The home of one left-wing president is in the news after a particularly distasteful protest against another.
A stuffed, black doll said to symbolize current U.S. President Barack Obama was hung in effigy from a landmark building in Plains, Georgia – which is the hometown of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter.
From WALB TV 10 (NBC – Albany, Georgia) …
Witnesses say it was an image of President Barack Obama with a rope around his neck, and the display was found hanging in one of the city’s most recognizable sites dedicated to former President Jimmy Carter.
A few people were able to snap pictures of the black doll before it was taken down.
The Secret Service is reportedly investigating the incident, although that strikes us as overkill.
Seriously, U.S. presidents are burned and hung in effigy both at home and abroad every day … so why is this any different? Because Obama is black?
Please …
Also, aside from possible trespassing and vandalism charges (which the local authorities should be able to handle), is it illegal to burn or hang a president in effigy? Because that sounds a lot like someone expressing their constitutionally-protected right to free expression to us …
Don’t get us wrong, you won’t find a website that’s any more rabidly anti-racist than we are, but people also have a right to express their views, however distasteful, disrespectful or flat out disgusting those views may be.
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By Mike from Shreveport January 4, 2010 at 12:10 pm
Threats against President NOT protected speech:
from 18 USC Sec. 871:
“…Whoever knowingly and willfully deposits for conveyance in the mail or for a delivery from any post office or by any letter carrier any letter, paper, writing, print, missive, or document containing any threat to take the life of, to kidnap, or to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States, the President-elect, the Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President of the United States, or the Vice President-elect,
or knowingly and willfully otherwise makes any such threat against the President,
President-elect, Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President, or Vice President-elect,
shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.”
http://usgovinfo.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/871.shtml
By fitsnews January 4, 2010 at 12:22 pm
Mike from Shreveport,
What’s the “threat” here? Protest, yes … but threat? Not based on what’s been published so far.
-FITS
By Pat Hendrix January 4, 2010 at 12:51 pm
The people who did this are about as smart as the dude who melted his balls off in Michigan last week. Too stupid to take seriously.
I guess the Secret Service has to do a little CYA. Imagine if they didn’t and some bobo tossed a shot at the president – Jim Demint would be looking for the first camera.
By 2 cents January 4, 2010 at 1:07 pm
In Benettsville, SC, 15 miles or so from Cheraw, a man was sent to prison a few years back for threatening to kill Bush. I guess they take it seriously. He blurted it out somewhere, he wasn’t serious about it, but off he went.
By Rick January 4, 2010 at 2:23 pm
Sooooo, when Bush was hung in effigy, the perps should have been imprisoned. And mike the law, post office? Threat? Yep, Barack will spend more money on this than on the panties bomber. Must have hurt Ms Baracks feelins…..
By Cooter Brown January 4, 2010 at 3:43 pm
Mista Willie-
Iz ye loosin’ yer edge? This is plum silliness!
By Knocktwice January 4, 2010 at 4:32 pm
So if I burned a cross on the front lawn of an African American family in my neighborhood, I would only be guilty of trespass and vandalism under the Sic(k) Willie standard? Would I be using my civil right to protest? Sure it would be a protest of sorts. Would it be protected speech? HELL NO.
And how many white people have been lynched in this country? Racism is like pornography…yah know it when you see it. Race related hate speech that seeks to incite violence or is in of itself an act of violence is not protected. Neither is threatening the President of the United States.
If someone here thinks that burning a doll that symbolizes President Obama is not a threat or violent, I would be happy to come over and do the same in their front yard to measure the reaction.
I may not agree with much of President Obama’s policy or even like him much personally, but I at least respect the Office of the President.
There are much more effective, less ugly, less racists ways to protest the President’s policies. Political discourse at this level does not belong in the marketplace of ideas and is just a part of the problem of the radical elements in our society.
By rick January 4, 2010 at 8:07 pm
By Knocktwice… If someone here thinks that burning a doll that symbolizes President Obama is not a threat or violent, I would be happy to come over and do the same in their front yard to measure the reaction.
Somebodies got their Obambi panties in a twist….
