Yesterday morning I posted about the string of violent threats and assaults by Republicans in Washington state, suggesting that it might represent a pattern, and wondering how the fear and anger that is driving the Teahadists might potentially escalate. To which one commenter responded:

A handful of incidents in one state do not a trend make.

Okay… how about a Rand Paul supporter stomping on the head of a MoveOn protester outside last night’s Senate debate in Kentucky? Does that fit the pattern? Huh?

Or are we going to continue to comfort ourselves with the fiction that these are all just random incidents, totally unrelated to the violent rhetoric the Republicans and their surrogates are using to incite their base?

Perhaps my years of hosting comment threads inhabited by some of the most vile, hateful trolls on the Internet have colored my perception of politics, but it’s time my fellow progressives wake up to the fact that there are folks out there who viciously hate us… and who are just itching for the opportunity to do something about it. See, they don’t just think we are wrong; they think we are dangerous. Dangerous enough to warrant a head-stomping… or worse.

Violent words fuel violent actions. So don’t be surprised to see more political violence like what we saw in Kentucky last night.

94 replies on “I’m just sayin’…”

  1. I love how the right wing troll skips over the fact that Stack was more in line with the teabaggers politically. His act of suicide was against the IRS and what he considered “big government.” His suicide note is filled with rants about both. Heaven forbid this idiot try to justify right wing terrorists like Timothy McVeigh, Scott Roeder, Eric Rudolph. But keep on trying to spin there Skippy, it is pretty amusing.

  2. @53 Did Lauren Valle threaten anyone? Was she brandishing a weapon? If so, please link. Otherwise, I don’t see how Lauren Valle’s actions are more egregious than Chris Broughton to justify the reaction of the crowd. Please explain if you could.

    Which do you consider more of a threat, a wig and a sign, or an AR-17 and loudly spoken open prayer that someone in firing range “die and go to hell”?

  4. holy fuck they found the girl with the puppies and the lady with the cat, the should name this assface and press assault charges. the right wing are all about violence and force and at heart disregard human dignity.

  5. It sure would be nice to see the video footage that preceded the beginning of this seemingly selectively edited video.

    @56 – Did Lauren Valle threaten anyone? Well, she attempted to approach a politician while wearing a disguise and holding a suspicious package. It sure looks like the people in the video thought she was threatening someone. Her actions certainly make her look naive and stupid.

    Did Chris Broughton approach anyone threateningly? Did he ever brandish his weapon at all? Was he wearing a disguise? Did he have a suspicious package that he wanted to “present” to Obama? No, No, No, & No.

  6. @58 “the right wing are all about violence and force”
    ———-

    “Every Communist must grasp the truth, “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

    – Mao Tse-Tung – “Problems of War and Strategy” (November 6, 1938), Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 224.

  7. “The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of the issue by war, is the central task and the highest form of revolution. This Marxist-Leninist principle of revolution holds good universally, for China and for all other countries.”

    – Mao Tse-Tung – “Problems of War and Strategy” (November 6, 1938)

  8. “Without armed struggle neither the proletariat, nor the people, nor the Communist Party would have any standing at all in China and it would be impossible for the revolution to triumph. In these years [the eighteen years since the founding of the Party] the development, consolidation and bolshevization of our Party have proceeded in the midst of revolutionary wars; without armed struggle the Communist Party would assuredly not be what it is today. Comrades throughout the Party must never forget this experience for which we have paid in blood.”

    – Mao Tse-Tung – “Introducing The Communist” (October 4, 1939), Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 292.

  9. “According to the Marxist theory of the state, the army is the chief component of state power. Whoever wants to seize and retain state power must have a strong army. Some people ridicule us as advocates of the “omnipotence of war”. Yes, we are advocates of the omnipotence of revolutionary war; that is good, not bad, it is Marxist. The guns of the Russian Communist Party created socialism. We shall create a democratic republic. Experience in the class struggle in the era of imperialism teaches us that it is only by the power of the gun that the working class and the labouring masses can defeat the armed bourgeoisie and landlords; in this sense we may say that only with guns can the whole world be transformed.”

    – Mao Tse-Tung – “Problems of War and Strategy” (November 6, 1938), Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 225.

  10. @59 Link to where it says she was holding a suspicious package. Link to where it says she came close to approaching Rand Paul, because I have found several places where it says she wanted to approach him, but I can’t find anyone who says that was likely to be a reality.

    Even still, she appeared threatening, and her actually being threatening are two different things. Did she appear threatening to police? The police felt that Chris Broughton and the dozen or so other gun carrying protesters appeared threatening and had to use resources to keep tabs on them, rather than focus on other possible threats.

    Do you believe all it takes is a wig to make some one more of a threat than a person with an actual weapon?

  16. “68
    Um, could you perhaps find a better example of current violent left-wing extremism than a seventy-year-old one from China? I mean, I’m not saying there aren’t ANY, …”

    The very existence of the current governments of Myanmar and North Korea is all the proof I need.

