"Abrain" (A Pharmaceutical Commercial Parody) (opens in separate window)

the assassination culture

friday, may 2nd, 2025

Political violence in America is not just a relic of the past. From the attempted assassinations of Donald Trump to the murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, to the burning of Teslas in protest of Elon Musk, political violence is a present-day reality. More than 9,000 threats have been made against members of Congress this year—a “huge increase,” according to officials.

[ACTUAL TITLE: "Why Progressives Increasingly Support Violence".]

Are these events aberrations or do they reflect a national problem? Are they connected? And does the public support them?

A new survey finds more than half of left-wing respondents believe assassinating Donald Trump could be justified.

A new report from our group, the Network Contagion Research Institute, provides answers. Our research, based on nationally representative surveys and analyses of online activity, demonstrates the existence of online subcultures that support the murder of public figures like Trump and Musk. This “assassination culture,” incubated on social media, has migrated from the margins of public life into the mainstream.

We found that nearly one-third of Americans surveyed—and around half of those identifying as left-of-center—believe that the murder of certain public figures is at least somewhat justified. The figures are startling: 38 percent of respondents, and 55 percent of those left of center, said assassinating President Trump would be at least somewhat justified; 31 percent of respondents, and 48 percent of those left of center, said the same about Musk. Forty percent of respondents, and 58 percent of those left of center, deem it at least somewhat acceptable to “destroy a Tesla dealership” in protest.

Our report also discovered an online “assassination culture,” found in predominantly left-leaning digital spaces, such as Bluesky and Reddit. This subculture justifies and glorifies political violence. Some of these networks’ users wield the name “Luigi” or use the Luigi video game character as coded endorsements of Brian Thompson’s alleged assassin, Luigi Mangione. These users cloak explicit calls for violence in stylized memes. Many believe that political murder and sabotage are acceptable forms of protest.

What motivates these attitudes? To answer that, we looked for statistical associations between respondents’ backing for political violence and other psychological and behavioral measures. We identified three key variables that predict support for violence: left-wing authoritarianism (characterized by a willingness to use coercion and punishment for progressive aims), external locus of control (the extent to which individuals feel powerless in their lives), and use of the left-wing social media platform Bluesky.

This finding is especially concerning, as it reveals that many progressives have adopted a coherent ideology that justifies political violence. While right-wing extremism certainly exists, its left-wing equivalent merits considerable attention. Unfortunately, it has been historically understudied and, according to corroborating reports, is on the rise.

The rise of this ideology is troubling for American democracy. Political assassinations often occur when perpetrators believe a critical share of the public will tolerate—or even justify—them. Given the growing number of Americans who now express support for political violence, and the surge in threats to political figures, we recommend heightened security precautions across all levels of government.

These attitudes reflect a deeper pathology in our political culture: social media has magnified feelings of powerlessness and redirected them toward violent extremism. Confronting this contagion requires moral clarity and a renewed commitment to America’s founding principles. Civil disagreement must replace online hostility, and political leaders must denounce violence—without qualification—as incompatible with a constitutional republic.

If we fail to hold that line, the future may echo the darkest chapters of our past.

[JS - There are many hundreds more articles on this topic, in these many articles.]

A Day In The Life.

Up at 4:30a (!) on Friday, a cool, 49°F morning, I upped the heat to 73°, made coffee and breakfast, took a 250mg Bayer "Body & Back" Aspirin for various Sciatica and Neuropathy pains, fired-up the Win-7 Pentium HP Desktop to let 32 million lines of code load, had a couple smokes in the garage and checked the leftover to-do list, and plan on calling Sherry over the weekend, after her schedule's set-up.

I had another bad night, unable to get to deep REM sleep since 1a, when I hit the bed. Usually, after taking one of the Zolpidem 12.5 CR ("Ambien"), I'm out and in LA-LA Land for 7-8hrs. This is the second time in the past 2mos, that it didn't happen. Damn. I set the timer and activated my front gardens' Drip Irrigation System, so the dry, warm weather isn't a worry for me. Rain is forecast for later tonite, and we sure can use it. I decided to postpone the several errands for today -- due to being lethargic from the lack of sleep -- and err on safety's side.

Sherry called and was free for the afternoon, so I invited her over. We had a nice 3+hrs together, and we'll talk over the weekend, to plan a day or two, for next week. I had dinner, watched the news, noted that the heavy rain had started, and switched to Discovery's "Gold Rush: White Water", until midnight, and unplugged.

I need more sleep.

