Who’s More Violent in American Politics Today?
In my unprofessional opinion, judging by videos created by Jared Laughner and anecdotal evidence, I believe, he had psychological issues. What the pathology is, I don’t know. If this were true, how does this impact the situation?
The rhetoric about the state of this nation’s government seems to come from two basic sides.
- One is what I believe to be propaganda that asserts that the nation is being taken over by Communists.
- The other, that our government is controlled by a small percentage of the population that have access and influence because of their wealth. More specifically, multi-national corporate power.
My view is the latter.
Can you see a common denominator? I would suggest, the loss of visibility, voice and influence by those outside the perceived circle of control and for many, a sense of growing fear and frustration; a sense of alienation.
This alienation manifests itself in many different ways depending on the temperament of the individual. The motivating force, or at least a prime mover, is, I believe, fear. The prevailing sentiment is that the ideological Left and Right deal with their fears and frustrations in different ways.
In my opinion, the incessant propagation of the “Communist takeover of government by an alien, racist negro” meme, is a smoke screen to distract from the real problem, corporate influence. In other words, it’s a lie. There is no Communist party movement, no Red Party movement armed and angry.
How does this relate to Jared Laughner? This young man was responding to a threat that doesn’t exist and is wholly fabricated to marginalize and frustrate the connection of the People to their government. While he may be of an unstable mental state, his response need never have happened.
This rhetoric comes, not from a Liberal media bent on taking down a capitalist system so we can all be Communists but rather by a corporate media system that is seeking the highest possible cash profits at any expense. A free society is going to have many, many varying levels of mental stability within its populace and the occasional tragedy occurs. This is not a perfect world. But perhaps in this case responsible sane people should have behaved better. Unfortunately, in America at this point in time, sanity doesn’t increase ratings and the bottom line.
Again, what’s my point? This massacre as well as others since Barack Obama’s election are the result of hyperbolic, incendiary, couched and blatant violent rhetoric from the right. In my opinion, when a right wing subject is frustrated, fearful and feeling disengaged, they more readily resort to violence as a remedy. I ask you to review the assassinations and shootings of politicians and activists in our nation’s recent history. How many right wing assassination victims have there been?
I can’t recall murder sprees by Democrats and Liberals during the hideously unconstitutional and freewheel-spending Bush Cheney years. Refresh my memory. I am fully amenable to admitting I’m wrong about this.
