Aug 19, 2009
On Wednesday, August 12, a man holding a sign that said “Death to Obama” at a town hall meeting in Maryland was arrested and turned over to the Secret Service, which is pursuing an investigation into charging him with threatening the president.
As well they should. I fully and absolutely agree with this arrest, since anyone who threatens the president is breaking the law and should be prosecuted. It doesn’t matter that Obama was not at the meeting nor that the man was unarmed: the threat all on its own is a federal crime, according to the United States Code.
I support the arrest and prosecution of any person who threatens Obama or any president of the United States.
Bush was threatened frequently — but no arrests
But the story of this arrest got me to thinking: Why was no one ever arrested for threatening President Bush at protests, when they displayed signs in public that called for his death?
Many readers may naively think, “The answer is obvious: no protester was ever arrested for threatening Bush at a protest because no one ever threatened him at a protest. Who would be that stupid? I certainly never heard of any such threats.”
Alas, if only it were that simple. Because the bald fact is that people threatened Bush at protests all the time by displaying menacing signs and messages — exactly as the anti-Obama protester just did in Maryland. Yet for reasons that are not entirely clear, not a single one of those Bush-threateners at protests was ever arrested, questioned, or investigated.
Don’t believe me? Then keep reading. Because this essay exists for one reason only: To prove beyond any doubt that explicit and implicit threats to Bush’s life were commonly displayed at public protests throughout his term as president. Below this introduction you will find dozens of examples of such threats — unaltered photographs from a wide variety of sources, along with links verifying their authenticity.
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3 comments:
Wishing death to Obama is threatening? Maybe "I'm going to kill Obama" like one of the anti-Bush signs said, but wishing a person would die is not a threat, its freedom of expression.
the problem mr or mrs anonymous is you obviously missed the sign that said "I'm here to kill Bush"
Then again I'm not surprised that anyone who would support something like this would ignore the facts
Expressing your hatred for the president is fine. However, explicitly stating that you intend to kill a public figure or attempting to persuade someone else to kill that public figure is something that should be followed up by law enforcement. We are not yet so oppressed that we have to resort to assassination.
I disapproved of most of Bush's policies and actions during his presidency, but the only way someone has the right to kill him is if he is tried for war crimes and convicted, in which case the criminal justice system will take care of it. Vigilantism is unacceptable whether from the right or the left.
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