Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says an agency report warning of potential rise in activity by right-wing extremists didn't violate anyone's rights and is only meant to help cops do their job.
But the one thing our government doesn't seem to understand anymore — and this was on display quite clearly on Wednesday — is that being concerned about your country doesn't make you an extremist.
If you attended tea party, you were called — quote — "steeped in insanity" by The L.A. Times; "nutjobs" by The Washington Post; and your actions were seen as quote "not really family viewing," by CNN.
And then you had the activists.
Left-wing blogs like Daily Kos not only mocked the tea party attendees as GOP plants, they also spoke publicly about infiltrating the events along with groups like ACORN. They were adamant that us extremists would never be able to get together, but they were wrong — I haven't heard a single report of violence. Imagine that kind of peace at a Code Pink protest or a G20 summit?
Meanwhile, the government says you may be an extremist if you, "feared, predicted and anticipated a cataclysmic economic collapse in the United States..."
OK, so people like Alan Greenspan are fine because they never saw it coming, but I'm an extremist? That's government logic for you.
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You might also be an extremist if "you incorporated aspects of an impending economic collapse to intensify fear and paranoia among like-minded individuals...."
Guilty — except that it's not about intensifying panic, it's about preparation.
A few weeks ago I did that whole "War Room" special about a global economic collapse and it was endlessly mocked on shows like Colbert. But last month the Pentagon itself held a two-day war-gaming session on how our enemies might use the crisis to cripple us.
Does that make them extremists too? Where is Colbert now?
Let me get this straight: Bush and Obama put us on the hook for $12.8 trillion, but I'm the extremist?
Lawmakers stuff $20 billion in pork and earmarks into spending bills, but I'm the extremist?
We have to beg the Chinese to keep loaning us money, but I'm the extremist?
Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg and Harold Koh who will help run the State Department, both talk about trans-nationalism and, by definition, a diminished role for the Constitution, but I'm the extremist?
I believe in the Constitution, the Founding Fathers and the American people. Does that make me an extremist or does it make me someone who loves his country and refuses to sit idly by as it's "reshaped" and "redefined"?
More than 300,000 people stood shoulder-to-shoulder across the country yesterday to send a clear message to both parties: Our country is off track and no one is listening.
And what's President Obama's response? A statement: "The president is unaware of the tea parties and will hold his own event today."
And people still wonder what we're so upset about.
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