I was struck by today’s response of Sarah Palin to criticism that her rhetoric and “targeting” of Rep. Gifford’s district may have added to the recent massacre in Tucson. In fairness to Palin, the family stated today that Jared Loughner did not watch news or listen to talk radio. However, I was most interested in her claim that the attacks against her and conservative commentators amounted to a “blood libel.”
On her Facebook page, Palin has the following comments:
But, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible.
There are those who claim political rhetoric is to blame for the despicable act of this deranged, apparently apolitical criminal. And they claim political debate has somehow gotten more heated just recently. But when was it less heated? Back in those “calm days” when political figures literally settled their differences with dueling pistols? In an ideal world all discourse would be civil and all disagreements cordial. But our Founding Fathers knew they weren’t designing a system for perfect men and women. If men and women were angels, there would be no need for government. Our Founders’ genius was to design a system that helped settle the inevitable conflicts caused by our imperfect passions in civil ways. So, we must condemn violence if our Republic is to endure.
Of course, she is not speaking of actual libel. Such criticism of the over-the-top rhetoric of conservative commentators is clearly opinion and not defamation.
“Blood libel” is a term usually associated with religious groups who are accused to killing innocents. Blood libels have a strong anti-Semitic history, such as claims that Jews feed on the flesh or blood of innocent children. For that reason, the Anti-Defamation League has denounced the use of the term — though I do not believe that the simple use of this term is evidence of any anti-semiticism by Palin.
That is a pretty loaded term to use for the criticism over violent terminology and over-heated rhetoric. Indeed, it seems to emphasize a degree of persecution. There is probably some distance between dueling and discourse.
The closest term in torts is “group libel” which (as discussed earlier) is generally difficult to establish.
If either term is relevant, there appears to be an ongoing effort on both sides to tag the other with the massacre. Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik stated “The kind of rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment he is irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information. . . [Limbaugh] attacks people, angers them against government, angers them against elected officials and that kind of behavior in my opinion is not without consequences.”
Limbaugh has reportedly fired back by saying that the Democratic Party supports Loughner and is “attempting to find anybody but him to blame.”
In the meantime, members are moving toward a spasm of new laws to criminalize speech.
There is of course another obvious possibility: Loughner is mentally unstable and fully motivated by his own personal demons. Of course, this does not mean that we should not reexamine the rhetoric of our politics.
Frankly, I also share the concern of conservative commentators with politicians like Bernie Sanders (who I agree with on many issues) referring to the massacre in fundraising appeals. This massacre has somehow become about the politicians as opposed to the killer or the victims. That alone says something about the state of our politics.
Jonathan Turley
btw, the spelling is Loughner.
Bob,
That the meme he was repeating doesn’t relate directly to violence is irrelevant. You wanted a connection – any connection – and the NYT article pointed to a direct connection to right wing propaganda.
Is your understanding of memetics really that poor?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memetics
One cannot understand the true nature of propaganda, let alone anti-propaganda, if they do not understand memetics. Even Gobbels understood the fundamentals of the process Dawkins later described when Gobbels said, “The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly – it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over” and “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” Gobbels understood memetics as evidenced by his application of the Big Lie form of propaganda even if he didn’t have the base of Dawkins quantification to build upon. Information in a social matrix propagates like a virus. How well it propagates is not only tied to the mechanics of natural selection (variation, mutation, competition, and inheritance) but by the effectiveness of the initial delivery vector.
I do agree with Buddha that returning to the gold standard would be a huge mistake and that it is the far Right and the Tea Party that is pushing that idea. For better or worse, I will hitch my economic wagon to Paul Krugman who is not a Gold Standard backer. Plus if Jared Loughner is for it, I am against it.
Sarah Palin is nothing if she cannot use her ‘dog whistle’ to enflame the hate groups in America. that is her source of power.
Without the ‘schtick’ of violent hate speech she loses her appeal. That applies to the rest of the hate mongers, too. Beck-Rush-Hannity-Malkin et al.
All are hate mongers who rely on this sort of hate speech, lies and demonizing to maintain their celebrity.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewm-XOsODho&w=425&h=349]
Chan L.,
You lost me on the gold standard comment. Then again economics is far from my strong suit.
Buddha: “So someone espousing a right wing theory has no connection to right wing rhetoric?”
And now you’re flipping back again claiming Laughner was espousing a right wing theory? Which one was that and how did it rise from the flotsam of rambling he left behind that lacked so much as a complete sentence?
Buddha: “What color is the sky in your world?”
Gray, freezing rain & generally disgusting today.
