In a previous posting on the 911 families that support the "Ground Zero Mosque," I got a comment that shows so much of what is wrong with the mentality of the far right.

trencherbone Says:

The Victory Mosque is just the visible tip of a very large iceberg. Beneath the surface of Western societies, Muslims are waging a campaign of infiltration, subversion, sedition and social sabotage, with the objective of destroying our countries and way of life from within.

First, let's look at the "Victory Mosque" phrase. It's totally made up, though not originally by the commenter. This mosque in no way was ever proposed or promoted as a "victory" anything. The first three words of the comment are an extreme example of the gullibility of people on the right. If they don't like something, they will believe anything about it.

If all the stuff about "infiltration, subversion, sedition and social sabotage" sounds familiar to you, you are remembering old anti communist rhetoric from the McCarthyist era, either from personal observation or by reading about it in a history text. The right is playing on the same fears that were used during the 50s without irony, and some people actually fall for it.

There really is a copy and paste laziness in far right rhetoric these days. They can't adapt to the fall of the Soviet Union, so they project their old fears onto a new enemy, or rather a caricature of Muslims. Yes, Islam is irrational and can be dangerous, but that is true of every religion. The notion that we should be looking out for evil Muslims everywhere who are out to get us is rather paranoid, especially when you consider that many Muslims in the West immigrated here to get away from Islamic extremism.

Nostalgia is always a bit fuzzy. But, nostalgia for old fears is so bizarre. Yet, that's exactly what the right has.

Paranoia, ignorance, gullibility, and intellectual laziness are the hallmarks of the 21 Century right, and that comment was a blatant example of those problems.

Photo: cjmartin