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  If 9/11 Changed Everything, Why Did Oklahoma City Change Nothing?
by Chris Edelson
In 1995, more than 160 people were killed in the Oklahoma City bombing. Right-wing talk show hosts blamed Middle Eastern terrorists, “towelheads“, as they put it, for the deadly act. Of course, it turned out they were absolutely wrong–the main culprit was Timothy McVeigh, a radical anti-government extremist with ties to the militia movement. What if the over the top talk radio hosts had been right? Would Oklahoma City have “changed everything”, as the Bush administration later claimed 9/11 did? Oklahoma City was a much smaller scale attack than the 9/11 attacks, and far fewer people died. But, if 9/11 “changed everything”, why didn’t Oklahoma City change anything when it comes to dealing with radical right wing terrorists in the United States? A few months before the Oklahoma City bombing, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Morris Dees wrote to then-Attorney General Janet Reno, warning about the danger posed by extreme right-wing militia groups. earlier this year, the Department of Homeland Security issued a report warning of right wing extremism, including the danger of violent acts by anti-abortion extremists and anti-Semites. Although DHS wilted in the political heat generated by its report, and Secretary Janet Napolitano ended up actually apologizing for it, we’ve seen that the report was, unfortunately, one that should have been heeded. An extreme anti-abortion fanatic murdered Dr. Tiller in Wichita and, this week, an anti-Semitic white supremacist killed a guard at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. These murders follow events in Pittsburgh last April and in Knoxville in July 2008. The Pittsburgh killer apparently accepted right wing talking points that the Obama administration was going to take away his guns, and the Knoxville killer, in a four page document he wrote, described his act as “a hate crime. I hate the damn left-wing liberals….This was a symbolic killing. Who I wanted to kill was every Democrat in the Senate and House, the 100 people in Bernard Goldberg’s book..Liberals are a pest like termites. The only way we can rid ourselves of this evil is to kill them in the streets.” I want to be very clear about what I’m saying. I do not think it’s (ever) time to rip up the Constitution. I’m not advocating warrant-less surveillance or water-boarding. I think Bush was wrong–9/11 didn’t change everything. It didn’t change the Constitution, it didn’t (or shouldn't have) ended the rule of law. Torture remains both illegal and immoral. What I am asking is: why didn’t Oklahoma City change anything? What I mean by that is–why is it still acceptable for supposedly mainstream political leaders and parties to spew venom about doctors who provide abortion? Why was it ok for Republican leaders to endorse the radical Tea Partiers, at whose rallies we saw signs calling for the execution of Democratic leaders? Why did the Obama administration bow to political pressure after it issued a report accurately warning of the dangers posed by right wing extremists? Free speech remains a protected constitutional right, and I am not saying the Republican party should be punished when it calls abortion an assault on human life or that Republican leaders who spoke at tea parties should be punished because of the messages conveyed by Tea Partiers. What I’m saying, as I have said in other recent posts, is that it’s time for responsible leaders to act responsibly. Will we see Republican leaders clearly say that it is dangerous to equate abortion with murder or to call doctors who perform abortions mass murderers? Will Republican leaders tell party members that it’s time to rein in the Obama-as-Manchurian Candidate conspiracy theories? (I should give credit where it’s due: someone at the conservative Little Green Footballs blog noted that “With the Tiller shooting and [the shooting at the Holocaust Museum], the DHS report that caused such an uproar has been vindicated.“) Reining in over the top rhetoric is one step, but, of course, it’s more important to make sure we have an effective law enforcement report. People for the American way has rightly called on DHS to make clear that it stands by its original report, warning of dangerous right wing extremism. If the Obama administration allows itself to be bullied into downplaying these threats, shame on it. Chris Edelson is a lawyer in Washington, D.C. who writes frequently about current political and legal issues. His writing has previously been published in The Philadelphia Inquirer, Metroland (Albany, NY) and at commondreams.org.
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