Isaac Chotiner explains that the expressed desire/hope/prediction of many liberals that the Boston bombers turn out to be white non-Muslims was based on a “reasoned reactions to a society that is still full of racism and bigotry” and that “in times of national emergency or stress, double standards—one form of that dreaded disease called political correctness—serve very useful purposes.” He writes that if the bomber had turned out to be white, then the bombing would have been treated as an isolated incident and that if the bombers were “militia-men type extremists”, then you wouldn’t have seen racial profiling and such. It is almost convincing but . . .
Did you notice that when liberals were talking about white terrorists, they didn’t mean just any old white terrorists? Liberals were predicting (hoping for) “militia-men” who were “on the right” and inspired by Tax Day . Whites, like most large groups of people, are a varied bunch. So are white terrorists. Most of the Occupy movement-inspired bombing conspirators in Cleveland were white. Kathy Boudin, Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn were all white. Somehow I don’t think that Isaac Chotiner’s liberal friends were hoping that the Boston bombers were deranged fans of the Occupy movement.
If liberals really were hoping that the Boston bombing would be a one-off, then they, in all their deep commitment to tolerance, would have hoped that the bombers were left-wing extremists. Remember how, after the Gabby Gifford’s shooting, we were all told by the president to tone down our rhetoric and how a New York Times entertainer suggested that Sarah Palin had contributed to the climate that led to the shooting? The guy who shot Giffords was just a loon whose obsessions had nothing to do with partisan politics, but that did not stop liberals in the media from suggesting that the shooter was tied to the Tea Party. That was a collective smear against millions of innocent people, but these things happen. Now do you remember the lunatic who tried to shoot up the Family Research Council? He actually was inspired by a liberal group’s description of the Family Research Council as a “hate group.” That wasn’t such a big deal was it? Just an isolated event. The guy only represented himself. No reason to curtail robust public debate. Certainly it wasn’t a moment for liberals to rethink the virulence of their rhetoric.
So if liberals really hope that the next terrorist event will be treated as an isolated incident, they should, in the immediate aftermath, say something like “We really hope these are left-wing terrorists who were inspired by the ability of the Weather Underground bombers to leverage their terrorist activities into employment in academia.” Because liberal journalists, activists, politicians and entertainers are saying they believe and “hope” that that it is a right-wing terrorist, aren’t hoping that the terrorism will just be treated as an isolated event. They are hoping it is a chance to smear their peaceful and democratic political opponents. They should be despised first for their approach to democratic debate, and second for their hypocrisy.
