How Can You Live With Yourself?
I pose this question to all of our conservative and Republican readers and commenters. How can you do it? I am going to tell you two stories, and then I am going to ask you a further question.
From the Asheville, NC Citizen Times:
A dead bear was found dumped this morning on the Western Carolina University campus, draped with a pair of Obama campaign signs, university police said.
Maintenance workers reported about 7:45 a.m. finding a 75-pound bear cub dumped at the roundabout near the Catamount statute at the entrance to campus, said Tom Johnson, chief of university police.
“It looked like it had been shot in the head as best we can tell. A couple of Obama campaign signs had been stapled together and stuck over its head,” Johnson said.
This was a baby black bear, no doubt shot in the end to both represent Obama and to threaten him and his supporters. Campus police have a photograph of the dead bear, but it has not been released to the media.
From the Chicago Tribune:
A 74-year-old woman and a 46-year-old man with Obama signs in their front yards near the 600 block of South Villa Avenue received similar letters that had a Villa Park Village Hall return address. “Get the Obama signs off your property—now,” the letter reads. “Failure to obey this order will result in the immediate death of all family members.” Both residents said they will not remove their signs, though the man, who had voted Republican for 25 years before switching parties this year, said his wife is worried about letting their 7-year-old son play alone outside.
Now, you conservatives and Republicans love to play the moral equivalence card, and indeed John McCain played it in his last debate with Obama, saying that there were “stuff” said at Obama rallies about McCain too, so that justifies or at least excuses such incidents as above and at McCain and Palin’s rallies, where supporters shout “terrorist” and “kill him.” What is this “stuff?” Name me on incident were McCain was called a terrorist. Name me one incident where someone said kill McCain. Name me one incident where an Obama supporter killed an animal so as to threaten McCain and his supporters. Name me one incident where McCain supporters have received death threats on their families for having a McCain sign in their yard.
You can’t.
Yeah, Obama supporters think McCain is an elderly angry senile unstable insane warmongering asshole, and we have said it many times, but that is in no way equivalent to fucking death threats. To killing a bear. To hanging a ghost in a tree to symbolize a lynching of Obama, which happened last week in Ohio.
These hateful and disgusting incidents are happening so often that I really think that any honorable and moral person, no matter if they are a diehard conservative or Republican, cannot vote for McCain lest they be branded by these incidents for all eternity. How can you align yourself with someone who would kill a baby bear to make a racial threat against Obama? How can you align yourself with someone who would threaten death upon whole families simply because they have a sign in their yard? How can you sleep at night?
Tags: 2008 Election, John McCain, Republicans
This kind of extremism is the root of the problem in our country today, and the reason why Americans are going to be voting Barrack Obama into office on November 4th.
How can you consider yourself a “thinking person” much less even moderately sentient by asking such asinine questions?
Look at it this way, though — you’re exactly the same. You once said Republicans should be killed. Yes, you did. You are no better. See? You stepped right in it, asshole.
Fuck you and yours.
You serious? I’m with Hube on this one – this blog has now lost all right to refer to itself as “enlightened”, “progressive”, “thinking” or “informed”.
http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20080916_Fatimah_Ali___Race_war__in_America.html
“This kind of extremism is the root of the problem in our country today”
That’s a pretty bold statement. Can you back it up? I’d assert that the need of some on the left to rigidly box Americans into groups rather than looking at individuals and thinking of the good of the country as a whole is a far more serious problem.
Seriously, have you lost your freaking mind? You should probably step away from any media concerning this election for a little while since you’re clearly not well. Both of those stories are hideous, but to actually imply that all McCain voters are aligning themselves with extremist wackos is just plain stupid.
Here’s a news flash, genius – Republicans are not all the same any more than Arabs or blacks or men or women are all the same. Do you really need that shit explained to you?!?
I’m really worried about your mental stability at this point. First you lash out and say that all Republicans should be shot. Then you were allegedly sorry for it. Now you post this garbage.
It’s becoming abundantly clear that you’re becoming a bit unhinged. You appear to be carrying way too much anger for a POLITICAL PARTY. Think about that. It’s a group of people who happen to like one candidate more than another. They just don’t happen to agree with you on which candidate. That’s all. Nothing sinister, no one’s out to get you, John Nash. Now please get the fuck over it. If you can’t, please seek professional help before you become a danger to those around you.
As usual, our local Republicans won’t condemn the growing GOP fascist movement, but they’ll go apeshit over Bill Ayers. And they wonder why we refuse to vote for any Republican, any time.
This sums up perfectly why I detest Mike Castle – the deafening silence as his party marches toward fascism.
“As usual, our local Republicans won’t condemn the growing GOP fascist movement,”
Yep, you nailed it. Us and the Zionists, coming to put microchips in your teeth.
“And they wonder why we refuse to vote for any Republican, any time.”
