Far Right Poses As Much Danger To The U.S. As Radical Islam

The West Point think tank known as the Combating Terrorism Center has
issued a paper on the dangers posed by the far right in this country,
specifically people who espouse “civil activism, individual freedoms and
self-government,” and says that these people tend to be anti-federalist,
white supremacist, and fundamentalist in their views.

According to the paper, liberalism, including that which is seen in
other developed nations, looks forward to the future, while conservative
movements, especially those here, look backward and cling to an
idealized version of history. They also hold a belief that the
government is inherently tyrannical and given to intruding on civil and
constitutional rights as much as they can. According to the paper, these
people initiated 350 attacks in 2011.

One of the core issues with the extreme right is that while they espouse
individual freedom and like to try and spread fear regarding the
government’s activities, they also seem to believe in a type of
authoritarianism—one of the very things they profess to loathe in
government—that includes a strong resistance to authority from what they
view as “outgroups,” namely blacks and women, unions, and more.

They also seem to view the Constitution as a static document, unchanging
despite the way society has changed over the last 230 years, and want
laws made and judges to rule based on the original intent of the
document. Here’s the issue with that: When it comes to the 2nd Amendment
(for example), the original intent of the amendment was to preserve
slavery. The words, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the
security of a free State…” refer to the freedom of white men in the
southern states to own slaves, and to police those slaves with their
militias as they saw fit. The original intent was not to ensure the
people’s freedom from a tyrannical government, which is what every
gun-rights activist espouses today.

Given that slavery hasn’t existed here for more than 150 years, the
original intent of the 2nd Amendment is not applicable to today’s
society. The extreme right, however, would argue that we are becoming
slaves of the government, if we aren’t already, with anecdotes and
paranoia fueling their claims.

According to an article published on CNN in August 2012, eight attacks
perpetrated by extreme right-wingers have been carried out in the U.S.
since 9/11 (though the study by the West Point think tank does say 350
just in 2011), compared with four carried out by Islamic jihadists. It
makes mention, however, of more than 50 attacks by white supremacists
that resulted in 7 deaths, though it was concluded that these were
racially motivated and not political acts.

A staff member for an unnamed Republican congressman discounted the
Combating Terrorism Center’s paper, saying that if the government is
looking to cut spending, the think tank should be among the first to go,
since they’re wasting time and money with this nonsense and not working
on radical Islamist threats or threats from the far left, naming the
Weather Underground, the Animal Liberation Front, and the Earth
Liberation Front, as left-wing terrorist groups.

The issue with that, however, is that extreme left-wing groups tend not
to try and kill, and/or only target individuals and not entire groups of
people, according to a CNN article from Sept. 2012. This article says
that the biggest threats for large-scale attacks not only come from
radical Islam groups, but also come from radical American right-wing
groups. It cites a report by the director of National Consortium for the
Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) that says while
homegrown terrorist groups from the left, such as the animal and
environmental groups, only tend to target individuals and don’t
generally intend to kill, whereas right-wing extremists do.