Sleaze

His soul goes marching on: Tailgunner Joe (Joe McCarthy), alcoholic slanderer who loved to accuse people of treason

It's always a dilemma about citing real extremist or hate-site information. Are you giving them too much publicity? Or are you recognizing that certain poisonous viewpoints are way more influential than they should be and putting them into some context?

I don't know. But I'm going to cite a post that qualifies as both extremist and hate-mongering from Tanker Brothers, one of the better-known "milblogs": "Congressional Treason" 02/17/07. This is in response to the overwhelming vote of the House of Representatives yesterday against the McCain escalation that Cheney and Bush are currently implementing in Iraq. For news on the actual event, see Pelosi's Gambit Succeeds - House Rebukes Bush on Iraq by Marc Sandalow San Francisco Chronicle 02/17/07.

The poster, "Brat" frames the criticism as an e-mail he received that supposedly quotes someone else. I don't know why this "I received this from some anonymous source quoting some other anonymous source" type thing seems to be so attractive the rightwingers. Go figure. But here's Anonymous quoting Anonymous:

So America what do we do?!!!Because of treasonous self interested media and politicians, radicals across the globe just sit in wait.following from a marine mom:

Today is an extremely sad, disappointing and maddening day in America. The majority of the Congress of the United States has committed treason. With a single vote against the President of the United States, our Commander in Chief, it has given "aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States."

Of course, it's nothing new that there are people out there clutching old John Birch Society pamphlets and obsessing about how to preserve their precious bodily fluids.

What's different about today is that the national Republican party promotes exactly this kind of sleaze. And they have a huge noise machine, from OxyContin radio to FOX News, to promote it.

I do think we need to recognize what perspective this represents: patiotism in the sense of Anonymous and Anonymous-via-Anonymous just quoted is supporting the Republican Party line on war. It has nothing to do with loving the country, "honoring the troops" or defending the Constitution and democracy. Those who support the Party line are "patriotic"; those who don't are "traitors".

Stright-up rightwing sleaze, in other words.

Tags: authoritarianism, iraq war, republican party