This is America, where a white Catholic male Republican judge was murdered on his way to greet a Democratic Jewish woman member of Congress, who was his friend. Her life was saved initially by a 20-year old Mexican-American gay college student, and eventually by a Korean-American combat surgeon, all eulogized by our African American President.” –Mark Shields
I have a feeling this is what the right wing does not like about our nation right now, and they will do anything to change it back to the bastion of white male power.
We are not going back to those Mad Men days, never, ever.
Get used to it.
Bob,
So someone espousing a right wing theory has no connection to right wing rhetoric?
What color is the sky in your world?
Bob Esq.:
I will say there are a lot of libertarians who would like to return to the gold standard. It is a good idea.
So Buddha is right that there are certain groups who do wish to eliminate “fiat” money. Most of them are not on the left.
Fiat money helps the left and hurts the people through inflation. So we can say that sound money principles are definitely a right wing/libertarian convention.
If a Muslim had put together a poster like this telling people to ‘reload’, they would have gone straight to gitmo.
Well, Palin doth protest too much, me thinks.
trying to avoid the tarring and feathering.
Dont you think, when her target poster came out to a pretty general outcry from the ‘target’ herself, moderates and the left, that she could have done the gracious thing and removed this?
Here is what normal people thought about it at the time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGoZcPayJds&feature=player_embedded
I actually wrote John McCain asking him to condemn this target poster. Because when you combine this image with the words from Palin, “dont retreat, reload” etc. it was exactly like an incitement to violence…….and did increase the political atmosphere of hate in Arizona.
I started calling her the Cheerleader of Violence ™
Buddha: “There is a connection between right wing rhetoric and my general assertion that such rhetoric plays to the mentally unstable.”
And your general assertion. Your general assertion that has not been established in the particular case of Laughner.
Because if your general assertion DID apply to the particular case of Laughner, your right wing suspects would have been tarred and feathered already. Oh, and it would have been world news worthy.
When you combine lies with hate speech, of course it has an effect on society in any nation!
We are seeing those effects more and more in the past two years.
Here is an example:
The liar email ‘quoted’ Nancy Pelosi in an interview. This was a totally flake interview, completely made up! Nothing in the interview contained anything Pelosi said at any time. Someone pulled it out of their ass.
My right wing friends know it is true, because we all know that is what Pelosi ‘thinks”. Oh Really? You believe lies because you just know that is what the person would think. It is ridiculous!
They use this to justify slander, hate speech and lies.
And how the hell do these emails get put together and sent out to deceive gullible people? Thousands, probably millions of liar emails from the right wing each day.
The left does not do this.
Bob,
What part of “I did not pay with gold and silver” and “the need for a new money system” are common far right memes isn’t registering?
The shooter got the idea from somewhere.
It’s an idea constantly repeated by the likes of Ron and Rand Paul, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and Robert P. George – all of whom are on the far right of the spectrum. And nary a leftist call for a return to the gold standard. Why? A return to the gold standard would make credit slaves out of most Americans. Economic slavery is what the far right is shooting for since they know whitey is about to be outnumbered and they can’t go back to their old model: race based slavery.
There is a connection between right wing rhetoric and my general assertion that such rhetoric plays to the mentally unstable. If you disagree with the tactics? That’s your prerogative. But to deny the connection is simply denying reality: lunacy and incitement appeal to the mentally unstable and while they may not be prime causal drivers for bad actions, they most certainly exacerbate the underlying conditions.
I was not talking about “views” or “opinions”. I was talking about the rights propensity to dismiss REALITY.
A lie is a lie and can be proven in court. The right wing seems to believe lies that somehow support their ideology. There is something very wrong with this, especially when it happens in the public sphere.
You are entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts.
Facts are provable things. there is a difference.
Also, it is no surprise to me that the shooter bought the gun last November. We had just endured months and months of terrifying commercials. Ominous, menacing words and images whenever you turned on the TV.
This is the result of Citizens United. Sheriff Dupnik is trying to tell us that this is going to be a continual problem in the US.
Our media market was flooded with these disgusting commercials. It was enough to drive a sane person to madness.
This on top of the regular daily dose of hate speech and lies coming from the Hatestream Media.
Right is Right,
“If you don’t like your views then change them but don’t call someone hateful because they think your ideas are stupid and can make a case against them.”
I’m confused about exactly what it is you’re trying to say in that sentence.
*****
“You don’t even know what you are talking about do you?”
That’s your opinion.
“The attempted assassination of a politician is inherently political.”
Tell it to the Secret Service.