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writing for godot

The Vengeance of 'Don’t Retreat-Reload' Vigilantes

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Written by Robert S. Becker   
Tuesday, 03 April 2012 07:21

Is there a more incendiary, compact, unapologetic cover for domestic vigilantes than "Don't Retreat, Reload"? Though domestic terrorism occurred before and after Palin's pandering war cry, her loaded gun imagery decoying as political rhetoric, gave itchy-fingered zealots open justification when "feeling endangered." Overall, what the Bush Doctrine kicked off as unilateral pre-emptive immorality, executed by Rumsfeld's dire "shock and awe," then justified by Cheney's One Per Cent Doctrine, was domesticated by in-your-face mandates from a presumptive national leader.



With the Christian right singing the chorus, what our rogue government sustained endlessly "over there" has come home to roost, with literal vengeance, a slaughter of innocents. For if this "exceptional" nation has God's consent to smote foreigners any time because a few belligerent "feels endangered," even by fabricated enemies, why can't a Florida punk delude himself one hooded black boy presents a mortal threat? What shouldn't the U.S.'s no retreat foreign policy inhabit, with poisonous payoffs, all sorts of abuse against the "other," whether minorities, immigrants, or a top dog with Kenyan anti-colonial biases?



Forgive my focus on the Wasilla Witch, but few others, as ardently pro-life, so glorify hunting, guns, and domestic vigilantism, far more a threat than teens armed only with snacks. What we initiated far away now invades backyard Neighborhood Watchers. Scope aside, can we distinguish irate stalking, warned off by police, from hate crimes and/or domestic terrorism? Indeed, despite our 9/11 victimization by feeling-driven fanatics, 26 state laws now legalize modern retribution, unconscious or not, in the name of self-defense. That scope covers totally avoidable tragedies like the fleeing Trayvon Martin, plus blowing up tyrannical government buildings or shooting down Congresswoman Giffords or abortion doctors attending church.



Dead Victims Don't Talk



Promoted by eye-for-an-eye readings of sacred text, the mania of "don't tread on me" emerges as a national call to arms for the aggrieved. The upshot is a wide-ranging, take-no-prisoners mindset voiced by abortion fanatics, Tea Partiers, gun extremists, anti-Obama scapegoaters -- plus shrill GOP primary campaigners (intact and fallen) or House militants pushing budgets that punish the youngest, the poor, the sick, the indigent old, the homeless and the jobless.



Whether called "hold your ground" or "no retreat" releases, predators shoot first, fabricate defenses, and escape accountability. What civic order survives unstable people imagining lethal threats in a void? That way truly lies madness, if not vengeance and retribution. Captured by Palin's gun sights on her "enemy maps," we face now domestic, pre-emptive assaults, often incited by coded guilt by association. Just like Saddam = 9/11, Taliban = al Qaeda, Iraq=mushroom clouds, today's "Reload, Don't Retreat" killers tragically equate skin color, time of night, and hoods with lethal menace, indeed dire blows to civilization itself.



If you scoff at needing real-world evidence for the big issues, like terrorism, climate change, or evolution, why demand actual behavior to justify violent urges and reactions? Facile surfaces rule all, for would any white child, even hooded, have incited "fears that one's life was in danger," the threshold by which vigilantes defy police, strike down unarmed children, and leave no prisoner to tell his side?



Emotional Imperialism



Sounds much like invasive American imperialism coming home to roost. When core assumptions are flaunted, the flimsiest of justifications propel invasions against those not readying to attack, let alone firing away at our borders. What goes around comes around . . . and the heart of Palin's Domestic Violence Doctrine still goes virtually unchallenged in the public square, certainly not by a halfway-to-peace president.



Instead, our war-making machine continues its own retribution, as unmanned drones execute civilians -- children, parents and grandparents. Anticipate our own rampaging soldiers, exhausted by multiple assignments, will defend their outrages because too much war made them fear and hate inconvenient, inscrutable enemies. If amassed, subjective dread alone justifies our ten-year Asian onslaughts, no surprise when equivalent demons migrate home and loom over darkened walkways.



Blind self-righteousness also foments the violent rhetoric from House extremists, sneering about debt ceilings, brooking no budget compromises and taking no prisoners when slashing programs that keep millions out of poverty, hospitals, and police cars. Other than emotional defiance, plus ignorance, what else scorns science and "elitist" expertise that makes America a technological innovator? It ain't reason but fear and rage, the blind conviction that "gut feeling" (like W.'s) is sacred, answering only to extra-judicial realms. Likewise, if your gut stamps Obama as foreign agent shoving treasonous socialism down our freedom-loving throats, what other choice for "true Americans" but insurgency and arsenals?



Mowing Down Our Own



It's good we are confronting revelations the NRA and A.L.E.C. held the lowest ground by funding horrors of self-defense. Sure, some may back off the worst excesses, but note the stagnant hush, even post-Gabbie Giffords, against restraints on buying, let alone carrying loaded hand guns. Where are minimal demands for mandatory training of amateurs peopling Neighborhood Watches? The reason Palin and her ilk endanger public safety (aside from egregious TV appearances, including NBC!) is that one third of this nation supports Reload laws, dreads minorities, and identifies with the night hunting of evil-doers.



The ugly American is now the bullying, belligerent predator, here and abroad -- with any sort of protest, especially from big (Christian) pulpits, notable by their total absence. The "Christian" right against rides its own contradictions: loving all babies but approving capital punishment, absent due process, when they happen to grow up dark-skinned. And still on the horizon are looming uprisings from the record gun sales since Obama's inauguration, secured by shadowy militants.



Of course, Palin does not deserve all the blame, though not understanding or apologizing for her own wickedness fed our violence-prone culture. Her stance represented a watershed, at least by a putative, if disgraced national figure. As Rep. Giffords warned before being shot, yet after Palin gun-sighted her district, words and intentions matter. Palin stands out for cheering on at home the same pre-emptive militarism that shames our beacon on the hill. Now, we have 26 states that defend, even excuse, predatory street violence, as if what "works" in games, fantasy or action movies doesn't shake public safety.



We are fascinated with the "wild west" because of its famed, if lawless vigilante "justice" against bad guys. But that mythology depended on disruptive crimes which the community observed and verified, whatever its harsh penalties. But here we are again: civilization besieged now by legalized vigilantism -- when putting up a hood in the rain ends the life of a child. Sadly, what rained down on Trayvon Martin no cotton could impede. Anyone taking bets on whether the shooter gets jail time? Not me.
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