October 27, 2008
Mac Zilber
Today, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms announced that they had foiled a plot to assassinate Barack Obama. A group of neo-nazi skinheads were planning to attempt to shoot 88 black people, decapitate 14, and then kill Barack Obama as some sort of final act. This particular threat came a month and a half after reports the week of the Democratic convention that unlicensed sniper rifles were moving around the Denver area and had been confiscated from four people ostensibly plotting to kill Obama, and just over a week after people at Sarah Palin rallies began yelling “Kill him!” in apparent reference to Obama. While none of these threats have amounted to anything, they do raise the specter of something that most of us don’t want to admit, because if we admit it then it becomes real. Barack Obama has a higher chance of getting assassinated than any presidential candidate since Bobby Kennedy.
There are a couple of reasons for this. The most obvious is that Barack Obama is the first legitimate black candidate for president. There are still a lot of hateful, racist people in this country who don’t want to see a non-white man get elected, and they are disproportionately the type of people who have guns. By the same token, there are many militant Christians who believe that Obama is a Muslim, and that a muslim should not be president. The number of people who believe these things are a tiny fraction of the population, but enough people believe these things to cause periodic threats to Obama. The myth that Obama is some sort of Marxist/terrorist/manchurian candidate are also the type of things that could get people up in arms. His “exoticness” makes him a vulnerable target.
Another reason that his chances of being assassinated are higher than most presidential candidates is that he is one of the greatest speakers and most inspirational figures since Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy, Jack Kennedy, and Malcolm X died. I need not remind people what mode of death these four men shared. Lunatics often choose the most inspirational speakers to assassinate, such as the aforementioned icons, as well as John Lennon, Mahatma Ghandi, Harvey Milk, Huey Long, etc. The other way that Obama’s status as an internationally beloved icon makes him more at risk is that he regularly draws crowds of over 100,000 people. It only takes one lunatic to perpetrate a crime, and it is far too easy for somebody to blend in in crowds that are often up to six times the size of Albany.
The final reason that Obama has a higher likelihood of being assassinated than probably anybody else in the western world is because he will, unless something shocking happens, be president in January. One in ten presidents gets assassinated, and there have been assassination attempts against 10 of the last 11 presidents (with only 1 being successful, mind you), making the presidency one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. As the first black president, and arguably the most internationally beloved and popular figure in the world, those odds will likely be higher for Obama.
All of the above factors are probably why Obama was given secret service earlier than any other non-incumbent presidential candidate in history, and why he has a heavier service detail than most candidates do. It would be an enormous tragedy if an assassination attempt were to successfully occur against Barack Obama, or anybody else for that matter, and we can only hope that the fact that the last seven presidential assassination attempts have been foiled is evidence that the secret service is far better now than it once was.
Let me know what you’re thinking. Email me at themuse [at] albanyhighcougar [dot] com and I will respond to every email.
this article kills me
this article is to die for
this article is drop dead gorgeous
Obama said the assassination attempt on CNN: if so, I continue to review many things
http://cnn-election.com/index.php?q=Obama-about-assassination
If Obama gets assassination the anarchy in the streets will make the Rodeny King riots look like a school play ground fight. An assassination will put the country back 40 years.
Dear Mac,
Now that nobama has been elected by a construct of the democratic party, meaning an electorate principally made up of millions of individuals who own no homes, pay no taxes and are receiving various forms of government benefits, it is entirely likely that various assassination attempts will be made.
I think it entirely likely that a successful attempt will be carried out, not by some half crazed gun nut, but by loyal patriotic Americans who dearly love their country and don’t want to see it turned into a third level socialist state pandering to the inept, ignorant and incapable.
America was and is a great country built on drive, ambition and opportunity. The concept of pandering to the daily needs of millions of the unemployable and unemployed at the expense of those of us who earn taxable income is preposterous and hateful and is tearing this country apart.
Robert Ellis
Someone is going to kill Obama someway or another within the first year of his career as president. There have been millions of people that are of white, Latino, French, and Asian decent that want the man dead. I believe that this country is going to suffer very, very hard and will not end out well. Goodbye America. That is the very reasons why I am moving to Germany. Have fun you Americans.
Mason O’Neill
New York, New York – Berlin, Germany in 2009.
Mason, can I go with you? this sucks!
I HOPE HE DOESNT AS IT SHOWS THE WHOLE NO MATTER THE COLOUR OF THE SKIN WE SHOULD COME TOGETHER AS ONE.
SIMPLE!
As a black person Obama has past a lot of wall that most people ca not understand …. so that makes him a leader… a leader is influential .. this we all know … the impact he will have in this country and in the world will be grater than any man in the world just because he is black … And no one can take that away from him and from what the world saw…. the wall are coming down and the KKK and related are loosing ground. The KKK and related gain ground only by killing, but a true leader gains ground by using his mind as Obama will. If he does get killed it will not stop the fact that black people have arrived and made a world mark. No matter if he is Muslim or what ever, religion is not the only factor that he will act upon in his decision.. this country at the end of the day is controlled by money and power. And thee way to many religions that one will not totally control the country and we have a say in the matter. Interestingly enough HE MADE IT TO BE A PRESIDENT ELECT but it was not YOU. Now as far as dragging the country down, it will take more than a president to destroy what every American (Muong, Ming, Latin, Russian, Armenia and so forth)has worked for the last few centuries. It will not happen we WILL not allow it even the KKK and related. We should be lucky not to have to live in a country were fear control a country were there is a 3rd country layout and it will not change until the freedom we have in this country prevails through out the wold. This country will fall because it is oppressed or we feel we are oppressed, but not because we are pushing for better health, make people make more money and the freedom there of. We can open a company and run it, with in a week and make our money, an no one with a gun tells us we must give them their cut for the most part. Heck we are free to post our view and not be imprisoned.
So, if he does get killed.. yes it will be the biggest riots ever made and it will be the fault of the KKK and related. If the KKK and related wants to prove that they are the better race let him fall apart as a President and let us all in the US make the Judgment of his incompetence. After all this is the land of the free. By the way I voted of McCain. But I knew that Obama would win, his character is of a leader and people fallow this type of person, now it will be time to prove he has what it take to lead. You live by the gun you die by the Gun KKK and related.
No my spelling is not good nor my gram-er, but I will not be killed for that, what a country. By the way I don’t hate the KKK and related I hate what they do. Like smokers, they stink and are killing people with second had smoke.
To all those in the KKK not to offend you but please think about something, by the numbers if every black in the country who was able to vote voted for Obama and no whites did he would not be the president elect. It actually took people from all walks of life to elect him. It is very easy to say the he was elected because of his race but the truth is it was more about the economy. We are just seeing the tip of the iceberg of hard times if things were to continue along their current path. Unemployement can’t be fixed if the government does nothing to stop companies from sending jobs to other countries. Believe it or not there are many whites loosing jobs also and not because they are lazy, or because they were not educated, but because their companies CEO decided that his salary was more important than their jobs. The real picture is not even in focus yet because the media is not talking about it. How long do you think it will be before states start screeming about lack of funds, unemployed people, black, white, or other, can’t pay taxes. People that loose their homes can’t pay property taxes. The last time I checked that is how government is financed.
Lets get off the race issue and talk about what is really important, every person that can work having a job to go to.
It’s a sad day when any United States president is assassinated. No matter his/her color. We don’t need that sort of thing going on in this country. And this is from someone who is diametrically opposed to his political leanings. But for God’s sake don’t kill him!!!!!!