Posted on 09/24/2011 5:56:24 AM PDT by marktwain
“When all else fails … vote from the rooftops.” That’s how a T-shirt logo advertising Michael Dukes’ radio show reads. What can that statement, in blood-red lettering over a black background and paired with the image of an assault rifle, possibly mean except that people who aren’t satisfied with election results should use an assault rifle to take matters into their own hands. That they should climb to the top of a building and start killing people?
It is, of course, a despicable logo. Most people, conservative to liberal, get that. Just this month, an AK47 owner blasted 11 folks having breakfast at a pancake house in Nevada, killing three. “You can’t believe the firepower,” said a witness, “the kind of rounds coming out of that weapon.”
So when Michael Dukes suggests that the text and image of his 2007 logo is some kind of joke (“satire … not to be taken seriously,” according to the News-Miner), I wonder how many people think it’s funny. (View the logo at http://themichaeldukesshow.blogspot.com/2007/06/artwork-for-firearms-friday-show-almost.html.) Supporters in the online comments below the News-Miner article protest that the intent is serious, that people should prepare for armed revolution if “all else” — however you define that — fails.
I wonder what fraction of the Fairbanks population thinks that this moment in American political history is so desperate that we should be thinking about launching a civil war. Schaeffer Cox does, I guess.
According to the seven-count indictment, Cox told his militia “ … you also have to be ready to kill.” It’s alleged he envisioned “guerilla warfare” and was getting ready to kill judges and troopers, having amassed for that purpose “a tripod-mounted, belt-fed .50-caliber machine gun, a belt-fed, hand-cranked, tripod-mounted .30 caliber machine gun, at least one fully automatic assault rifle, multiple pineapple grenades, at least one grenade launcher … ” — the list goes on.
Dukes, a member of the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly who is running for re-election, cavalierly blends fatuous macho talk with gun-rights advocacy, but this kind of talk isn’t bluster to Cox and his ilk. In Cox, a sometimes political candidate, we see the fusion of a Second Amendment activist and a radical accused of actively planning to use gun violence as a political tool.
What kind of mind thinks this way? What sort of values must these people hold? What part of “Thou shalt not kill” eludes those who tend to tout Christian values? For that matter, what part of criminal law eludes this brand of conservatives, usually champions of “law and order?” What deep sense of victimhood and impotence leads one to prop up his inadequacy with an assault rifle and to snicker at the prospect of shooting his neighbors?
It isn’t just in our town, either, where it sometimes seems the lunatics are running the asylum. Tea Party-backed candidate Sharron Angle of Nevada offers the same message as Dukes and Cox when she refers to “Second Amendment remedies.”
And then there’s our gal Sarah Palin, saying “Don’t retreat — reload,” and graphically targeting congressional Democrats by placing rifle scope crosshairs on their districts. Of course, all it takes is one delusional fanatic, infuriated with the government, to pull a gun and send a bullet through the skull of one of those people, Rep. Gabby Giffords.
Michele Bachmann makes a point of telling audiences that her favorite gun is an AR15 assault rifle. She told Minnesotans that she wanted them “armed and dangerous” for upcoming political battles and that she needed her supporters to “take out some of these bad guys.”
Joyce Kaufman, a conservative radio host and Florida Republican Rep. Allen West’s chief of staff, said, “If ballots don’t work, bullets will.” Not much ambiguity there. Stephen Broden, a conservative candidate for Congress in Texas last year, is even less metaphorical: “Our nation was founded on violence; the option is on the table.”
This, of course, is the talk of children. Or of adults stuck at a profoundly immature level of thinking. It’s the kind of thinking that informs those who bring guns to public meetings, intimidating ordinary folk from testifying, or even attending.
It’s the kind of thinking that results in noxious smoke pouring into a grade school for years before the citizenry rises up and demands a stop to it.
It’s what allows our borough mayor, an unfailingly polite and thoroughly decent man, to be utterly pilloried — shrill voices threatening and denouncing him as a socialist — for an eminently sensible wood stove replacement program.
It’s what scuttles Vision Fairbanks, a modest proposal to revitalize downtown, never mind that the downtown business owners requested the reform.
It’s time for people with a little more maturity and soundness of mind to take back their town.
Dan O’Neill is the author of “The Firecracker Boys” and “A Land Gone Lonesome.”
Read more: Fairbanks Daily News-Miner - The voice of Interior Alaska since 1903
Maybe he thinks the patriots used spitballs against the red coats.
Ole Danny boy should be sitting next to Eric Holder and his side kick Barry Soetoro.
If it ever comes down to the actual use of violence, the Democrats are going to come off VERY badly.
Considering the violent rhetoric coming from Democrats with the intent of silencing their opponents, ballots may not be an option.
Maybe he’s auditioning for a part in the Huntsman campaign - you know - being he’s so reasonable and all.....
The soft tie he made between Palin’s “target” graphics and actual violence was especially ridiculous.
He's probably getting his bottled water from the left. He's clearly a gift to them.
I'm no gun expert, but I really don't think that's an assault rifle. It's some sort of sniper rifle. Two very different weapons.
An AK would be a poor choice for a "fight from the rooftops" weapon. It's designed for close to medium range high-firepower situations. The major reason it's so popular among the "spray and pray" boys around the world.
If you want to be effective from a rooftop you need to be able to hit what you aiming for at a considerable distance.
“Christian values” - interesting to hear that phrase. Often used by non-Christians in ignorance of what Christian values really are. Uninformed Christians sometimes allow non-Christians to use guilt to manipulate them. Don’t be fooled. It’s not the state’s job to take money from one person to buy another an efficient wood stove. Charity taken by force or fraud is not charity. Let’s call it by its true name - which is “theft.” Buying votes is what the politicians want to do. And they want to do it with your money. Do not let them.
Of course what this article fails to point out is the fact that it has been the democrat party and their progressive movement base that has a long history of using terrorism in this country and in targeting innocent civilians. The KKK was a terrorist wing of the democrat party and was also championed by the progressive movement. In the sixties it was terrorist groups like the Weather Underground that were championed by the democrat parties progressive movement. Then of course you also have the terrorists groups like ELF and ALF both championed by the democrat party progressive movement and greenie movement.
This guy’s article would have been much more effective if he had also pointed out some of the many recent militaristic statements from unions and other leftists. Since he ignores them and focuses solely on statements of this type from conservatives, he just manages to look like an ideological hack rather than a concerned citizen.
Most people who aren't pacifists or utter cowards will agree with this statement. That there is some point at which one must fight back rather than supinely submitting to enslavement or death.
The question is thus not one of whether fighting back is ever appropriate, it is whether preparing to do so is appropriate and how close we are to the shooting point.
Personally, I think we're a lot farther from this point than many around here do, but I am in full agreement that such a point exists.
I suspect the author of this piece also agrees that such a point exists, although his shooting point would no doubt look very different from mine.
Dans an ignorant socialist presstitute....
Excellent!
A Christian will kill you in self-defense, but pray for your soul while doing so, and regret it afterwards.
BUMP!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.