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Bats Over Ballots: Anti-Trump Rhetoric Takes Violent Turn

For days leading up to the election, President-elect Donald Trump was pummelled (not without reason) for suggesting that he might not accept the results of the election.  Now, many of the same people who were outraged, are protesting the results of the election. Some however have gone further and taken the rhetoric to violent levels.  For example, Actress Lea DeLaria, right, (Big Boo on “Orange Is the New Black“) wrote on Instagram that she wanted to “take out” Republicans and Independents with a baseball bat.  Likewise, Matt Harrigan, CEO of the network security firm PacketSled went on Facebook to say that he would kill Trump.They are only two of a chorus of liberals who have discarded any  measure of restraint or principle in lashing out at the results of an election because it did not turn out the way that they wanted.

DeLaria left little doubt as to how she believes people should react when they do not get what they want in a democratic process. She  suggested that people “pick up a baseball bat and take out every f–king republican and independent I see. #f–ktrump #f–ktheGOP #f–kstraightwhiteamerica #f–kyourprivilege.”  It is not clear if studios would react to her hateful message. There has been no such reaction thus far.

There was a response to Harrigan, who is now the former CEO at PacketSled.  Somehow threatening the life of the President-elect did not sit well with the security company. It also did not help to prove that you are a dysfunctional moron in publicly threatening a president, which is a crime under federal law.

 

Harrigan went back on social media to say it was just a joke — just one that no one thought was funny:

“My recent Facebook comment was intended to be a joke, in the context of a larger conversation, and only privately shared as such. Anyone who knows me, knows that I do not engage in this form of rhetoric with any level of seriousness and the comment most certainly does not represent my real personal views in any regard. I apologize if anything that I said was either taken seriously, was offensive, or caused any legitimate concern.”

In the meantime, the company is working with the Secret Service after dispatching their CEO:

“The PacketSled Board of Directors accepted the resignation of President and CEO Matthew Harrigan, effective immediately. Fred Wilmot, the company’s Chief Technology Officer, will serve as interim CEO while the Board of Directors conducts a search for a permanent replacement. We want to be very clear, PacketSled does not condone the comments made by Mr. Harrigan, which do not reflect the views or opinions of the company, its employees, investors or partners.”

These statements raise a long-standing debate that we have had on this blog over the discipline or termination of employees for their actions in their private lives.  Companies are not restricted under the First Amendment in this sense. If any employee embarrasses the company by their association with controversial actions or statements, they can be terminated.  That can create a “Little Brother” problem that we have previously discussed.

While I know people coming to Washington protest the election, I do not share that view.  They, of course, have every right to protest, but I believe that the country should come together in the 45th peaceful transfer of power in the country.  Those voters who prevailed have every reason to celebrate.  Those who lost are protesting the results of a democratic process — a problematic notion.  Nevertheless, both the inauguration and the protests reflect the core rights protected in this country so long as people like DeLaria and Harrigan do not find solace in calling for violence as a way to vent their disappointment.  President Barack Obama said once that “elections have consequences.”  The inauguration is one of those consequences.

283 thoughts on “Bats Over Ballots: Anti-Trump Rhetoric Takes Violent Turn”

  3. Ex-George W. Bush counselor warns conservatives to stay away from Donald Trump administration filled with “unquestioning loyalty”
    Another Republican comes forward to deliver a scathing attack of the Trump administration’s transition team
    http://www.salon.com/2016/11/16/ex-george-w-bush-counselor-warns-conservatives-to-stay-away-from-donald-trump-administration-filled-with-unquestioning-loyalty/

    Eliot A. Cohen, a military historian who served as counselor of the State Department under President George W. Bush from 2007 to 2009, is warning fellow conservatives to stay away from the Trump administration.

    “I am a national security Never-Trumper who, after the election, made the case that young conservatives should volunteer to serve in the new administration, warily, their undated letters of resignation ready,” Cohen wrote in an editorial for The Washington Post on Tuesday night. “That advice, I have concluded, was wrong.”

    Cohen went on to describe how one of his conservative friends “in Trumpworld” asked him to provide a list of names from the Republican foreign policy establishment who had not formally joined the Never Trump movement and might be willing to serve under President Trump. After complying with the request, Cohen says that the friend responded in an email “seething with anger directed at those of us who had opposed Donald Trump — even those who stood ready to help steer good people to an administration that understandably wanted nothing to do with the likes of me, someone who had been out front in opposing Trump since the beginning.”

    Although Cohen has since patched things up with his friend and characterized the email exchange as “a momentary eruption of temper,” he also describes the exchange as a “tipping point” when it comes to his feelings about conservatives working in the Trump administration.

