A plot to kill an American president would surely unite Americans in horror & anger....

[iluvtennis]

stuart stevens@stuartpstevens·Dec 14
A plot to kill an American president would surely unite Americans in horror and anger. Now we learn of a plot to kill American democracy. What does it say about the Americans who do not respond in horror and anger?

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Let the church say Amen.

[RockRaven]

1. I disagree with the premise that it would unite Americans if there were a plot against POTUS...

If the POTUS in question was a Democrat, the Repukes would celebrate and excuse the plot while also lamenting that is was not successful. They are deranged traitors. There is no unity to be had with such people.

[iluvtennis]

5. Cant argue with you this is the case in these current times. It's sickening. n/t

[Caliman73]

8. I second that.

These appeals to "Americans united" are an anachronism. Maybe in the past, but not in the last 20 years has there been any "united in horror" sentiment. 911, sure, but that was outside terrorists. No one was horrified when Gabby Giffords was shot. Sarah Palin actually put literal targets on the photos of Giffords and was aiming to "take her out".

There were several plots to kill President Obama, more death threats and plots to kill him than ANY modern President. Those plots were often applauded by Republican voters.

There has always been division in the US. There were people who were glad when JFK was shot. I am sure there were people who wished that Hinkley Jr. had better aim. Those people, however, used to be the fringes, and in the Democratic party, they are still the fringe.

With the rise of right wing media however, there is a much larger and more coordinated segment of society who lives in a world of propaganda. Who do not understand one whit about "Communism" or "Socialism" or even what "the Left" is but they can swear to their last ounce that Joe Biden is a "Communist, Socialist, and Radical Leftist" even though they cannot give ANY one thing that President Biden has done that would even approach the policies that anyone in those ideological groups would suggest. Right wingers are brainwashed. They like to say that Democrats hate America, but they actually hate any American who isn't aligned with their vision of a White, fundmentalist Christian America.

[DickKessler]

13. Agree in full.

Good post.

[maxrandb]

10. And they would use the media

to turn the discussion to the privacy rights of the assassination planners.

[evolves]

19. I unfortunately agree.

JFK's assassination was before I was born, but I have read plenty of anti-JFK rhetoric from the time. Same can be said of Lincoln.

That being said, your point is well-taken-- there should be universal outrage over the attempt to undermine free elections. Whatever anyone thinks of an individual President, we should all hold the health of the nation as sacrosanct.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. We respond to the death of a person simply because we're all people.

American democracy is a much more abstract thing and that's why we don't respond in horror or anger.

Plus, that destruction happens slowly, over time and thus is less obvious.

My 2 cents!

[iluvtennis]

4. Agree that it's the slowly over time aspect that prevents people from recognizing the imminent

danger.

[LiberatedUSA]

9. On point.

Slow death by gas leak. By the time you realize it, you’re falling asleep.

[Buckeyeblue]

3. Not any more it wouldn't.

[XanaDUer2]

6. I think there's a large subset of the population

Who'd be okay with it if it was a Democrat. Sad, just my two cents

[DickKessler]

12. There were a fair number who were happy to see JFK go, no?

[XanaDUer2]

15. Yup

People think everyone was united in grief.

[DickKessler]

18. Kinda like how after 9/11 "everyone" was "united" around Bush. Bill Maher? Susan Sontag? Oops.

And lest we forget, many hundreds if not thousands of Muslim men in the US were rounded up and unlawfully detained in the days and weeks after 9/11. Some were tortured while in detention. Many immigrants were deported. Families were torn apart, and people lived in fear. Guilt by the most tenuous of association, to put it mildly.

Hate crimes against Muslims and people who “looked” Muslim (notably Sikhs) escalated after 9/11. The Bush administration itself was directing law enforcement to infiltrate mosques and aggressively question Muslim families. John Ashcroft created what amounted to a Muslim registry long before Trump threatened to in the 2016 campaign.

Muslim children were told by their classmates that they or their parents were responsible for 9/11 and should “go back to where they came from.” Many teachers and parents tolerated and even encouraged this abuse.

Meanwhile, Congresswoman Barbara Lee got tons of hate and death threats for daring to vote no on the blank check given to Bush by Congress to fight a permanent war on “terror.”

All of this was facilitated by the mainstream media, and mainstream politicians. The “uniting” was a uniting in fear of the Muslim “Other” and revanchist, aggressive, violent jingoism.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

7. That person is living in denial.

[DickKessler]

11. Weren't there a lot of segregationists and radical right who openly celebrated JFK's assassination?

[unc70]

14. Yes

[XanaDUer2]

16. Yes nt

[JustAnotherGen]

17. It wouldn't

Had it been Bush 2, Obama, Biden, Bill Clinton, Bush 1, Raygun, Carter - yes. . . .

But I didn't and don't view 45 as a human being so it wouldn't have bothered me.

[haele]

20. A lot of people expressed satisfaction when Kennedy was assassinated.

GOP and White Supremacist haters, along with John Birchers and other radical Right groups.
In the 60's I heard that, according to a certain set of older, well off GOP/Birch member relatives from Missouri, Kennedy was - "Too soft on Commies, too nice to Coloreds, too Catholic (alternatively, a jumped up son of an Irish bootlegger and criminal), too Yankee, or just a Democrat, so he wanted to give our hard earned tax money away to the undeserving, cut our military, and make our country weaker."
My dad didn't associate with them very much. They loved Nixon - untill he pushed through the EPA - and though Agnew was framed.
Just a bunch of selfish haters.

Haele