The myth of the new hatred

Many liberals are trying to promote the narrative that negative political rhetoric has reached a new low with attacks on Obama.  They hope that if they say it often enough, it will sink into the scenery as the way things are.

It’s an absurd claim.

Folks, we’re nowhere near the level of frenzied rancor and sadistic abuse that was directed toward George W. Bush.  Moreover, as a wise person notes, the occasional extremist/hateful sentiment directed toward Obama comes from the ordinary citizen.  The Bush hatred came from huge piles of ordinary citizens, but it also came from political, social, and cultural leaders.  It was simply the way things were then.

I’ve assembled a few quotes and items for those of you who would believe that we really have crossed a new, terrible, nasty threshold with anti-Obama rhetoric:

Remember when CBS talk show host Craig Kilborn showed Bush giving a speech, and put the graphic “SNIPERS WANTED” on the screen?

Betty Williams is a Nobel Peace Prize winner.  Know what she said?  “I have a very hard time with this word ‘non-violence,’ because I don’t believe that I am non-violent. . . . Right now, I would love to kill George Bush.”

Have you read Checkpoint?  I haven’t either.  Go click that link and see what it’s about and when it was published.  Can you imagine such a thing now?

While you’re over there, have a look at Death of a President.  Same question.

Know what Charles Brooker wrote just before the 2004 election?  “The world will endure four more years of idiocy, arrogance and unwarranted bloodshed, with no benevolent deity to watch over and save us. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr. — where are you now that we need you?”

“Or I could have gone to 1600 Pennsylvania and killed the real bird with one stone.” – John Kerry

In 2006, the New York comptroller, Alan Hevesi, spoke to graduating students at Queens College. He said that his fellow Democrat, Senator Charles Schumer, would “put a bullet between the president’s eyes if he could get away with it.”

Man, how about those elected officials?  Quoting Jay Nordlinger’s piece “All Wee-Weed Up,” in the September 21 issue of National Review:

Some Democrats — Pelosi, Barney Frank — have been upset that town-hall protesters have brought up the Nazis, when talking about Obamacare and such. Do they remember the Bush years at all — when comparisons to the Nazis were ubiquitous and incessant? “Bushitler” became a routine term. Former senator John Glenn, objecting to Republican campaign rhetoric, said, “It’s the old Hitler business.” Al Gore said that the Bush administration was “unleash[ing] squadrons of digital brownshirts.” Julian Bond, as chairman of the NAACP, said of the Bushies, “Their idea of equal rights is the American flag and the Confederate swastika flying side by side.” Rep. Keith Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota, compared 9/11 to the Reichstag fire. In a long list of epithets, Garrison Keillor, the National Public Radio favorite, called Republicans “brownshirts in pinstripes.” Etc., etc.

All y’all just get back to me when you find language like this about Obama from such prominent figures, okay?

There are plenty of other places to call absurdity on this, i.e. “dissent is the highest form of patriotism” and so forth, but I’ll stop here.

I trust you see how ridiculous it is to suggest that we have a new low in attacks on Obama.  When Bush was in office, it was far, far beyond rank and file with obnoxious posters and shirts.  It was acceptable—even fashionable—for prominent people to fantasize about his assassination, and to wax practically erotically about the Third Reich, and their stooges lapped it up.

(And before you dash off a spittle-flecked comment to tell me how much Bush’s policies really were like the Third Reich, you better be sure Obama the Wise isn’t continuing whatever you’re so “wee-weed up” about.  PATRIOT Act, anyone?  How’s that Guantanamo closure coming?)

If you’re an Obama supporter and you think your guy’s getting it worse than anyone ever has, you are wrong.

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