what do we do? It seems to me, the right answer has two parts. First, be very careful about concluding that such a situation has actually been thrust upon us. Are we actually obliged to become an occupying power? Is there any other entity, national or supra-national, who might be more appropriate to serve that function, assuming someone has to? How much would it cost us, in terms of achieving concrete policy objectives, to decline the part? Second, assuming there really is no alternative, how can we effectively thrust that situation onto somebody else in rapid fashion?

That sounds callous, but I don’t think it needs to be. Is there any reason to assume that we would handle an occupation of North Korea better than South Korea would? Is there any reason, assuming South Korea needs more boots on the ground to provide basic order than they can provide, to assume that the United States would be a less-provocative provider of said boots than some combination of friendly countries like Canada and the Philippines?