The Moderate Voice has an intersesting post on the tragic murder of a census worker in Clay County, Kentucky. The point is that anti-government terrorism should not be defined too narrowly. When Michelle Bachman says crazy things about census workers, her audience isn’t just official Tea Party members, it’s all kinds of weirdos and nuts.
Undermining the legitimacy of the federal government and dehumanizing federal workers is, I fear, a message that spreads far can spread far and wide with deadly consequences.
Update. McArdle informs us teabaggers have no problem with the census.
calipygian
The Wingnuts in Malkin’s “I killed the census worker” thread are all worried that Federal workers will become a protected class like blacks and gays and concerned that it will become a hate crime to hurt or kill a fed.
Seems to me they should make more efforts to stop hurting or killing blacks, gays and federal workers.
Incertus
I clicked through to some of the wingnut sites via Memeorandum last night because I felt I hadn’t abused myself enough lately, and you can smell the fear there. It reminds me a little of the post Dr. Tiller murder with its “there’s no proof that this was a Beck-Bachmann-wingnut inspired murder” with a dose of “the Dems are doing an end zone dance over this” tossed in for good measure. They’re praying this is a case where a guy wandered into a meth lab, and not of some loon who bought into the mega-patriot talk.
MikeJ
It’s already a different crime than plain old murder to kill a fed. For one thing, it’s a federal crime and for almost anybody else you kill you’d only face local charges.
Wilson Heath
I’ll go further back to Reagan. Government may not be the solution to all problems, but it isn’t the problem. The thing to remember is that the government is what we make it. If government is dysfunctional, it’s because we did something dumb in setting government to a problem, or more frequently these days, because it reflects some of our dysfunction. For example, the complete schizophrenia of fiscal policy, shown on the national level and on a smaller scale in California.
Government isn’t them. Government is us. That’s the design of the system.
calipygian
Why should they be praying for that? After all, Doughy Pantload made the contorted argument that the guy who went and shot up the Holocaust museum was an evil Lie-brul.
Bachman, Gingrich, Palin, Beck, Rush, etc. are going to keep squeezing the bellows of hate and the fire is just going to get hotter no matter what the outcome of the investigation.
And they will continue to get away with it.
MikeJ
Wasn’t mcmegan taking bets that people carrying guns while proclaiming that “the tree of liberty must, etc, etc” were simply flaunting fashion accessories?
Perhaps she can pay off by donating to the Brady Campaign, named after another public servant who was never in any real danger according to her.
Mnemosyne
We had a big murder case here in California back in 2000 where the owner of a sausage factory killed three FDA inspectors. Not just shot them, but went back to his office, re-loaded, and returned to shoot each of the wounded inspectors in the head to make sure they were dead.
No one can convince me that the prior 8 years of right-wing howling about jack-booted government thugs had no influence whatsoever on the murderer.
calipygian
The Wingnuts have been spectacularly successful in portraying all non-DoD/non-intel service parts of the federal government (including the Marshalls Service and other armed agencies of the DoJ) as “them” and a delivery system of tax dollars to the undeserving “other”. It is deeply ingrained and I think a successful national health care program will go a long way to countering this, but there is a lot of work to be done.
Fulcanelli
The irony of this anti-government madness is that it will continue until somebody noteworthy on the right is hurt or killed. Then these idiots will blame Obama and the Democrats and all hell will break loose.
I’m not optimistic regarding the right wing’s ability or desire to herd it’s brainwashed base back onto the reservation. What passes for it’s leadership needs a midnight ride in a black helicopter over the open ocean to show them the error of their ways before the shit hits the fan.
Or something.
Martin
Well, there are more than a few people inside academia that quietly blame Malkin for contributing to the suicide of the UCSC Chancellor a number of years back. If she and her readers didn’t take anything away from that tragedy, then there’s honestly no hope for them.
May the FBI kick all their doors in some day.
Brick Oven Bill
Barack Obama, Michelle Bachman, and Terrorism
If the Left is truly concerned about the radical fringe of American society becoming violent, they should urge the President to present his Birth Certificate. This would take 30 minutes and forever put aside the concerns of a significant percentage of American Citizens who are concerned about the Rule of Law.
These concerns will not go away, and will likely grow louder, unless they are addressed.
There is nothing irresponsible about Michelle Bachman, and her active defense of the Constitution. It is very irresponsible for the President to allow these questions to remain hanging. He is the President of all Americans, not just his buddies.
calipygian
@Mnemosyne:
Jesus, that’s horrible. Since when is it more dangerous to be a Department of Agriculture meat inspector than a Marine in Helmand province?