  19. Don’t even try with this troll. He is well established on this and other websites around the country. It appears by the repetitive word usage that he operates under multiple identities until a blog gets tired of him and filters him out. He truly is the sociopath in the basement.

    In his own words from a post a few days ago:

    “Here, I will help you out a little with your awesome insults:

    “I, the Naive White Libtarded Seattle Progressive, am a retarded inbred redneck racist hick. I live in the basement of my mom’s trailer in a white trash trailer park, where I hide behind my computer screen all day, while posting hate, and wearing a tinfoil hat on top of my white bedsheet Klan hood, and I jack off all day to a poster of Hitler, because I can’t get laid, unless it is with my mom and sister.””

    It was a feeble attempt at showing how he could shrug off insults. I suspect, however, that it was a little more autobiographical.

  20. “Don’t even try with this troll.” = unless you can show me some real facts and logic that can stand up to and defeat the facts and logic that I present.

  21. @75 Speaking of facts and logic, I’m still hoping you can show me where you read that Lauren Valle was holding a suspicious package or that she successfully came close to approaching Rand Paul.

  22. “The very existence of the current governments of Myanmar and North Korea is all the proof I need… of left-wing extremism”
    Let’s clarify terms, cause you are not on the same page as most people.
    When people think Left wing, think Sweden, Denmark and Holland. Myanmar and North Korea are not that at all. Myanmar and North Korea are dictatorships.
    From Wikipedia
    “For some scholars, dictatorship is a form of government that has the power to govern without consent of those being governed (similar to authoritarianism), while totalitarianism describes a state that regulates nearly every aspect of public and private behavior of the people.”
    “… In this sense, dictatorship (government without people’s consent) is a contrast to democracy (government whose power comes from people) and
    totalitarianism (government controls every aspect of people’s life) opposes pluralism (government allows multiple lifestyles and opinions).”

  23. If you are trying to claim that the governments of Myanmar and North Korea are not leftist governments, then you are delusional.

  24. 78 well in this country, in american culture, its the Right Wing that is perpetuating violence, on an individual (said examples), civic (police state), military (hello), and systemic basis (how many on the right want to reduce the deficit by cutting military spending?). you are after a strawman if you think any of your old school marxist examples are relavant anymore. you imaginary opposition doesn’t exist.

  25. 78 the modern liberal state is Denmark, The Netherlands, Sweden etc. If that’s not the kind of place you want to be in fine, but stop with your b.s. comparisons to fucking North Korea or Myanmar or fucking 19th century Russia. Not relevant or persuasive at all. And yes, I would love it if my home country was as progressive as Denmark with our own flavor. That’s what yo are up against, not some paranoid commie conspiracy. And do I want to force you to live under that? Hell no, go live in some right wing parking lot surrounded by missiles. I would much rather prefer this country broke up and you could live your happy life in east bumblefuck hicksville and the rest of us in a modern civilized society.

  26. 80 :

    You want recent examples of leftist violence from the USA, here you go:

    Violent leftists prevented Tom Tancredo from giving a speech at UNC. They broke windows, screamed profanities, and spit on people.

    http://www.newsobserver.com/2009/04/15/4…

    Protest stops Tancredo’s UNC speech

    Published Wed, Apr 15, 2009 04:59 AM

    By Jesse James DeConto – Staff Writer

    CHAPEL HILL — UNC-CH police released pepper spray and threatened to use a Taser on student protesters Tuesday evening when a crowd disrupted a speech by former Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo opposing in-state tuition benefits to unauthorized immigrants.

    Hundreds of protesters converged on Bingham Hall, shouting profanities and accusations of racism while Tancredo and the student who introduced him tried to speak. Minutes into the speech, a protester pounded a window of the classroom until the glass shattered, prompting Tancredo to flee and campus police to shut down the event.

    …

    University Chancellor Holden Thorp said in an e-mail message to students and faculty that he had called Tancredo today to apologize for his treatment.

    Campus police are investigating the incident and will pursue criminal charges if warranted, Thorp said. The students involved also could face Honor Court proceedings if there is sufficient evidence, he said.

    …

    Inside the classroom, several student protesters screamed curses at Tancredo and Riley Matheson, president of the UNC-Chapel Hill chapter of Youth for Western Civilization.

    “This is the free speech crowd, right?” Tancredo joked.

    …

    “Fascists are fascists,” Tancredo said. “Their actions were probably the best speech I could ever give. They are what’s wrong with America today. … When all you can do is yell epithets, that means you are intellectually bankrupt.”

    ———————————

    http://www.newsobserver.com/2009/04/24/4…

    UNC student charged in Tancredo protest

    Published Fri, Apr 24, 2009 05:20 AM

    CHAPEL HILL — Campus police have charged a UNC-Chapel Hill student with disorderly conduct in connection with last week’s protest that shut down a speech by former Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo.

    Morehead scholar Haley Koch was arrested outside a classroom Thursday. She was released on $1,000 bail.

    She joins six other people who were arrested Wednesday during a speech by another conservative former congressman, Virgil Goode of Virginia. None of those arrested Wednesday was a UNC-CH student or employee, the university said in a news release.