    “The tenor of the Trump team, from everything I see, read and hear, is such that, for a garden-variety Republican policy specialist, service in the early phase of the administration would carry a high risk of compromising one’s integrity and reputation,” Cohen declared, going on to criticizing Trump for “surrounding himself with mediocrities whose chief qualification seems to be unquestioning loyalty.”

    1. President Obama’s Deputy National Security Advisor has an MFA in fiction writing and was an aspiring novelist with no national security background.

      Trump’s transition will fall into place. The man has good instincts. He proved it during his campaign. Likewise, Hillary proved her lack of judgment and poor instincts during her losing campaign.

      1. I think you should have done a little more research on the educational background of Susan Rice.

        Ambassador Rice received her M.Phil (Master’s degree) and D.Phil. (Ph.D) in International Relations from New College, Oxford University, England, where she was a Rhodes Scholar. She was awarded the Chatham House-British International Studies Association Prize for the most distinguished doctoral dissertation in the United Kingdom in the field of International Relations. Ambassador Rice received her B.A. in History with honors from Stanford University, where she graduated junior Phi Beta Kappa and was a Truman Scholar. Ambassador Rice is married to Ian Cameron and has two children.

      2. Another pov (from a – gasp – leftist).

        I find the above [short summary of Cohen changing positions furiously to curry favor with Trump after the election having insulted him all over the media before] very funny. How could that turncoat think he would be greeted by the Trump organization with anything but derision? Cohen believed he and his ilk would be welcome with candies and roses after insulting Trump in all major media? Who is the arrogant one in the above?

        http://www.moonofalabama.org/

      1. Indeed. Many see the expulsion of Christie and co and of Cohen as very positive signs.

  4. Donald Trump ditches press pool so he can tell people at a fancy steakhouse he’ll lower their taxes
    Trump delivered red meat at a famous, pricey New York City steakhouse, saying he’s going to cut taxes on the rich
    http://www.salon.com/2016/11/16/donald-trump-ditches-press-pool-so-he-tell-people-at-a-fancy-steakhouse-hell-lower-their-taxes/

    If reporters were with Donald Trump last night, they would have heard him assure the New York City elite that their taxes will soon be lowered.

    “We’ll get your taxes down. Don’t worry about it, ” Trump said to the diners, who paid $25 for crab cake appetizers.

    During the election, Donald Trump consistently railed against the greed of Wall Street and the Washington, D.C. elite, riding a populist movement all the way to victory. But since becoming president-elect, Trump has seemingly abandoned his supporters who voted for him because of real economic anxiety.

        1. This really irks me. The inconsistency with respect to loafers is disturbing. Loafers can “step up,” but everyone knows loafers can’t “rise.” Loafs of bread perhaps, but not loafers.

          Did I miss anything?

  7. One wonders how many of the people advocating violence are also snowflakes who need safe spaces where they can go and hide from speech such as “all lives matter”? I’m under the impression that a certain number of people want to put up a one-way speech wall that allows them to hurl hateful speech at others, but claim to be scared and hurt at the slightest hint of an idea they don’t personally agree with.

    3. No, we hear your speech loud and clear, and we are against it. The problem is that you don’t hear the hate that was spewed from your candidate,and you basically elected a puppet with NO clue as to how government works to the highest office in the land. So now he’s loading up the swamp with the most extreme hateful elements of the Republican party, and it will destroy us all, including you.

      1. Free speech is hate speech to those who hate the truth!!

        And thus should be subject to hate speech legislation…don’t worry, it’s coming.

        Antonio – proud Puerto Rican for Donald Trump.

  8. “First, there will not be a civil war.”

    Only if the left stops rioting.

    Soros should be jailed for funding and instigating the riots.

    1. KC Fleming
      ….Sen. Barbara Boxer just announced that she’s spearheading a movemement to abolish the Electoral College.
      Like-minded citizens should consider whether they want someone like Sen. Boxer, aptly described as “a barking moonbat” and “thick as a box of rocks”, to lead their cause.

  10. “..the man who will be made
    President despite not being elected in legitimate fashion”.
    It depends on whether one considers the Constitution a “legitimate document”.

  11. Prof. Turley, I respect your typically balanced presentation of views but on this particular post your premise is simply incorrect. The people who are in the streets protesting and those who are emoting on social media in ways indicating that they do not accept the election results are not in any way the same people who were hammering Trump for his outrageous and clearly false statements about the election being rigged so he couldn’t win prior to the actual election. The people who did what they could to exploit the childish and typically stupid statements Trump made were mostly representatives of the Clinton campaign itself and other Democratic office holders and luminaries. None of those talking heads and other members of the elite are out in the streets. Not one of them. The people on social media, including the guy who lost his job after making an idiotic statement about Trump are also not the people who, in the weeks leading to the vote, were denouncing as antidemocratic and “dangerous” Trump’s immature stupidity regarding the election being rigged.

