Conservatives Gleefully Proclaim Ft. Hood Terrorism As The Nation Mourns

Fear has been the operative ethic for most of this wretched decade. Since the tragic days after 9/11, the Republican party has assured us that they are the only force that stands between the American people and fiery jihadi death. Wherein FDR told us that “all we have to fear is fear itself,” the main electoral message of the Republican party in the elections since 9/11 has been “be afraid, be very afraid.” Bush Administration officials constantly reminded us that is was not a matter of if, but when we would be attacked again and that fear helped them to a rare mid term win in 2002 and a close win in 2004 on National security platforms. But after the mismanagement of two wars, Americans moved in a new direction. Before and after the 2008 election various Republicans insisted that a new direction would make the terrorists dance in the streets. Republicans even tacitly allowed constant insinuation that the eventual President of the United States was a terrorist sympathizer himself. But in the end the American people chose a new path over fear and knee jerk foreign policy.

Since the election even al Qeada’s leaders have come out strongly against President Obama and have called him no better than George W. Bush. Yet that is no matter to Republicans desperate for their old national security arguments to work yet again. But Republicans have come out publicly several times and have fantasied about how the country would be better served if we were to be hit again, as in their minds we’ve somehow become complacent. The only evidence of that in their mind being the country overwhelmingly electing Democrats to Federal office. Even as the current administration successfully stops actual terrorist plots in Denver, Glenn Beck carries on with his 9/12 project. In the minds of the Glenn Beck’s of the world, political ideas don’t rally people to the conservative cause. Only fear has been able to rally the people to their ideas. Beck longs to return to 9/12 because people were too scared to think. They are desperate for another terrorist attack so that they can return to office despite their lack of actual ideas the American people back. Which brings me to the tragedy at Fort Hood.

From the moment the tragedy began before any facts other than an Arabic sounding name were known, conservatives almost became gleeful. Before the bodies of those brave soldiers were even cold the right began to proclaim the actions of Maj. Hasan as nothing short of a coordinated attack by international terrorism. While I have no doubts from what I know now that Maj. Hasan was consumed by extremist Islam, conservatives were claiming the coordinated hand of of al-Qeada when nothing but his name and religion were known. I’ll wait for a thorough investigation of what occurred and the eventual trial of Hasan before I’m ready to draw policy conclusions from this staggering tragedy, but the gleeful declarations roughly hours after the horrific crime from self righteous conservatives is very telling. It became all about Barack Obama.

The right is insisting that the actions of Hasan are terrorism in a cynical attempt to paint the President as being at fault for it. Wingnut Jerome Corsi started the ball rolling by claiming a 17 degrees of separation connection between the Obama Presidential transition and Maj. Hasan. While emails detailing Hasan’s extremist views were intercepted during the Bush Administration, Sean Hannity placed the blame directly on President Obama. So as Ft. Hood and the nation mourn these brave heroes, pay particular attention to the radical right as they celebrate. Because in their minds they got the terrorist attack they so desperately wanted, no matter what the facts say.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 at 4:30 pm and is filed under 2008, History, Politics, World Affairs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.