Countering Far Right Eliminationist Rhetoric

The kind of hateful statements against liberals and people of color that have been hurled by people attending Republican political rallies is likely to be a harbinger of a more violent acting-out by right-wing extremists as progressives gain more political power, OurFuture.org senior fellow Sara Robinson says.

In this podcast, which first aired on my LiberalOasis radio show, Sara traces the history of "eliminationist rhetoric"—the targeting of the "other" as the source of a nation's problems—among conservatives. There is a historical pattern within the far right that the nation has seen before, and a repeat of that pattern is likely to lead to a wave of violence instigated by the far right that parallels the insurgency after the election of Bill Clinton in 1992 that climaxed with the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

But there are positive signs that a forceful response is not only morally right but politically smart. We discuss in this interview the demographic changes progressives can take advantage of to counter the rhetoric of hate from the right.