Steve Newton Thinks I am an Asshole.
Perhaps he is angry at me because he is ashamed at himself, for giving a rather intellectual cover to right wing faux outrage back in March (and no, Steve, you “intellectual giant,” I am not calling you a right winger. But on occasion, you do give them cover).
To quote Matt Yglesias, “I hope that everyone who mau-maued the Department of Homeland Security for expressing concern about this kind of thing feel appropriately ashamed of themselves.”
Steve probably doesn’t feel ashamed. He is probably feeling intellectually superior and smug in his libertarianism. But since he feels I am both an idiot and an asshole, I will lay it out for him why I think he, and every right winger who derailed that DHS report, was and is tragically misguided at best, and an accomplice to murder at worst.
1. A DHS Right Wing Extremism Report is prepared and published, warning that certain right wing extremists may be violent. Specifically mentioned were anti-abortion radicals with their history of killing doctors, nurses, and bombing clinics, and white supremacists / Nazis, whose history of violence and evil hardly needs to be questioned.
2. Steve opposed the preparation and publication of the DHS Right Wing Extremism Report.
3. Richard Poplawski, a right-wing extremist, murders three police officers in Pittsburgh, in part because he feared the non-existent “Obama gun ban.”
4. Scott Roeder, another right-wing terrorist, assassinates Dr. George Tiller in Kansas.
5. A few hours ago, Von Brunn, another right-wing extremist, murders a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
It seems to me that anyone who opposed the DHS report was obviously and horribly wrong. Steve is obviously embarrassed at being proven wrong for the first time in his life, and reacts by establishing an easily beaten strawman scenario where he can easily say that I was wrong and he was right, and that way, all will be right with the world again. No, Steve, I never said that you said there were NO right wing extremists. But, that discussion and debate between us is irrelevant to the issue at hand. The issue is you opposed the DHS report, and you were wrong.
Even Fox News’ Shep Smith recognizes that simple fact: that the DHS report “was a warning to us all, and it appears now they were right.”
I was right, Steve. You weren’t, and yet somehow I am the asshole. You know what to go do with yourself.
I am not calling you a right winger.
In point of fact, you did.
You also continue to misconstrue my objections to the DHS report, objections shared by such rightwing organizations as the ACLU, the Boston Globe, and the DHS internal civil rights review board.
The report politicized the issue of domestic terrorism, failed to provide any reasonable guidance to law enforcement, and stereotyped virtually anyone with a different opinion than the current progressive agenda.
Your yardstick is this: if anyone with rightwing sympathies EVER hurt anyone again, all objections to the report were invalid.
What makes you an asshole in this situation is that twice now you have, without citing a single quote or piece of evidence made claims that I never made.
You did it again above:
2. Steve opposed the preparation and publication of the DHS Right Wing Extremism Report.
I never opposed the preparation of such a report. Show me where I did. I opposed the shoddy quality and politicization of the report by DHS and by you. I opposed the publication of this particular report because it had no law enforcement value, and in fact led (as I documented repeatedly) to even further police-state type behaviors on the part of state and local agencies, such as the Maryland National Guard with regard to the Tea Baggers.
Yes, I think in this case you have acted like an asshole. But then, you’re the one who once threatened to call me a supporter of child molesters if I didn’t agree with your interpretation of the Catholic Church and its role in the priest sex abuse scandal.
I’ll let you and jason have your fun now.
And what would have the DHS report done absent the right wing outrage: raise awareness. Among citizens. Among law enforcement. What would it have done to save lives? Perhaps threats would have been reported and investigated. Perhaps all three would have been arrested prior to their killings.
The sad fact is, we will never know.
But with these three instances of right wing terrorism, we are now fully aware of the potential for violence. I only wish 5 people did not have to die for that awareness.
I’m an asshole,
I’m an asshole,
I’m an asshole through and through.
But I’d rather be an asshole.
Than a piece of shit like you.
for no one in particular, just reminded me of an old frat song….
I threaten to call you a child molestor? Huh? To quote you, link it or it didn’t happen.
Steve, you just admitted that you opposed the report in comment #1.
I opposed the publication of this particular report.
Right there.
You opposed it. I don’t care why. But you did. You were wrong. Accept it.
Jsut for you:
So either retract that statement, or I will be forced to call you a liar, or a supporter or pedophiles.
http://delawareliberal.net//2008/08/05/there-there-my-son-put-your-head-right-here/
“Perhaps all three would have been arrested prior to their killings.”
