June 12, 2009

The Poor Holocaust Museum Terrorist: No Reason for the Left to Love Him

An 88-year-old by the name of James Von Brunn allegedly walked into the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C. this week, gunning down a security guard. Are leftists going to feel the Holocaust Museum shooter's pain and find ways to blame themselves for this act of terrorism like they do when the “usual suspects” do such things? I bet not.

In the left’s view, this guy doesn’t have any boxes to tick off in the “victim” column. He’s white, male and hence “privileged”. That’s how they see it. How do I know this? Because I’ve been called privileged enough times by leftists who don’t know a single thing about me beyond my skin color.

Not to say that Von Brunn has any excuses for his alleged actions. What I’m saying is that the non-white terrorists don’t, either. Every terrorist apparently has a giant axe to grind – one the left is always happy to retrieve for them the second it’s misplaced, if they pick the right cause. The Unabomber hated technology. (Nice try.) Bin Laden hates American foreign policy. (Good one!) Von Brunn had a vicious, longtime hate-on for the Jews. (Not very PC!)

As a public relations strategist, if I were forced at gunpoint to take this whack job on as a client, I would play the "lack of affordable mental health care for the aged/veterans" card (Von Brunn served in the military). And it would work. At the very least, it would make leftists feel conflicted about labeling him a terrorist.

For the time being, at least, he doesn’t have any leftist pet causes working in his favor. And because the various mainstream media outlets don’t have to tiptoe around the touchy race issue with Von Brunn, it’s now finally safe to talk tough on terrorism!

In the immediate aftermath, CNN’s Campbell Brown hosted a discussion on “homegrown terrorists”. Finally, it’s safe to discuss Americans who kill their fellow citizens – because with Von Brunn, we can do so without having to navigate the minefields of religion and ethnicity. 

Brown also asked her guests whether America is “too tolerant of hate-mongers”. Could you imagine having such a discussion in the wake of an act of Islamic terrorism? People would be accusing CNN of musing about thought-policing. Yes, America is too tolerant of people who muse about blowing things up and committing terrorist acts – but we have a solution for monitoring such things, called the Patriot Act. Would the left now suggest using the Patriot Act against terrorists like Von Brunn?

As I see it, there could be a few windows of opportunity here. For example, if President Obama was looking for an excuse to keep Club Gitmo open – because the status quo is much easier than taking any action that could result in a screw-up, given that they often return to the battlefield upon release – he should just tell leftists that Von Brunn will be in there propping up the walls. Until he comes up with an excuse the left finds sufficiently self-serving, they probably wouldn’t even mind if he’s pushed against a hollow wall, put in a room with caterpillars and ladybugs, or given an aggressive face-washing by a federal agent.

Some are having a hard time categorizing Von Brunn. That’s what happens when you try to foolishly rationalize insanity. One expert on CNN this week opined that a lone nut acting outside the context of any organized group effort isn’t a terrorist. “Loner” and “terrorist” aren’t mutually exclusive labels. Much of Islamic terrorism isn’t “organized”, in the mob sense, either. Osama Bin Laden isn’t Don Corleone. He just muses about how much he hates things, and any nutcase is free to pick up the ball and run with it.

What this expert should really have said is that, while Von Brunn is indeed (allegedly) a terrorist, it’s not like he has any palatable leftist rationale for his actions. Such people will only become a problem when they find better excuses and give rise to the appropriate leftist make-work projects.