Yesterday, we posted an item about a Politico column arguing that Tea Partiers are "full blown terrorists." Today, Politico mixes things up a bit by publishing an Op/Ed advancing the premise that members of the Tea Party are just like the Taliban. Diversity:
We now have a group of U.S. politicians seeking political purity, who seem to have much in common with the Taliban. They are tea party members; and because of blind adherence to smaller government, they seem intent on risking destroying what American political leaders have constructed in more than two centuries of hard, often painful work. Like the Taliban, they see compromise as an unacceptable alternative.
The author, a former Democratic Congressman and DCCC Chairman named Martin Frost, proceeds to lay out his take on the current debt impasse, and offers some potential paths to resolution. He concludes by accusing the Tea Party of exploding American governance:
Granted, all this is hard. But there is no need to blow up centuries old religious statues — or two centuries of American government.
While I understand the best response to a comparison this inapt is to shrug or laugh it off, I can't quite shake the conviction of how deeply offensive it is. The Taliban is a ghoulish cult built on harsh repression and the celebration of death. They harbored and aided Al Qaeda for years. They
maim,
abuse, torture, and kill in the name of Islam. If you can stomach it, watch these
appalling videos illustrating their horrifying barbarity.
Major content warning. To compare these unconscionable butchers to the Tea Party -- a group of American citizens who seek to rein in the size and scope of government through peaceful, democratic means -- is
totally outrageous. Martin Frost, William Yeomans, and the whole lot of Lefties who enthusiastically participate in this slander should be ashamed of themselves -- or at least humiliated by their intellectual bankruptcy.
For what it's worth, I conducted an online search for any Politico column that draws parallels between the political Left and enemies of the state. I came up empty. If you're able to find examples that eluded me, feel free to post them in the comments section. I'll be happy to denounce them. But I suspect you won't find any, because Politico wouldn't dare publish material so patently uncivil and divisive. Unless it's aimed at conservatives, of course -- at which point, they'll print two identically unhinged columns in the span of 48 hours.*
UPDATE - A friend reminds me that prominent left-wing online agitator "Kos" published
an entire book based on the the thesis that American conservatives are kindred spirits with the Taliban. (He based much of his argument on a series of polls that were later
revealed to be completely fraudulent). As I
wrote yesterday, this mind-boggling slander is apparently par for the course in contemporary liberal circles. But remember,
they're the open-minded, tolerant, "adults in the room."
UPDATE II - I see from their respective time stamps that these two columns were published less than 12 hours apart.