Arrested for what? Aside from Brunn none of them had ever broke the law before. But maybe that doesn’t concern you.
You are being an idiot, now. I opposed the publication of this particular badly flawed report, not the dozens of reports which DHS and the FBI had published on similar topics. I didn’t oppose the idea of publishing a report on rightwing extremism–I opposed the idea of publishing such a flawed one.
Geez, read English.
I wrote a series of posts here laying out what the DHS was looking for in those reports and it certainly wasn’t people with “differing views”. The entire point of all of the mau-mauing was to make certain that all of the effort by the usual suspects to stir up their belligerents avoided critique and was seen as normal discourse. It is of no consequence that people will actually act on the enabling rhetoric — they just don’t want any surveillence of the craziness.
Did you know that the Virgina Fusion Center thinks that HBCUs in the state could be harboring extremists? No? Well that would be because there are extremists we defend, and the the ones who probably deserve it. And this is across the right-wing universe. Certainly the manufactured outrage that came as a result of the DHS report is no where to be seen when people not like them are targeted.
This still reads just about right for the ginned up paranoia.
Tom
You’re wrong; Roeder had been twice convicted; once of having bomb-making materials and once for not paying his taxes.
Certainly the manufactured outrage that came as a result of the DHS report is no where to be seen when people not like them are targeted.
Horseshit:
http://delawarelibertarian.blogspot.com/2009/04/i-feel-better-now-dhs-is-also-concerned.html
Steve, you were right, I did say that. Reading that old thread re Catholicism, you can be quite the asshole too.
Takes one to know one I guess.
“Tom
You’re wrong; Roeder had been twice convicted; once of having bomb-making materials and once for not paying his taxes.”
Turns out that was a different Scott Roeder.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090601/ap_on_re_us/us_tiller_shooting
Not horseshit.
That ACLU report tries to call out the problem with the Fusion Centers and does not address any of the points I made.
But that is the usual script, yes?
DD I have never claimed not to be an asshole (except maybe to my children before they got to middle school, when they knew better).
I would remind you, however, that even when I have called you an asshole, I have not been one of the people bringing up the “round ’em up” comment every two weeks since you apologized for it.
The line “OK Asshole, I’ve had enough” was specifically in response to your calling me a right winger (when you say “and other right wingers” you are doing so by the inclusion of the “other”), and to the fact that your comment implied for the second time in so many weeks that I had said no rightwing extremist groups were dangerous.
So, yeah, I probably shouldn’t have called you an asshole, but you need to stop crediting me with statements I never made. We have plenty enough to argue about without that shit.
cassandra
I’m quite willing to let people read for themselves.
You have no less a political agenda than any of the rest of us from any direction, and your so-called analysis of the DHS report was both superficial and in many cases factually incorrect.
You will now say, “Oh no it wasn’t.”
People can read for themselves. You said people condemning the DHS report did not condemn other abuses toward people who were not rightwing. I condemned the DHS report and I have repeatedly condemned DHS abuses toward left-leaning, environmental, and animal rights groups. So your statement
Certainly the manufactured outrage that came as a result of the DHS report is no where to be seen when people not like them are targeted.
is simply untrue with regards to the positions I have taken.
Maybe you are an asshole
Rob
Don’t help me. I can call somebody an asshole all on my own. And agree with same asshole that conservative/GOP positions on torture are inconsistent, immoral, and unAmerican.
Asshole means really bad jerk. It doesn’t mean unpatriotic, wrong on everything, or even that we wouldn’t someday enjoy a beer together while still calling each other assholes.
DD
Substantively
And what would have the DHS report done absent the right wing outrage: raise awareness. Among citizens. Among law enforcement. What would it have done to save lives? Perhaps threats would have been reported and investigated. Perhaps all three would have been arrested prior to their killings.
1) The report was never meant to be publicly released in the first place.
2) There is not the slightest evidence that law enforcement needs its awareness of potential domestic terrorism raised, if you read the material that DHS, the FBI and the fusion centers have been cranking out for the past several years.
3) Scott Roeder was reported just before he killed Dr. Tiller and the FBI did nothing, even though he was a convicted felon with a history of violence, mental illness, and vandalism.
4) The guy in Pittsburgh did his killing three days before the report was released, so it could hardly have had any impact there, unless DHS now has time travel.
