SYNDICATED COLUMN: The Guns of August
Why Won't Obama Stand Up For Himself?
No wonder President Obama won't stand up for us. He won't even defend his personal safety!
Two weeks ago, a right-wing man protested outside the president's healthcare meeting in New Hampshire wearing a gun strapped to his leg. Lest we miss his point, he carried a sign that called for the shedding of blood in a new revolution.
A week later, a dozen men appeared outside Obama's appearance in Phoenix brandishing loaded guns. "We will forcefully resist people imposing their will on us through the strength of the majority with a vote," said one, who carried an AR-15 military-style automatic rifle. You read that right—they threatened to use guns to annul the results of the last election.
Cops stood by and watched. The Secret Service did nothing. Strictly speaking, these mooks are allowed to openly carry guns. Which is fine with me. I'm a big fan of the Second Amendment.
It is, however, horrifying to watch goons threaten to assassinate the President of the United States and get away with it. Make no mistake: guns don't have anything to do with healthcare. This is a revival of Klannism. A black man is president, and the good ol' boys don't like it. That's what this is about: putting him in his place. Which, if they or someone they inspire has their way, will be six feet under.
God. The smirks those turds wear! Run a Google Image search on "Klansmen" or "lynching." Same ones.
(Doubt this is about race? Bill Clinton's 1993 healthcare proposal would have gone farther than Obama's. And he wasn't nearly as popular. Yet he didn't face gun-toting loons at his public appearances.)
John Lott of Fox News says the liberal media is making a big deal out of nothing. "A story about an American with a gun who behaved properly is twisted into something else: a narrative about crazy conservatives who want to threaten the president," he argues, too clever by half. But the right-wing media doesn't even try to explain what place guns have in the healthcare debate. These are crazy conservatives who want to threaten the president.
Obamaites' reactions have been breathtakingly blazé. "There are laws that govern firearms that are done state or locally," Press Secretary Robert Gibbs replied to a reporter's question about the gunmen stalking his boss. "Those laws don't change when the president comes to your state or locality."
Federal laws do change. Kody Ray Brittingham, who faces five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 under Title 18, Section 871 of the United States Code for threatening Obama—thinks a lot about that fact nowadays. "We take all threats against the President and other high officials of the United States very seriously," said the U.S. attorney prosecuting the case against the 20-year-old soldier, who said he planned to shoot Obama—but never made any move to do so. "The threat itself represents a disruption of the United States Government, even if no actual attempt is made to carry out the threat."
That was just six months ago.
Why doesn't the Obama Administration want the gunmen taken in for questioning and investigated? He wouldn't even have to file charges. Habeas corpus is gone, eliminated by Bush. Obama's "indefinite detention" continues Bush's policy. These town hall terrorists could be declared enemy combatants and bundled off to Bagram with the stroke of a pen. If ever there were a reason for suspending civil rights, this is it.
Perhaps Obama's team doesn't think gunmen a block or two away from a Secret Service perimeter is a big deal. Maybe the White House has made a political call: better to gamble the life of the president than to risk antagonizing the gun lobby.
They should rethink.
Arthur Schlesinger's classic book "A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House" describes how an atmosphere of violence can contribute to the death of a president:
In late October 1963, former vice presidential candidate and then U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Adlai Stevenson "had gone to Dallas for a meeting…The next day handbills with photographs of the President of the United States—full-face an profile—were scattered around Dallas: 'WANTED FOR TREASON. THIS MAN is wanted for treasonous activities against the United States,' followed by a scurrilous bill of particulars."
What follows reads like last week's news reports about town hall meetings on healthcare: "That evening…While Adlai spoke, there was hooting and heckling, placards and flags were waved, and noisemakers set off. When the police removed one of the agitators from the hall, Stevenson, with customary poise, said, 'For my part, I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.' At the close he walked through a jostling crowd of pickets to his car. A woman screamed at him, and he stopped for a moment to calm her down. The mob closed in on him. Another woman crashed a sign down on his head. A man spat at him."
Schlesinger didn't claim that JFK was killed by a right-wing anti-U.N. protester. Instead, he wrote, "The fundamentalist religious background of many of its inhabitants had instilled a self-righteous absolutism of thought…[Dallas] was a city of violence and hysteria, and its atmosphere was bound to affect people who were already weak, suggestible, and themselves filled with chaos and hate."
