Two people have been shot at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. The shooter has been identified as James Wenneker von Brunn, a man with ties to various right-wing hate groups. His Web site is here.
At the risk of putting too fine a point on it, we should note that since September 11, 2001, more innocent American citizens have been killed by anti-abortion activists and other fringe right terrorists than by al Qaeda. Oddly, we’re hearing no calls from Republican legislators or party leaders like Rush Limbaugh (or their Vichy Democrat allies) demanding that we invade Coeur d’Alene.
So are we serious about terror or not?
Categories: Politics/Law/Government, Race/Gender, Religion & Philosophy, War/Security
Progressive Culture | Scholars & Rogues 
How do you know they’ve killed more than 3000 since 9/11? Where’s your proof for this? Believe me, no one hates these lunatics more than me but I’d like some proof of your scholarship.
Von Brunn’s website’s been taken down, btw, as was the link to one of his articles in Freeper Land.
I would love to publicize this data, if I can get sources for verification. What data are you using to make this claim and where can I access it?
Oh, I see. Since 9/11/01. OK, that I can believe.
I like the term “Vichy Democrats.” Nice.
I saw the website. He claims to have been a PT boat captain (Lt, USNR) in WWII, which would make him at LEAST 86 years old, assuming he was 22 in 1945. But he also claims a commendation and four battle stars, which would suggest that he was in PT boats during the thick of things, which shoujld make him about 88 or 89. AND, this is assuming he was given command of a PT boat at 22 years of age (a minimum, certainly).
Hmmm.
It says since September 11. I don’t think those deaths are included.
He IS 89. They listed Von Brunn’s year of birth at 1920.
Denice:
I suspect that what Bonesparkle meant is that there have been no Al Qaeda attacks on American soil since 9/11/2001. On the other hand, Dr. Tiller was shot and killed recently and it appears that this attack was by a right-wing nutjob, so it stands to reason that more people in America have died at their hands that at Al Qaeda’s hands since 9/11.
Now, if “American citizens” includes American soldiers, and of course it does, then this is almost certainly not true, since AQ certainly initiated deadly attacks against US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Wow. 89 and still able to shuffle into a public facility with a gun.
JS, a fair question is whether we should define soldiers, marines, airmen, and seamen as “innocent American citizens” or not. If we choose not to include military and security-based independent contractors, the question becomes a little harder to answer.
I’m reasonably confident that there’s data out there for anyone who wants to look for it.
Yeah, the word “innocent” adds and interesting cast to the question, doesn’t it? Are State Department employees working abroad innocent? Are humanitarians working for NGOs?
It’s probably better just to say that the right-wing nutters have killed more people in the US than Al Qaeda since 9/11. That would certainly have to be true.
Sure, the claim can be made that Al Qaeda has caused less deaths since 9/11 but what about Radical Islam? There have been at least four murders that received major attention that were enacted by radical Islamic citizens and more that have only received local coverage. Do we just throw those into the “right wing” group?
What about honor killings? Or are those ok because Sharia law says it’s ok?
I’m not sure that any such data exists that can give us a concrete number of US troops killed by actual al Qaida forces. It’s virtually impossible enough for our troops abroad to make an educated determination as to which are al Qaida, which are Taliban, which are sympathizers, which are offshoots of Al Qaida (al Qaida in Iraq, for instance) which are death squad assassins and which ones are just impoverished farmers fighting our occupation.
I also would think state dept. officials would have to be considered innocent since they don’t have current military training and really aren’t expected to be killed considering they’re guarded by the USMC and Xe (Blackwater).
JPork: I’m almost 100% certain that Bonesparkle doesn’t count battlefield deaths as terror victims.
Stephan: I’m even more certain that criticizing the right for terrorism isn’t the same thing as endorsing Sharia.
I’m denying that this shooting even took place today.
“I’m denying that this shooting even took place today.”
Ooh, that’s low.
Dr. Tiller was a personal friend and former colleague. His daughter is a friend. Believe me when I say I would like to have this data to use against the whack jobs that seem to be crawling out from under every rock of late. However, if we use “iffy” data, we look as bad as the wackos we despise. If this can be quantified or nailed down further, I will use it to the full extent I am able. Someone let me know if you find the source for some firm numbers.
