I don't know if you have noticed, but something truly ugly seems to be bubbling up from the primordial ooze of the conservative movement.and proceeds to list the recent turn of Psychosis in the RingWingNutters.
[ cf Follow The Leaders ]
This is followed with the usual obligatory waltz through the usual problems, including, but not limited to, the usual sexual guilt crisis amongst the damaged white males who wanted to be the great war heroes.... and all they get to do is be spiteful, in some phaux american traditonalism. But digby goes unpleasantly off the rez starting with:
...And then stomps down hard with:
I don't think that adequately explains why this seems to be happening more at this moment. It's possible that it's a result of frustration with the fact that conservatives have been shown to be dramatically incompetent at governance. But they have always believed themselves to be an aggrieved minority bravely fighting against the liberal elites who run everything, so that doesn't really hold water either. And in any case, they will purge the Bushmen from their pantheon and instantly assume the glorious mantle of Ronald Reagan the first chance they get and carry on as if it never happened. (You can already see it with the astonishing hypocrisy with which they are once again extolling themselves as good fiscal stewards after six years of feeding on the government carcass like gluttonous hyenas.) These little set-backs do not penetrate the right wing mind very deeply.
(op cit)
And last week, among all these instances of violent right wing rhetoric flying through the ether, our president smirked, for the umpteenth time, "we don't torture" knowing very well that the whole point of his refusing to define torture is because they want people to believe they are actually torturing. Torture --- a taboo for centuries --- is now considered a useful tool by the government of the United States of America, both in practice and in rhetoric.Interesting problem there...
...
And many members of the leadership of this country, in all branches of government, have signed off on the presidents right to order torture and indefinite detention with no due process for "enemies" however he sees fit. We know that the administration "renders" people to foreign countries for torture. They admit doing it, although they laughably claim that it is done "responsibly."
Why wouldn't the hard core right ratchet up its natural proclivity for violent rhetoric in light of that? Clearly, this kind of thinking is now openly sanctioned by the conservative leadership of this country.
The question for the rest of us is whether they will be content with only emulating their words. It wasn't that long ago that, under the influence of much less authoritative extremist rhetoric, a couple of radical right wingers took matters into their own hands. It's not as if it can't happen here.
( op cit ( url in original text - CHECK IT OUT!!!) )
A minor problem exists here, since by digby's working position, which I have little argument directly with, there is that small problem that he has now ejected from being 'conservative' any of us who worked with the intelligence community and do NOT support warcrimes. I think we, as a nation, would find it far better to take the matter to task the old fashion way, and note that the current collection of RightWingNuttery has opted OUT of the american conservative movement, precisely because they no longer LIKE to be a part of the America that fought against Stalinist Oppression, and DO NOT like the fact that we put both german and japanese war criminals on trial for their war crimes.
I WORRY because as the last Url makes clear, americans have seen what happens when american wingNutters go off the reservation and abandon their moral standards. It is even more comical as the root cause of that attack has been drifted from an Iraqi Controlled, to an Iranian Controlled, to a Space Alien Controlled Ops. Anything but taking into account that when americans decide that they want to live out their rhetorical posturing, they can do a really good job of actually implementing that rhetoric.
The tragedy for the fighting 101st keyboardists is that they have been ever so polite and voted loudly and often with their feet!!! Unfortunately, when the killers walk off the rez to implement their violence, the killers they get will not have a clean command and control infrastructure, nor will they work out the unpleasant technical details of why the fighting 101st keyboardists were always running away.
The ultimate challenge on the flip side of that coin to the liberals will be if they can break away from the simplistic companion notion that anyone who is not a progressive is a regressive. That will ultimately be the major challenge as the nation seeks to recover from this long dark nightmare of the soul!!!