David Neiwert, aka Orcinus has been turning over rocks and finding ugly things crawl out. The latest example in a depressingly long series of posts is hinterlands of Idaho and Montana, where it seems “eliminationist” rhetoric is getting a strong foothold.
I've been talking for some time about the course that eliminationist rhetoric on the right would eventually take by the force of its own nature: pretty soon we'd go from talking about liberals as traitors to overtly wishing for violence to be visited upon them and discussing locking them up, followed in due course by such violence and incarceration becoming a reality.
Well, it is now becoming a commonly spoken sentiment on the right to wish for violence against liberals and to simultaneously suggest they and all “traitors” (including Muslim Americans) should be locked away. We're firmly into Phase II now.
I would like to assure you — and myself — that Mr. Neiwert is some sort of alarmist crank, and that the attitudes he describes cannot spread.
But I can't do that.
