A couple of days ago, when there were some voices in the mainstream press and the blogosphere still unwilling to yell JIHAD JIHAD JIHAD in response to questions about the Tsarnaev brothers' motivation, we got headlines in the right-wing blogosphere like this:
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCnw2Eo3iIaqPa0osKyzc_uxxFYY4gDLAgpGH6ty9ppsYvfnC45jm5sofm0FXJQsV6WZlTLuOBFM_kaOB_kvtse_40VzkNUWRCV4cSGzzrgSbem3jRqzjnr2nv-gNcuVvEH-k/s422/enemedia+jpg.jpg)
And this:
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2fSjVQkUfZJ9R8u-RlMMDOYg2GIrvQzaN5u2VkTbnOtjwCt8CQZqG2A1kmYi45WNapf7-ptYm21eBYGe_OOkTAewiLTL4Np2BTHSYeWij_J2b3Qx0a6wYxu4CznJ1tT0UiVk/s320/mysterious+jpg.jpg)
Well, the press is certainly telling us now that the Tsarnaevs had an Islamist motive. Here's The Washington Post:
The 19-year-old suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings has told interrogators that the American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan motivated him and his brother to carry out the attack, according to U.S. officials familiar with the interviews.So the wingers are happy now, right?
... officials said ... the evidence so far suggests they were "self-radicalized" through Internet sites and U.S. actions in the Muslim world.
Nahhhh:
On Sunday, I wrote about how the media and left-blogosphere were trying to move the Boston Bombing narrative to focus on what is wrong with how we treated the bombers as immigrants and away from the problem of Jihadism....Also:
Sure enough, it’s no longer an implication, it’s being stated out loud.
Notice the not-too-subtle Washington Post spin here....So liberalism (which for wingnuts, encompasses everything from the radical leftists to the right-center) is to blame because not every voice in this broad spectrum was immediately willing to call these guys jihadists. But now that the brothers are effectively being called jihadists, it's also our fault for reporting what one of the brothers says was their motivation.
In other words, the Brothers Tsarnaev shared the Left's worldview that U.S. military intervention abroad in the wake of 9/11 was illegitimate....
You can't win with these winger bastards.
Yeah, but you gotta admire their ability to do that.
ReplyDeleteWe Liberals can never frame things like that - both ways.
Hell, we take a decent-sized victory like Obamacare, and bitch about Obama, and that it isn't Medicare for everyone, instead of on the Republicans and lobbyists, and Democrats, to be honest, who made sure we didn't get Medicare for everyone.
And NOW, the Conservatives want to end Medicare as we know it, claiming Obamacare will take precious money away from seniors, and give it to "Blah" people, and immigrants, and gays, and something or other, cause... FreeDUMB, LiberTEA!!!
Peoples,
ReplyDeleteit's a such a good thing that people are so easily stereotyped into two groups lefties= socialist= commies = Commies = democrats = subversives V Conservatives = True patriots!
Stop for a minute and analyze the easy step logic of association.
If all the first mentioned are "villains" they must be a threat to to SOMEBODY but WHO?'
The average tea partier or irascible religious curmudgeon? If so how?
Deduction would suggest that “the villains” are about including more people in the true benefits/purpose of the Nation (Society... any society).
Clearly the true Patriots are in there too.
Call me cynic but "WHO gains the MOST from this really?"
Hint "which elementary group benefits the article being written this way?"
Objectively none of the above!
"Once you eliminate all the suspects who ever is left, no matter how unlikely, must be the culprit… it’s elementary…Dr. Watson”
The real issue is how …. We all understand the importance in such instinct like Fear, Threat and protecting our own (what ever it is… Survival) as manifested by emotions. And clearly these emotions are being deliberately stimulated (manipulated). We also know that the group (species) survival instinct is often greater than that of the individual survival (patriotism, religious devotion, fear of otherness et al). All these are (ab)used in advertising/marketing psychology.
What is not widely understood by the public is that, like everything, there are usually more to these techniques than are the obvious.
Right wing spin not only gives emotional reassurance to its followers but also creates the environment where opposition is so emotionally distracted it act in the exact way they want them to react… to emphasize the desired differences rather than the greater number of issues they share. i.e. conflict.
e.g. Some articulated individual that expands their fears all be they lacking in any sense of an informed (greater) understanding ( expressing their emotive fears etc) and the left immediately jump to ridicule and or vitriolic put downs. What most in the left are doing is simply mirror imaging the right wing emotionalism right on cue.
Any one who has had to mediate a conflict knows that the first thing is to confirm the mutually agreed. Get agreements on the problem(s) one at a time seeking the real CAUSES to/for both SIDES.
Sadly most web sites tend to be for emotive venting i.e. this is Why MY opinion is correct or how lame the other side is.
Even the committed socialist Noam Chomsky doesn’t attack the Tea Party out of hand but acknowledges they have genuine issues (IMHO I would add most of which are poorly articulated)
If the left sees its self as the higher intellectuals and keepers of the greater good surely it’s time they showed both these by way of superior tactic rather than non productive the equivalence of WW1 trench warfare measured by grime, sludge and mutual carnage.