Martin
Right. Declaring that government is unconditionally the problem is, by definition, undemocratic.
calipygian
@Brick Oven Bill:
Jesus BoB, you have any OTHER posts in your repetoir?
dr. bloor
@Incertus:
They’re praying this is a case where a guy wandered into a meth lab, and not of some loon who bought into the mega-patriot talk.
Ironically–or perhaps not–I’ll bet the overlap between those two populations is much larger than one might guess.
Bachmann et al aren’t going to slow down anytime soon. For members of a party who preach “personal responsibility,” they have none. Personal and civic responsibility require a modicum of empathy, a personality attribute with which they are entirely unacquainted.
calipygian
And I have ZERO tolerance for “Rule of Law” arguments coming out of the mouths of right wing assholes after years of cheering Bush and Cheney conducting illegal surveillance.
Martin
DougJ, this troll is getting boring. Can you send him some new material please?
kthxbai
Alien-Radio
Anti Government Terrorism should not be too broadly defined either, especially given the authoritarian streak in state security apparatus. poor, low information people are the ones suffering from the status quo, and it’s easy to brand them terrorists when they act out.
Thoughtcrime is a dangerous thing to legislate on.
Morbo
I agree completely. Michelle Bachmann had nothing to do with the Oklahoma City bombing, but she certainly isn’t helping matters now. I also think that there has been a false mutual exclusivity built up around this case (intentionally by some, unintentionally by others) between the moonshiners and meth makers and anti-government types. The reality is that if you draw a Venn diagram of moonshiners and anti-government types, there’s probably a pretty significant overlap.
calipygian
Not only was he a fed, he was Teh Ghey too!
A million Daily Show/Colbert Report writer monkeys working 24/7 for a million years couldn’t make that shit up.
gocart mozart
Careful B.O.B., you don’t want to end up in Obama’s FEMA Concentration Camps. I understand that Soros and his ACORN minions are busy compiling the list right now as we live and breath.
JR
You know, it used to be you had to do something seriously offensive, like register black people to vote or investigate church bombings, to get this kind of lynching. Now you just have to count people. Our domestic terrorists are really lowering their standards these days.
Fulcanelli
@Brick Oven Bill: If you really think that the birthers would back down and go home once Obama catered to their racist paranoia and produced some sort of holy grail birth certificate, then you know nothing about the idiots you rub elbows with when you go looking to score hot, right wing chicks at meetups, you fucking fool.
You morons don’t trust the abilities of the Secret Service, the FBI, the CIA or the entire invisible right wing GOP money apparatus that backed the McCain campaign. Nothing will ever be good enough, because the possibility of a left wing conspiracy is like crack, and you retards can’t kick it.
anonevent
BOB – as if. No one gets to kill another person just because they think the president is illigetimate. Period. That is why it would not help if Obama had some secret birth document. These people have no use for facts, just like we all know you don’t.
yeager12
After overhearing conversations in stores,etc. I thought to myself that I wouldn’t want to be taking the census this time. People are angry and frightened, the very things that breed violence. It doesn’t help matters that the govt. is asking a lot of personal questions this time. Should send bodyguards with them. Hey, that would create jobs!
Demo Woman
In order to prove that Mohammed was not President Obama’s middle name, President Obama posted a copy of his birth certificate on his web site. He is the only candidate that did so. Now the Birthers don’t like the copy and want a new copy. The latest birther infomercial is sick.
MSM takes some of the blame for the hysteria surrounding a small percentage of our country.
Bob In Pacifica
Actually, federal workers, at least some of them, are a protected class. When some d-bag does something against a mailman, for ex, that’s a federal crime.
Speaking of Michelle Malkin, I tend to avoid her like the plague, but last year I stumbled across a video of her dressed up like a cheerleader. Can’t remember what it was about, I think it was supposed to be funny and about politics, but it looked like the beginning of a really bad porno movie where there’s an older woman dressed up like a teen.
And go Niners!
Jen R
BOB, STFU.
calipygian
One of McMegan’s commenters:
I find the part in bold unbelievable.
Morbo
@calipygian: I would prefer to avoid looking at her comments on this type of post… The glibertarianism is likely to reach the threshold of pain.
gnomedad
@Jen R:
Message or suggestions for the lexicon? :)
Jason
@Brick Oven Bill:
Oh I see what you did there. Cle-ver.
flavortext
@Brick Oven Bill:
Aww, me too Brick Oven Bill!
