You all can go screw yourselves.

Roughly a year ago, Glenn Beck complained about what he considered to be profligate spending of tax dollars by politicians, and he asked, "When do we ever run those who are bankrupting our country and literally stealing our children's future out of town? Grab a torch."

In March of 2009, Erick Erickson discussed a ban in Washington state on a certain kind of dishwasher detergent in a post entitled, "At What Point Do People Revolt?" Erickson wrote,

At what point do the people tell the politicians to go to hell? At what point do they get off the couch, march down to their state legislator’s house, pull him outside, and beat him to a bloody pulp for being an idiot? . . . Were I in Washington State, I’d be cleaning my gun right about now waiting to protect my property from the coming riots or the government apparatchiks coming to enforce nonsensical legislation.

We don't know why Jared Loughner killed six people and injured 13 others in Tuscon last Saturday. But isn't it at least possible that the aforementioned kind of rhetoric could have incited his shooting spree?

According to the Christian Science Monitor, the answer is yes:

Fox News commentator Glenn Beck, who’s honed being provocative – even outrageous at times – to a fine and lucrative art, is the focus of criticism for inciting violence.

Specifically, his dozens of comments attacking the Tides Foundation are being linked to the attempt by a heavily-armed man to assassinate employees at the San Francisco-based foundation, which funds environmental, human rights, and other progressive projects. The attack in July was thwarted in a shoot-out with police in which two officers were wounded.

Since then, alleged attacker Byron Williams has said in jailhouse interviews that he wanted to “start a revolution.” He says Beck was not the direct cause of his turning violent. But he does say: “I would have never started watching Fox News if it wasn't for the fact that Beck was on there. And it was the things that he did, it was the things he exposed that blew my mind.”

At various times, Beck has referred to Tides as “bullies” and “thugs” whose mission is to “warp your children's brains and make sure they know how evil capitalism is.” More recently, Beck (who describes himself as a “progressive hunter”) has warned the foundation “I’m coming for you.” 

Surprisingly, one politician who appears to agree that speech can incite violence is Sarah Palin.

Palin released a video statement today denying that she or any of her conservative brethren are responsible for inciting any acts of violence. Curiously, however, she suggested that those who commit the "blood libel" of claiming that she's responsible are themselves somehow responsible for inciting acts of violence.

Palin's goal in releasing the statement appears to have been to strike back at those who have taken issue with her "crosshairs" map above. Palin says:

Like many, I’ve spent the past few days reflecting on what happened and praying for guidance. After this shocking tragedy, I listened at first puzzled, then with concern, and now with sadness, to the irresponsible statements from people attempting to apportion blame for this terrible event.

President Reagan said, “We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.” Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own. They begin and end with the criminals who commit them, not collectively with all the citizens of a state, not with those who listen to talk radio, not with maps of swing districts used by both sides of the aisle, not with law-abiding citizens who respectfully exercise their First Amendment rights at campaign rallies, not with those who proudly voted in the last election (emphasis mine).

Palin appears to be saying that the responsibility for a criminal act rests on the person who commits it and no one else, not even those who create "maps of swing districts." She is denying that she is responsible in any way for any act of violence. A mere two paragraphs later, however, Palin says,

Vigorous and spirited public debates during elections are among our most cherished traditions. And after the election, we shake hands and get back to work, and often both sides find common ground back in D.C. and elsewhere. If you don’t like a person’s vision for the country, you’re free to debate that vision. If you don’t like their ideas, you’re free to propose better ideas. But, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible. (emphasis mine).

Palin appears to be saying that journalists and pundits (on the left) are potentially responsible for acts of violence that they may incite through their speech. Sharon Angle was even more blunt:

Expanding the context of the attack to blame and to infringe upon the people's Constitutional liberties is both dangerous and ignorant. The irresponsible assignment of blame to me, Sarah Palin or the Tea Party movement by commentators and elected officials puts all who gather to redress grievances in danger.

Therefore, according to Palin,

• Those on the right could not be responsible for acts of violence incited by their own words, but 
• Those on the left are potentially responsible for acts of violence incited by their own words.

And this moron wants to be president? Did she even notice this apparent inconsistency, or did she notice and simply not care? Or is her statement simply the pure partisan stratagem I take it to be?

