We have noted before the extreme eliminationist rhetoric directed at Republicans and the Tea Party by the most senior Democratic politicians, who portray the House’s exercise of its constitutional power of the purse as terrorism.
That rhetoric has also moved into mainstream liberal publications. What was once expected only of DailyKos or crazy fringe left-wing websites, now is mainstream liberal media.
Here’s a partial screenshot (full here) of a Google search this morning for “Republican extortion” — note the mainstream liberal publication that show up on the first page parroting Obama’s rhetoric:
But The Atlantic outdid just about everyone with this image on its story by Philip Bump, How Obama Can Deal with the Irate Republican Army (via Ed Driscoll h/t Instapundit):
Smitty had it right:
As startling as the image may seem coming from a mainstream publication, consider that the source of the image was a photo of an Irish Republican Army terrorist, Colin Duffy, who was charged with the killing of British soldiers (he later was acquitted):
Notice the photo of Colin Duffy is the exact same photo The Atlantic used as the source for the photoshop.
I’m sure the author and editors at The Atlantic knew exactly what they were doing, even if most of the readers didn’t pick up on the Boehner being equated to a specific accused murderer.
Bump made sure to invoke the Irish Republican Army in the text of the post:
It is another group of Republicans that offers a reminder of how governments actually deal with terrorists. For decades the Irish Republican Army conducted a campaign of terror throughout Britain. British prime minister Margaret Thatcher publicly disavowed any negotiations with the IRA. But secretly, those negotiations happened, through backchannels. The British couldn’t risk the appearance of placating the IRA, but were obviously willing to do what they could to stem the violence.
That’s how off-the-charts even mainstream liberal publications have become.
If The Atlantic insisted on photoshopping Boehner’s head onto the arrest of an enemy of the state, I think this might have been a better source photo:
[Note – the word “accused” was added to the title shortly after publication to reflect that Colin Duffy was later acquitted of the murder charges]
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