The eliminationist chorus

As if to underscore my recent discussion of eliminationist rhetoric, all kinds of figures on the right have been providing me with a fresh bounty of examples. The right-wing cup, as it were, runneth over.

First we had a fifth-tier online columnist attacking Rep. John Murtha as "vermin" and a "traitor".

This kind of talk, of course, has become quite common in recent years, almost to the point that it is unremarkable. But to understand why it's noteworthy, we can leave it to Dean Esmay to explain what should be done with such "vermin" (via Glenn Greenwald at Hullabaloo):

When I say "treason" I don't mean it in an insulting or hyperbolic way. I mean in a literal way: we need to find these 21st century Julius Rosenbergs, these modern day reincarnations of Alger Hiss, put them on trial before a jury of their peers, with defense counsel. When they are found guilty, we should then hang them by the neck until the are dead, dead, dead.

No sympathy. No mercy.Am I angry? You bet I am. But not in an explosive way. Just in the same seething way I was angry on 9/11.

These people have endangered American lives and American security. They need to be found, tried, and executed.

Unsurprisingly, when Gavin at Sadly, No! decided to turn the tables on Esmay to see how he liked someone harboring execution fantasies about him, the result was rather predictable shrieking on Esmay's part. [Longtime readers will recall my encounter with the mendacious Mr. Esmay.]

Meanwhile, Brad R. at Sadly, No! took note of another right-wing blogger's execution fantasies, this time Dean Franks:

I'll make a deal with the Left: You wanna impeach President Bush? Go ahead. Knock yourself out. In fact, let's just go to the polls and turn the whole government over to the Democrats. You wanna run the whole show? Fine. Elect Howard Dean President. End all surveillance against possible enemy combatants, unless you can get a warrant based on probable cause. Withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan immediately. Permanently kill the PATRIOT Act. Do whatever you want to do. I'm perfectly willing, at this point, to do it your way.

I mean, really, what's the worst that can happen? An American city goes up in nuclear fire? Well, it’ll probably be New York, Chicago, or LA. You know, a major city. I don't live there, nor do most Americans. So we'll be fine.

But here's the other half of the deal: If that happens, we get to march on Washington, drag you naked and screaming from your offices, and hang you from the ornate lampposts that line The Mall. Then, free from roadblocks thrown up by infantile political fools, maybe we'll get serious about defending the United States, her people, her freedoms, and her values, in an increasingly hostile world.

Hanging traitors from lampposts? Wasn't that the central fantasy of The Turner Diaries?

Anyway, Esmay, Franks and Co. aren't the only right-wingers giving voice to that old lynch-'em-high impulse: so is Bill O'Reilly:

Where does George Soros have all his money? Do you know? Do you know where George Soros, the big left-wing loon who's financing all these smear [web]sites, do you know where his money is? Curaçao. Curaçao. They ought to hang this Soros guy.

Yessiree, it's a regular ol' necktie party in the Conservative Corral these days. But lest we think the rhetoric extends only to lynch-mob violence, you can look elsewhere for right-wingers ready for all-out, eliminationist war, like the Shot in the Dark commenter "DLG":

The only "common ground" we'll ever find with the blue state scum is the battleground, when we finally cut the shit and put all the enemies of this nation to the pike. It can not come too soon.

... Have fun spending your vast wealth when you are dead. Other countries will be happy to sell you potash and soybeans. But you'll all be dead, so they might balk at the terms.

Heads on pikes, traitors hanging from lampposts ...can't you just feel the love?