The Right of the Left

Newt Gingrich New Hampshire Event Disrupted By Occupy Protesters:

I often hear people get all bent out of shape about "the shout shows", or "the blowhards on conservative radio" -- sometimes they say things like "why do conservatives support that stuff??".

I went to hear Newt Gingrich speak in Rochester about 15 years ago -- not long after the Republicans took over the house for the first time in over 40 years. In order to get in, my friend and I had to walk right through a loudly chanting union picket line being led by a Democrat that ran for the congressional seat here a number of times. We didn't mind, both of us solidly over 6' tall and 200 lbs, we figured they would stop and let us pass without problem, and they did. No question however that they were loudly and directly trying to intimidate people.

Fast forward close to a decade, and it is '02, a Senate debate in Rochester. Paul Wellstone and Norm Coleman are there. The crowd is of course admonished to not demonstrate and not interrupt the speakers. The Republicans followed that with the exception of some clapping and a few cheers. The Democrats??? Even people that I recognized from work or retirees were wildly booing and screaming in a manner that went beyond even what you typically see out of drunk fans at a game. They cheered with such joy for "their guy" and booed and yelled derogatory things at the Republican with such fervor you could tell that the "snake brain" was fully in charge. Their politics was a blood sport of a sort that I have no personal understanding of. I know we are not to talk about "Nazis", but the films of the Germans were the only reference point I had to that level of emotion being attached to politics.

There have been a few other cases over the years where I've observed such things -- even on the media. "Code Pink" for example disrupted both the '04 and '08 Republican conventions. I'm sure that nasty left-wing demonstrators will be heavily in evidence around, and likely breaking into this years Republican convention as well.

I checked around the web a bit. CNN has nothing on the disruption of the Gingrich event. I know when any Tea Party people at all showed up at Obama events -- even though they were quiet and I don't believe there has had to be a single arrest at one of their events,but never the less the media tended to look at the Tea Party as "threatening". This weekend was the anniversary of the AZ Giffords shooting -- we all remember that the media went INSTANTLY to WILDLY blaming Sarah Palin and the Tea Party without a single shred of evidence. They were 100% wrong, but that is so standard for the MSM, it really wasn't news.

The whole "Occupy" movement has been nothing but a stream of ill-formed obscenities aimed at some chimera of "anyone with any money" --- although most of them seem to have smart phones, laptops and other baubles, they do seem committed to a solidly slacking lifestyle. The media certainly has no trouble with them shouting, blocking things, swearing, beating drums, carrying signs that talk about violence, etc. -- from the MSM POV, there is nothing remotely threatening about OWS -- in fact, the most common comparison is "Arab Spring".

It seems that any form of "protest", including wild statements by entertainers at awards shows, shouting down people, blocking people, defacing all manner of property, burning flags, etc is somehow "positive grass-roots democracy in action" as long as it serves Democrats. 

On the other hand, Fox, Rush Limbaugh, etc -- money making media formats with really not very much actual "shouting", and certainly no profanity, calls to violence, etc are somehow "bad / dangerous / childish / liars / etc".

I truly believe that the well reasoned intellectual position of the left relative to the thoughts and speech of the "right" is "SHUT THE F**K UP!!!!" ... and they remain ever more angry that the nasty folks on the right don't just do so. 

Meanwhile, whatever they want to do -- shout down folks, try to intimidate and block people, spend billions of dollars collected by public unions for and against whatever they want, overturn elections via recall efforts ... "whatever", is completely protected and "good news".

No double standard here.

The left has a "right" to pretty much do anything they want to impose their politics from the point of view of the establishment ... the right has the "right" to remain silent, or preferably dead. 

'via Blog this'