Notice that Palin wants to reframe this debate as a First Amendment issue. According to Palin,

No one should be deterred from speaking up and speaking out in peaceful dissent, and we certainly must not be deterred by those who embrace evil and call it good. And we will not be stopped from celebrating the greatness of our country and our foundational freedoms by those who mock its greatness by being intolerant of differing opinion and seeking to muzzle dissent with shrill cries of imagined insults.

Current calls by those on the left to take it down a notch and tone down the incendiary rhetoric are serious threats to our First Amendment freedom of speech, according to Palin. Is she serious? Think about it. Can't Erick Erickson voice his opposition to Washington's ban on certain dishwashing detergents without suggesting that beating a legislator to a bloody pulp is appropriate? If calling a Supreme Court justice a "goat-fucking child molester" is discouraged, have we really lost any important political speech?

I don't think we should be banning speech (though we should keep in mind that not all speech is Constitutionally protected and it never has been). Erickson should remain free to say all kinds of things; he and others are being asked to take it down a notch. Many of us hope that they will be decent enough to accede to the request. And by the way: if this request is a threat to our First Amendment freedoms, then isn't the demand from the right that the request not be made also a threat to our First Amendment freedoms?

Again: we don't know why Loughner went on his shooting spree. But it seems appropriate that we reflect on our political discourse in the wake of it. The response from some responsibility-free talkers on the right appears to be to deny even the possibility that their rhetoric may play a role in inciting violence. "You all can go screw yourselves; we're going to say whatever the fuck we please," seems to sum up their sentiments nicely.

And I haven't even pointed out that Palin plagiarized James Madison in her statement until now. Jesus.

Learn from the Master

I was at the gym Friday afternoon to exercise my anxieties away, and I noticed that Glenn Beck's show was on the television attached to the treadmill I wanted to use. So I thought I would watch his show for a while. Besides, I am mildly intrigued by the plastic frames Beck has been wearing lately, which appear to have time-traveled from 1984 to the present to rest on his nose.

Beck was presenting a version of an argument that appears to be getting traction in the right-wing responsibility-free media. These arguments purport to show that those on the left actually stand for the very opposite things they are ordinarily thought to stand for. So, for example, that moron Lori Ziganto has been insisting that feminists are actually against women. Her arguments are all garbage, and her readers only want to be reassured by her words, which travel effortlessly through the echo chamber, unchallenged by those who only want their ignorant prejudices confirmed, while Ziganto cashes the checks they send her. (Great racket, if you can live with yourself while you participate in it.) She cowardly refuses to respond to any mature adults who challenge her, and instead only offers attaboy's to those who agree with absolutely everything she says.

Anyway, Beck appeared to be arguing that progressives are actually racists. (I can't seem to locate the video. You can watch a segment from the same broadcast here.) Why would he do this? You see, the Tea Party has been suspected of harboring racists, and the Tea Party is a more libertarian wing of the Republican Party, though not officially so. To blunt this criticism ahead of the November election, it appears that defenders of the Tea Party are trying to accuse progressives of being the very thing that the Tea Party is being accused of. It's a grown-up version of this old playground debate (where x is replaced by a noun or adjective, e.g., "racist," "homosexual," etc.):

You're an x.
Nuh-uhh. You're an x.
Nuh-uhh!

Now, I didn't watch the entire program. You see, I don't understand Beck's appeal. I find him difficult to watch. There's enough smug packed into an hour of his show to last a lifetime. And the only thing worse than a person who tries to be funny but isn't is a person who tries to be funny, isn't, but thinks that he's funny anyway. But the part of his argument I did catch was as follows, as I recall:

1. The Supreme Court led by Earl Warren is known for making progress in civil rights. 
2. Earl Warren was nominated to the Supreme Court by a Republican president. 
3. Lyndon Johnson objected to an important section of some piece of civil rights legislation. 
4. Johnson was a Democrat. 
5. Therefore, progressives are racists. 

If you "attend" Beck U., I suppose you too will learn how to formulate arguments that will convince only those who already agree with everything you have to say. Learn from the master, I say.

Glenn Beck: our confused savior?