No, we have some simpler theories regarding that trend but I’ll be civil and leave them unmentioned.
“This sums up perfectly why I detest Mike Castle – the deafening silence as his party marches toward fascism.”
Do you think I’ve ever cast a ballot for Mike Castle?
Fascism? Really? Overdramatize much?
FTR, I’m not going apeshit over Ayers. I will vote for both Dems and Republicans because I am open-minded (which, btw, is one of the definitions of “liberal”, ironically) and I see good and bad people and ideas on both sides of the political aisle. Go ahead and vote straight Dem, tho, that makes perfectly good sense since they’re ALL great thinkers and great leaders.
BTW, how’d Minner work out for you? I’m sure KHN would be just as effective. Gimme a break.
Seriously.
No party
has a monopoly
on stupidity.
Not to mention the video Pandora posted below.
And, by the way, “kill him” never happened. The FBI investigated it and could find no one to corroborate the reporter’s story.
I’m sure if I draped myself in McCain Palin signs and walked around Harlem, Atlanta, Compton, West Philly, or the South Side, I would emerge COMPLETELY UNSCATHED.
Ahem…..
Thanks Hube and all those who agreed with his comments, I agree totally with you all. Anyone who can say all Republicans should be lined up and shot is not well even with an apology since the same type comments are always made again with different words. And I vote both parties as there are good and bad in both parties. I am not going to vote for someone just because that is the party I belong too. Hence Minner was a very good reference and the fact that Democrats the far left liberals will vote Democrat no matter who the Democrat is, even if they don’t like them. Hence the flip flops of Hilary and Obama and all the mean nasty things that were said about Hilary from De Dem himself.
Good point on deldem’s violent proclivities…..
I suspect these events are the work of Obama supporters trying to drum up the violence card now that everybody laughs at the race card.
Right now, Vlad Putin is greasing up and waiting for Jan. 20. Talk about a little GLASNOST!!!!
Open wide, Barry!
For the record, I never stated that McCain or all Republicans draw a parallel to those in the above story. I simply believe Obama will better steer us away from that type of extremism.
DOM
It’s not the fact that all these nuts are sanctioned by the Mcsame campaign but the fact the Mcsame is silent on their comments. we all know that there are kooks in this word thus the signs in Dallas stating KENNEDY wanted dead not alive and no one in a position to lead spoke out against them. Sarah and John has stoked these vile comments and have done to stop it,
DelDem, you have some serious anger issues. If your anger were confined to individuals who act in inappropriate ways, then it would be understandable. But you generalize to an entire party of individuals based on the examples of a few.
If you were a buffoon, it could be dismissed as owing to an intellectual problem. But you are clearly not am idiot. It seems, therefore, that your anger has its source in something pathological, something for which you need to seek help.
Jason, et al, you need to seriously consider the kind of reputation that DelDem’s outbursts is giving your blog. I for one object to him being passed off here as a progressive. He is far too reactionary for such an honorific designation. You need to get this under control.
“Yeah, Obama supporters think McCain is an elderly angry senile unstable insane warmongering asshole, and we have said it many times, but that is in no way equivalent to fucking death threats. ”
Your inability to communicate says it all.
By the way, Sen McCain has spoken out at every rally to halt the offensive language and actions you speak of.
What’s the point?
It’s all an Obama feint.
RE Dana’s comment 15–will we now be treated to a new DL post: “Uncle Dana calls out Delawareliberal,” and will you all then suggest he’s as far off the mark as you seemed to think I was?
Just so I am clear, none of you think it reprehensible that McCain supporters are making death threats with more frequency and vehemence. Indeed, I dare say by your lack of condemnation, you now own those death threats as if you yourself made them. It is as if you killed that baby bear.
And you still adhere to your moral equivalence. At least I apologized for my assine comment about killing Republican. But hey, if it makes you all sleep at night thinking that it is ok for death threats to be made to Obama supporters nationwide and for bears to be killed just because Delaware Dem once said kill Republicans in anger, then fine.
I just pray to God that nothing happens to Obama, his wife and daughters, or any of his supporters, for the blood will be on your hands.
Your apology was an empty one if it’s followed up with this nonsense. Your first paragraph in #19 sums you up in a nutshell: delusional and histrionic.
First, no one said it wasn’t reprehensible. Second, you’ve now lumped us all in with the crazies AGAIN. WHERE DID ANYONE SAY IT WAS OK??!????!???!
Find some meds, stat. You’re unbelievable.
Of course, Tom in his city upon the hill thinks that all one needs to do to absolve themselves of this vile talk and action is to ask G-D for forgiveness. That makes it all OK.
DD – You have got to be the most asinine, ridiculous person I have ever come across, and that’s saying a lot. A lot.
What color is the sky in your world?
