Site was down for a couple of hours due to server troubles, apparently resolved. Here’s a belated link to the new cartoon, the topic of which you can probably guess.
Meanwhile
Just read this by Roy Edroso. I value Roy’s writing immensely, and you probably do too (and if you don’t, chances are it’s only because you’re not familiar with him yet). Anyway one of Roy’s friends is conducting an Edrosothon, and you are all strongly encouraged to donate. For those who don’t bother to click thru on links (which is entirely understandable, given how many links are thrown at you every time you turn on the computing machine), please note that this isn’t just your standard “blogger wants to score some bucks” fundraiser — Roy’s apparently had a run of luck, with not so much of the good kind, and could seriously use a hand here. And if he’s too proud to ask for it himself, then fuck him — send him some scratch anyway, in spite of his crotchety old self.
Weird
Writing in Slate, Jack Shafer argues in favor of extreme political rhetoric by claiming
The great miracle of American politics is that although it can tend toward the cutthroat and thuggish, it is almost devoid of genuine violence outside of a few scuffles and busted lips now and again. With the exception of Saturday’s slaughter, I’d wager that in the last 30 years there have been more acts of physical violence in the stands at Philadelphia Eagles home games than in American politics.
I guess no one has told him about Oklahoma City, or the murder of George Tiller (adding: or any of the other abortion providers killed or assaulted within the last thirty years). Or the would-be Tides foundation killer, or the guy who flew the plane into the IRS building, or the guy who shot up a progressive church in 2008, or the neo-Nazi who killed three cops because he feared “the Obama gun ban,” or the neo-Nazi who shot up the Holocaust Museum, or the anti-tax lunatic who took three people hostage at a Virginia post office, or the anti-government guy with the apartment full of pipe bombs who was arrested after accidentally blowing up his own hand, or the Truther who opened fire on cops at the Pentagon, or the guy arrested on the Mall two months ago with “a .223 caliber rifle, a .243 caliber rifle barrel, a .22 caliber rifle, a .357 caliber pistol, several boxes of ammunition, and propane tanks wired to four car batteries in his truck and trailer.”
To name a few.
(More examples of violence in both rhetoric and reality in this timeline of the past two years, linked earlier.)
Or maybe we’re defining political violence so narrowly as to exclude all of the above. I genuinely don’t know.
The stupid, it burns
Sarah Palin’s people now say those weren’t crosshairs on the ad targeting Democrats, they were surveyor’s symbols, inspiring much amusement on Twitter and elsewhere. As @lippard notes, “You remember how the map was described — ‘survey the landscape for a 2010 win.'” Clearly that’s why she scrubbed her Tweets and website — you know how controversial those surveyor’s symbols are.
And of course the right wing bloggers are doing what they always do — as my friend @barryeisler sums it up, “Deny everything, admit nothing, make counteraccusations.” Which reminded me of this cartoon from 2005 …
Pervasive
The culture of political violence has become so commonplace in this country, we almost don’t notice it anymore, until yet another lunatic with a weapon makes it impossible to ignore. Via Digby, this astonishing timetable of violent rhetoric and political violence over the past two years is a must-read.