"Pop" Poplawski, the high-def hucksters, and the downward cycle of violence
News blogs, sports blogs, entertainment blogs, and more from Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News.
"Pop" Poplawski, the high-def hucksters, and the downward cycle of violence
This is not good news.
Richard "Pop" Poplawski has fans now.
You probably remember Poplawski, or if you don't it won't take much to refresh your memory. He's the aimless, unemployed 22-year-old man, living in a red-brick working class neighborhood of Pittsburgh, who went off on the morning of April 4, 2009, the 41st anniversary of the shooting of Martin Luther King Jr. When he was done firing his extensive arsenal including an AK-47 style semi-automatic, he'd fatally gunned down three Pittsburgh police officers who came to his house, initially, over a domestic dispute with his mom. There was a brief stir -- perhaps too brief, in hindsight -- when a friend told TV reporters that Poplawski feared that with Barack Obama in the White House the government would confiscate his guns.
Last week, I got an email alert that a man from just a few miles down the Allegheny River from where Poplawski carried out his murderous rampage was going to jail for violating his probabtion by stockpiling 10 firearms and a cache of ammunition. Federal authorities contacted local police after they learned online that 32-year-old Hardy Lloyd was a big fan of Poplawski:
In April 2009, the FBI started investigating Lloyd's website because he posted a message praising Richard Poplawski....
The investigation turned up a blog entry in which Lloyd talked about his shotgun. During a search of Lloyd's home, agents found 10 firearms as well as white supremacist literature and Nazi propaganda booklets.
This is how hate talk is increasingly viral in America in 2010. At the bottom of the chain, a cop-killer like Richard Poplawski becomes a hero to a clearly deranged man like Hardy Lloyd. But who were Richard "Pop" Poplawski's heroes?
Glenn Beck...to begin with. Also a host of foul-mouthed shock jocks including non-political ones like Opie and Anthony, and also the community on the white-supremacist websites like Stormfront.org, which is basically the Facebook of neo-Nazism and has remained popular in a time of despair. The role of Big Media and hate talk or whacked-out conspiracy theories is particularly disturbing. While individuals like Poplawski are ultimately responsible for their warped action, what is the responsibility of media millionaires, "high-def hucksters" who now jack up their ratings not just by being provocative but by speaking of violence or irrational conspiracies -- especially when the evidence mounts every day that these ill-conceived words broadcast from coast-to-coast are motivating America's most unglued?
This January, I spent several days in Pittsburgh investigating the Poplawski case and seeking to learn more about what really motivated him to kill three police officers. The research was for a chapter in my book, The Backlash: Right-Wing Radicals, High-Def Hucksters and Paranoid Politics in the Age of Obama, which comes out at the end of the month. I learned quite a bit -- including a couple of new details about the shooting and Poplawski's past that will be revealed when the book is published. But the main thing was that Poplawski's fears about the "Obama gun confiscation" was the proverbial tip of the iceberg when it came to his increasingly paranoid ideas that he seemed to glean largely from talk radio and from Beck.
"Rich, like myself, loved Glenn Beck," Poplawski's best friend Eddie Perkovic told me during a long interview in his narrow rowhouse on the steep hill running down to the Allegheny. (Perkovic had a lot of time -- he was wearing an ankle bracelet for house arrest because of an unrelated case.) Perkovic and his mom -- who also had a close relationship with the accused cop-killer, still awaiting trial -- told me that for months Poplawski had been obsessed with an idea -- frequently discussed by Beck, including in ads for his sponsor Food Insurance -- of the need to stockpile food and even toilet paper for a societal breakdown. Poplawski was also convinced that paper money would become worthless -- another claim given credence by the Fox News Channel host, particularly in close connection with his frequent shilling for the now-under-investigation gold-coin peddler Goldline International.
And there was another idea that not only worried Poplawski but which Perkovic and his mom still swore by in January 2010 -- despite widespread debunkings in the mainstream media -- that the government had established a gulag of what Perkovic called "Guantanamo camps" here in the United States, for the purpose of arresting and detaining law-abiding Americans. This was the idea that Beck famously declared on FNC on March 3, 2009, or one month and one day before the shootings, that "I can't debunk." Poplawski downloaded to the Web a video of Beck glibly discussing the possibility of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, abusing its powers with a U.S. Congressman, Ron Paul of Texas. Poplawski's mother later said in a swown statement that her son "liked police when they were not curtailing his constitutional rights." By then, Officers Eric Guy Kelly, Stephen Mayhle and Paul Sciullo II were already dead.
If would be easy to blow off the Poplawski case -- horrible as it is -- if it just a one-time thing. The evidence is mounting that this is far from the case, sadly. In recent days, we've learned about the incident involving an ex-convict named Byron Williams who loaded up a truck with weapons and -- saying he was on his way to an obscure outfit called The Tides Organization to launch a revolution -- wounded two officers near Oakland, Calif., before he was arrested. Research showed that no other media figure had discussed the Tides Foundation...except for Glenn Beck.
In fact, the notion that America is on the brink of a violent right-wing uprising is becoming such common currency that some outbreaks don't even leap to the national news, even when murder is involved. I would not even have learned of this alarming story had a friend not emailed it to me last week:
A Pennsylvania prison guard charged with murdering a man at a shooting range and stealing his semi-automatic rifle told police that he was stockpiling guns as part of a plan to overthrow the federal government, according to a police affidavit reviewed by Salon...
"Peake said he has been stealing guns for the purpose of aiding an organization that Peake refused to name. Peake said the organization is collecting guns for the purpose of overthrowing the federal government. Peake said he and Tuso together are members of this organization. Peake [said] that he would kill to defend his country and he was stealing weapons to defend his country."
