Several political conservatives -- invoked “blood libel” in print yesterday

[RamboLiberal]

Carrie Dann writes: Within minutes of the release of Sarah Palin’s video response to the Tucson shootings, the Web ignited with furious debate about the former Alaska governor’s use of the phrase “blood libel” to describe connections drawn between Arizona shooter Jared Loughner and conservatives who have used guns and violence as metaphors for political activism.

-----

Less than 4 hours after the release of the video, Wikipedia.org's entry on “blood libel” had been updated to note Palin's application of the phrase to the aftermath of the Tucson shootings.

Despite the bright spotlight pointed at Palin’s uttering of the flashpoint expression, hers was not the first usage of the phrase by a conservative in the wake of the Arizona shootings. Several other commentators -- all political conservatives -- invoked “blood libel” in print yesterday.

In an op-ed about the shootings in the Wall Street Journal on January 11, University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Harlan Reynolds asked “Where is the decency in blood libel?” Human Events staff writer John Hayward urged the “Right to fight back” against blame for the attacks in a piece titled “The Giffords Blood Libel Will Fail; The Left rides a horse that is dying beneath them.”

And, on the same day, the editorial page of the Washington Examiner slammed New York Times columnist Paul Krugman for placing “the blood libel of blame for the Tucson murders squarely on the shoulders of the crowds at the McCain-Palin rallies and right-wing extremism."

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/01/12/5822791-what-is-blood-libel

Coordinated talking point? How many of us had even heard the term "blood libel" till Palin uttered it. I hadn't. This sounds like dog-whistle to me! Painting your true origins & thoughts RW'ers?

[Fuzz]

1. Yeah, I saw that. I didn't think Palin came up with it by herself.

[AspenRose]

2. Shit.

:-(

*SMH*

[cynatnite]

3. All I knew about it was that it was a slur and no one should use it. n/t

[mwb970]

4. Can she say anything without sounding both violent and stupid?

She goes directly from gunsights that aren't gunsights to "blood libel". What a ghastly woman.

[Tesha]

5. Could you hear "the dog whistle"?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics

[Ozymanithrax]

6. Being Jewish, I've heard of Blook Libel...

No, we are not accusing the right of murdering the children of their opoinents and making them into cookies.

They are claiming to be a prosecuted minority.

Screw them all.

[RamboLiberal]

11. I'm Catholic and should've heard of it I admit

But then being in Catholic school in the 60's they sure managed to pass over (no pun intended) of that part of the church's sordid history.

[Gothmog]

12. I am a Jewish and was shocked at the use of this term by Palin

Palin and the other conservatives do not care about the context of this term or the history of the use of such term.

[ProSense]

7. The spotlight was on Palin

because she earned it, and it's good that the other culprits were exposed.

[LibertyLover]

8. I'm interested in medieval history and religion

so I had heard of the term "blood libel" before and was appalled to hear how Palin used it in her speech. It was wrong on so many levels, and yes, I suspect that it was a dog-whistle, at least to those of her listeners who belong to Christian churches that are part of the Third Wave theological movement.

[HereSince1628]

14. What is the Third Wave theological movement?

Blood libel sounds like libel with an adjective to me. So I guess it means more serious libel than most...

But what is this 3rd wave thing? Help an old sod understand...

[LibertyLover]

17. Third Wave theology

Well, it gets a bit complicated. Third Wave was created by C. Peter Wagner, a charismatic evangelical minister. It is dominionist and Christian reconstructionist, which means ultra-conservative, right-wing Christian theology. The main things with Third Wave is a belief in generational curses and demonic possession of people, places and concepts. 3rd Wavers go on on what they call Prayer Walks. Prior to a Prayer Walk it is determined that a specific area is under demonic possession. There are several ways this is done, one being are there any new age stores there or admitted pagans. With their Prayer Walks, 3rd Wavers consecrate an area to God and exorcise the demon or demons living there. Ted Haggard is a big 3rd Waver and conducted a number of Prayer Walks around Colorado Springs to exorcise the demons allegedly living there.

This article (a transcribed sermon actually) comes from another conservative Christian site, which considers 3rd Wave to be a heresy. It is a fairly good explanation of 3rd Wave theology from a traditional Christan point of view. http://www.biblebb.com/files/mac/chaos6.htm
Another good description of 3rd Wave strangeness can be found this article, also from a traditional conservative Christian site: http://www.directionjournal.org/article/?1055

In history "blood libel" generally refers to the belief held by certain Christians in the Middle Ages that Jews killed young, innocent Christian children, drained their bodies of blood and used that blood in their religious rituals as a direct spiritual and magical counterfeit to the Blood of Christ that the process of transubstantiation produced during the Mass. It can also refer to the more generalized belief in the medieval period that Jews were responsible for plagues, well poisonings and deaths of animals. If a child was found dead, many medieval Christians believed that the Jews were the cause. I should point out that the Romans believed the same things about the early Christians, claiming that Christians practiced cannibalism in actual fact, used blood of Roman citizens in their rituals and were responsible for plagues, etc. Also, a bit later, the same beliefs and accusations were leveled against the so-called witches.

I hope that helps. It's just a brief, off-the-cuff explanation.

[HereSince1628]

18. Thanks, I had no clue

That stuff is way outside my experience, I had no idea.

[backscatter712]

9. So this may actually be Frank Luntz's creation.

Wow.

And yeah, I'm hearing the dog-whistle in this toward her fundy base...

[Tsiyu]

10. These people will never learn

They were frantically googling "libel" to see if they could come up with a cogent argumant defending their hate.

Some yutz saw "blood libel" in a google result and, never clicking on the link to see what it really meant, decided that would be a great phrase to use. After all, aren't people saying Bloody Sarah, Bloody Beck, etc ( I know I am!)?

And then he used it in a sentence; sounded good to the yutz so he sent the e-mail out and the rest is history.


They are like lemmings. If one jumps they all have to follow.....

[deminks]

13. Breitbart evidently used it as well yesterday.

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/01/12/palin-blood-libel/

(snip)

It’s worth noting that conservative Instapundit blogger Glenn Reynolds first injected the term into the post-shooting debate this week in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal titled, “The Arizona Tragedy and the Politics of Blood Libel.” Meanwhile, right-wing media tycoon Andrew Breitbart warned “the gutless GOP establishment” yesterday that those “who watch[] in silence the blood libel against @SarahPalinUSA. We will remember.” But, because Palin is a far more high-profile figure and fashions herself as a national leader, she should choose her words far more carefully than incendiary pundits.

(end snip)

[otohara]

15. Frank Lutz Phrase of the Day For Those

on the right-wing echo machine.

[DCKit]

16. Not for long. nt