Jack & Jill Politics

(Video above: Roger Ailes’ history of race-baiting) As you know, we’ve been tracking this trend at JJP for some time and have expressed concern that the GOP and the mainstream media is winking at right wing extremism. JJPer Casey Gane-McCalla has a great analysis on the rise of Neo-Cons, Neo-Nazis and Neo-McVeighs on the right — and the risk to minorities in the U.S. It’s a must read. I found the failure of the mainstream media to label Joe Stack, who flew his plane into an IRS building on purpose, as a classic Neo-McVeigh right wing terrorist troubling indeed. Like it’s “understandable” that someone would be “upset” at the government. Um, what if Joe Stack had been black and the IRS employee who lost his life on the job had been white? How would that have played out in the media? The economic situation for African-Americans is dire indeed with unemployment at near-Great Depression levels in many communities, yet I don’t think you’d see many black folks defending terrorism in any form on teevee, like Rep. King or Stack’s own daughter who brazenly called him a “hero”. The Tea Party is rife with Neo-McVeighs with teabaggers being the same demographic as Joe Stack: white, middle-aged, upper middle class & conservative.

Here’s more information on the growth of extremism on the right from ThinkProgress:

A new report by the Southern Poverty Law Center has unearthed shocking data about the rise of militias, antigovernment groups, and other right-wing extremist groups. The report, titled “Rage on the Right,” has found that there has been an increase of 244 percent in the number of these extremist groups in 2009:

The number of extremist groups in the United States exploded in 2009 as militias and other groups steeped in wild, antigovernment conspiracy theories exploited populist anger across the country and infiltrated the mainstream, according to a report issued today by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

Antigovernment “Patriot” groups – militias and other extremist organizations that see the federal government as their enemy – came roaring back to life over the past year after more than a decade out of the limelight.

The SPLC documented a 244 percent increase in the number of active Patriot groups in 2009. Their numbers grew from 149 groups in 2008 to 512 groups in 2009, an astonishing addition of 363 new groups in a single year. Militias – the paramilitary arm of the Patriot movement – were a major part of the increase, growing from 42 militias in 2008 to 127 in 2009.

Early last year, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned about the rise of “rightwing extremism in the United States,” sparking an uproar among many on the right who derided DHS’s warning as merely “paranoid accusations of liberal bloggers.”

The biggest antigovernment Patriot rightwing extremist group happens to be Fox News IMHO. Roger Ailes, Fox News Chairman and CEO, is quoted as saying that the White House has “legitimate complaints” and that the network is “the Alamo” in terms of challenging the Obama administration “until the last shot is fired.”

Um…say what now? The ALAMO??! How disturbing is that? I think that the unpatriotic and revolutionary stance of Fox News, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Michelle Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh, Ron Paul and the Tea Party Movement must not go unwatched or unnoticed. These people are dangerous in their words, deeds and aspirations which in some cases may end up crossing over form First Amendment territory into treasonous incitement to overthrow our government. Or at a minimum, mere incitement of violence of the sort perpetrated by Joe Stack. The race-baiting and attacks on the Obama Administration as socialists, communists, racists, fascists — these are connected. DHS and DOJ — heads up. Is it time to start cracking down?