Demo Woman
I do think that Karen at the Moderate Voice is correct when she said Now, these details still do not tell us whether Starkman was killed because he was a Census worker, or whether he was killed because, in the course of doing his Census work, he happened to come upon an illegal activity. But they do make it crystal clear that Starkman’s killers wanted him to be found like that. Which means — obviously — that this was a message killing. It was a political statement — an act of terrorism.
BTW his name is Sparkman but her message is still strong.
dmsilev
My hat goes off to the few commenters on McMegan’s site fighting the good fight for sanity. Badly outnumbered by the wankers, they continue the struggle. Kudos.
-dms
asiangrrlMN
You know, I think I see the strategy of the right. Winning by sheer attrition of the opposition. I am tired and cranky and I just can’t deal with their shit today.
John S.
Our old friend TallDave is over there, queering the thread as is his wont.
Martin
Roman Polanski was just arrested in Switzerland. I wonder if our tussle with the Swiss banks have had additional benefits.
Roger Moore
@Brick Oven Bill:
Fixed that for you. In case you hadn’t noticed, President Obama presented his birth certificate before the whole birther phenomenon started, and the birther nonsense started anyway. Idiots who refuse to believe the evidence he’s presented so far aren’t going to be convinced by anything else he could do. Why don’t you go crawl back
into your basementunder your bridge.Tim
You sir, are a complete tool. BO should not be required to take any actions that every other POTUS has not taken. I do not recall seeing a GWB birth cert released to everyone. Or one from Bill Clinton or any other President. In fact, the longer he desn’t do it, the more it makes the right-wing look like a bunch of out-of-touch assholes and I am OK with that.
Michelle Bachman’s marching orders to the lunatic fringe, that clearly includes yourself, are in fact contrary to the constitution. It is her that is inciting people to break the rule of law. It is her that is encouraging people to not pay taxes.
RSA
Over at McMegan’s a number of commenters are warning that you’ll look pretty foolish if you blame this on anti-government sentiment, based on the lynching, the “fed” scrawl, and the Census badge taped to Sparkman’s forehead… because it might be the work of fiendishly clever meth-head geniuses.
WTF?
steve s
I just got a new (used) compy, about a week ago. I’m still getting all my programs, firefox addons etc installed and configured. Unfortunately, I just got exposed to some BOB birth certificate stuff in this thread and the wallop of stupidity was hard to take. Have to get to installing Cleek’s script again
http://ok-cleek.com/blogs/?p=2149
for those of you who don’t know about it.
Only problem is, it only hides the troll, not the endless troll-feeders.
The Grand Panjandrum
I read McArdle for about one week some years back. She doesn’t have anything to say that I want to read.
Kattenberg makes a compelling case that this was a message killing. An act of terrorism. I’ll buy that. Now law enforcement must determine why this message was being sent.
An additional piece of information, and as someone else in a previous thread pointed out, this post by Marcy Wheeler Clay County politicians were being prosecuted by the Feds for actual voter fraud. Go to the local papers to find out more.
As I have been writing in these comment threads since late July I hope some guy with a beef, real or perceived, against the gummint isn’t renting a Ryder truck.
NutellaonToast
@dmsilev: “My hat goes off to the few commenters on McMegan’s site fighting the good fight for sanity. Badly outnumbered by the wankers, they continue the struggle. Kudos.”
Some of us have been entirely too sucked into the vortex. Check my name-linky… It hurts.
Maude
@Martin: The members of the elite film community think that this is just awful.
Roman raped a 13 year old girl, BTW. He pled guilty to one count. He fled the US to avoid the possibility of more jail time and deportation.
Polanski can burn in hell. I don’t care what movies he directed.
There, I feel better.
JenJen
Oh good gawd, I could’ve done without reading McMeghan’s stupid opinion on this topic. So I see she’s taking the Malkin angle!
You know, a very dear friend of mine is an official with the Dept of Education, and you wouldn’t believe the letters he gets from loons about the Census just as a Constitutional issue included in curriculum.
Proving, once again, that Meghan has no earthly idea what she’s talking about. How many times do we have to go through this exercise?
RandomChick
@NutellaonToast:
I did see your comment and kudos to you. Thoughtful, on point, and much more polite than I would have been.
The Grand Panjandrum
OT: Giants scored on this play, lead Bucs 14-0.
steve s
“September 27th, 2009 at 12:26 pm Reply to this comment
Brick oven bill
It puts the apples in the pie crust, or else it gets the hose again.”
