Politico is so determined to suggest to its readers that evil right wing Republicans were at least indirectly responsible for the break-in at Nancy Pelosi’s home, in which Paul Pelosi ended-up in the hospital from being hammered, that they published on Friday and Saturday not just one or two, or even three or four stories, but ELEVEN stories at their top home page.
There were so many stories, that only six of them could fit in the photo on this page. Let’s start with the story at top of the page. It blamed, without any real evidence, the usual suspects in the media and Politico, “Pelosi attack rattles a already skitttish campaign trail.”
The brutal attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul at their San Francisco home early Friday morning was reverberating across the campaign trail Saturday. Some Democratic campaigns acknowledged increased violence threats, while others took extra precautions in their rhetoric.
Recent years have seen an increase in violence threats against elected officials. Some members of Congress and elected officials have purchased flack jackets, home security system, and other protective measures in recent weeks. Pelosi and other congressional figures are being targeted by Republican ads that have become more violent and widespread in the country.
…”Speaker Pelosi, her family and friends have been attacked at their place of work and her home in the past 18 months,” Jake Auchincloss, a Massachusetts Representative, told POLITICO in a Saturday interview. It is a sign of a dysfunctional political culture. GOP candidates in particular need to be aware of their rhetoric on election day.
According to Democratic strategists, the speaker was mentioned in at least 29 ads by the Congressional Leadership Fund, a Kevin McCarthy-aligned super PAC.
…Ex-President Barack Obama called for Republicans to temper violent rhetoric at a rally in Detroit on Saturday afternoon.
Obama stated, “If our rhetoric about one another gets that mean, and when we don’t just disagree with each other but start demonizing people, making crazy accusations against them, that creates dangerous climate.” “If elected officials fail to do more, people can be hurt.”
The story below continues with the same theme about dangerous Republican rhetoric: “Attempted attack against Pelosi raises questions about motive, family protections.”
“Evidence now points towards an unhinged individual motivated by years of demonization and demonization of Speaker. This is what happens when political leaders accept the intolerable to political gain,” he said, referring specifically to the Republican-led political attacks on Pelosi.
Kamala Harris, Vice President, was campaigning in Baltimore Saturday. She linked the attack to political rhetoric, which she claimed is “promulgating hatred.”
Harris stated that Harris was aware of “something that has been going on in our country where powerful people, so called leaders, have been using bully pulpits that they were given to them by the people in order to preserve their personal power and are being used to divide our nation.”
Others Democrats pointed the finger more directly at their fellow Congressmen for not responding in a strong enough manner in recent years to the rise of political violence and threats.
It would seem that the two stories at the top on the Politico home page would be enough for Republicans to make their point (so please do not vote for them in midterms), but the third story, “Law enforcement agencies rushes to assess new threats to legislators,” is completely redundant.
After the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, a Brookings Institution study found that conservative websites and political leaders “now regularly use violence and demonize political opponents” and that the “incendiary rhetoric of political leaders against their opponents” doesn’t “fade away after being given.”
On Capitol Hill, Democrats have warned for years that Pelosi was at risk due to the constant Republican attack ads and internet conspiracy theories. There was also concern that lawmakers were increasingly being targeted by the current political and media climates.
Evil, nasty, and nasty Republicans are known for their relentless attack ads. We have ELEVEN times repeated that theme, in case you didn’t notice. The next story, which is a complete overkill story about you-know-who in “Pelosi”‘s status as GOP campaign-ad-villain, comes under new scrutiny after a violent home invasion.
Nancy Pelosi has been a leader of House Democrats for nearly two decades, and she’s played a consistent role as one of the GOP’s favorite political villains.
Pelosi is among the most high-ranking women to ever serve in U.S. Government during each election cycle. The Republican National Committee revamped its website with a “Fire Pelosi” theme. This featured Pelosi in flames, just before the 2010 tea party wave election which swept the GOP to the House Majority. She starred in numerous GOP spots that attempted to link her with vulnerable Democratic candidates, even though she was in the minority in 2018.