    The people in the streets appear, in the main, to be young people properly outraged that the winner of the plebiscite is not going to become President. They are protesting the anachronistic, outmoded, and certainly antidemocratic outcome of the campaign which is perfectly legitimate. Furthermore, there is no obligation upon the citizens to simply accept the antidemocratic outcome which, had it occurred in any nation we are not friendly with, would be roundly denounced by our government and both political parties and our media as an illegitimate outcome.

    The bottom line on elections goes straight back to the fundamentals of democracy properly understood. That is that the election itself is the official and to some, sacred, act of the people exercising the most important right they have which is to confer legitimacy on our elected officials providing the essential prerequisite to all legitimate government which is the consent of the governed. Trump enters the White House without that necessary consent as he not only failed to get a majority of the votes but he failed even to get a plurality. Millions more voters who cast ballots on election day voted against Trump than the number who voted for him. Therefore, as a matter of actual fact, his presidency is legitimate only in a technical sense in that the electoral college vote (which is no longer legitimate in the 21st century) has robbed both the government and the people of a legitimately elected President.

    Thus, there’s no hypocrisy at all involved on the part of those who are not official spokespeople or talking heads that have prominent media perches from which to make their pronouncements known. The, what I consider, ill advised protests and stupid, empty threats of violence are not something I approve of but they are not hypocritical nor are they wrong to make their extreme opposition known. They represent, after all, a significantly larger block of the population than the man who will be made President despite not being elected in legitimate fashion.

    1. So that makes it ok to break windows, assault people and cause mayhem.

      I bet you dollars to donuts if Trump had lost and complained in any way, you would allege this to be another example of his incipient fascism.

      Just don’t pretend you are an impartial observer.

      The socialist, multicult utopia will have to wait. I’m so sorry for you.

      Antonio – proud Puerto Rican for Donald Trump!

    2. “Therefore, as a matter of actual fact, his presidency is legitimate only in a technical sense in that the electoral college vote (which is no longer legitimate in the 21st century) has robbed both the government and the people of a legitimately elected President.”

      Who gave you the power to amend the Constitution?

      As a matter of actual fact, you calling your opinions “facts” does not make them facts. The fact is that Trump is technically and legitimately President-Elect, in accordance with the Constitution and the laws of the nation.

      And since your “actual facts” are not facts, your argument has no basis on which to stand. Go learn the difference between opinions and facts, and then try again.

  12. Ain’t useless rhetoric wonderful? Here’s the deal. First, there will not be a civil war. Second, exchanges of stories about violence and threats of violence against political opponents is unproductive. Third, no rational person believes that violence is an intelligent response to the election results. Fourth, no rational person should be surprised that violence and threats of violence have attended these particular election results.

    History teaches that us that appeals to the ugliest elements of human nature inevitably produce physical manifestations of that ugliness. Nativism, xenophobia, misogyny and racism comprise a few of those elements. A campaign that addresses societal problems by blaming those problems on the Other, however defined, encourages that ugliness. A victorious campaign that publically expresses a desire to bring people together while simultaneously rewarding the proponents of that ugliness with influential positions in the emerging government generates neither good will nor credibility.

    We now return to our regularly scheduled program of ad hominem invective.

  13. I can’t get this post to go in so I’m trying a different way of saying it.

    Trump is thinking of appointing a person who takes a full on military response towards protests, including protests against Trump. Free speech is an important American value. Republicans and Democrats alike should be protesting this sheriff’s appt. He does not believe in free speech or the right of the people to redress their grievances.

    Personally, I have had more than enough of this militarized response to protest by police under Obama. I am hoping Republicans will join with others to restore the rule of law, including the right of free speech and protest.

    Please read more about this in global research.

    1. Politico, yesterday, noted that Sheriff Clarke is a long shot for that position. Is that who you are referring to?

    2. Dream on, Jill. Mr. Trump preached that only he can save this country. Sixty million people agreed. Authoritarianism, whatever euphemistic description it may adopt, is antithetical to the rule of law.

    4. Donald Trump’s Police State
      The Republican nominee’s proposals on public safety would discard the constitutional rights of blacks and Hispanics.
      http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/donald-trump-stop-and-frisk-blacks-round-up-millions-of-hispanics/501032/

      Frisking Innocent Black Bodies

      In New York City, where Michael Bloomberg presided over most Stop and Frisk policing, the approach involved 4.4 million stops—that is to say, armed agents of the state forced New Yorkers to stop on the street 4.4 million times between 2002 and 2015.