Sweet.
gnomedad
@asiangrrlMN:
Yeah, that’s about it. Keep flinging shit at the walls until the zookeepers get tired of hosing it down. Except I think it’s not so much a strategy as they just like doing it.
Martin
Ask if any of them have 13 year old daughters they’re willing to offer up to the director of the next Citizen Kane. I suspect the awfulness will fade quickly enough.
JenJen
@John S.:
Oh, did that asshat used to comment over here, or something? This is one of my rare forays through he McMeghan comments section, and he’s a real stand-out!
Shell
Nah, he’s just another brain-dead parrot.
dmsilev
@NutellaonToast: Yes, I saw your comments. I admire your tenacity; I used to do similar things a few years ago, but rapidly ran out of patience with the nonsense.
-dms
kay
@The Grand Panjandrum:
Someone in the media should follow up on that. The entire membership of the Board of Elections in that county were indicted in March for felony election fraud? They all pled not guilty, but one changed his plea to guilty and began cooperating with the DOJ?
I mean, is that not at all interesting? Considering?
ROLES OF THE DEFENDANTS
12. The Defendants accomplished their purposes through a pattern of, among other
things, bribery, extortion, and mail fraud designed to corrupt and affect the outcome of
elections.
Surreal American
@Brick Oven Bill:
If President Obama does this merely to mitigate the impending violence you promise will happen, then the terrorists would win.
Fair is fair. If you keep repeating idiotic posts, I’m allowed to repeat my replies.
JenJen
@NutellaonToast: Hi, and great work in that thread! Thanks for coming over here and dishing with us Juicers. :-)
asiangrrlMN
@gnomedad: I agree. They do it because they love it. The attrition is just a happy bonus for them.
Still tired of their bullshit.
Radon Chong
@Brick Oven Bill: I had you pied for a while. Then, having forgotten why I took the trouble to pie you in the first place, I unpied you. But after that one? REPIED! For good this time!
chris
Maybe McMegan can tell us whether the teabaggers are ok with Bachmann. That’s the more important question, isn’t it?
NutellaonToast
@RandomChick:
Heh, polite, don’t think I’ve been called that before.
Alan
@RSA: I think that was Althouse’s take on the murder–that Starkman must have accidentally stumbled upon a meth lab, or something else criminal.
Of course it’s perfectly reasonable to expect criminal enterprises to taunt federal law enforcement authorities by lynching a census worker. Well, at least to RW hacks.
Chad N Freude
@Brick Oven Bill:
Good lord, have you bothered to read her public comments or see her on TV or video?
http://www.dccc.org/page/content/bachmannwatch
http://www.immelman.us/news/michele-bachmanns-greatest-hits/
Nothing irresponsible? Sheesh!!!
Chad N Freude
@Jason: Score!!
steve s
Frank Rich has a good column today
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/opinion/27rich.html?em
Nellcote
What happens when ultra-religious neocon Michele Bachmann co-hosts a town-hall meeting with anti-authority libertarian Ron Paul? Wingnut worlds collide. Maureen O’Connor reports.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-09-26/the-craziest-town-hall-ever/
ed
The only thing I can glean from this update is that Teabaggers must have a problem with the census.
Pasquinade
Republicans On House Census Subcommittee Rebuke Bachmann’s Fearmongering As Illogical And Illegal
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) has been bragging about the fact that she plans not to answer Census questions this year, which is a violation of federal law punishable with a fine up to $5,000. Bachmann has been mocked by Stephen Colbert and criticized harshly by the largest Minnesota newspaper for her conspiratorial stance.
Now, in the latest rebuke of her off-the-wall claims about the Census, three out of the four House Republicans on the subcommittee that oversees the Census have released a statement calling her boycott plan “llogical, illegal and not in the best interest of our country”.
Florida Cynic
McAddled is a walking cloud of stupid. And I regret clicking that link.
Boots Day
Wow, when Patrick McHenry thinks you’re too far gone, you must really be off the hizzy.
Kelly
Do you have a link to the proof that a anti government person committed this crime?
TuiMel
I had the same thought about Lynn Westmoreland.
EscapeVelocity
To the OP,
You seem to be missing the regular and more numerous political violence on the Left.
Your plea for prosection would be more credible if you were serious about opposing political violence.
The terroist bombing plot targeting the GOP convention. Blowing up Star Bucks. Rioting at every WTO and G20/G8 meeting. Blowing up laboratories.
