806 Domestic Terrorism by the far Right
A while
ago (blog 783) I wrote about how terrorism is a political tool for the West’s
leaders, namely Donald Trump. They use the Fear Of
Terrorism to further their own agenda. The agenda being - of course - to mollify
the public and to distract from ‘real’ problems … and this is not to diminish
the problem that terrorism presents, but - as I said then - it needs to be seen
in proportion and in context.
Today in
the paper (SMH) an article by our resident New York correspondent Josephine Tovey
sheds a new light on the issue: Donald Trump trumps up terrorism incidents
overseas and domestically that can be linked - even if ever so strenuously - to
Islamism. That is where he gets traction and here he is sure of support from
the ‘Deplorables’ who voted him in.
Yet, he
ignores the domestic terrorism perpetrated by his supporters … namely white,
middle class males, who inhabit the very right wing fringe of American society.
And who cause many more deaths in America than the much maligned Islamists.
Read the article, it is rather enlightening.
Furthermore,
Trump’s and his team's relentless framing of the threat to America as one posed
by foreign Muslim terrorists is simply out of step with the real threats faced
in his country.
According to the think tank New America, "jihadist"
attacks account for 95 deaths from terrorism in the US since 2002 (49 in the
Orlando Pulse nightclub massacre alone), most of which were carried out by
American citizens or legal residents. A further 51 people died as a result of
what it classified as right wing political violence and 5 from left wing
political violence.
Nevertheless,
the president maintains that a travel ban from a handful of Muslim-majority
countries is what will keep Americans safe.