Denice:
As I said, I suspect this was a very simple calculation. There have been no Al Qaeda attacks on US soil since 9/11. There have been at least two right-wingnut murders since then. I think that’s all this article intended to say.
I’m very sorry for your loss.
JS OBrien: I like the term Vichy Democrats too. Weimar Democrats works for me too.
I agree, Denice. And allow me to add my condolences to JS’s for your loss.
Our scholarship regarding facts and figures and everything else has to be impeccable since statistics are such shifty, malleable things, to begin with. And no matter how empirical may be one’s facts and figures, there will always be naysayers who will take exception to it and make their counterargument sound plausible.
But in order to come up with any hardcore, definitive data, we first necessarily must exclude military deaths at the hands of post 9/11 terrorism, which, as I’d said earlier, would be next to possible to quantify, anyway.
jurassicpork and Denice:
Really, folks, I think Bonesparkle was just engaged in comparing deaths in the US from Al Qaeda with deaths in the US from the right-wing mental ward since 9/11. He needed to add “in the US” to make that point. So, I’m pretty sure this wasn’t a data-driven claim, and I’m sure he didn’t spend a lot of time getting his words exactly right.
That’s what I think, too, JS.
Good post and comment thread. The debate about casualties, however, veers away from the discussion we need to have–namely, how we might wage the war on domestic, home-grown terrorists. Denice, I am so sorry for your loss. I’m also concerned that Dr. Tiller’s murder was somehow seen as a green light by other wingnut extremists to lock and load and start picking targets.
I propose the WoT 2.0 be waged with an eye toward dealing with those media wingers who insist on continuing the sort of inflammatory rhetoric that might boost ratings but also send these nuts out of the house armed and dangerous. I saw a post here earlier that addressed this issue and I totally agree that it’s high time to start holding accountable those who don’t just shout fire in a crowded theater, they actually pour out the gas and hand out matches.
At least three attacks by right wingers since 9/11. Don’t forget the nutjob that shot up a Unitarian church because he hated liberals.
O.K. I’m not trying to make this a big deal. Just thought there might be something out there I could use to further my battle for sanity here in the great Heartland Bible Belt. I get the argument. Thanks for the discussion. Send an extra donation to the women’s reproductive health organization of your choice, because access to LEGAL abortion has taken a huge setback. Dr. Tiller’s family has decided to close his clinic permanently. A decision that I totally understand, but is such a loss. And now this tragedy today. What country am I in?
We seem to be paying a bit more of a price for de-regulation than most of us thought, aren’t we? Or is someone out there saying regulating firearms is what caused this latest nutjob to go off his plumbing? The world will be getting harsher and harsher while the Republicans scream their filth and war fodder in trying to get back into power. And, wowee, is Cantor singing “holy, holy” or what?
Soooo, the good God is beating the bad God? Is that what you’re saying? (not including spotting the bad God 3000 or so points, of course)
2 “Japanese” carrying $134 BIL worth of U.S. bonds detained in Italy.
Goin’ Swiss ~
And some of those bonds were in the $500 million variety.
I always wondered about carrying paper across borders, now I know. They should have wired them as there would probably be someone willing to accommodate them.
Jeff
Stop being played. These things are all staged for problem-reaction-solution purposes.
And your reactions are exactly what they wanted….get the wingnuts, protect the Jews, ban the guns!
Ask yourself if a 89 year old rifle totin’, right-wingnut walked into a museum with a rifle and started shooting because he hated Jews….is this story plausible? Yes, but unlikely. Just like the terrorists hating us for our freedom so they decided to go to flight school, buy some box cutters, etc….
I’m sorry, I’m just having a hard time imagining this old man moving around NY with a rifle gunning for Jews at a holocaust museum. He could have shot at people on the street and hit more Jews than at the museum. Why the holocaust museum? Why not the AIPAC offices?
Ask yourself if the FBI and local police would ignore an abortion protester who was caught on surveillance tape (and NAMED) super gluing the locks of an abortion clinic and apparently stalking the place in the week before the Kansas murder.
If it smells like dung, it probably is…no need to taste it.
Uhh, Rick,
I admit I’m a bit slow and can be occasionally manipulated into reacting in ways that serve someone else’s interest. My wife will corroborate, since she often is the beneficiary.