Perhaps if the Left, ditched their “No Enemies to the Left” policy and deradicalized Universities in which students are radicalized by New Left Radical Professors, then things wouldnt reach such a boiling point and stay there.
This is standard practice on the Left and has been since the 60s. They have created the political environment. The Right is a reaction to them and their tactics and strategies.
So perhaps a bit of reflection is in order, heh?
PS – The last bit of violence attributed to the Right was the vandalism of a Democrat politicians sign with a Swastika, which turned out to be a Leftwinger trying to villify Conservatives as hatefilled Nazis. Seems to me that he just proved the Left is full or violent radicals who stoop to such low brow tactics. Really, the Left needs to pull the beam out of its own eye, before getting whipped up into a violent frenzy over the mote in Conservatives eyes.
But alas…
Been There Done That
The “He probably stumbled across someone’s still/meth cook/weed patch” excuse the right wingers are trying to hide behind is complete horseshit.
This guy was working for the Census. They go to the front door and ring or knock. They don’t go nosing around the property.
The thing about the front door is that any criminal with 2 brain cells knows to keep any criminal activity OUT OF SIGHT OF THE FRONT DOOR.
Use common sense, of course this was a gov’t-hate crime.
steve s
I just learned that Megan McArdle grew up in Manhattan and lives in Washington DC.
That would explain why she says things like ‘teabaggers don’t dislike the census’. She has no firsthand knowledge of the retards she’s talking about.
steve s
“This guy was working for the Census. They go to the front door and ring or knock. They don’t go nosing around the property.”
Not entirely true. To attempt to get a good estimate of the homeless population, census workers will occasionally go to some very out-of-the-way places.
Sentient Puddle
I read through the comments in McArdle’s thread yesterday, and it’s sort of mind-blowing. I don’t know if these guys are willingly performing mental gymnastics to rationalize the thought that this wasn’t a political murder, or if they’re really just wired like that.
That said, my favorite exchange. Starts out with this bit of nonsense:
To which we get this great reply:
Which of course doesn’t seem to pass the smell test of the original poster:
Right…
kay
@Sentient Puddle:
Federal investigators have been all over that County probably since 2002, investigating the incredibly corrupt local government.
7 local officials were indicted on federal voter fraud charges in March of this year. The charges are amazing. They changed votes. They paid off voters. They traded prescription drugs for votes. The incidents date back to 2002.
They probably interviewed tens of locals, to bring the indictment. It must have been all over the county. The indictment is like a “who’s who” of local big-shots.
That particular county has not lacked federal law enforcement attention.
Ed Marshall
@EscapeVelocity:
consisted of a government snitch who encouraged a couple of kids to make molotov cocktails and then when they didn’t return the snitches calls to go bomb empty police cars, the police rousted them from bed where they had found some hippie girls to fornicate with instead of doing anything.
I don’t know why we get stuck with the animal rights people, but I don’t think any lab has ever been blown up. I remember someone from the ALF left a molotov cocktail on a doorstep where they thought a researcher lived. This one unexploded molotov led to the unanimous passage of the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, funny I don’t remember a bunch of right wing bitching about thoughtcrime about it either.
On the other hand, anti-abortion terrorists alone have scored 41 bombings, 173 arsons, 91 attempted bombings or arsons, 619 bomb threats, 1264 incidents of vandalism, and 100 attacks with butyric acid.
Seriously, if Obama hasn’t riddled you morons with spies and agent provocateurs like the anti-war movement has had to put up I’m going to be seriously put out.
General Winfield Stuck
@kay:
This is exactly right but it goes back much further than that. There is about a 3 or 4 county area that is nothing but one big mafia like operation with about every kind of corrupt enterprise the area could possibly support. There have been FBI stings in the region forever, mostly targeting corrupt elected officials, and the place is lousy with informants and undercover agents. I would be surprised if they don’t solve this pretty soon as it is a small world with a lot of ears and eyes to pick up on what happened. Though there is also a cesspool of political chicanery that sometimes even sometimes involves the feds, and that is worrisome, particularly with what seems like draconian efforts to withhold even the most trivial details of the case for nearly three weeks.
Sentient Puddle
@kay: Are we talking about the same case here? I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m referring to the death (and likely murder) of a census worker.
handy
@EscapeVelocity:
Shorter post: Hey, don’t look there, look over here!
Alternate shorter: You do it too!