    Liberal student groups have clashed with Goode and Tancredo, who were invited by the conservative Youth for Western Civilization to speak against illegal immigration.

  27. Leftist union thugs beat black tea-party member Ken Gladney:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr_4ZWEFO…

    ———–

    http://www.examiner.com/city-hall-in-lou…

    White union thugs beat black man at Obamacare rally

    An angry mob attacked a black man outside a town hall meeting on healthcare in St. Louis last Thursday. The group was “invited” to the meeting by U.S. Representative Russ Carnahan (Dem., Mo.), who had a reserved seating section for them inside the hall, while security guards posted outside refused entry to members of the Tea Party Coalition.

    Kenneth Gladney was exercising his First Amendment rights outside the hall, by handing out flyers with the revolutionary “Don’t Tread on Me” flag on the cover. Mr.Gladney also happens to be a black man. He was assaulted by a bunch of thugs from the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), proudly wearing their union shirts with the SEIU logo. Most of the union thugs appeared to be white men.

  28. 81 not convincing. Spitting, broken windows by college kids… that’s not anything like what the right is perpetuating. See video above.

  29. 82 keep em coming. maybe somebody can tally a blog of violence by both sides. i still maintain the right are the ones with the culture of violence and force.

  31. @85 It takes a special kind of stupid to go straight to Mao and the communists when arguing about left wing violence. People here could easily start screaming about right wing violence (Hitler, Franco, I can go on all day) but they don’t, because they are keeping it in perspective. It’s teabaggers vs. progressives not Nazis vs. commies. So why don’t you dial it down a notch, huh slappy?

  33. @86 – The anti-Tancredo mob was organized by a Maoist sect named “Freedom Road Socialist Organization” which publishes “Fight Back!”
    http://www.fightbacknews.org/

    So it actually is commie maoist violence. But again, I know that because I’m not a sheltered white naive libtarded Seattle progressive like most of the people on here.

  34. @89 please refer to the post at #74. You are probably too lazy to do that so I’ll just quote it:

    “I, the Naive White Libtarded Seattle Progressive, am a retarded inbred redneck racist hick. I live in the basement of my mom’s trailer in a white trash trailer park, where I hide behind my computer screen all day, while posting hate, and wearing a tinfoil hat on top of my white bedsheet Klan hood, and I jack off all day to a poster of Hitler, because I can’t get laid, unless it is with my mom and sister.””

  35. 88 I had sex with the wife of the socialist party in seattle when I was 20. i really wish she would get back to me, id know how to handle that horny ass now.

    well if it is some crazy REAL socialists (which your opposition on here is not) it still doesn’t justify the right wing crazy stomping on a girls head.

    and that’s where your argument ends here because we dont give a fuck about moaists, that’s the right wing’s strawman.

    larouche and the socialists can have a crazy orgy and you can have fun with that!

  36. @42 They were Volunteer Rand Paul security. Story updates show that the 5 men involved in taking down this woman are Rand Paul volunteers and they surrounded the woman early on because they knew her from her previous protests at rallies. One of them admits to telling the others they might need to “take her down”. Protest protected by the constitution, so much for the Tea Party’s vaunted desire to go back to our “founders’ intentions.

  37. 88 and you know whats a joke about your smarmy ‘sheltered’ snub is how hypocritical it really is. should we be uneducated serfs? how bout some john adams:

    “I must study politics and war, that my sons may have the liberty to study mathematics and philosophy, natural history and naval architecture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, tapestry, and porcelain.”

  38. I know I’m supposed to be a good little non-violent progressive, but I think anyone on the left should be taking martial arts so when one of these fratboy jock dickheads feels like flexing their manliness they can be dropped like they should be.

  39. So in your world, Communists are still a threat? Uh…riiiiiight.

    I gotta go, it’s time to sharpen my sword. At sundown the Ostrogoth’s are going to attack my village. I best be ready!

  41. ‘But always—do not forget this, Winston—always there will be the intoxication of power, constantly increasing and constantly growing subtler. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever.’

  42. @92
    Well, maybe they were already living in the Owners’ Paradise, where there will be no true free speech outside of the home because there will be no publicly-owned spaces—you do _not_ have the right to protest on privately-held land, and so when everything is finally privatised…well, we’ll have as much of our rights as we can afford.

    This will be good, because then only then will the virtuous have the rights proportionate to their virtues. No-one questions William Gates III’s right to own approximately one million times as much land on which he may decide what speech is free as someone whose net virtue is only (say) $50,000; why should anyone object to his having that much more freedom of speech?

  43. 80

    Did you know The Netherlands has a very high homosexual suicide rate?
    As do other Socialist Paradises.
    It seems to be very hard to make The Gays happy…..

  44. Remember, if anyone:

    a. hates our Government

    b. hates our President

    c. hates our Middle Class and wants to export their jobs to their Red Chinese comrades overseas.

    Then they are NOT patriotic. They are in point of fact, TRAITORS.

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