Four weeks later, a weak-minded, eminently suggestible man shot President Kennedy to death.
"Supporters of the Second Amendment ought to find another way to send their message," editorialized The Washington Post. It was a typical, reasoned, pointless stance. But it's too late now to call for common sense and self-control. Now that extreme right racists have made a splash, they're only going to double down.
Obama's approach may be a brave one, but it's not his to take. As a recent headline put it, the presidency belongs to all of us. Like JFK, Obama's assassination would lead to a host of tragic consequences, not least in the area of race relations. And what about the more likely danger, a repeat of the Greensboro massacre, when right-wing thugs shot leftists at a rally?
Existing gun laws weren't written with death threats to public officials in mind. Anyone who shows up armed at a forum where a public official or political candidate is due to appear ought to be detained—and possibly prosecuted.
(Ted Rall, President of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, is author of the books "To Afghanistan and Back" and "Silk Road to Ruin.")
COPYRIGHT 2009 TED RALL
No wonder President Obama won't stand up for us. He won't even defend his personal safety!
Two weeks ago, a right-wing man protested outside the president's healthcare meeting in New Hampshire wearing a gun strapped to his leg. Lest we miss his point, he carried a sign that called for the shedding of blood in a new revolution.
A week later, a dozen men appeared outside Obama's appearance in Phoenix brandishing loaded guns. "We will forcefully resist people imposing their will on us through the strength of the majority with a vote," said one, who carried an AR-15 military-style automatic rifle. You read that right—they threatened to use guns to annul the results of the last election.
Cops stood by and watched. The Secret Service did nothing. Strictly speaking, these mooks are allowed to openly carry guns. Which is fine with me. I'm a big fan of the Second Amendment.
It is, however, horrifying to watch goons threaten to assassinate the President of the United States and get away with it. Make no mistake: guns don't have anything to do with healthcare. This is a revival of Klannism. A black man is president, and the good ol' boys don't like it. That's what this is about: putting him in his place. Which, if they or someone they inspire has their way, will be six feet under.
God. The smirks those turds wear! Run a Google Image search on "Klansmen" or "lynching." Same ones.
(Doubt this is about race? Bill Clinton's 1993 healthcare proposal would have gone farther than Obama's. And he wasn't nearly as popular. Yet he didn't face gun-toting loons at his public appearances.)
John Lott of Fox News says the liberal media is making a big deal out of nothing. "A story about an American with a gun who behaved properly is twisted into something else: a narrative about crazy conservatives who want to threaten the president," he argues, too clever by half. But the right-wing media doesn't even try to explain what place guns have in the healthcare debate. These are crazy conservatives who want to threaten the president.
Obamaites' reactions have been breathtakingly blazé. "There are laws that govern firearms that are done state or locally," Press Secretary Robert Gibbs replied to a reporter's question about the gunmen stalking his boss. "Those laws don't change when the president comes to your state or locality."
Federal laws do change. Kody Ray Brittingham, who faces five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 under Title 18, Section 871 of the United States Code for threatening Obama—thinks a lot about that fact nowadays. "We take all threats against the President and other high officials of the United States very seriously," said the U.S. attorney prosecuting the case against the 20-year-old soldier, who said he planned to shoot Obama—but never made any move to do so. "The threat itself represents a disruption of the United States Government, even if no actual attempt is made to carry out the threat."
That was just six months ago.
Why doesn't the Obama Administration want the gunmen taken in for questioning and investigated? He wouldn't even have to file charges. Habeas corpus is gone, eliminated by Bush. Obama's "indefinite detention" continues Bush's policy. These town hall terrorists could be declared enemy combatants and bundled off to Bagram with the stroke of a pen. If ever there were a reason for suspending civil rights, this is it.
Perhaps Obama's team doesn't think gunmen a block or two away from a Secret Service perimeter is a big deal. Maybe the White House has made a political call: better to gamble the life of the president than to risk antagonizing the gun lobby.
They should rethink.