      And 88 percent of those stops resulted in no further action!

      Put another way, millions who did nothing wrong were needlessly stopped and harassed by police. It could not be more plain that huge numbers of them, the vast majority of whom were black and brown, gave no probable cause to justify a search.

      As the New York Times reported in August 2013, Stop and Frisk did not just harass masses of innocents, it violated their constitutional rights: Federal Judge Shira Scheindlin “concluded that the stops, which soared in number over the last decade as crime continued to decline, demonstrated a widespread disregard for the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures by the government, as well as the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.”

      Trump proposes to impose Stop and Frisk upon communities nationwide—he evidently has as little regard for the Tenth Amendment as he does for the Fourth and Fourteenth.

  14. Darren,

    i can’t get a post in to save my life. Would you see if you are able to find it? It’s about the proposed DHS chief.

  15. Both sides use the canard, “The other side is crazy!” Bu when it comes to the Democrats, and the SJWs in particular, that is no longer just rhetoric. Many Democrats are truly, non-rhetorically, non-perjoratively mentally ill crazy.

    A new hashtag I saw is TARD. Trump Acceptance Rejection Disorder.

    Squeeky Fromm
    Girl Reporter

  16. @Paul: Exactly.
    I suspect their ‘fears’ about internment camps, violence, and loss of rights are really what they want to happen to their opponents.

  18. If the left gets their civil war, they won’t like the result.

    Kurt Schlichter:
    “Liberals need to understand the reality that rarely penetrates their bubble. Non-liberal Americans (it’s more than just conservatives who are under the liberal establishment’s heel) are the majority of this country. They hold power in many states and regions in unprecedented majorities. And these attacks focus on what they hold dearest – their religion, their families and their freedom.

    What is the end game, liberals? Do you expect these people you despise to just take it? Do you think they’ll just shrug their shoulders and say, “Well, I guess we better comply?” Do you even know any real Americans? Do you think you’ll somehow be able to force them into obedience – for what is government power but force – after someone finally says “Enough?”

    …liberals would be well advised to ask themselves who will be willing to fight and die to preserve their power and policies. In contrast, there are an awful lot of people willing to fight and die for their religion and our Constitution.

    And let’s be blunt – these are the people with most of the guns and the training to use them. That’s the reality of the rule of force.
    Now, this will no doubt draw the lie that I am somehow advocating violence. The current liberal habit of shamelessly lying about their opponents makes civil debate impossible.

    I’m not advocating violence – I am warning liberals that they are setting the conditions for violence.

    And that better worry them, for the coastal elites are uniquely unsuited to a world where force rules instead of law. The Serbs were, at least, a warrior people. The soft boys and girls who brought us helicopter parenting, “trigger warnings” and coffee cups with diversity slogans are not.

    I know the endgame of discarding the rule of law for short-term advantage because I stood in its ruins. Liberals think this free society just sort of happened, that they can poke and tear at its fabric and things will just go on as before. But they won’t. So at the end of the day, if you want a society governed by the rule of force, you better pray that you’re on the side with the guns and those who know how to use them.“

    1. KCFleming – the problem with the left in a civil war is that they are not armed. The right is armed and knows how to shoot.

  19. In defense of the electoral college system. It not only serves to prevent a dictatorship of the heavily populated states if does one other important job.

    Candidates only have to target 50% plus one in 48 of the 50 states and with in the other two 50% plus one in three sub districts. That’s all it takes to gain winner take all electoral college figures. 60% to be safer. they do not have to target 80 or 90 or 100%.

    If California passes the percentage rule it will financially change the whole flavor of campaigns to ensure the entire 55 goes where they hope it will continue going.

    But another great idea is looming. None of the Above is no longer a Brewsters Millions comedy. All ballots should have NOTA as a choice. and if NOTA takes 50% or more the election re-run with new candidates. Wouldn’t take long at the primary level to weed out the undesirables. Californias as an example could then have gone 25 Clinton 20 Trump and ten for Sanders, Johnson and Klein. I made those up as an example not to be accurate. Wow could anyone then make 270? Built in none of the above.

  20. There is certain irony involved when Isaac pontificates about “mindless, emotional, unAmerican vitriol”.
    His mindless and emotional rants are even more entertaining after he makes a statement like that.

    1. I sooo agree with you! But IsaacB should be commended for finding 8,237 different ways to say “Republicans are sooo stupid and us Democrats are sooo totally smart!” I wonder if uses an algorithm???

      Squeeky Fromm
      Girl Reporter

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