Timothy McVeigh started as a redneck asshole kid.
Same question that is asked of the ultra-far left.
Check out The Eliminationists: How Hate Talk Radicalized the American Right, by David Neiwert. The ultra-far-right is very serious indeed. What’s more, Neiwert found: (1) Many people involved in it are not tattooed skinhead punks or ignorant rednecks; they’re educated middle-class people, or even highly educated professionals. (The late William Luther Pierce, author of The Turner Diaries, was a physicist.) (2) In the past decade they have had a surprising amount of success in pulling mainstream movement conservatism in their direction.
Except, nowadays, the ultra-far left in America is mostly harmless. Their “terrorism” rarely rises above the level of property damage. Whereas on the right we’ve got the likes of Timothy McVeigh, Jim David Adkisson, etc.
Timothy McVeighs are relatively rare. And they don’t exactly generate a lot of support. And would Nidal Malik Hasan be considered a Ultra-far Left Winger?
Booga booga
Palin is not going to get anwhere (other than a few book sales) by courting the Right Wing lunatic fringe. Fact of the matter that the “coastal elites” as she calls them are actually the majority of the population and the Town Hallers are a tiny minority.
“Wanker” is not the right word for the situation the OP is describing, FWIW; Wankers are generally assholes who think they’re great but aren’t generally a real threat to anyone . It’s actually quite a nuanced term and whilst I’m glad to see our American friends embracing the term, it’s not a clever synonym for “People with silly opinions who take them seriously”.
No. He’d be a right wing, religious fundamentalist. Nothing liberal about him.
And then you have Eric Robert Rudolph, the serial anti-abortion bomber who was hidden by sympathisers and had songs and T-shirts in his honor. And I was around the last time a Democrat was in office, when right wing radio talked about murdering federal officials and Republican Congressmen implied that Clinton might be murdered if he visited his state.
Like it or not, the more violent right wing fanatics have quite a bit of support and encouragement. Thuggery is a major part of the modern right wing.
Yes, they are; and their votes don’t count for any more because they hit the lever harder. But gun-triggers are a different matter.
I didn’t realize anyone with half a brain took Ann Coulter seriously. Do you think she really believes half the crap that comes out of her ass or do you think she is just a shit-stir who gets off on making outrageous political commentary to sell more books?
What is the “threat” you Leftos think the far right represents? Yes, there are criminals who glom onto the far right ideals of racism, bigotry, and blowing up anything you find disagreeable and scary. Those are specific criminal threats and are dealt with by law enforcement agencies. But what is the real threat of people just acting like ignorant assholes and what should be done about it?
If anything, the Sara Palins, Glenn Becks and Teabaggers of the world hurt the Republican party because they radicalize it. Moderate conservatives don’t want to be associated with rednecks, hillbillies and skinheads.
Lest we forget:
You just gave one answer to your own question. Most of us want there to be a sane opposition to our party, which there isn’t right now. I, for one, would love to see an election where I actually had to make a difficult choice because both candidates were capable, sane, and principled. So long as the far right has as much influence as they do over the Republican party, that can’t happen.
Of course, then there’s also all those folks advocating for the violent overthrow of the government, the assassination of Obama, and so on. They’re dangerous, too.
I think she represents a fairly large part of the Republican base. She’s hardly the first or only right wing figure to talk that way. And I think that many of the people she doesn’t represent are even farther to the right than she is.
The threat is them killing people, threatening people, influencing legislation, and using the right wing media machine to push their lies.
It’s more the other way around; people like the “rednecks, hillbillies and skinheads” pretty much are the Republican party these days. Moderate conservatives are generally independents or Democrats.
I would love a definition from the OP for the Ultra Far Right.
Pat Buchanon ran for President a few times, but does not appear to have made a significant impact. Sarah Palin will succeed in getting loose change from some people from her book and speaking tours, but I don’t see her taking over anytime soon.
If we go to the militia types, aside from a stand-alone (i.e. not run as part of an organized, national group) terrorist incident (McVeigh, Rudolph) I don’t see them as a major threat to the Republic.
Why just the Right? Too far ultra anything is a wacko, as far as I’m concerned.
For a working definition (ymmv), I would say people on the right of the political spectrum who not merely want to see changes within our system but who claim that the system itself is illegitimate or irredeemably broken. People who consider democracy itself a failure or a sham because it didn’t produce the society THEY think we ought to have.
This would include people who claim that our administration is fraudulent, people who claim that secularism is defiance of God, people who claim that supposedly neutral institutions such as the press take secret marching orders from hidden controllers, etc.
For an operational definition, I’d go with anyone who thinks Sarah Palin is even remotely qualified to be commander in chief.
That’s pretty darn whacko-the-diddle-oh. It also includes a sizeable chunk of the Republican party.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it fairly accepted that in a given population something like 15-25% will exhibit an authoritarian personality?