Arthur Schlesinger's classic book "A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House" describes how an atmosphere of violence can contribute to the death of a president:
In late October 1963, former vice presidential candidate and then U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Adlai Stevenson "had gone to Dallas for a meeting…The next day handbills with photographs of the President of the United States—full-face an profile—were scattered around Dallas: 'WANTED FOR TREASON. THIS MAN is wanted for treasonous activities against the United States,' followed by a scurrilous bill of particulars."
What follows reads like last week's news reports about town hall meetings on healthcare: "That evening…While Adlai spoke, there was hooting and heckling, placards and flags were waved, and noisemakers set off. When the police removed one of the agitators from the hall, Stevenson, with customary poise, said, 'For my part, I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.' At the close he walked through a jostling crowd of pickets to his car. A woman screamed at him, and he stopped for a moment to calm her down. The mob closed in on him. Another woman crashed a sign down on his head. A man spat at him."
Schlesinger didn't claim that JFK was killed by a right-wing anti-U.N. protester. Instead, he wrote, "The fundamentalist religious background of many of its inhabitants had instilled a self-righteous absolutism of thought…[Dallas] was a city of violence and hysteria, and its atmosphere was bound to affect people who were already weak, suggestible, and themselves filled with chaos and hate."
Four weeks later, a weak-minded, eminently suggestible man shot President Kennedy to death.
"Supporters of the Second Amendment ought to find another way to send their message," editorialized The Washington Post. It was a typical, reasoned, pointless stance. But it's too late now to call for common sense and self-control. Now that extreme right racists have made a splash, they're only going to double down.
Obama's approach may be a brave one, but it's not his to take. As a recent headline put it, the presidency belongs to all of us. Like JFK, Obama's assassination would lead to a host of tragic consequences, not least in the area of race relations. And what about the more likely danger, a repeat of the Greensboro massacre, when right-wing thugs shot leftists at a rally?
Existing gun laws weren't written with death threats to public officials in mind. Anyone who shows up armed at a forum where a public official or political candidate is due to appear ought to be detained—and possibly prosecuted.
(Ted Rall, President of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, is author of the books "To Afghanistan and Back" and "Silk Road to Ruin.")
COPYRIGHT 2009 TED RALL
Labels: Barack Obama, Right
posted by Ted Rall at
12:01 AM
33 Comments:
With President Obama's relaxed attitude about the gun-toters at his town hall meetings, I realize that my "There are no longer words to describe it" road-to-doom attitude can actually go to a lower level where I thought there just couldn't be a lower level or a worse-case scenario. But here we are! A sitting President inviting armed gun nuts to get as close as possible to his personal space, BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT VIOLATING THE GUN LAWS OF THEIR STATES!
Our country has a tradition of killing good leaders and allowing the seriously-dangerous ones to live out their pathetic, criminal lives in taxpayer-funded Pleasantville. When my city of birth legally elected our first Black Mayor by an overwhelming majority of votes, the sick, perverted, bigoted scum of society freely and openly shared their bile, predicting all kinds of disasters (that never came about) as a result of having a Black man in office.
Scum like George W. Bush whose base is always greed-motivated couldn't care less how many of our young adults are killed and disabled in their vanity wars. And you'd think at least they'd support better benefits for the disabled Veterans and their families, widows and orphans. Dream on! These greedy throwbacks to pond scum can only think of their own worthless skins.
That's why, in view of President Obama's and his secret-service protectors' current apathy about gun nuts on the perimeter at town hall meetings, we are doomed. I thought Bush would have iced the deal. But no, we have to get the coup de grace from a wet noodle Democrat! We are doomed! Get your hangmans nooses ready, but by all means, do NOT allow political correctionists to see the rope in your possession. Not a one of them could possibly imagine your noose is for anything but demonstrating hate for Black Americans. The times they are a-doomed, we are doomed, bend over and kiss your own and your neighbors' asses goodbye. I can see it if Barack Obama was Steven Seagal, but he isn't. It's nearly all over. Go fishing. Kiss your dog goodbye. Drive your hybrid vehicle full-speed into an overpass abutment. Maureen Down said Bush is intelligent! We have seen the enemy and it is us.
Ted, have you even seen a picture of man in Arizona who carried the gun? He's AFRICAN-AMERICAN, as the footage from CNN has clearly shown, so how is that Klannism?