The GOP’s obsession with Pelosi is not a new phenomenon. This criticism has been intensified by the attack on her husband Friday morning. According to law enforcement officials, the assailant was specifically looking for Nancy, and his online activity was rich in conspiracy theories and baseless claims about the 2020 election.
Politico’s next story, “Pelosi Assault is Latest in a Series of Threats, Attacks Against Political Figures”, was about attacks on public officials. Most victims were Democrats, but Steve Scalise was also included because it would have been too obvious if Scalise wasn’t on the list. But Senator Rand Paul was brutally attacked (described in some media as a “landscaping disagreement”) by a Trump-hating neighbor. This was noted by his ABSENCE from this list.
Are you one of those few who hasn’t had enough of this topic? You don’t have to worry because “Pelosi’s San Francisco home has long-drawn unwelcome attention” can provide more of the same. Are you still hungry for more? Take a look at “Democrats lash back at GOP after Pelosi attack” to see if you are still hungry for more.
A growing number of Democrats are openly blaming Republicans, blaming them for failing to control violent rhetoric after an attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband. He survived with serious injuries.
“A far-right white nationalist attempted to assassinate Speaker of the House and nearly killed her husband one year after violent insurrectionists tried unsuccessfully to find her and kill him in the Capitol,” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D.Minn.) stated on Saturday morning. “And the Republican Party’s reaction is to either ignore or minimize it.”
Pelosi’s fellow Democrats point fingers at their Republican counterparts in Congress as they continue to investigate the attack. Others also criticized the lackluster response of the public to the attack, including from Kevin McCarthy (R.Calif.).
If you haven’t yet figured out who Politico believes the villains to be, they once again hammer it home with “Pelosi attacker was involved in 2020 election conspiracyacies.”
The man accused of breaking into Nancy Pelosi’s home and attacking her husband, House Speaker, lived in a resentful world of conspiracy and had a fringe existence even by San Francisco Bay Area standards. David DePape is currently in custody and faces charges of homicide, elder abuse, and assault on Paul Pelosi’s home. According to his social media posts, he also appears to have believed falsehoods about the outcome and conspiracies.
Many people immediately concluded that DePape, 42, was motivated by politics by his connection to the election lies promoted by former President Donald Trump’s supporters. However police have not revealed what motivated him to break into the Pacific Heights home of Nancy and shout “Where’s Nancy?” before dawn on Friday.
Did you get that? Although the motive of the perp has not been determined by the police, Politico is not shy to share their theory.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican congressional candidate, said to an audience of Paul and Nancy Pelosi, “There’s no place for violence anywhere, but he’s going to send her back.
After Friday’s trauma attack, not all Democrats were satisfied with the kind words they received.
Dean stated that “We know what fuelled this: It has been years of vitriol, disinformation,” citing GOP leaders who allowed politically motivated lies to become mainstream, including those concerning the validity of elections. “What we have sow is what we are reaping.”
Jeff Greenfield, a columnist for Politico, tries to rise above the fray with “America’s Darkest Forces are Being Unleashed”, but ultimately blames GOP, especially considering that it is only a little over a week before the midterm elections.
Some right-leaning people, such as Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari lake, claimed that Paul Pelosi’s attack was linked to “leftist elected officials”, creating a climate that encourages crime. It was a shame that the accused attacker filled social media with conspiracy theories about Covid-19 and the 2020 election.
Importantly, the attack highlights the dangers of an escalation in heated political rhetoric, overwhelmingly but not exclusively from the right.
“Where will this political violence lead?” is the eleventh and final Politico story. The 1850s is perhaps the most nutst of all. Joshua Zeitz somehow manages a seamless transition from the Pelosi home burglary to January 6, then to the Jim Crow Era, then back to the Fugitive slave Act of 1850, then on to the Kansas Nebraska Act of1854 before moving on to the 19th century. It is important to remember that all this happened because of a Pelosi situation, for which the police are still investigating. It was a long history lesson from someone clearly very concerned about the outcome of the midterm election.
Oh, and if the motivation behind the incident is not political, will Politico publish ELEVEN corrections stories on its home page.
