Nothing to see here, nothing at all
by digby
Amanda Terkel has a nice primer on all the right wing violence that’s sprung up during this campaign which includes all the incidents you know about and some you may not.
But this surprised even me:
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, last year, hate groups stayed at record levels, and “anti-immigrant vigilante groups” soared by nearly 80 percent. The largest, jump, however, came from so-called “patriot” groups, made up of militias and other groups that distrust the federal government and believe its plotting to impose a “one-world government.” Those rose 244 percent in 2009, going from 149 groups to 512.
I can’t even imagine what 2010’s brought. I suspect that it will calm down once we get a legitimate right wing Republican majority and president as the founders intended. But it’s always possible that someone will get impatient.
And why is this happening?
Potok attributes the rise to three factors: 1) The change in racial demographics in the country, with Obama as the apotheosis of this fact, 2) anger over the rough economy, and 3) the mainstreaming of “demonizing propaganda and conspiracy theories,” encouraged by the likes of Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, and Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.)
That’s much too shrill. Everyone knows that there is no racial component to any of this and that Glenn Beck and his cronies are just speaking out for an oppressed minority. Besides, until somebody blows up a building or beheads someone, there no reason to get all paranoid and silly.
Still, it’s interesting on a sociological level, don’t you think?
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