Up at 8a on Saturday, a rainy, warm 66°, there was a lot of noise on my front street, so I was sort of curious thru my just-awakened-haze, as to what was going on. I made coffee, had a smoke in the garage, and saw the unknown company's 5-ton dump truck off-loading several tons of topsoil for my neighbor. I tuned into the weather and news on the Office's HP Desktop, listened to a "CP Show" Podcast from Friday, and cleared the 'cobwebs' from my brain. After breakfast, I got ready for the day around 1p, and drove to Rite Aid Pharmacy to P/U several waiting Rxs, my only errand for the day. The rain continued.

Pollen is dropping in bucket loads from the remaining 70ft Pin Oak (Quercus phellos) in my next door neighbor's yard and it's blowing everywhere, including thru my condo, when I have the front and back screen doors open. What a mess. Pollen sacs coating the driveway and lawns, 2-3" deep, and yellow pollen coating everything. My Jeep's in the garage during this Spring period, but the rear still get s coating. I had a nice, an all-too short ¾hr nap, had some dinner and watched the NEWSMAX evening news. I switched to History's "The unXplained" and TWC's "Weather Gone Viral" until 12:30a. Lights out.

It's hard to sleep at night, when there's so many thoughts going thru your head. DEAR BRAIN, PLEASE SHUT UP.

Up at 7:30a on Sunday, a sunny but chilly 47°, I upped the heat, made coffee and planned the day ahead. I had 2 loads of laundry, Sis would be coming by to drop-off 3 containers of her 'world famous' York County Ham & Bean Soup, and I had garbage and recyclables to take out to the curb. Easy day ahead.

I scanned the news and weather, had breakfast, got ready for the day and started laundry. Beautiful day. Except for all the yellow pollen from the oak and maples. TONS of that ubiquitous stuff, just everywhere. (((SIGH))) Such is Spring. Sunday is -- along with Saturday -- an "NBC Night for TV" (Nothing But Crap), so I just switched over to NEWSMAX and left it there for the evening. After dinner, I had some computer work to do, occasionally checking the ever-changing weather forecast for the week ahead. Chores done, I took a break from the computer work, scanned headlines at several websites, and pulled the plug at 11;30.

Up at 7a on Monday, a clear, sunny, windless, and nippy 47° morning. Beautiful day ahead. I made coffee, tuned into the "CP Show LIVE", and scanned the weather and news. After (Poached Eggs In a Bowl w/ Toast) for breakfast, I got ready for the day, and left at 12:15p, for my usual Monday trip and 3 stops. No heat, no AC, Jeep's windows and massive panoramic sunroof open to the wind and 71° Spring weather, and I was back in 90mins.

After unloading, I had lunch, and took a walk around the condo complex, stopping at several neighbors' units, to talk gardening and plants, at their request. By 6p, I was in front of the 82" wall-mounted Samsung TV, and watched some of Fox' shows until 9, then switched to History Channel (direct) and caught up on some recent, missed "American Pickers" show. Cleaning lady's in at 8:30. Lights out at 1:30a.

Up at 6a on Tuesday, O-DARK-THIRTY, made coffee, 51°, had a couple smokes in the cool garage, scanned the weather and news, tuned into the "CS Show LIVE" until 9a. JoAnne arrived at 8:30, and got right to work. At 9a, I tuned into the "CP Show LIVE", did some paperwork and the HOA 'handyman' stopped by to look at a couple of small projects I need him to do. I spent the day working on the "My Document" on and off, and by 5p, quit that for the day. I watched the 6p news, got some Ham & Bean Soup for dinner, switched to "Curse of Oak Island" until 1a, and unplugged.

Up at 8a on Wednesday, a sunny, windy, 69° morning, I made coffee, had a smoke, opened the doors and windows to a beautiful, sunny, low humidity, 63° morning and made coffee. The HOA handyman would be coming by around 10:30 to do a small project for me -- stuff I can't reach with a ladder anymore, due to Peripheral Neuropathy in both feet -- and that took 10mins. I'd tuned into the "CP Show LIVE" from 9-12, and checked the eMail load. 132+. (((sigh))) This warning was repeated on every weather-related site in the Susquehanna Valley...

★★★ SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT ★★★

• WHAT: Residents are urged to exercise caution if handling any potential ignition sources, such as machinery, cigarettes, or matches. If dry grasses and tree litter begin to burn, the fire will have the potential to spread rapidly.
• PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS: For more information about wildfire danger and wildfire prevention and education, please visit the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources website at http://dcnr.pa.gov/Communities/Wildfire.