When these stories begin to become routine, this nation is in big, big trouble. Not long ago, Bill Clinton gave a moving speech to mark the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, in which he spoke the connection between increasingly conspiratorial and angry talk on the radio and even TV networks like Fox and the incitement to violence. He said their words "fall on the connected and the unhinged alike."
The unhinged will always be with us. But highly paid media stars -- and their allies in Congress and elsewhere -- with followings in the millions floating bizarre theories and obsessing on violent remedies, are a new and most alarming phenominon.
These high-def hucksters can tone down this madness, starting right now. So why don't they?
Comment removed.
Will would have no financial purpose whatsoever trying to freak everyone out about Beck, would he? Not, say, a book that's just been released or anything. Right. Huckster.
Will, you seem to forget: This kind of right-wing extremism doesn't exist. And, of course, there is no relationship between the hyperventilating of media figures like Beck and the lunatics that listen to Beck. Just put your head in the sand, Will, and it all goes away.— Talking point sleuth- ===}}} Will would have no financial purpose whatsoever trying to freak everyone out about Beck {{{=== "Mommy, mommy, it's so unfaaaaaaaaiirrr. Sure, mommy, Glenn Beck is a lunatic extremist and violent lunatic extremists follow Becks's extremist rhetoric very closely. Sure, Beck makes money from selling extremist rhetoric. Sure, Beck shows tapes of Black Panthers and little kids in military uniforms and calls them "Obama's thugs." And of course, I never listen to Beck and no one should interpret any meaning behind the fact that I'm always defending Beck. But Will's selling a book, mommy, Will's selling a book. He's so unfair for talking about Beck. It's sooooooo unfaiirrrrrr, mommy."— Talking point sleuth
- Well at least Will's moved off the conspiracy theory that Bush was gonna invade Iran and call off the 2008 elections. I'm surprised you didn't include the "murder" of that census worker as a part of this "violent right-wing uprising" that is all too common.— RG
Will: I wonder how accusing Glenn Beck, and the right in general, of stockpiling weapons in preparation for some kind of armed revolution against this country contributes to toning down the madness? You accuse the right of harboring kooky conspiracy theories, but your entire post is one big kooky conspiracy theory. I guess this is where it ends up when you just can't stand the notion that someone disagrees with your politics. I hope this post, and your book is just a desperate attempt to get Glenn Beck to notice you, and give you a mention on his highly rated program.— jmc- You have be kidding me, Will. How does Glenn Beck's name get into this story?? Would it be too much ask for a political writer to do a story about how this country is going nowhere? With a Democratic president, house, and senate?— bobbyd24
- And next to the cutesy alliteration, is there any reason to call the hucksters "high-def"?— RG
- "While individuals like Poplawski are ultimately responsible for their warped action" I can just imagine Bunch sitting at his computer trying to type that line in. His fingers cramping up in protest as if to say "how dare you try and hold someone responsible for their actions". The effort to put that single line down must have been enormous since it went against every other thing he wrote in the article.— barlowjames
- I bet he also listned to Marilyn Manson and Ozzy. This kook was a ticking time bomb for years. Blaming Beck is easy and suits your purpose of exposing him as a "huckster". Do you blame the neighbors dog for the son of sam killings? Beck is an entertainer who knows his audience and plays to their fears for his gain.— egmetzjr
- TPS, you seem to love responding to my posts. I'm in your head, weasel, admit it.
- So let's see if I get the Will/TPS logic: poor people are smart enough to be responsible for their actions if those actions are, say, right-wing inspired lunacy. But they are not responsible for their actions when it comes to filling out a voter registraton form, or applying for a mortgage. Interesting.
- GT, you're on a wild goose chase if you're attempting to find their logic.— RG
- I can't believe the wingnut crazies are defending cop killers now. Way to go, American patriots!— yoda
- Comment removed.
- Andrew Sullivan
- Blinq
- Blogorrhea
- Blonde Sagacity
- Free Republic
- Instapundit
- James Taranto
- ScrappleFace
- The Corner
- Buzzmachine
- Eat the Press
- Editor and Publisher
- Media (Huffington Post)
- Media Bloodhound
- Mickey Kaus
- Pressthink
- Romenesko
- The Inksniffer
- A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago
- Above Average Jane
- BlankBaby
- Citizen Mom
- Keystone Blog
- Metroblogging Philadelphia
- Phawker
- Philadelphia - America's Hometown
- Philadelphia Will Do
- Philebrity
- Philly Future
- Phillyblog
- Phillyist
- The Clog
- The Next Mayor
- Welcome to Phillyville
- Young Philly Politics
- Afro-Netizen
- All-Spin Zone
- Atrios
- Bad Attitudes
- Billmon
- Booman Tribune
- CorrenteWire
- Fables of the Reconstruction
- iFlipFlop
- Kiko's House
- MyDD
- Philly (Dragonballyee)
- Rowhouse Logic
- Slacktivist
- Suburban Guerilla
- Tattered Coat
- upyernoz
- AmericaBlog
- Andy Borowitz
- BuzzFlash
- Crooks and Liars
- Cursor
- Daily Kos
- David Sirota
- Drudge Report
- Echidne of the Snakes
- Fire Dog Lake
- Glenn Greenwald
- Hullabaloo
- Jesus' General
- Jon Swift
- Josh Marshall
- Juan Cole
- Kevin Drum
- Mad Kane
- Majikthise
- Matthew Yglesias
- Oliver Willis
- Raw Story
- Swing State Project
- Talk Left
- Taylor Marsh
- TBogg
- The Carpetbagger Report
- Think Progress
- War and Piece
- Wonkette
- A Citizen's Blog
- Balls, Sticks and Stuff
- Beer Leaguer
- Dick Polman
- Phillies Nation
- Philling Station
- Shallow Center
- The 700 Level
- The Good Phight