General Winfield Stuck
@EscapeVelocity:
When you escape and arrive at your Home Planet, please say hi to Malkin for me, and all the other crazy motherfuckers you run with.
kay
@Sentient Puddle:
I am, too. I’ll find the link to the federal indictment. I read it here.
The nature of the charges are such that federal investigators would have had to interview tens or perhaps hundreds of local voters, prior to bringing the indictment. Surely word got around when nearly the entire governing mechanism in a town of with a population of 2000 were indicted.
One entirely rational possibility (and I don’t know, I’m just looking at what we know) is that the census worker was a witness or an informant in that voter fraud case. He’s been there since 2003. He’s active, locally, as both a part time teacher and Boy Scout organizer, and he’s a census worker. He would know a lot. He interviews people, for a living. They probably tell him all sorts of things.
kay
@General Winfield Stuck:
I’m afraid he was involved in assisting the feds in the criminal case. The voter fraud indictment must be based almost completely on witness testimony.
Then the “fed” makes sense to me, and the gruesome “warning” nature of the act makes sense, because 6 of the 7 pled not guilty and are presumably going to trial.
But. I don’t know. I do think the federal charges pending against small-town heavy-hitters changes the whole picture.
kay
@The Grand Panjandrum:
@Sentient Puddle:
Okay, follow the link at Grand Panjandrum all the way through to the complaint ( the voter fraud indictment) if you want to read what I read.
Then this whole mess will come clear. Well, no, but you’ll know what I’m talking about, anyway.
kay
@Sentient Puddle:
And, then, Sentient Puddle, the “targeted because census worker” doesn’t ring true to me, so I was looking for some other reason. Again, they knew him. He wasn’t a faceless “fed”. He lives there, and he has for a while, and he’s engaged in the community. There aren’t a lot of people. If you’re a boy scout leader and a teacher and a census worker you inevitably know a hell of a lot of locals.
General Winfield Stuck
@kay:
He lived and taught in Laurel county next door to Clay co. Except for both being hard core republican, the counties are very different. The area where he was murdered is much more remote and backward and lawless. The people who did this may well have also had some connection to the drug trade, but the taping of his census ID to his head screams out anti-government harkening to recent headlines from national right wing leadership. Until proven otherwise. IMHO.
EscapeVelocity
My post still stands.
And your leaping to smears still stands as well.
Look in the mirror folks.
General Winfield Stuck
@EscapeVelocity:
In clown sh oes.
pseudonymous in nc
Read the Harper’s piece on the Daniel Boone National Forest. (If you’re not a subscriber, it’s worth the sub alone.) That part of the US is like the Af-Pak border: guns, drugs, illiteracy, poverty, tribalism, hatred of central government.
gwangung
And so does the Creation Museum and Ken Ham.
They’re both still liars. And they act the same as you do in “defending” their charges.
pseudonymous in nc
@EscapeVelocity: go and book your monthly conjugal visit with Eric Rudolph, you piece of shit.
truculent and unreliable
Speaking of con mental gymnastics, this was linked over at the Sadly, No! comments
I think Riehl might have a mental illness.
truculent and unreliable
Speaking of con mental gymnastics, this was linked over at the Sadly, No! comments.
I think Riehl might have a mental illness.
truculent and unreliable
D’oh! Double-posted, and for no good reason!
binzinerator
@JR:
It would seem to parallel the abstraction used in Ronald Reagan’s version of the GOP’s Southern strategy.
Lee Atwater described it like this:
“You start out in 1954 by saying, “Nigger, nigger, nigger.” By 1968 you can’t say “nigger”—that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states’ rights and all that stuff. You’re getting so abstract now [that] you’re talking about cutting taxes… .”
It seems now even lynching-trigger events have been abstracted as well. Now the stand-ins are the actions of government agencies like the FDA, EPA, OSHAA, and now, the Census Bureau.
(I believe ACORN and unions are lumped in this as well.)
This is the legacy of modern conservatism. They’ve tried to hide the hate and bigotry of their base by shifting it to things tangential to the what they want to lash out at. And they’ve succeeded.
My theory is agencies like the Census Bureau do things that redneck fucktards perceive as 1) either resulting in benefits for people they hate or loss of privileges for themselves, or 2) protecting the kinds people they want to fuck over from being fucked over.
It’s gone to the next level beyond state’s rights and cutting taxes. With Norquist’s infamous quote about drowning the government in a bathtub the Right began to personify government — and fantasize about murdering it.
So the Census Bureau represents the worst of everything these shitlicking morons hate (and will be no doubt the eventual messenger of everything they hate), so counting people has become provocation enough.