Re: FBI arrests man who threatened Boston Globe reporters over editorial critical of Trump
That Trump repeatedly condemns news organization as “enemies of the people” can only contribute to inciting nutjobs to violence against news people. That they are “nutjobs” does not excuse the kind of comments Trump makes.
It is obvious and not subtle when Trump condemns a “nutjob” liberal for shooting up a GOP game but says nothing about an American Nazi killing a woman peacefully protesting at a contentious demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia. Instead, he said there were “Bad people on both sides”. In fact, the only time he singled-out one side was when he said “'Now because of what's happened since then, with Antifa… I said, you got some very bad people on the other side also, which is true.'”
Trump’s divisive language of “both sides” being equally to blame and terms like “the other side” and naming Antifa in the pejorative but not white supremacists singularly only serves to favor extreme right-wing violence if not at least draw a moral equivalency between “sides”. Trump has never singled-out right-wing hate groups, the KKK, white supremacists, white nationalist, neo-Nazis. Not once. It’s always about condemning “both sides”:
“We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides, on many sides,"
"Racism is evil -- and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans,"
"We must come together as a nation. I condemn all types of racism and acts of violence.”
The political right-wing has used Antifa as the equivalency factor in an attempt to equalize the violence occurring at demonstrations by white nationalists/supremacists/Nazis where Antifa counter-demonstrates. However, Antifa is considerably less violent. And, whereas the extreme right-wing openly supports Trump, Antifa is apolitical. They are basically anarchists:
https://www.pastemagazine.com/artic...wings-effect-on-the-quiet-rise-of-violen.html
The fact is, there is a great deal more violence caused by the extreme right-wing than the left. The Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism, said that statistics show that radical leftists have been dramatically less likely to kill people than their counterparts on the opposite side.
https://www.snopes.com/news/2017/08/17/are-antifa-and-the-alt-right-equally-violent/
Overall, there is considerably more violence perpetrated by right-wing extremists than by the left. In fact, there is such violence from the right wing that the main terrorist threat in the United States is not from violent Muslim extremists, but from right-wing extremists.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/opinion/the-other-terror-threat.html
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...most-extremist-killings-2017-adl-says-n838896
Another fact most worthy of attention. White supremacist and other far-right extremist groups have killed 51 police officers from 1990 to the beginning of 2018 according to a report published by the Anti-Defamation League . Left-wing extremist groups, including black nationalists, killed 11 during the same period.
Read more here:
https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article196423174.html#storylink=cpy
To minimize the threat this Boston Globe caller was and is, ignores the reality of a genuine threat. When there’s a mass shooting, we all point to the prior warning signs that the shooter was unstable and ready to do harm. Globe did the right thing to report the incident and law enforcement did their job to prevent something that could have gotten a lot worse.
Meanwhile, threats to news organization are on the rise, as is overall extreme right-wing violence. Trump’s rhetoric only serves to exhort violence by the extreme right-wing and, by confrontation, by the likes of Antifa to a lesser degree.
