Interesting thoughts on security and politics from Steve Striffler:

…in a world where fragments of information come from so many sources, it often leads them to the odd place where any explanation of the world is as good as any other, where there is no conceptual rudder for judging one theory or idea against another. […] Hence, the tendency toward apathy and (after a philosophy class or two) nihilism.

Striffler seems to conclude that discussions about risk should still look at the role of political views and rhetoric, including confused and reactionary ones like Loughner’s.

It is a bit ironic that at the same time as many commentators are urging us to listen more closely to our opponents’ ideas and resist the urge to demonize them, that we are dismissing Loughner’s political views without even so much as a real discussion. What he did is horrible, but the commentary has gone too quickly from “Loughner’s actions were politically motivated” to “it had nothing to do with politics.”

George Packer also has an interesting look at the balance of violent rhetoric within American political discourse:

In fact, there is no balance—none whatsoever. Only one side has made the rhetoric of armed revolt against an oppressive tyranny the guiding spirit of its grassroots movement and its midterm campaign. Only one side routinely invokes the Second Amendment as a form of swagger and intimidation, not-so-coyly conflating rights with threats. Only one side’s activists bring guns to democratic political gatherings. Only one side has a popular national TV host who uses his platform to indoctrinate viewers in the conviction that the President is an alien, totalitarian menace to the country. Only one side fills the AM waves with rage and incendiary falsehoods. Only one side has an iconic leader, with a devoted grassroots following, who can’t stop using violent imagery and dividing her countrymen into us and them, real and fake. Any sentient American knows which side that is; to argue otherwise is disingenuous.

Vermont Professor James Loewen, author of “Lies My Teacher Told Me”, gives an interesting look at common myths regarding why the South seceded:

He says the South did not fight for states’ rights; they were opposed to them:

The South’s opposition to states’ rights is not surprising. Until the Civil War, Southern presidents and lawmakers had dominated the federal government. The people in power in Washington always oppose states’ rights. Doing so preserves their own.

He also says the South was not opposed to taxes:

Tariffs were not an issue in 1860, and Southern states said nothing about them. Why would they? Southerners had written the tariff of 1857, under which the nation was functioning. Its rates were lower than at any point since 1816.

He points out even whites who did not own slaves still supported slavery:

…belief in white supremacy provided a rationale for slavery. As the French political theorist Montesquieu observed wryly in 1748: “It is impossible for us to suppose these creatures [enslaved Africans] to be men; because allowing them to be men, a suspicion would follow that we ourselves are not Christians.” Given this belief, most white Southerners — and many Northerners, too — could not envision life in black-majority states such as South Carolina and Mississippi unless blacks were in chains.

He quotes Lincoln to show that the President went to war to save the Union, not to end slavery:

On Aug. 22, 1862, President Lincoln wrote a letter to the New York Tribune that included the following passage: “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.”

In conclusion, he says it is unlikely the US would have ended slavery if it had not been for the war:

To claim that slavery would have ended of its own accord by the mid-20th century is impossible to disprove but difficult to accept. In 1860, slavery was growing more entrenched in the South. Unpaid labor makes for big profits, and the Southern elite was growing ever richer.

In other words, it is fair to describe the South as pro-federalist and pro-tax as well as pro-slavery.

The reason for secession was slavery alone, as presented by the Southern states at the time. Take, for example, South Carolina’s Declaration of Causes of Secession, December 24, 1860:

Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.

For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now secured to its aid the power of the common Government.

In other words, anyone who did not support a definition of people as property was characterized by the South as an unacceptable threat to slavery practices. Everything from the failure to arrest and return escaped slaves to the “books and pictures” that did not support slavery were cited as forms of incitement to revolution and agitation. The Editor of the New York Evening Post wrote (Cincinnati Gazette, May 24, 1856; New York Evening Post, May 23, 1856, quoted. in “Battle cry of freedom: the Civil War era” by James McPherson, pg 150):

[The South] cannot tolerate free speech anywhere, and would stifle it in Washington with the bludgeon and the bowie-knife, as they are now trying to stifle it in Kansas by massacre, rapine, and murder.

Has it come to this, that we must speak with bated breath in the presence of our Southern masters? … Are we to be chastised as they chastise their slaves? Are we too, slaves, slaves for life, a target for their brutal blows, when we do not comport ourselves to please them?

The South declared themselves victims to justify armed dissent against their own country; they believed disintegration of the Union was their righteous path to maintain slavery. What they did not calculate was the new President’s resolve to keep the country in a Union. Had they not seceded they probably would have continued slavery in America, and continued Southern influence over federal rule, for many more years.