DD
You like to spin your “moral equivalence” narrative and then spout “blood on your hands.”
What you’re doing is nothing more than playing an angry little “gotcha” game in which you demand that people who don’t think exactly as you do are required to demonstrate moral credentials by performing some specific act of contrition specified by you, to prove that anybody with a different viewpoint than you is scum.
Cute game, but if you can’t even convince Dana Garrett (whose progressive/intellectual credentials trump yours many times over) that it’s on the up and up, then you’ve got nothing but vitriolic anger that has now completely crossed over the line into the extreme exterminationist rhetoric you so piously castigated just a few months back.
Short version of previous comment: I call bullshit on your faux moral outrage.
I second that.
25 comments and all of our friends on the right want to castigate DD and not the behavior that is becoming fairly representative of your party.
And the Kill him thing? The Secret Service couldn’t corroborate the Scranton event, but did corroborate the FL events but said they weren’t a threat. But is that actually OK? Crowds where someone shouting out for a candidate to be killed is fine?
All this means is that their lowest is lower than our lowest.
That is all.
Again you come across with hatred DelDem. Must say I guess you get it honestly. But has anyone proved who it was that killed the bear? NO one said we thought it was okay and no one thinks it is okay no matter what party they are. So don’t lump in everyone but you and yours with this. There are stupid people who just don’t care about anyone but themselves on all levels and in all parties. You are proving you are one of them with your comments. And you are a lawyer. How do your associates feel about your judgments against people you don’t even know? I hope you ask what political party your clients are before you represent them and let them know they don’t stand a chance with you if they aren’t a Democrat Liberal like yourself. There are some professions that need to be handled by objective people who can see past their own beliefs, I thought Lawyers were one of them.
Interesting.
25 comments and all of our friends on the right want to castigate DD and not the behavior that is becoming fairly representative of your party.
So Dana Garrett is now one of your friends on the right?
Get a grip.
Well, Burris is an authority on assine behavior, even if such behavior was his own, so I guess he would know.
And the color of the sky is blue, like this country will be in 14 days.
pwned.
Get a grip.
Perhaps you should climb down from your high horse. Jerry, XStryker, TT, and MJ aren’t part of our friends on the right, either, but I imagine they read closely enough to know that they were certainly not included in the list.
cassandra
There’s no room for me on the high horse (or dead bear): DD has taken that all for himself, and you’re holding the stirrups here.
You deftly slip past the fact again that one of the most damning comments about DD’s faux anger came from one of Delaware’s major progressive voices. Deal with that, why don’t you?
Or can you?
If it makes any difference, I’m with Newton, Garrett, and Burris on this one.
I hate torturers and those that enable them.
I hate an executive that spys on American citizens without warrant or cause.
I hate governments that imprison without charges or a day in court.
I hate a justice department that prosecutes based on political party.
I hate the chicken hawks who lied us into attacking another country.
I hate the bigots that want to use our Constitution and laws to discriminate against other Americans.
I hate the thieves who use government to steal from the poor and middle class and give to the rich.
I hate the theocrats who want to take our taxes and shove their bigoted “family values” down everybody’s throats.
I hate the repub party that has destroyed everything that made this country great. May it be forever flushed down the toilet of history with all the other defeated totalitarian movements.
As long as DD is right here, he can be responsible for his own posts and behavior. And Dana can take up whatever cudgels he wants — that is his fight, not mine.
My comment still stands. We are now at 37 posts and no one sees fit to find anything particularly unreasonable about dead bears left on a door step by members of a viable political party in the United States of America in the 21st Century that thinks that this is reasonable political expression.
I hate bear killers, too.
Ah, that’s the difference. Liberals hate killer bears; wing-nuts hate killer bears.
I do support the right to arm bears, though.
I hate anonone.
And I can’t fucking believe deldem is an attorney. Let me guess…personal injury?
cudgels?
“Both of those stories are hideous,”
That’s from my #4 post, but it’s ok that you missed it, Cassandra. It didn’t have the word Obama in it, so you probably just glossed over it.
Google is your friend.
You Del Libs are falling apart! It was only a matter of time. Do you really think this was the only hate message that happened during this campaign or was it the only one that the stupid media hyped up? Once again you fell into the trap. I noticed that some of the “contributors” stayed away from this one.
STOP….breathe….in….out….ahhh…
Of course the killing of a bear in an APPARENT effigy (but I’d assume take it as a fucked up warning shot) is wrong. Of course the threatening letter was wrong. I don’t think a single person on this thread condones it. Seriously, do you think they do? Playing this “gotcha” bullshit makes it such feigned outrage in the name of one-up-manship, it’s making you pathetic.
