Byron York is rethinking Obama’s much lauded Tucson speech. Even conservatives have been swooning in its wake, because the President of the United States didn’t take the moonbat bait, and blame conservative rhetoric for Jared Loughner’s shooting spree.
But as York asks, how could he?
By the time Obama spoke, there was irrefutable evidence that shooting suspect Jared Loughner was deeply mentally ill and acted out of no recognizable political agenda. Obama simply could not have made the case that Loughner’s acts were in any way the product of political rhetoric from right or left.
He didn’t need to. The point Obama wanted to make was not that political rhetoric caused the violence but that such rhetoric — like, for example, criticism directed at Barack Obama — should be toned down. So even as he conceded that rhetoric did not cause the violence, Obama argued that it should be muted anyway. And he cloaked his appeal in so much emotionalism, in so many tear-jerking references to the recently departed, that some in his audience might not have noticed he was making the political point he wanted to make all along.
Why is it that whenever conservatism is on the ascendancy – we are chided by the left to tone it down? We saw it happen in the ’90’s when conservative talk radio was on the rise, and we’re seeing it today with the tea party movement.
“Be civil”.
When the the left is losing all the arguments, what do we hear?
“Be civil”.
As Rush Limbaugh said on his show, Friday; “civility” is the new word for “shut up”.
We are brow-beated by the most uncivil of civilians. We are told to “watch our tone” by people who look the other way when conservative leaders are threatened, or verbally abused in the most obscene and unspeakable terms, or hung in effigy. How many leftists have been willing to defend Sarah Palin against the Tucson blood libel? Most have instead, attacked her for using the term, “blood libel”.
How many have been willing to discuss at any length, threats of violence and hate speech against her?
Be civil?
I’m with Don Surber:
For two years now, I have been called ignorant, racist, angry and violent by the left. The very foul-mouthed protesters of Bush dare to now label my words as “hate speech.”
Last week, the left quickly blamed the right for the national tragedy of a shooting spree by a madman who never watched Fox News, never listened to Rush Limbaugh and likely did not know who Sarah Palin is.
Fortunately, the American public rejected out of hand that idiotic notion that the right was responsible.
Rather than apologize, the left wants to change the tone of the political debate.
The left suddenly wants civil discourse.
Bite me.
The left wants to play games of semantics.
Bite me.
The left wants us to be civil — after being so uncivil for a decade.
Bite me.
There is grown-up work to do now. Liberals ran up the federal credit card, destroyed the American medical system and undermined the rule of law — which is the foundation of capitalism — with a bunch of unconstitutional fiats from the president and his bureaucracy.
The economy is a mess. The president “inherited” a 7.6% unemployment rate. It’s now 9.4% — after we spent a record $787 billion on a stimulus.
I was not consulted on that stimulus. I had a very good argument against it. I said the money supply was too large and printing more money would fail. I said let the economic downturn run its course.
Lefties were too busy celebrating the 2008 election to listen.
When people protested lefties made vulgar remarks about tea-bagging and giggled.
So screw you and your civil discourse.
BlackisWhiteImperialConsigliere has a similar message for the left:
Your civility, for decades, has to been to tell us that we are stupid. To mock those who speak for our views. To paint anyone who believes as we do as being stupid, ignorant, and hateful. You have poured scorn, derision, and condescension upon us with the obliviousness of those who never gave a thought to what they were doing. Any attempt at a dialogue which doesn’t require those on our side to start with a premise that you are correct on any of these characterizations has been met with a vehement ”Shut Up!”, and now, after days of engaging in savage slander and blood libel, now you wring your hands, and speak softly of civility, either as again, trying to control the speech of others, or in hopes of being treated with greater restraint than you and yours showed me and mine since Saturday morning?
Go to Hell.
Your orgy of hate and blame that started before the bodies even hit the floor of that Tucson Safeway last Saturday revealed everything important to any who still had doubts about who you really are. And I’ll be damned if I’ll be silent and polite about the people who I think are the real danger to America. Especially after they pantsed themselves in front of the country last week.
Here’s what I’ll do: I will continue to love my country and obey its laws as I always have. I’ll continue to not hang people in effigies, or wish death or destruction on anyone. I will continue my political dissent against the Obama regime, and I won’t shy away from words like, “Socialist” to describe it. I will also call far left nutjobs, “moonbats” when I feel it’s warranted. And it will be warranted.
If the past week has proven anything to me at all, it’s that liberalism/leftism really is a mental disorder.
MORE:
Bloggers who are politely declining the the left’s invitation to engage more civilly:
Zilla of the Resistance: Take Your “Civil Discourse” and SHOVE IT!
Wolf Howling: Civility & Other BS
Matthew Vadum, Newsreal Blog: This Is What You Can Do With Your ‘Civility’!
Linked by Michelle Malkin, and Doug Ross, thanks!