Glenn Beck is promoting what he calls "The Plan" at the 912 Project. What is this plan, you ask? No one knows. Beck assures us that he "will be explaining the entire Plan over the coming weeks and months." But it has something to do with saving the country and changing its course. (I voted for Barack Obama for precisely that reason. Perhaps Beck wants Gingrich to save the country by getting us into a holy war with Islam, I don't know.)

To this end, Beck has proposed nine principles and 12 values. And he suggests that these principles and values motivated the founders, and that without them, the United States will collapse:

We must invite Republicans and Democrats who like freedom and small government. We must invite them into a plan that makes sense! That encourages sustainability. We must get them into—you know the saying, into the tent. But see, the tent doesn’t mean anything anymore. What is the purpose of a tent? A tent is to keep the elements away, to keep you safe in case of a rainstorm. But see, we don’t have a tent anymore with these two parties. . . . Because a tent requires stakes. A tent requires some sort of stake to hold it down to the ground. Well, what are those stakes? They’re principles and they’re values. We don’t have any principles anymore. . . . So there can’t be any tent because there’s nothing to stake that tent down! And both the Republicans and the Democrats know it. They know it. But they don’t fear anything. . . . Well, they need to. And if they don’t wake up, if they don’t go back and look for the stakes of that tent and the principles of those tents, if they don’t look back for the principles and the values of our Constitution, they should be destroyed! We’re not destroying them; they’re destroying themselves. We’re trying to save ya.

Here are the values and principles:

The Nine Principles

1. America Is Good.
2. I believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.
3. I must always try to be a more honest person than I was yesterday.
4. The family is sacred. My spouse and I are the ultimate authority, not the government.
5. If you break the law you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it.
6. I have a right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results.
7. I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.
8. It is not un-American for me to disagree with authority or to share my personal opinion.
9. The government works for me. I do not answer to them, they answer to me.

The 12 Values

• Honesty
• Reverence
• Hope
• Thrift
• Humility
• Charity
• Sincerity
• Moderation
• Hard Work
• Courage
• Personal Responsibility
• Gratitude

That doesn't sound too bad, right? Let's take a closer look.

Beck must be assuming that Democrats (and even Republicans, if we are to believe that he is being sincere) think that America is not good. Naturally, Beck believes that he is the defender of the United States, and everyone who disagrees with him are traitors. But what about your commitment to the value of humility, Glenn? Or (8) above? We should not forget that Beck compared progressivism to a cancer that eats the Constitution and must be eradicated. So much for (8). I guess Beck neglected to clear this list with Ari Fleisher.

Beck must also believe that there is no room in our democracy for we atheists. That's what (2) suggests. But what about (4)? Is the family the ultimate authority, or is God? (I assume that those who claim that God is the center of their life would also claim that He is the ultimate authority.) And if God is the ultimate authority, then what about (5)? What if this or that law offends one's religious sensibilities? And are we to infer that all those who don't worship Beck's God are un-American? But where would that leave the 1st Amendment guarantee of freedom of religion? Is the Bill of Rights un-American?

Let's think about (7). If charity is good, then what difference does it make whether one writes a check to a private charity or pays taxes for humanitarian aid? Many Christians try to argue that there is some important moral difference between these two kinds of charity, but they are splitting hairs in an effort to make their religion cohere with the secular, sociopathic politics of the Republican Party. And they're not consistent about it. They think that they should be able to veto the spending of their tax dollars on projects to which they are opposed, but when someone like me objects to spending billions of dollars on an unnecessary war of choice in Iraq, I have to pay my taxes and shut the fuck up, or I'm a traitor.

It is difficult to believe that Beck sincerely believes in these principles. He claims that God is the center of his life, and yet rejects the religious notion of social justice. His goal of becoming a more honest person is merely aspirational, as Politifact demonstrates. And he appears to believe that it is appropriate that the government force people like me to be charitable by increasing my tax burden to pay for tax cuts to the very wealthy.