So since I’m a bit slow, what’s your point? Is the 89-year old a conspiracy tool? And who is behind the conspiracy? This inquiring, albeit slow and malleable mind wants to know.
Actually, Von Brunn was from the left, in his own words.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=35192
Jeff
Von Brunn was not, is not now and never will be one of us. We’re not anti-Semites. We don’t advocate kidnapping, shooting and murdering people and we never advanced this conspiracy theory about Obama’s birth certificate.
@jurassicpork,
You might not consider him to be one of y’all, but he considers himself to be one of you. Now you get to see how it feels to get lumped in with people you don’t agree with. Happens to conservatives all the time, so perhaps this will be a learning experience for you.
Speaking of anti-Semites. I’ll bet that most liberals aren’t anti-Semites, but still, most of them are pro-Palestinian. The Obama birth certificate thing was a Hillary thing originally, and I don’t think she’s a conservative.
As for the murder part, liberals do murder. Here’s a few instances.
“1. In July 2007, a liberal anti war liberal shot Senior Airman Jonathan Schrieken in his driveway outside McGuire AFB,
2. In Sept 2007 American Liberal anti war protester Carlos Hartmann , traveled to the Netherlands and killed a young female student on a train platform with an axe, when he could not find a soldier to attack. He was mad about the Netherlands supporting the war in iraq.
3. In June 2009, liberal anti war protester Carlos Bledsoe shot and killed Pvt. William Long and wounded Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula to protest the war.”
None of us are perfect, and one should look in their own backyard first.
Jeff
Generally, a learning experience, my conservative friend, involves getting and digesting hard information, which you have not offered. You and reactionary right wing bloggers had autonomously designated these people as “liberal war protesters”.
Let’s get one thing straight: Liberals don’t believe in killing people. We have a strong and defined enough sense of identity to know what we truly stand for and don’t stand for. In our collective mind, anyone who kills for their cause is not a liberal.
Extreme conservatives like von Brunn, Adkisson, McVeigh and Hal Turner, to cite just a few examples, proudly call for the murder of innocents and even go out and do it themselves. Just because Fred Phelps used to be a registered Democrat doesn’t make him one of us.
But when some whackjob walks into a church in TN and kills two of the people inside because of their tolerance of homosexuals and is found to be in possession of right wing hate literature written by the likes of Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity and Michael Savage, we take it as an article of faith that they’re proudly conservative.
It’s obvious that you’ve gotten your information from Yahoo Answers. In fact, it was copied and pasted directly from that page.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090602172358AAscbnf
In fact, one person provided me with the perfect comeback; “Wow, you have to go back 2 years to find 4 attacks….when I only have to go back 6 months to find several attacks by ‘christian conservatives’.”
A final postscript on the Hartmann murder: The Dutch newspaper Telegraff said that Hartmann came from a right wing family in which Mein Kampf was standard reading fare. As with you, I have no proof of this but this is what I heard and has to be taken with as big a grain of salt as your assertion that he was some wild-eyed liberal extremist.
As for Carlos Bledsoe’s recent murder of Pvt. Long, the only people who seem to be calling him “liberal” are other right wingers such as you. He has not been tied to any affiliation other than his recent conversion to the Nation of Islam
As for Airman Schrieken, his shooting was not a fatality and his assailant, Matthew J. Marren, has also not been linked to any left wing, progressive organization. Just because a mentally ill man fancies himself a war protester and shoots a military person doesn’t make him a liberal. We generally have higher standards than that and to assume that all one need do is to call oneself a war protester to become one of us if, frankly, insulting.
Virtually all the right wingers who have been committing mayhem in our nation’s churches and elsewhere are either consumers of right wing hate literature or actual purveyors of it. Therefore, it’s a lot easier to tie them to right wing extremists than your three pathetic examples can be tied to liberal war protesters. So take that back to your own backyard, my conservative friend.
Hey, I could make a very sound and logical case that Hitler was a liberal, but won’t as I don’t wish to shatter your illusions.
As for copying and pasting from yahoo, I did put that part in quotation marks indicating it wasn’t from me. I guess that nobody here would ever cut and paste and that’s just another one of my conservative weaknesses and lack of intellectual rigor.
Jeff
Well, you prove your “lack of intellectual rigor” that by not proving your case that these three men were “liberal war protesters.”