5) And in doing threat assessment regarding the Holocaust Museum guy, give me a break. Who would you concentrate on as law enforcement: an 88/89 year-old guy or the younger ones? Frankly, given the fact that he’s been spouting this stuff since 1981 and never done anything violent before, I’d say they made a fair judgment call there. Some calls are simply wrong, even when they are with the odds.
If dozens of murders and attempted murders by the Army of God and ilk over the past two decades have not alerted people to that form of violence, you stretch credulity to the breaking point to think that DHS report would suddenly have been a blaze of lightning.
And–in point of fact–the report was released, and all the posts here and at the Daily Kos and elsewhere are evidence that people read it, and screamed about it, and that there was public debate over it….
Damn it! All this assholing and I don’t get to call someone an asshole?
Fine, I’m catching up.
Jason330 – you prick asshole!
Nemski – you hairy-ass-asshole!
DV – You goddamned assholio!
Geek – (*) – that’s the geeky emoticon for asshole
DD – you’re an attorney? Fucking asshole! ( 😆 )
X – oh X, where have you been, asshole?
El Som – esfinge (couldn’t find a translation for asshole, so sphincter had to do)
Ladies – I just can’t call y’all assholes, but I just figured out a way to say it while addressing you.
OK, that was one assholey comment, but I feel better now.
I feel left out somehow.
Hey, asshole, you just lost the “except RSmitty” exemption.
Go re-adhere your self back to the bottom of Mike Protack’s shoe. 😛
Fine. UI – Stop whining, asshole!
(now forgive me, you’re no asshole, asswipe)
Gaah, I didn’t realize how many assholes I needed to dole out.
Steaksauce – you are a spicy asshole!
Next time try this:
Please fill out the following and post to the thread:
(your name here) is an asshole.
And you, sir, are a proctologist’s delight.
DD,
I don’t think it is possible for right wingers like Steve Newton to feel shame.
Has anyone actually read the report? I have. It was basically a glossary for idiots. Anyone with common sense would know that someone threatening anyone else becase of their race, religion, or what have you is nuts/dangerous.
But all in all, how much more dangerous is any extremist (right/left/center, whatever) attack than just being out with the rest of the population?
here is a link to Background Information: Far-Right Attacks on U.S. Law Enforcement from The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism
http://www.start.umd.edu/start/announcements/announcement.asp?id=140
key points for people who don’t want to click:
Cops killed since 1990 by far right extremism: 42 (and possibly a stretch, read the article)
Total homicides linked to far-right extremism: 275 (it then says 530 fatalities, so not sure what the difference is)
Now for normal crime.
Cops killed between 1990-2005: 999
Total homicides 1990-2005: 308,973
(src. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/homicide/homtrnd.htm#contents)
Now this guy was a total wackjob, but really, would a list of groups really protect anyone anyway from him?
70% of extremists are under 30 years old or younger, so this guy would of gotten under the radar.
Your comment was in moderation because of the two links.
You need to break those up.
Will do next time, thanks.
Phillies win! ,Phillies win ! ha-na-na -na : > )
tom s.
Arrested for what? Aside from Brunn none of them had ever broke the law before. But maybe that doesn’t concern you.
Need I remind you we are at war and we can snatch anyone up that is a threat regardless of them having broken the law. I guess that only applies to muslims huh?
the beauty of our Patriot Act Tom is that we can take threats off the streets no matter what.
Pretty sweet huh? Now, we don’t need to wait until people commit a crime, we can prevent them just by magically abducting them.
The new america. I don’t make the rules tom, I just assume you want these applied the same way we are applying them across the globe.
I’m still stuck on Tom S.’s comment about “another Scott Roeder.” Wha?
President Obama speaks to the Black and Muslim communities in the same tone….referring to them as his Brotha……
Geezer, I’m just ignoring Tom. He supports domestic terrorists.
Geezer
Actually read the link; apparently there really are two completely different Scott Roeders, although I am still uncertain after reading the article exactly which one did what.
My laptop is broken (motherboard problem most likely). Geek’s going to help me get the hard drive backed up before I send it back to the manufacturer. My job prevents me from posting at work for the most part, and my computer options while at home (my ancient work laptop or my wife’s Mac) – well, they suck and they discourage me from using the internet at all. (Sorry Mac users)
I use a Mac at home. You can put Firefox on it and it works pretty well.