One thing Beck does appear to believe in is himself:

All the elements of Beck's paranoid ethos converged recently as he announced his intention to move beyond the realm of political commentary and take an activist role in the political process. During a rally at a Florida retirement community, Beck told his gathered audience that "what we're experiencing now is really a ticking time bomb that they designed about a hundred years ago at the beginning of the progressive movement," the purpose of which was to use both the Republican and Democratic parties to create a "socialist utopia." Beck's prescribed antidote was a plan to "bring us back to an America that our founders would understand" by developing "a 100-year plan" in the mold of the Chinese—the rationale being: "Two can play at that game." Of course, at the center of the "100-year plan" is Beck—or as he referred to himself, America's "Constitution czar." All the facets of the paranoid style are there—an improbably wicked conspiracy to undermine the country perpetrated by the nation's powerful elite, a gauzy plan of action to take back America that emulates the tactics of the enemy and is crudely wrapped in the trappings of patriotism, and Beck offering himself as the nation's savior. 

Saul Alinsky's hypocritical followers

From Saul David Alinsky's Rules for Radicals:

The thirteenth rule: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.

From Conservapedia:

Demonization is when a demagogue, or group of demagogues, paints their ideological enemies or scapegoats in terms intended to render them as irredeemably evil and fit only for destruction, which is usually presented as 'self-defense'. Possibly the best-known example of demonization in the 20th century was the Nazis' demonization of Jews, which played off of existing antisemitism for political gain and eventually led to the Holocaust. . . . [emphasis mine]

A reviewer of Barbara Olson's, Hell to Pay : The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton Regnery Publishing (1999) wrote,

Olson discusses the Clintons' method of dealing with enemies, which is straight out of the writings of left-wing crank Saul Alinsky: demonize, polarize, and destroy. Witness Ken Starr, Newt Gingrich, Paula Jones, et al. Olson, a former Senate counsel who investigated the Clinton Administration's FBI file caper and Travel Office fiasco [emphasis mine].

A literal example of the politics of personal destruction from the Sual [sic]Alinsky field manual was uttered by Democratic Presidential hopeful John Edwards in 2007 about social commentator Ann Coulter. Edwards spoke of "that she-devil Ann Coulter" and in same breath said "people like Ann Coulter, they engage in hateful language."

From Michelle Malkin, "Thank you, Keep America Safe":

The DOJ terror lawyers’ defenders complain that it is unfair to question their motives and loyalty. There wouldn’t have been so many questions in the first place had Eric Holder simply divulged the names when Sen. Grassley asked him to do so months ago. 

The predictable cries of “McCarthyism” are rising. The demand for public disclosure is now being characterized as a “witch hunt.” Exactly as the Obama White House would have it: Demonize dissent. Freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. 

From The Huffington Post:  

Michelle Malkin labeled Michelle Obama "First Crony" on Monday, saying she was complicit in corruption reminiscent of the Clinton years and Watergate. According to Malkin, Michelle Obama's involvement is one of the "underplayed angles" of this story. She referred specifically to AmeriCorps Inspector General firing. (The AmeriCorps board has said that they, not the White House, initiated the dismissal.) 

From Eric Alterman, What Liberal Media?: 

The greater [Ann] Coulter's fame, the more malevolent grew her hysteria. In her 1998 book, High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Case Against Bill Clinton, she wrote, "In this recurring nightmare of a presidency, we have a national debate about whether he 'did it,' even though all sentient people know he did. Otherwise there would be debates only about whether to impeach or assassinate."

At a meeting of the National Political Action Conference, speaking of the young American who converted to militant Islam and fought for the Taliban, Coulter advised, "We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed to. Otherwise they will turn out to be outright traitors." 

 From Glenn Beck on Fox "News":

Progressives were lurking like a virus, waiting for their chance to suck all of the blood out of the Democratic neck. They were looking for the opening to infect the system. And once they were inside that system, I warned in 2004, the Democrats -- it will be a battle to the end of your party to get them out.

... What we are talking about is an ideological movement that has set its sights on the destruction of the Constitution and the fundamental transformation of our Republic. It is called the progressive movement, and it has been using both parties for a long, long time.

But mainly, it's the Democratic Party that has played host to it. And this parasite has been feeding on that host. 

From Glenn Beck's CPAC Address, 20 February 2010: 

Progressivism is the cancer in America and it is eating our Constitution. 

