John McCormack
Weekly Standard
via Washington Examiner
3/26/2010
The Democratic National Committee emails reporters a lot of stories everyday in an attempt to spin a narrative. The narrative of the week, of course, is the supposedly hateful and violent rhetoric espoused by Obamacare opponents. Paul Krugman’s column today, like most days, can be stitched together from about a dozen DNC emails.
But the most amusing part of Krugman’s column today is his deep concern with the “eliminationist rhetoric” of the GOP:
What has been really striking has been the eliminationist rhetoric of the G.O.P., coming not from some radical fringe but from the party’s leaders. John Boehner, the House minority leader, declared that the passage of health reform was “Armageddon.” The Republican National Committee put out a fund-raising appeal that included a picture of Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, surrounded by flames, while the committee’s chairman declared that it was time to put Ms. Pelosi on “the firing line.” And Sarah Palin put out a map literally putting Democratic lawmakers in the cross hairs of a rifle sight.
All of this goes far beyond politics as usual. Democrats had a lot of harsh things to say about former President George W. Bush — but you’ll search in vain for anything comparably menacing, anything that even hinted at an appeal to violence, from members of Congress, let alone senior party officials.
This is the same Paul Krugman who wrote in December:
“A message to progressives: By all means, hang Senator Joe Lieberman in effigy.” (Emphasis CAJ)
But heaven forbid Sarah Palin say she wants to “target” certain Democratic seats. For the sake of the republic, we can only hope that John Boehner and those tea party wingnuts refrain from describing election efforts as a “connected series of military operations forming a distinct phase of a war.”
See also Michael Barone’s article: “Where was mainstream media on Bush death threats?“:
The indefatigable Instapundit, Glenn Reynolds, links to a collection of pictures of protesters calling for the death of George W. Bush. Question: Can anyone find a front page story in the Washington Post or New York Times decrying documenting and decrying such vile political discourse? Threats of violence are newsworthy to the news reporters of the Post and Times, it seems, only when they’re directed against Democrats.
Bush being beheaded by a guillotine, at an Obama campaign rally, Denver, 10/26/08. (Source: Looking at the Left.)
Betty Williams (Nobel Peace Prize winner)
On July 11, 2007, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Betty Williams gave the keynote speech to the International Women’s Peace Conference in Dallas, Texas, and said (to laughter and applause from the audience):
“I mean right now, I could kill George Bush, no problem. No, I don’t mean that. I mean — how could you nonviolently kill somebody? I would love to be able to do that .”
You can hear the audiotape of her threat on Breitbart.TV. Despite the fact that threatening to kill the president is a crime, the Secret Service refused to question her or detain her…
There’s much more at Instapundit.com