After lunch, I did a couple errands and sewnt in a work order to the mgmt co, who handles our condo assn, for help with a bees' nest in the front siding. I took a nice walk around the complex, and thought how nice it'd be to be walking with Sherry, but she was busy with Family Responsibilities today, and hopefully will be with me, tomorrow. I drove to local, nearby Weis Market to get a couple things, and wound-up buying 2 new Phalenopsis (Moth) Orchids, to replace the 2 I'd had for 5yrs, but lost last Fall. Very nice. By 6p, I'd made dinner, watched the evening news and got myself updated, switched to History's "American Pickers" until 1a. Lights out.

Up at 8a on Thursday, a partly sunny, warm 72°, forecast for 84-86° I just wanted to sleep thru the morning, but got up. After a new bag of Kona "Ohana" Coffee from Monarch Coffee Farm in Hawaii, I had a smoke and some breakfast, tuned into the "CP Show LIVE" and listened until 12 noon. I scanned the news and weather, tuned into the usual "CP Show LIVE" from 9-12, and decided that any errands could wait until either tomorrow or Saturday. The lawn mower crews arrived around 12 noon, and finished-up after 3hrs or so. I went out for a walk around the condo complex after lunch, After moving the Jeep out of the garage 2xc, and sweeping all the organic debris out, I gave up and will do a clean-up tomorrow, before Sherry arrives.

After working on "The Document" in MS-Word2007 for a while, I watched the evening news, had a late dinner and switched to History's "Ancient Aliens" until 11:30, and unplugged.

Tomorrow starts a new week, here in the "Journal", and except for a haircut and beard removal, it's another clear week. Damn, I could seriously get used to so many 'clear' weeks.

What Is Democratic Legality?

Since 2021, the left has waged a veritable war against the American legal system in a variety of ways.

One serial target of Democrats and the Left has been the Supreme Court.

In 2020, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) spoke to an angry throng of pro-abortion protestors assembled at the very doors of the court chambers.

He threatened two of the justices, Kavanaugh and Gorsuch, by name. Schumer yelled to the volatile crowd that the justices’ views would make them “reap the whirlwind,” and the two would not know what “hit” them.

In the ensuing months, protestors mobbed some of the conservative justices’ homes—likely committing felonies. The sympathetic Biden Justice Department chose not to follow the law, and so did nothing—although eventually a would-be assassin turned up.

Joe Biden himself bragged that he would try to ignore the Supreme Court ruling banning his arbitrary cancellation of billions of dollars in student loans. Indeed, he boasted, “The Supreme Court blocked it, but that didn’t stop me.”

In response, no one on the left ever complained about endangering the “rule of law” or Biden as “a dictator.”

For three years, four local, state, and federal prosecutors warped the law to neuter Donald Trump. Most of the charges had never been brought against other political figures in similar circumstances.

The vast majority of the 93 weaponized indictments backfired on the liberal prosecutors, who had contorted the legal system for political purposes and now face their own ethical or legal quagmires.

The federal prosecutor Jack Smith belatedly reported accepting $140,000 in free legal services.

Georgia prosecutor Fani Willis was removed from the Trump case and fined, and is now under further investigation.

New York prosecutor Letitia James is now facing allegations of falsification of documents and loan fraud.

Federal immigration law prohibits the illegal entry into and residence within the United States. Yet the Biden administration deliberately violated the law by allowing somewhere between 10-12 million illegal aliens to cross the border. Thousands had criminal records.

No one on the left decried any of these various affronts to the legal system.

In polls, by overwhelming majorities—above 70 percent—the public wants the Trump administration to close the border, begin deportations, and start with criminals or those with violent histories and gang ties.

The recent deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an illegal alien from El Salvador, to the vast majority of Americans seems to fit that profile.

Garcia entered the U.S. illegally and was later found consorting with members of M-13—a State Department-designated terrorist organization—who were selling drugs. Informants reported that he was a gang member. His own tattoos likely confirm those accusations.

Two prior immigration judges found such evidence sufficient to allow deportation proceedings. In 2019, a third judge allowed Garcia to stay temporarily, but only on the grounds that hostile gangs might harm him should he return to El Salvador.

Garcia was pulled over for speeding without a driver’s license—but with eight illegal aliens who reportedly all lived at the Garcia residence. The officer released him, despite suspicions that Garcia was engaged in human trafficking.

Garcia’s live-in girlfriend, now wife, was physically assaulted by Garcia on two occasions, suffered injuries, and initially sought restraining orders against him.

The left claims Garcia is a “Maryland man” without an arrest record.