From Erick Erickson's Twitter feed: 

The nation loses the only goat fucking child molester to ever serve on the Supreme Court in David Souter's retirement. 

From Balkinization:  

Liz Cheney and her group "Keep America Safe" is after the lawyers who work for the government but (her ad disgustingly insinuates) are secret sympathizers with Al Qaeda. "Whose values do they share?" appears in bold white letters across the black screen, as the voiceover intones the same words against a background of ominous music. The slanders against government lawyers who represented detainees is an uncanny repetition of Senator Joseph McCarthy's hunt for Communists in government 60 years ago. In one of the most dramatic moments, McCarthy went after a lawyer. 

From The Rush Limbaugh Show: 

"Limbaugh likens Democrats to murderers, rapists, and 'this Muslim guy' that 'offed his wife's head.'" 

From Hardball Rep. Michelle Bachmann's appearance on MSNBC's in 2008: 

I'm focusing on Barack Obama and the people he's been associated with and I'm very worried about their anti-American nature. . . . I would say, what I would say is that the news media should do a penetrating expose and take a look -- I wish they would. I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America or anti-America? I think the people would love to see an expose like that. 

 From Lori Ziganto, "Obama Administration and Democrats Kowtow to Other Countries . . ."

But the current crop of Democrats have taken it to new lows; they are past rock bottom and are now frantically burrowing through the Earth’s crust. Since attaining power, everything they’ve done has been an attempt to fundamentally change our “defective” Constitution and country. They are trying to create a federal government involved in and in control of every aspect of our lives, even the foods we eat. They have attempted and continue to attempt to morally equate America with those who wish to kill us . They have actively tried to weaken our military and are attempting to further their belief that America is not special. 

You get the idea.

A lesson in Glenn Beck's unorthodox logic

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Sandy Levinson: "The stench of fascism"

The New York Times reports that Glenn Beck, in his closing speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference, described "progressivism" as a cancer, "the disease in America." Let there be no doubt that this is nothing more than the stench of fascism, which relies on treating one's political opponents as what Carl Schmitt, the great (I use that word advisedly) Weimar political theorist (who ended up supporting Hitler's takeover in 1933), termed "enemies" who were viewed ultimately as subhuman (as "cancers" are), ulutimately fit to be eradicated "by any means necessary." Forget Newt Gingrich, who also spoke, and who, by contemporary standards, is almost a reasonable elder statesman of the GOP, actually willing to work, on occasion, with Hillary Clinton. The voice of way too much of contemporary "conservatism" (the scare quotes are also deliberate, because it is an insult to "conservatives" to say that they are necessarily fascists) is fascistic.

Beck and his ilk feel free to call on Democrats to denounce anyone who strays from a quite narrow "political correctness." Jessie Jackson is still being criticized, after his many apologies, for his "hymietown" remark of 1984. God help us if Barack Obama were ever discovered to have written a term paper at Occidental in which he argued that there might be something to be said for "socialism." But Republicans say nothing. They are truly "useful idiots," who are counting on their ability to rein in Glenn Beck (and Sarah Palin) before they destroy the country. It is past time for Republicans to be called on whether or not they tolerate millions of their fellow citizens being called "cancers" and "diseases." We are indeed in a true moment of cultural and political warfare, in which Glenn Beck has made very clear that he has no regard whatsoever for the most basic notions of civility (which begin by granting the possibility that one's opponents simply disagree rather than are "cancers" to be ripped out of the body politic).

What "Beckism" presages is more terrorist violence like that conducted in Austin, Texas, where a demented citizen flew into an IRS building and killed a true American "hero" a/k/a known as a public servant who had dedicated his life to tax collection. One might remember that Justice Holmes called taxes "the price we pay for civilization." Part of our move toward fascism is to view as "heroes" only those who carry guns and are prepared to risk their lives while preparing to inflict fatal violence on others. We must recognize that all public servants are, in their own ways, "heroes." The Republican Party for the past generation has systematically viewed all public servants, save for the military, as chumps, who if they had any real talent, would be working in the private sector (perhaps in Goldman Sachs, etc.). I truly fear for our country.

Lightly edited by Φ

Source: http://balkin.blogspot.com/2010/02/stench-of-fascism.html