THE PERSON/PEOPLE WHO DID THAT TO THE BEAR AND THE THREATS THAT WENT ALONG WITH IT SHOULD BE PUT IN JAIL FOR A LOOOOOONNG TIME. However, they should also disclose their political party, so DD can either tap dance if they are Republican, or DD can give an “oh shit, mea culpa” once more over his own brand of stereotyping.
THE PERSON/PEOPLE WHO CREATED AND DELIVERED THAT THREATENING LETTER IN CHICAGO SHOULD BE PUT IN JAIL FOR A LOOOOOONNG TIME. However, they should also disclose their political party, so DD can either tap dance if they are Republican, or DD can give an “oh shit, mea culpa” once more over his own brand of stereotyping.
Get it? See the point? Yes, they were both horrible and freaking wrong. To assume they were Republican operatives is opportunistic and shows how far you would go to perpetuate your own bigoted stereotypes upon the political world.
pwned that, beeyatch.
I’m not asking you to define it, I’m just questioning the use of it. Do you have thesaurus.com up whenever you post? You pull the most obscure words out sometimes. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone use that word.
Breaking News: David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs have been found covered in bear blood. Full story at eleven.
“You pull the most obscure words out sometimes. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone use that word.”
You crack me up – and you’re the best writer DWA could find? C’mon – you’re dating Mike M, right?
Cassandra,
I find the dead bear and the letter to be disgusting. I posted something about the jerk in Fairfield, OH who hung a ghost from his tree with Obama signs on it and a Star of David drawn on its head. The story is horrible. But I was told by Tom S. that all this guy needed to do is ask for forgiveness from G-D and everything would be OK. The campaign that McSame and Co. have run has to be the lowest, most reckless campaign I’ve ever witnessed.
Sorry for injecting sanity and killing your thread last night. I know it had been fun for ya.
Herpes outbreak!!!
DD, I don’t think you are an angry or unbalanced person. I do think you have a writing problem. When you want to express outrage, you lazily reach for extreme cliches instead of making the effort to describe your thoughts more clearly. You are fine when y0u are writing factually or logically, but to describe an emotion such as outrage requires a certain amount of poetry. And any writer needs to have a disdain for cliches.
The Delaware Dem wrote:
Quite well, actually, because my vote for John McCain will be a vote for the better candidate, for a better country. Your attempts to link everyone who votes for Mr McCain with a few extremists is nothing but demagoguery.
What would you have said had I written that you shouldn’t be able to sleep at night because you are voting for the candidate favorec by Negroes, and a Negro himself, since Negroes commit a very disproportionate number of violent crimes? That, after all, is about the same argument you tried to make!
I don’t know what DD would have said but I’d have called you the r-word. Your logic is mind-numbing.
The Delaware Dem also tried to pull another demagogic trick by sayiny, in comment number 19 that if we don’t specifically condemn the bear killing actions, we must be silently consenting to thjem or agreeing with them in some way.
An interesting argument that; does it mean that if any Democrat or Obama supporter does or says anything stupid, anything at all, DD will have agreed with it if he doesn’t come out, specifically, every single time, to issue a Strong Condemnation?
And if, heaven forfend, something tragic happens to Senator Obama, since some of us haven’t issued the specific bear killing condemnation, we will therefore have Mr Obama’s blood on our hands as well.
The greatest tragedy I can see would be Mr Obama not being able to complete his full term in the Senate.
Mr Gray: My logic was pretty much what DD used; that’s why I wrote it as I did. You’ll note that I have not used such an argument, anywhere.
Dana, I see you’re trying to equate levels of bigotry (see my comment in #46 pointing out the political bigotry of DD), but doing so by equating political bigotry (DD) to racial bigotry (you) is going to get your point so lost in translation. I see your point, but your analogy won’t do more, but to have people label your comments as racist. Personally, I know the point you are trying to make, but not all will, as it was incendiary.
Good luck.
I love how Dana refers to me now as “The Delaware Dem.” I wonder if I should refer to myself in the third person.
RSmitty wrote: I see your point, but your analogy won’t do more, but to have people label your comments as racist.
Ya think? 🙂
Eh…it’s a distinct possibility. 😉
The Delaware Dem wrote:
That’s as precise as I could make the nom de plume you have established for yourself. What more, or less, did you expect?
I think when someone makes a point that makes DelDem have to think about what he has said, sometimes makes him quiet. But it doesn’t last long until he puts his foot in mouth so to speak again. I would hope he would tone down his thoughts before writing in the future and lumping everyone with a few stupid people who don’t speak or act for the majority.
Just so everyone is clear: “Dana” and “Dana Garrett” are not the same person.
Dana and Dana Garrett, it is very clear you are not the same person, because both of you write clearly. But thanks for the reminder, to all those drive-bys, and drive thrus.
I enjoy clearly reading from both of you.
Like I said, neither campaign’s supporters have a monopoly on stupidity.
does carved mean the same as scratched?
can’t wait to see the atm video footage!