And, I for one, would absolutely LOVE to hear your theory as to how Hitler was a liberal when Nazis, as everyone knows, were and still are hard line right wingers.
If you had any intellectual rigor yourself, you’d read Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom”
I didn’t know I had to prove that liberal guys who killed people were murderers. But, I guess whatever state school you attended from provided you with plenty of smarts .
By the way, on your blog, you ought to stop beating up on Bush, as he’s old news.
When one says, “Everyone knows,” that makes me ask questions as the general public is usually wrong, especially where Nazi politics are concerned.
Um, “Nazis” were socialists…or at least claimed socialism in their party name. The nationalism part might have ended up outweighing the socialist part, but not before it gave us “the people’s car” and such. Is socialism left wing? How about Communism? I mean Stalin never really killed anyone, he was just making omelets.
It seems to me that President Obama has ordered a number of killings…though it could be argued that he’s no liberal. Madelaine Albright once said that killing 500,000 Iraqis was “worth it” (what it was she never really clarified), and since her liberal boss never disavowed the statement we can deduce that he agreed.
One thing that the extremes of the political spectrum share is a strong belief in their own righteousness and innocence as explanation for their actions…no matter how depraved.
Mostly the Nazis claimed socialist as part of their party name. NSDAP (the official Nazi part name) stood for National Socialist Democratic Peoples Party. As my fascism/Nazism prof said in college, the Nazis were neither socialist nor democratic and only slightly for the people (their people, sure, but not those other people….), but 2 out of 5 wasn’t too bad.
Not the best joke, but a point I came to agree with over the course of the class.
Lex,
Suffice it to say that Socialism would probably not be considered to be on the right of the political spectrum.
Why is it that liberals delude themselves into thinking that they’re not capable of murder?
You’re right about the extremes of the spectrum having the righteous attitude.
That book I mentioned earlier by Hayek is a gem and should be read by everyone. Also, Nock should be a study requirement for everyone. His ideas have appeal to both sides, and his concept of affability is wonderful. We need more affable people around these type of sites, even disagreements would be handled in a civilized manner.
Jeff
Watson, you haven’t proved shit as regards liberals killing people. I never said that we weren’t capable of murder, just that we’re far less susceptible to succumb to those barbaric urges than you conservatives. But the bottom line is that you still haven’t proven your case.
Trying to graft today’s liberals to the Nazi party of olde is automatically doomed to failure because you’re trying to graft an old European political rubric to a newer American one. In fact, just in our country, the very definitions for what’s liberal and conservative and what’s Republican and Democratic have undergone paradigm shifts in the last three decades.
And one of the most fallacious arguments on the far right is to ask aloud (as several right wing bloggers have. I’ve checked), “Was Hitler a liberal?” Hitler was a faux populist “reformer” who nonetheless exhibited the foundational characteristics of today’s American right wingers- collusion with industry (including Bush’s grandfather, Prescott, who benefited from Nazi death camp slave labor), disrespect for the judiciary, disrespect for the rights of the people (Enabling Act=US PATRIOT Act), a paranoid lashing out toward critics and rivals… The list goes on.
And, no, I WON’T leave Bush alone any more than Cindy Sheehan would. The man needs to pay for his war crimes as do Cheney, Rove and that whole rancid Reich.
And you, sir need to go back to school and study. You’re not as smart as you think you are, and this touchy feely liberal thing you have going on is just a facade, as you have serious anger issues. Speaking of proving statements, you said,
“Von Brunn was not, is not now and never will be one of us. We’re not anti-Semites. We don’t advocate kidnapping, shooting and murdering people and we never advanced this conspiracy theory about Obama’s birth certificate.”
Rather broad statement…,..prove it.
The thing is you just don’t get it. No idea how the world really works, just how you “wish” it would be, if only someone would give you something that you didn’t work for.
I find you boring, and will not continue this any longer. I realize that I’m arguing with someone who probably was beaten up on the playground as a kid a lot. For that, I’m sorry, but I won’t be your whipping boy. You remind me of that old whack job, Savantster who used to give circular arguments until he was blue in the face. I won’t waste any more time on you or this thread. I will stop by your blog(and encourage all my friends to), as I find it most interesting to see how a naive person navigates around the shoals of life. In fact, I will add you to my blogroll. I have noticed you have a donate button on your free blog…are you kidding…..what a parasite.