I used the word terror because I am working from a simple and common definition:

calculated use of violence (or threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious

The attack by Loughner therefore seems to me a form of terrorism. With that in mind…

Foreign Policy has an article called “A Very American Conspiracy Theory” that says Loughner was a student who succumbed to extremist rhetoric, which has a long history in America.

Arizona has, by some measures, become a ground zero for anti-government conspiracy theories. Loughner lived in a politically polarized state in which the federal government’s policies, from health care to immigration, were excoriated by mainstream politicians as evidence of a tyrannical plot against liberty. And these theories took root beyond Arizona’s borders. Throughout the United States, conspiracists rage against the alleged subversion of their country by “un-American” forces that reside in the U.S. government itself.

Conspiracy theories may seem to thrive on the margins of American politics: When historian Richard Hofstadter diagnosed a “paranoid style” in American politics in the 1960s, these views were easily characterized as fringe. But they become central when they gain powerful sponsors in the media and politics who inject their paranoid theories into the body politic. These conspiracy theories can be ridiculed in pop culture, but they will eventually lash out against reality — as they tragically did last Saturday.

A blog editorial in the Broward Palm Beach New Times goes even further and criticizes several people for a conspiracy theory linked to “un-Americans”:

The right wing has no monopoly on hyperbole, but it has very nearly cornered the market on the weaponizing of difference, on the insistence that a political opponent is not a citizen with ideological differences, but an enemy, immoral and un-American. Joyce Kaufman does this. Allen West does this. In Loughner’s back yard, Jan Brewer does this. These individuals do not merely craft the occasional martial metaphor; they are in the business of articulating a whole, martial political philosophy.

Another take on the same issue of semantics and persuasion is found on the Lawyers Guns Money Blog, which defines and explains “violent rhetoric”

The more pernicious rhetoric here is the conspiratorial variety being mainstreamed by the likes of Glenn Beck: rabid and ahistorical anti-federalism feeds into the beliefs of those who believe they’re being persecuted by vast faceless conspiracies.

The tragic attack in Tucson obviously is bringing forward a whole new look at conspiracy theorists in America. This, of course, will further alarm the conspiracy theorists. Like the dilemma of Schroedinger’s Cat, America has a need to assess a culture of violence without increasing the culture of violence by trying to assess it.

Take the reaction after California passed a law limiting the online sale of handgun ammunition (AB 962), for example. Conspiracy theorists worried that their supply of bullets was being limited, which only helped to push up demand and reduce supply, which increased conspiracy theorists fear of government control and demand for bullets increased, reducing availability…12 billion rounds of ammunition were apparently sold in 2009, up from 7-10 billion in “a normal year”. And therein lies the paradox of the box with Schroedinger’s Cat — can Americans find a reliable way to renounce terror as an undesirable state, or will some remain so fearful of judgment that they will try to maintain superposition (duality and the unknown)?

The Governor of California’s signature on the handgun bullet limit law explains how he decided:

I am signing Assembly Bill 962. This measure would require vendors of handgun ammunition to keep a log of information on handgun ammunition sales, store ammunition in a safe and secure manner, and require the face-to-face transfer of ammunition sales.

Although I have previously vetoed legislation similar to this measure, local governments have demonstrated that requiring ammunition vendors to keep records on ammunition sales improves public safety. These records have allowed law enforcement to arrest and prosecute persons who have no business possessing firearms and ammunition: gang members, violent parolees, second and third strikers, and even people previously serving time in state prison for murder. Utilized properly, this type of information is invaluable for keeping communities safe and preventing dangerous felons from committing crimes with firearms.

Moreover, this type of record-keeping is no more intrusive for law abiding citizens than similar laws governing pawnshops or the sale of cold medicine. Unfortunately, even the most successful local program is flawed; without a statewide law, felons can easily skirt the record keeping requirements of one city by visiting another. Assembly Bill 962 will fix this problem by mandating that all ammunition vendors in the state keep records on ammunition sales. As Governor, I have sought the appropriate balance between public safety and the right to keep and bear arms. I have signed important public safety measures to regulate the sale and transfer of .50 caliber rifles, instituted the California Firearms License Check program, and promoted the use of micro-stamping technology in handguns. I have also vetoed many pieces of legislation that sought to place unreasonable restrictions and burdens on firearms dealers and ammunition vendors. Assembly Bill 962 reasonably regulates access to ammunition and improves public safety without placing undue burdens on consumers. For these reasons, I am pleased to sign this bill.

The law goes into effect Feb 1, 2011.

It was based upon limits that were studied in Los Angeles and Sacramento (LA, California, Code Chapter V, article 5 $ 55.11; Sacramento, California, Code $$ 5.66.010 – 5.66.090), as presented to the Sacramento City Council in 2008.