By Mickey Blue Eyes January 4, 2010 at 9:24 pm
According to Keith Olbermann, if it were President Bush, it would be “free speech” and don’t you dare object. However, since it is Obama, it is “threatening behavior” and “racist” and the people responsible should be summarily executed.
By Brian January 4, 2010 at 11:18 pm
Rick – Shut the hell up…your stupid
Knocktwice – I like the way you think!
By Liberty For Me January 5, 2010 at 1:23 am
This is some completly stupid shit.The only thing less important is John and Kate
By WorkingTommyC January 5, 2010 at 7:32 am
Hanging something in someone’s front yard is a far sight from doing it on public property or otherwise far removed from the actual object of scorn or attack. In your front yard, it’s an obvious threat. On public property, it’s a protest. Of course, you’re all happily and illogically tossing out those straw men and tearing into them like rabid cows.
AND AGAIN, OBAMA, LIKE BUSH, IS A PUBLIC FIGURE!!!
When you’re in public office, boys and girls, it’s a whole new ball game. Get over it. If the SS were to start tossing people in the gulag on his behalf, that’s a police state you don’t want to live in.
Besides which, what’s the big deal about Obama’s effigy being hung in public, anyway?
If I were him, I’d worry more about the doll being HANGED in public.
By Knocktwice January 5, 2010 at 11:29 am
Let me be clear. I really don’t care for President Obama or his policies. Many of the things that are being implemented by his adminstration is in my opinion a movement backwards away from a free democracy.
That being said, virulent racist laced protests against the President that are both threatening and vulgar are not advancing the underlying point of the protest. They merely serve to reinforce the country’s image that Southerners are racist, backward, undereducated, and ill equipped to lead in any capacity.
I think most readers of this site would agree that at its best, the South represents the last bastion of those stand for a free country based on capitalist principals with lives free from government control.
This protest is the South at its worst by attempting to express those ideals through a thinly veiled potentially racially motivated attack on the person spearheading the opposition. I have no problem with protests against the President. I have a BIG problem with racially tinged attacks that are disrespectful.
By George January 5, 2010 at 1:19 pm
No problem as long as I am allowed to carry garbage, urinate on or burn a confederate flag.
By Richard January 5, 2010 at 1:59 pm
I can only imagine the comfort this must provide to our enemies throughout the world. Maybe it is true this country will fall from within rather than from a foreign enemy.
By Ben January 6, 2010 at 3:57 am
Rick,
I’m not sure that the perp(s) that hung Bush in effigy should be in prison any more than I am about the perp(s) in this case. But what I do know is that both cases are tasteless, classless acts that don’t have any redeeming value whatsoever.
Also, the president doesn’t get to pick and choose what cases the Secret Service investigates and which ones they do not. The only reason they are investigating this case is because somebody down in Georgia called them to report it. The good men and women of the Secret Service don’t concern themselves with partisan politics and do the same job to the same outstanding level that they do, regardless of which politician happens to hold that office at that time.
By three times January 6, 2010 at 6:43 am
Knocktwice:
You have upset some people because they don’t like the incumbent. If anyone had dared to even have a negative thought about the Connecticut cowboy, they would have lost their livelihood and possibly freedom. Someone brought up a thoughtless remark made by someone and it landed them in the pokey. It didn’t mean anything in all likelihood, but it was the end of life as the speaker knew it. Scott Ritter was a voice for restraint in Iraq and everyone was calling him some pretty awful names for dissenting against a blind rush to war. No one could say or think a bad thought about the decider without being called a traitor or appeaser. It’s not so much the act itself as it is who it’s perpetrated against. You may recall the commie Michael Moore complaining to the government when the late Jesse Helms made a threat against an earlier elected official. The response he got was that if it happened again, it would be investigated. Even though the threat was never denied and a matter of public record, that’s as far as it got. It’s selective and it depends on who gets offended. There’s no reason to hate someone for being a different ‘color’ or ethnic background than ourselves, but we should have known that when we were in our diapers. Racism is a learned behavior. It’s not something we are born with. May your ideals of freedom and sovereignty prevail long.