It's great when Republicans find a cause they can really get behind:
Shocking news alert: Conservatives are now almost rushing to embrace the Minutemen even as evidence mounts that the funny smell coming from their ranks isn't just a case of bad tamales.
The latest Republican politician to do so (following in the footsteps of Sen. Wayne Allard of Colorado and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a Texas congressman named John Culberson of Houston, who has introduced legislation that would give official sanction, for the first time, to "border militias":
The Border Protection Corps Act, introduced on July 28, would authorize access to $6.8 billion in unused Homeland Security funds to form volunteer border militias that report to their respective county sheriffs.
I just love the way they are all for preserving the vital American heritage of white supremacism in al its violent, hateful glory:
At Station Two, Minuteman volunteers grilled bratwursts and fantasized about murder.
"It should be legal to kill illegals," said Carl, a 69-year old retired Special Forces veteran who fought in Vietnam and now lives out West. "Just shoot 'em on sight. That's my immigration policy recommendation. You break into my country, you die."
Carl was armed with a revolver chambered to fire shotgun shells. He wore this hand cannon in a holster below a shirt that howled "American bad asses" in red, white and blue. The other vigilantes assigned to Station Two included a pair of self-professed members of the National Alliance, a violent neo-Nazi organization. These men, who gave their names only as Johnny and Michael, were outfitted in full-body camouflage and strapped with semi-automatic pistols.
Earlier that day, Johnny and Michael had scouted sniper positions in the rolling, cactus-studded foothills north of Border Road, taking compass readings and drawing maps for future reference.
"I agree completely," Michael said. "You get up there with a rifle and start shooting four or five of them a week, the other four or five thousand behind them are going to think twice about crossing that line."
Whole thing is over at Orcinus.
That last block quote comes from the new SPLC Intelligence Report, Arizona Showdown: High-powered firearms, militia maneuvers and racism at the Minuteman Project.
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I am not surprised. It is not hard to figure out how this country operates– and believe you me it all operates with a purpose. C. Wright Mills, back in the early 50s or late forties, did a study of the economic, political, and social power in this country–and traced it down to 500 hundred families.Not building any sort of conspiracy theories, but power breeds power, and power operates to protect itself and its own. In the context of the United States that power is white and male and people of color and others who do not best fit into that white anglo-saxon ideal ( or at least strive to) are a threat to the system. Alas, pushing this a bit, I found it quite interesting when Richard Nixon called Angela Davis, back in the 70s, “the most dangerous criminal in the country.” Hmm. I wonder why. This country is evil and it should burn in hell.