Up Against The Wall, Right-Wing Extremists

Covering a "tea party" protest in Santa Ana, California, even the good folks at OC Weekly admit that the Obama administration shouldn't have implied that those who want lower federal income taxes, and say so in public, are political lunatics:

Janet Napolitano's Homeland Security department did, indeed, make the politically insane move yesterday of issuing a report about rising "right-wing extremism," despite the lack of any specific threats. So, anyone who already thought of Barack Obama as a totalitarian had a perfect meme to use at the rally: tea parties = outlawed. Excellent grounds for a revolution.

And yet the Obama team is hardly shy about scapegoating conservatives, sometimes by name. It's hard to remember an administration that was as publicly hostile to the ideological true believers on the other side. Even President Nixon tried not to engage the left rhetorically, though some on his team dogged them ferociously in private. Who can blame the objects of such persistent scorn, whether overt or covert, from thinking the worst about the government's ultimate aims? After all, the left always does. As I recall, back in the day the term of art for allegedly oppressive rhetoric or tactics was "fascist."