You know, during the previous administration, an event like this reliably caused at least one GD or Pit thread to spring into existence.
Now that Obama’s in the White House, I’d like to say… meh.
Officer made a mistake. Secret Service investigates when called, as they should. No harm, no foul, no huhu. Perfectly reasonable.
As were most of the similar events screamed about over the past eight years.
So my Pitting has nothing to do with the players in the linked story, and everything to do with the few ultra-alarmists who regularly Pitted Bush when similar stuff happened during his terms. Don’t you guys feel even a little abashed now, looking back?
You know, I could understand if you were posting this, say, a week after it had been made public and no one said anything about it. Or even if it had made the national news and was being reported on the major outlets, like CNN or MSNBC. But it’s dated just this morning, and is from a local Oklahoma newspaper website.
Will you please forgive us for not having even seen it yet?
May we inquire, as a follow-up question, how it is that you became aware of it? Perusing some website, mayhaps, eager to present you with solid proof of lefty hypocrisy? Or is it your custom to acquaint yourself with the latest hot news from OK City upon arising?
I do not agree that there’s no harm, no foul here. I see it as a civil rights violation–a minor one, but still a violation. I’d file a formal complaint against the officer, and press to see him officially reprimanded, preferably with a short suspension without pay…say one week, followed by remedial training. I’d consider litigation to drive the point home. Might seek damages of $1 + attorney fees or something.
Looking back on what, exactly? Your vague references to “similar events” and “similar stuff” aren’t particularly informative. Would you please provide a specific example of an “ultra-alarmist” thread about a comparable incident that you think the participants have cause to be abashed about?
And no, I am not really okay with the fact that a police officer confiscated a car sign because it said “Abort Obama, Not the Unborn”. I don’t use the term “jackbooted” non-ironically, but I do think that that’s excessively intrusive no matter who the president is. If you want to call me an “ultra-alarmist” for feeling that way, well, so be it.
I’m not thrilled by the allegation that the Secret Service said “we’d just like to look through your house and make sure you aren’t a member of any hate groups”.
Being a member of a hate group, though repugnant, is not a crime.
I believe he’s referring to threads about how protesters were thrown out/had their signs taken away at Bush rallies. Frankly, this is much more bothersome than that- one could reasonably believe that protesters a few hundred feet from the President might constitute a threat, but it’s pretty unreasonable to suggest that a man on his way to work (or whatever) in Oklahoma is a threat.
You’ve started more than two hundred threads on this board. If you persist in asking this question, you may force me to have you account for what you were thinking when you started all of them.
Question: what, exactly, would constitute a sign that one would not be allowed to display, or that could even result in an arrest? Could I have a bumper sticker on my car that said “Obama deserves to die”? What about “Kill President Obama”? Or “Shoot Obama during his speech on March 3rd, 2009”?
Maybe, but I’d like to see the OP provide some specifics. It’s easy to make accusations about vaguely indicated bad things that you think you remember other people doing at some time in the past, but I’m not going to waste my time feeling abashed over vaguely indicated things that you think you remember. Show me something that you’re complaining about that I actually did, and I’ll see whether I agree with you that I shouldn’t have done it.
Makes sense to me if we go by what we’ve learned here in the past few weeks.
“Abort Obama” is akin to “butthurt much” as far as threats go thus the officer acted in a timely manner – I for one would be adverse to seeing the POTUS involved in knife fights this early on in his Presidency.
Sorry, I meant “me” in the sense of “generic me”. More precisely, one is not going to waste one’s time feeling abashed over vaguely indicated things that someone else thinks they remember, absent any specific complaint about a particular thing that one actually did.
So you didn’t think these types of incidents were the end of the world back then and now…you also don’t think they’re a big deal? OK.
I don’t think of myself as an ultra-alarmist, but I was deeply troubled and upset by the Bush administration’s pattern of restricting free speech related to protest (e.g. “free speech zones”). I find this incident just as troubling as I would if anyone else was president. However, there isn’t yet any indication that this type of restriction is happening on a wide scale or is being encouraged by the new administration, so it’s a lot easier for me to dismiss it as an isolated mistake.
After Obama won, I knew there would be some people who were going to try to minimize the egregious and outrageous actions taken by the Bush administration by equivocating them with actions of Obama’s they disagree with or which are superficially similar, thereby demonstrating some equivalence between the two and exposing the only real difference was unfair bias on the part of Bush’s detractors. I think these types of arguments are ludicrous. I’m not saying you’re making such an argument here, but it’s not far off. I’m hoping it’s just an isolated incident and not part of a larger pattern.
I’m also not going to speculate as to what incidents you’re refering to which we should feel “a little abashed now.” I do, however, take issue with this comment.
No harm, no foul? I disagree. They pulled him over and detained him because he displayed a message they didn’t agree with. They called the Secret Service, went through his home, and did a background check on him. He’s got an SS file on him now, and, while this is admitedly just speculation, might be put on a watch list of some kind and could have come pretty close to things escalating way beyond “let me ask you a few questions for 30 minutes.”
That’s not no harm, no foul.
That I completely disagree with his message does not mean I don’t protect his right to say it. This doesn’t in the least make me hypocritical. In fact, I’d call it damn near consistent with how I felt when the shoe was on the other foot a mere month ago.
