Thanks to the Rightwing’s unshakable lock on our national media, had the Governor of Wisconsin now up for a potential recall been a Democrat, the photo above might have been among the most familiar photos in the nation this week.
However, since WI’s governor Scott Walker is a Republican, this is likely the first time you’ve seen the photograph, or even heard that there has been yet another violent assault on a citizen petitioner seeking signatures for his recall.
Add this one to the Rightwingers found openly discussing collecting signatures for the “Recall Walker” campaign, only so they could then burn and shred them, and to the death threats received in the middle of the night and to the 30-year old West Bend man, Jeffery Karnitz, who’s been charged with two counts of election fraud for defacing petitions.
The story of what happened to the camera above begins this way:
It includes this:
The story ends with the police finding the man who did it and promising criminal charges, before this thought from the person whose camera was destroyed by a political supporter of Republican Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin:
Read the full story of what happened from “noise of rain” at dKos here. And then remind yourself how everyone in the nation would likely have heard about this incident, over and over again, days ago, had the violence in this story been carried out by a Democrat against a Republican. And keep all of that in mind next time you hear one of Andrew Breitbart and Rush Limbaugh’s pathetic brainwashed zombies complaining, once again, about that dastardly biased “Liberal Media.”
UPDATE 12/20/11, 11:52pm PT: The local NBC affiliate, TMJ-4 in Mequon, reveals the identity of dKos blogger “noise of rain” as Dave Hakman and reports that the man who destroyed his camera has now been arrested. Details from TMJ-4’s coverage follow below…
Hakman told TODAY’S TMJ4, “I was definitely scared, I’ve never been in a fight in my life”.
Meanwhile, Lane Hall said he tried to step in and calm things down. But he claims the Walker supporter became physically violent.
“And he yelled very aggressively and violently I’m going to kill that blankity, blank, blank,” said Hall. “out of nowhere he just kind of ducked down and did a football move and ran as fast as he could at me knocked me down, grabbed my camera from my hand and took the camera went to the street and whipped it down.”
Hall’s camera was destroyed and his winter jacket ripped. Mequon police arrived and arrested the man.
The police have yet to release details from the arrest, so Walker’s latest violent supporter has yet to be identified publicly.
In related news, two men were arrested for yet another alleged assault on recall workers Monday, according to The Capital Times…
Timothy Peterson, 28, and William Peterson, 55, were taken to the Iowa County Jail on tentative charges of disorderly conduct, according to a news release from the Iowa County Sheriff’s Department.
The incident was reported at 12:12 p.m. Saturday in the village of Arena.
Deputies found the two men at a business in Arena and made the arrest. The report said both posted bond and were released from jail.
CORRECTION: This article had originally stated that Mequon, where the petitioner alleged had his camera broken by the Walker supporter, was in “our favorite Rightwing County of Waukesha!” It isn’t. In fact, Mequon is in Waukesha’s neighboring County of Ozaukee. We regret the error.
so, its one thing for Fox not to cover stories like this…their thing is to whip up Repub outrage, but really, why not CNN, why not MSNBC…its good story, visuals, good controversy, they can cover it without even taking sides like Fox does, but still get eyeballs.
I wonder how this censorship is so uniformly enforced? Like the Ron Paul thing, there are so many local and national outlets doing all sorts of news 24 /7 how do they control it all, all the time?
Far off topic: Brad, I am dismayed that the man who ushered in the original Velvet Revolution (Vaclav Havel) did not even rate a passing mention, much less the RIP the rest of the civilized world has heaped on the mounds of flowers and masses of candles. PS: Please tell your spam filter to leave me alone, so that I might not need to thus address you.
BTW, the Cognitive Dissidence blog in Milwaukee has a lovely new “Recall Walker” poster.
I am hearing from sources in Wisconsin that local right wing radio shows are spurring on this activity. Inciting violence? Maybe. I’m trying to get audio.
Two arrested for allegedly spitting on recall workers in Iowa County
Btw, I don’t recall any Dems getting violent against Republicans when Cali recalled a Dem governor.
Of course this is incited by talk radio…..many conservatives were fine with Muslim community center in NYC til some one spewed hate about it being a ground zero Mosque.
The real irony here is the way that the protesters at the capital after the anti-labor laws were swept in were characterized as being violent brutes…
So, what about the incitement to violence that the talk radio hosts are engaging in? It is about time that talk radio hosts who are doing this – and it has been going on for a long time – were held responsible for helping to destroy this democracy. Right wingers talk so much about being responsible!
According to the Wikipedia article about Brandenberg v. Ohio:
The speech in question is not only likely to incite imminent lawless action, it HAS done so.
The incident in Arena happened in front of my business. The two “men” in question started with a stream of obscene comments for the two women holding recall signs in my parking lot. Then they decided to spit on the ladies as they left. This was only one of several incidents at our business last Saturday, but we also collected almost 20 signatures on petitions. All in all, a positive day.
Did “talk radio” not also have a hand in inciting the violence in Rwanda?
“However, since WI’s governor Scott Walker is a Republican, this is likely the first time you’ve seen the photograph, or even heard that there has been yet another violent assault on a citizen petitioner seeking signatures for his recall.”
Yep. I’ve all but abandoned the MSM and stick pretty closely to what passes for left wing media, and narry a word. Amazing. Thanks for the story, great work as always.
Shouldn’t Scott “the Godfather” Walker and WI Conz be subject to RICO prosecution?
This is just more reason to recall Walker. Hopefully, we can follow with the recall of many other GOP governors who intend to turn this country into a fascist, racist Amerika, while voting the selfish, do-nothing participants in Congress out of office. Keep up the good work petitioners. The reasonable people in this country appreciate what you’re doing and applaud you.