But he is not a U.S. citizen or a legal resident of Maryland. Instead, Garcia is in legal limbo and remains what he always was—a citizen of El Salvador with gang ties and formerly residing illegally in the U.S.

Garcia is now back home on El Salvadorian soil and was mistakenly sent to a high-security prison. But his own government in El Salvador will ultimately decide how involved Garcia is or was with M-13 gangs. And then, as a sovereign nation, it will act according to its own policies about its own citizens’ associations with that terrorist organization.

The left has demanded that Garcia be returned to the U.S. He has become a cause célèbre as a purported victim of the supposedly fascist Trump. Returning Garcia is seen by leftists as a performance art-act to derail the Trump agenda, which otherwise they have neither the power nor public support to thwart.

The left also ignores its own hypocrisies and ironies.

Those who weaponized the court system and destroyed the border now rail that Trump is acting unlawfully by not returning an illegal alien, an M-13 member, and a domestic abuser with a propensity to ignore our laws.

How ironic that those who rail about colonialism now sound like 19th-century Yankee imperialists.

Democrats do not own El Salvador—although they act like it when dictating to its government that El Salvador cannot detain one of its own citizens on its own soil for its own reasons.

https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/4312947/posts

The Real Crisis Slithering Through Our Southern Border.

The deliberate and strategic entry of Sharia-followers into the United States..

While the media drowns in humanitarian headlines and border numbers, the real threat crossing our southern border isn’t families fleeing hardship—it’s trained, ideological operatives with a mission: infiltrate, embed, and one day, execute. You won’t hear this from CNN. But if you’ve been watching closely, you already know what’s happening. FBI and DHS whistleblowers have confirmed that individuals tied to Islamist extremist groups—like Hezbollah and al-Shabaab—have already been apprehended at the southern border. These aren’t anomalies. They’re waves. And for every one caught, how many have slipped through undetected? Border Patrol agents have encountered individuals on the terror watchlist, while others have been flagged through encrypted communications, suspicious financial transfers, and travel patterns consistent with jihadist activity. Behind every name on a list are likely dozens more who entered unnoticed—blending into migrant caravans, using fake documents, and crossing through overwhelmed checkpoints. The deliberate and strategic entry of Sharia-followers into the United States.

But it doesn’t stop at entry. Once inside the United States, these Islamists don’t immediately turn to violence. They embed. They build communities, establish networks, infiltrate cultural spaces, and slowly worm their way into education systems, activist circles, and even local politics. This isn’t speculation—it’s strategy. This is classic sleeper cell methodology: stay quiet, stay legal, wait, then act. It’s what we saw before 9/11, and it’s what we’re seeing again. The hijackers didn’t sneak in under the cover of night—they came through the front door, legally, and waited until the moment was right.

Today, with a wide-open border and vetting protocols gutted in the name of political correctness, we’re facing the perfect storm for Islamist infiltration. These aren’t war refugees. They’re ideological foot soldiers exploiting our broken asylum system and progressive sanctuary policies to get inside. They don’t just want to live here—they want to change us from within. Through courts, classrooms, policy manipulation, and, eventually, through acts of terror.

These actors are highly trained. They know how to play the system, how to cloak their intentions in victimhood, how to mobilize identity politics, and how to silence critics with accusations of “Islamophobia.” But this isn’t about faith—it’s about conquest. This isn’t religious persecution—it’s a coordinated campaign of national subversion. Once inside, they’re not hiding in caves—they’re attending mosques, starting businesses, joining local boards, and laying the groundwork for something far darker. They don’t need to rush. Time is on their side.

And now, with sanctuary cities offering political protection, with ideological vetting all but extinct, and with our own government paralyzed by fear of offending anyone, they no longer even have to hide. What’s next? A mall bombing? A school hostage crisis? A high-profile assassination? These aren’t wild conspiracies. They are documented tactics from jihadist playbooks, and every one of them is possible. In fact, every one of them is predictable.

What we are witnessing is not immigration. It is infiltration—slow, deliberate, and backed by foreign agendas that despise America and everything it represents. We must stop pretending that open borders are compassionate. They are not. They are a national security suicide note. This is the cost of denial. This is the fruit of political cowardice. And this is why we must act—not tomorrow, not after the next attack—but now. Secure the border. Reinstate ideological vetting. Call out Islamist infiltration by name, and stop being silenced by weaponized guilt.

The threat is real. The timeline is short. The consequences are irreversible. Let’s not wait for the smoke and sirens to say we should’ve seen it coming—because we already do. And silence? Silence is complicity