Meyerson: The Right's Culture of Paranoia

[Nancy Waterman]

Harold Meyerson says that underlying the Right's violent rhetoric is a pervasive culture of paranoia.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/11/AR2011011105685.html

The primary problem with the political discourse of the right in today's America isn't that it incites violence per se. It's that it implants and reinforces paranoid fears about the government and conservatism's domestic adversaries.

Much of the culture and thinking of the American right - the mainstream as well as the fringe - has descended into paranoid suppositions about the government, the Democrats and the president. This is not to say that the left wing doesn't have a paranoid fringe, too. But by every available measure, it's the right where conspiracy theories have exploded.

A fabricated specter of impending governmental totalitarianism haunts the right's dreams.

[rainy]

1. this is exactly the point. nt

[ProSense]

2. It's both: it's demagoguery and

it incites violence.

Media Matters, October: Conservative media figures have history of violent rhetoric

[musiclawyer]

3. Not one of Meyerson's best

He's a good guy and unequivocable progressive, but his premise is too narrow. It's not about paranoia at the core. Perhaps at the fringe. But at the core, the rhetoric is scripted and laser focused by the those writing for corporation interests designed to scare and anger simple people-- millions who dont know better--- and get them to vote GOP even though the GOP's only constituents are the ultra wealthy and corporations, not regular people.