Maybe some people don't appreciate having a coke using, Islamic, illegal alien, Alinskyite, mental midget, liar as a President?
Anon 8/25/09 12:17 PM - Uncle Ruckus from The Boondocks? Clayton Bigsby from Chappelle's Show?
Yes, those are fictional characters, but the truth is stranger than fiction.
You couldn't be more right about the consequences of an Obama assassination. Can anybody say Helter Skelter? And the Race War has its proponents on all sides, so I really don't see how the race of ONE protester really matters, Anon 12:17.
"He's AFRICAN-AMERICAN"
nope
The Larouche crowd was out today with their Obama/Nazi signs at my local Post Office in New Jersey. I wonder if this is like the way it felt in Berlin.
Anon 12:17,
That was my exact reaction the man was an African American! However, in the news (msnbc) they showed the video of the African American with an AR-15 and then the commentators said, "Oh no that's not it. There was another white man with one. I guess we didn't get footage of it."
That's where I see Ted coming from too. I usually agree with him but this time I don't. It's actually kind of ironic that a lot of ex-Klans men (old Klan, '60s Klan) I have met in my time in the ex-Klan state (Indiana) actually voted and support Obama.
Then there are those that believe that Obama is ushering some sort of Jewish conspiracy. Idiots will claim anything and everything under the sun. Such as Obama is a socialist, a Nazi, a communist. The funny part about the latter three words is that they were buzz words floated by politicians that they didn't define and threw around. None of the idiots who are using the words know even the basic elements of any theory.
One of the reasons that you can tell they don't know anything is that they like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and VA benefits. All forms of government controlled socialist care. However, they hate "socialism."
I think a minor portion of the people out there are really and honestly ulteriorly motivated by race and race alone. I think they are dumb and they believe anything other people say no matter how dumb it sounds. The Republican have to back major pharma and major health insurers so they are going to do everything to kill this bill by flooding a lot of negative and incorrect information. That's the entire point. Also with people like Glen Beck asking for violent revolution it's honestly not helping.
> Maybe some people don't appreciate having a coke using, Islamic, illegal alien, Alinskyite, mental midget, liar as a President?
As opposed to the coke using, fundamentalist, over-privileged plutocratic mental midget and liar we had previously? Yeah, probably so, even if half of what you said WAS true.
LOL@ Anon 3:57. I bet you voted for the last coke-using, draft-dodging AWOL mental midget liar. I do think Obama ass-kisses the worthless gutter religion of Islam a bit too much, but how is your (I'm assuming) bullshit fairytale any better? And ALL politicians are "Alinskyites" these days. What balls you have, "Anonymous".
Angelo, if you and Bob De Niro are Italian-Americans, how in Heaven's name is Barry O not an African-American? He can even tell what part of the continent his African parent came from!
Shocking display of a loonie Klansmen on the loose.
Oh, well, better luck next time I google. Though I suspect I spotted a bona fide wingnut up that stage.
Maybe some of them were Democrats, I give you Maurice Schwenkler:
Caught smashing 11 windows at Democratic Party headquarters. ObamaCare supporter, paid by SEIU front group Colorado Citizen's Coalition.
Good column, but you couldn't bother coming up with different title than Frank Rich?
I chalk this up as a lost opportunity. I could have shown up at all those Bush-bashes and Iraq War protests armed to the teeth! But instead I played the good pacifist and left my guns at home.
Also, I was concerned that the police would shoot me on sight. Now I realize that the supporters of George W. Bush, the Secret Service and the local riot police would have quietly respected my right to bear arms.
Gee, he sure looks black to me...
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/08/18/obama.protest.rifle/#cnnSTCVideo
You don't seriously believe the JFK assassination was an impulsive act stirred up by the political climate in Dallas? Do you know anything about Oswald's background?
The Larouche crowd was out today with their Obama/Nazi signs at my local Post Office in New Jersey. I wonder if this is like the way it felt in Berlin.
You don't need to travel back to Berlin, only to a bunch of leftist protesters. What's a matter, you don't like being called Nazis (National SOCIALIST Party)? Get used to it.
Incitatus,
I am in favor of universal health care, and thus I am against Obama's "health reform".