What I find truly frightening about you, Watson, is that no matter what time of the day or night that I post a response to your ignorant drivelings, you always offer a riposte within so few minutes that I doubt you’ve given yourself the time to adequately parse my text. Do you quiver sitting before your monitor, clicking that “Check Mail” button every few seconds?
Since you’re the one who insisted that liberals were just as likely to kill as you right wingers, it isn’t incumbent on me to prove anything, especially when the weight of empirical evidence is on my side. The burden of proof is on you and you have utterly, completely failed to do such and now you’re angry at me for having exposed you for the fraud you are.
You’re also contradicting yourself. First you say I have bored you (facts often are, unfortunately) then you say you have blogrolled me and have encouraged both your friends to troll my blog. My God, dude- you are among the last 27% of the passenger manifest still on the Titanic. Just what do you think you’re defending here by ignorantly attacking liberals?
Jesus Christ, I’m being trolled by a clown who looks upon Larry Kudrow as a hero for his mantra of “greater prosperity through free market capitalism”, a concept that has worked wonders in this country since Reagan. I think we can safely ignore this clown, ladies and gentlemen. If this thread was a horse, I’d shoot it.
Okay, now is the time to invoke our new anti-threadfuck policy. We’re not here to provide a place for people to have at each other. If two or m ore people have an argument they’d like to wage that has nothing to do with the post, they may exchange e-mails or take it to another site. So, have a look at what you’re saying. If it does not pertain to the substance of THE ORIGINAL POST, then keep it off the thread.
Period.
Beginning now, I’ll be deleting any and all threadfucks, no matter who they come from.
Actually, they have a time stamp on this blog, and you exaggerate as usual.
I never told my friends to troll your blog. I just find your rigorous intellect very stimulating and wish to help spread your ideas. In fact, I’m going to make a blog post requesting my readers to donate $0.02 each to your blog to help spread your word and keep you in beer and cigarettes.
Jeff
Actually,
I made a comment on #31 and you responded to my comment within 45 minutes. Who’s trolling who…oh yeah, if you disagree with a liberal, then it’s trolling…I forgot that.
Anyways,
expect a few hits from my site, and who knows, if you bark loud enough, the capitalists at my site might just toss you a few bones.
In your case, this is a win-win situation.
Jeff
Brian, most (if not every) political parties are for their people and not so much the other party. It’s tribalism, and it’s at work in the US and right here on this thread.
It’s a matter of the individual ego appearing to be given up, but in reality simply enlarged to encompass a group. There is still the possessive, in-so-much as the individual dedicates the ego to his society. Basic infantile psychology, wherein the group (and consequently those inside it) are seen as nurturing parents and those outside get the ogre-father projection. That’s why it’s generally deemed ok to disparage, demean, or even kill those outside the chosen group.
This isn’t new or unique to America. And it is why the fringes display such similar behavior. Rather than clearing his own heart/mind/soul, the zealot attempts to clear the world.
Now, it’s true that liberal America is less likely to be fully zealous to the point of violent action; it generally doesn’t have the elders employing totem ceremonials in which they enact the ogre-father and simultaneously reveal themselves as the feeding mother too, Being mostly secular, it rejects the mytho-religious context and so tends to succumb to simple neuroticism and the ego is not even partially initiated into something greater…though there is a fair degree of tribalism.
As for Von Brunn, it is true that he did not fit the far-right stereotype. He hated Christianity because he saw it as a descendant of Judaism. He went back further, mistaking Norse mythology for pure Aryan doctrine. And like Hitler got the whole Aryan/superman thing mixed up by seeing a psychological path as a racial reality.
Hitler was a serious devotee of Blatavsky’s Theosophy, which is rife with cherry-picked mythologies and mistaking the metaphors for the truth. I’ve been to modern, Germanic Theosophical meetings. They’re still hung up on the superman idea and mistaking Shangra-La to be a real (or buildable) place. It’s very politically leftist, and at the same time has a whispered, but undeniable, undercurrent of anti-Semitism and racism. (The first question asked of me was whether i was a Jew, so i didn’t feel bad pointing out all the aped Buddhist doctrine that they fucked up to the point of tribal nonsense.)
And that’s my comment thread dissertation for the day…