Matt W Cook

Wanna see something bad? Skip to 1:44.

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I think Dan Fanelli may be a terrorist.

Terrorism is the use of terror or fear as a means of coercion. The Taliban uses terror to further its political ideals. The Army of God uses terror to fight abortion. The Jewish Defense League uses terror to protect their interests. And Dan Fanelli is using fear of violence and foreigners in order to coerce people to vote for him. They are all terrorists. They are all bad.

One of the worst things about any group using terrorism (violent or otherwise) is that it nearly always tends to bring out the worst in people. For example, when I hear about a group like the Army of God, who go around killing abortion doctors, I find myself getting so angry that I want to do violence. And violence + violence, is nearly always bad. I get ill-tempered and unreasonable. The group ruins my day whenever I think about them. They bring out the worst in me.

On the exact opposite side, when some people hear about the Army of God they half-way sympathize with them. An eye for an eye, they say. The terrorist touches another nerve in them, a dangerous and irrational nerve that can be convinced to wink at murder. They can get normal, reasonable people to abandon reason.

And dear Dan Fanelli has, of course, managed to bring out the worst in his viewers. For me, he’s steeled my heart against Republicans. That’s bad. That’s very bad, in fact. It’s unreasonable for me to feel anger toward his party just because of his idiocy.

On the other side, he’s reinforced the deep fear of the others that most folks struggle with. It’s this sort of talk that makes people think North America was made for the white man. It’s this kind of talk that convinces people that a change in the lyrics to ‘O Canada’ is worth more vehement protest than the ways our standard of living is sucking the life out of the planet. It’s sad to hear (as I do all the time) intelligent people make derisive comments about people, cultures, religions and nations that they know nothing about. It’s sad how the news agencies that are covering this guy are not using any words stronger than ‘bold’ and ‘controversial’. It’s sad that he’s consider legitimate.

Think about what Dan is saying.

White people = less likely to be dangerous.
Brown people = more likely to be dangerous.

That is not a far step from

White people = good.
Brown people = bad.

And that just makes me think of Kingdom Identity Ministries. Yuck, Dan. Very yuck.

I’ll close on a lighter note. Here’s a funny quote I found on an article written by Dan Fanelli on the War on Terror. See if you can find the spelling mistake:

First of all, we must realize that all passengers are NOT created equally! It is time to stop penalizing the patriotic American pubic when utilizing air traveling.

Tee he he