Instapundit notes a new book by Robert H. Churchill, To Shake Their Guns in the Tyrant’s Face: Libertarian Political Violence and the Origins of the Militia Movement. He quotes from the introduction:
It seemed to me as a historian that the concept of extremism begged a question: how do certain ideas, movements and political impulses come to be considered extremist? As a citizen whose political identity was shaped by the late twentieth century, I saw the militias’ assertion of a right to use armed force to change government policy as new, threatening, and beyond the pale of legitimate politics. But as a historian of early America I found achingly familiar their assertion of a right to take up arms to prevent the exercise of unconstitutional power by the federal government. As a historian, then, I was faced with a more specific question: how has the United States as a political society come to view the assertion of that right as extremist?
Haven’t read the book, but I would put strong blame on the left-leaning educational system, which hasn’t actually taught history for years.
On the other hand, there’s a certain amount of blame accruing to the militias themselves, as they are widely perceived to be saturated with Birchers, skinheads, and Klan types by people who historically have been persecututed by, well, Birchers, skinheads, and Klan types. I remember very clearly that, in the Jewish religious education establishment, there was significant discussion of which was worse — militias, or the Religious Right. (Most Jews I knew didn’t make any distinction between them, to be honest.)
It was probably better for one’s rep back then to publicly proclaim affiliation with the Freemasons than to be identified as a member of a militia (and it probably still is).
Militias could go a long way toward cleaning up their reputations by ejecting the bigots and concentrating on liberty and justice for all. Prove to the world you have nothing to hide and no secret agenda to wipe out the Jews, Catholics, blacks, and gays, and that anyone professing such is not welcome in your midst. Educate your members to understand that the Constitution is for all of us, and that our only enemies in this fight are enemies of Constitutional liberty.
And regardless of what the (unconstitutional) Militia Act of 1903 says, we’re ALL the militia.
Don’t fuck it up for the rest of us.
I think extremism is a word like censorship.
No one really objects to censorship, as long as the only silencing occurs to your opponents. Extremism is a word you apply to your opponents, a propaganda tool to make the other side look bad.
Akin to fanatic, extremists are lumped in with zealots – people so enamored of their beliefs and understandings, they are immune to argument – they literally cannot hear anything that doesn’t support their own views. There can be no discussions, no negotiation with a fanatic, an extremist, a zealot – thus they make convenient labels for opponents. Labels like extremist make the people holding opposing view – into death targets, because, after all, you couldn’t do anything else with them, now could you? (end snarky sarcasm)
Just like the concept of a heinous felon, when you label an opponent as “extremist”, you make them unsafe to leave free and you consider them dangerous to all.
Now, I personally think there is a vast difference between POTUS Barack Hussein Obama’s current agenda and “the people of the United States”, and I think that Oh! Bummer! really wants the people of the United States to take for granted that the opponents of the POTUS agenda are really dangers to everyone.
Extremist labels are part of a deliberate, war-time propaganda effort. And the extremist in the White House, as well as extremists Pelosi and Reid, want America to defend them from the opponents they created when they abused the Constitution.
At least, that is what I think.
I don’t think you’re wrong in so thinking. Personally I’ve always been partial to this bit of Heinlein’s:
“Political tags–such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth–are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”
If it is extremist to be the latter, then I guess I’m an extremist. But I hardly see that attitude as being extreme.