Rightwing Backlash Increases

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Meg White

The right-wing backlash of name-calling and hatred is in full swing, many weeks before Inauguration Day.

If you've been following the backlash from my article about the Astroturf fear mongers at Grassfire.org, you won't be surprised to hear this from their shill at Democrats=Socialists.com:

"If you had a 'hate meter' and filled one gymnasium with 6,000 Klansmen and the other with a lone Obama button wearing liberal, the gymnasium with the liberal would emanate a spectrum of hate and intolerance that would take a team of NASA physicist years to interpret."

The writer still won't give his identity (he's actually quite paranoid about it, writing that my interest in his identity must be because I want to "email Obama HQ and have them look into my tax records." He does say he's named "Buffoon" and he's a father, husband and veteran), but he's aligned himself with the Klan. Enough said.

But it's not just anonymous racist nuts trying to get the hate out. It's full-fledged companies and their high-powered CEOs getting in on the game. Grassfire leader Steve Elliott spews the same anti-environment talking points on his blog heard earlier this month in West Virginia. Don Blankenship, CEO of Virginia-based coal company Massey Energy, used a recent speaking engagement to spread alarm among the business community.

According to the Williamson Daily News, Blankenship compared the editor of the Charleston Gazette to Osama bin Laden in his address to the Tug Valley Mining Institute in Williamson, West Virginia, Nov. 22. He also called prominent Democrats such as Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi "crazy" and "idiotic" for wanting to protect the environment.

Blankenship also said that global warming is a myth, and that he was afraid to say how he really feels about climate change because "the greeniacs are taking over the world."

He seems to think that water pollution doesn‘t matter either. Massey, the nation's fourth largest coal company, has ignored the Environmental Protection Agency's fines and warnings to such an extent that regulators took the highly unusual step to sue the company to stop violations, which occur up to 28 times a day. Massey settled and was fined the largest amount since the passage of the Clean Water Act, due to more than 4,500 violations over a six-year period.

Massey has perpetuated other serious environmental disasters in West Virginia and Kentucky. Massey has lost millions in lawsuits for polluting towns with coal dust in one area and soiling well water in another community.

With the sheer amount of lawsuits pending against Blankenship personally and Massey generally, it's no surprise that the CEO would try to buy himself a state Supreme Court Justice.

Blankenship spent $3.5 million on an ad campaign and virtually bought himself a justice on the West Virginia Supreme Court. Not only that, but he was revealed to have been vacationing in the French Riviera with another West Virginia justice at the time of a state Supreme Court case involving Massey worth millions of dollars.

Blankenship, like Grassfire and others, is forced to rely on some pretty shaky logic. For example, he told the Tug Valley Mining Institute that reducing emissions in the U.S. will somehow increase carbon releases in China. He also relies on the failed sales pitch of the McCain/Palin campaign that Obama is a socialist or communist.

Say What?

He said that a government that encourages conservation is the first step to communism, and that a plea from the president to turn down one's thermostat and buy fuel-efficient cars leads to "sharing kitchens with four families" and other socialist tendencies such as public transportation.

There is simply no accounting for some people's idiocy. These "Dudes" are just two examples!

He said he's seen what goes on in China and Russia, and that's what's going to happen here. To avoid that, Blankenship ironically proposes the United States do exactly what China and Russia are doing: burn dirty national energy reserves, shunning conservation at every opportunity.

While the recent election may seem to grant a progressive mandate, it's important to look beneath the surface to see what the new administration is up against. There are a lot of people, for reasons ranging from economics to racism to just plain fear of change, who are receptive to the lying invective of Blankenship, Grassfire and others. For that reason, BuzzFlash is still watching.

Why is it that these idiots cannot see the difference between socialism and communism. Have any of them actually ever read Marx's Communist manifesto? I seriously doubt it. What they seem to be talking about is Stalinism, which has nothing to do with the thoughts of Karl Marx.

Thanks, Buzzflash, for keeping an eye on these fools!

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

For more on Blankenship and Massey, watch this West Virginia public television documentary called "The Kingmaker."

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Now We Have A Gooper Quoting The Founder of The KKK.

Is anyone else getting sick and tired of this crap? I mean, really!

Here we are, in the early years of the 21st Century, and we still have some lunatic quoting the first Grand Wizard of the KKK on the freakin' House Floor of the U.S. Congress!

Outlaw The GOP!

Republican quotes KKK founder on House floor


Roll Call reports today that a House Republican delivered a foreign policy speech yesterday in which he quoted Nathan Bedford Forrest, founder of the KKK.

On Monday, Rep. Ted Poe took to the House floor to discuss foreign policy matters. To make a point, the Texas Republican invoked the words of Civil War Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest: “Git thar fustest with the mostest.”

The quotation got some floor watchers’ attention pretty quickly. Forrest is a controversial figure who was one of the Klan’s first grand wizards. Although the Civil War hero (if you were a Confederate, that is) ultimately abandoned the Klan for its violent tactics, he continues to kick up dust.

“Controversial figure” doesn’t quite cut it. Most lists of the worst Americans in U.S. history include Nathan Bedford Forrest near the top. That’s what happens when someone creates the KKK to terrorize freed slaves and their allies, after taking up arms against the United States. What on earth would possess a GOP lawmaker to quote Forrest on the House floor?

Poe’s spokesperson told Roll Call, “The reference to Forrest was used in an historical context comparing the request to Congress for support of the Confederate troops to the request that is being made today by our Generals in Iraq.”

First, the comparison doesn’t make any sense. Second, when one bolsters their argument with the words of one of the most controversial Americans ever, rationalizing it as a historical comparison is unpersuasive.

Shouldn’t this be a bigger deal? Given all of the racial problems of the Republican Party, isn’t it rather scandalous for a Republican lawmaker to rely on the words of the founder of the KKK?Post Script: And, just as an aside, the quote Poe used was wrong.

[A]ccording to historians, Forrest didn’t really say the line that’s so often attributed to him. “Do not, under any circumstances whatever, quote Forrest as saying ‘fustest’ and ‘mostest’,” Civil War scholar Bruce Catton wrote in his 1971 book, “The Civil War.” Catton wrote that Forrest actually believed the essence of strategy — and the proper quote — was “to git thar fust with the most men.”

What’s worse than quoting the founder of the KKK on the House floor? Quoting him incorrectly.
Update: ThinkProgress has the video.


(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.