This whole so-called "health care debate" is nothing but a smoke screen designed to distract the American from the one and only true health reform, and that is UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE FOR ALL!!!
Futhermore, Incitatus, if that so-called Marine living in Outer Armpit, Nebraska wants to keep his crappy health insurance, then he's welcome to it.
As for me, I'm going to work for universal health care right here in NYC, like they have in San Francisco. I refuse to live in the third world country that Limbaugh and Obama alike wish to create for me.
Susan,
Aside from your condescending arrogance of someone from Nebraska, everyone will loose their private health care.Having private health insurance will be against the law:
When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee.
It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of “Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage,” the “Limitation On New Enrollment” section of the bill clearly states:
“Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day” of the year the legislation becomes law.
So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won’t be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers.
Hey Susan,
How is that universal health care working in Hawaii and Massachusetts?
Hawaii Ends Universal Child Health Care 7 Months After Start
Hospitals in Hawaii report $150 million in ’07 losses
Gov. Linda Lingle’s administration cited budget shortfalls and other available health care options for eliminating funding for the program. A state official said families were dropping private coverage so their children would be eligible for the subsidized plan.
...the costs of the reform for the state (MA) have been formidable. Spending for the Commonwealth Care subsidized program has doubled, from $630 million in 2007 to an estimated $1.3 billion for 2009, which is not sustainable.
incitatus,
I am only italian-american in so far as I have both Italian and American citizenship. I imagine the same could go for Bobby.
Not sure if O'bama retains his Irish citizenship...
Anyways, Anonymous poster No.29339338828384 was talking about the guy at the rally with the weapon.
There's a possibility that some of these people are false flags. I wouldn't normally think that, but the fact that the secret service is *allowing* them to do such things suggests it to me.
How is that universal health care working in Hawaii and Massachusetts?
They are shitty plans. Rather than these capitol-friendly state plans, we'd do well to liquidate the insurance companies and start a national single payer system.
Anon 12:06,
As I said before, I don't support Obama's "health reform", I support universal health care.
Anon 3:47,
Hawaii doesn't have universal health care per se, they have a system where employers pay a good chunk of of Hawaii's health care.
What I mean by universal health care is what they have in Canada and Western European nations. These systems are not perfect, but everybody is basically covered.
Susan, trust me, a third-world cannot be created by government action (and I have a lot of "confidence" in government's ill effects), but it damn sure can keep a country in that state for a long time.
What exactly does create a "third-world," Incitatus?
I'd say international commerce is the prime culprit. See Darwin's Nightmare for a perfect illustration of my point. There's plently of fish in Lake Victoria to feed the natives, buy they starve as it is shipped off to Europe. Sure, governments are involved in this theft, but it's international capital driving the system...
The Second Amendment says, in its entirety: "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Got that? A well regulated militia. This means that packing a rod is not an inalienable right. In fact, the Supreme Court ruled as such unanimously as far back as 1939. Today, however, the Supreme Court is a wholly owned subsidiary of gop, inc, and thus there will not be any significant restrictions on gun ownership in my lifetime. That's why, when massacres keep occurring we must stretch and stretch to find a scapegoat, films, video games, immigrants, etc., instead of the real culprit, fearmongering to a dangerously undereducated and gullible public.
To clarify my last post: nothing that I wrote should imply that I believe that anything the "Framers" thought should be sacrosanct.
1th: Our country has a tradition of killing good leaders".
Then Obama should be very safe.
2nd: Mrs. Obama stated in a public speech recently (see Youtube for video)refered to Kenya as her husbands home country and in another early video refered to Kenya as her husbands birth country. Her words, her mouth on video.
Referring to Obama's health care plan, ask a citizen from up north how that works for them. Need a MRI? Get in line. There are more MRI machines in Kansas City then there are in all of Canada. Need open heart surgery? GET IN LINE! Remember the Prime Minister coming to America for heart surgery? "I could have used my position to get to the head of the line, but I choose to come to America instead."
Line?
"We will forcefully resist people imposing their will on us through the strength of the majority with a vote,"
Where does this statement mean they plan to assassinate the Prez? And Klanlike? The group also had black men included that were armed also.
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