Has a conservative politician in the US been assassinated within the last 50 years?

[raccoon]

I don't recall any. I know there were attempts to assassinate Reagan and Ford, which were both unsuccessful.

But seems like it's the progressive ones (JFK, RFK, MLK (progressive leader anyway) who are successfully assassinated. :tinfoilhat:

[dbackjon]

1. Don't forget Wellstone

[TheMightyFavog]

25. Wellstone was NOT assasinated!

Take off the tinfoil hat. It was an unfortunate and tragic accident.

[Occulus]

27. you left out the word 'convenient' n/t

[yardwork]

28. Do you know that for certain?

Nobody has proven that Wellstone was assassinated, but on the other hand, nobody has proven that he wasn't, either.

[NeedleCast]

36. How do you prove that someone was not assassinated?

[WinkyDink]

37. The point would be---he's not an official assassination victim. Thus, not on the list.

[Jackpine Radical]

2. George Wallace suffered permanent injury from an assassination attempt.

Of course, he WAS threatening to take some racist Southern votes away from Nixon.

[TwilightZone]

3. Pretty simple, actually. People fear change.

With the exception of military coups and the removing of despots, leaders tend to be killed because they represent a change in the status quo. Lincoln, JFK, RFK, MLK, and others certainly represented that.

[LeftishBrit]

4. George Wallace was very seriously injured by an assassin..

In the UK, the Conservative politician Airey Neave was killed by the IRA in the 1980s.

[EFerrari]

31. I think Wallace is as close as we get here although John Connally

was also injured in Dallas. At the time he was a Democrat but iirc, a conservative one and he eventually switched his reg to Republican.

[NoPasaran]

5. Here's one----Tommy Burks, murdered 1998

From Wikipedia:

Born in Cookeville, Tennessee, Burks was one of the most conservative Democrats in the state legislature. He opposed the teaching of evolution in school science classes (twice introducing legislation to restrict its teaching), legal abortion, gambling, and a state lottery. However, his views seemed to have been very popular and in line with a large number of voters within his rural district.

Burks was an energetic legislator who almost never missed a floor or committee session. It is reported that he would on some occasions arrive at a session having already gotten up on his farm, delivered a load of hogs to Knoxville (approximately 90 miles east of his home) and then driven to the State Capitol in Nashville (100 miles west of his home and 190 miles west of Knoxville). Despite the 100 mile distance, and unlike most legislators from parts of the state a considerable distance from Nashville, Burks made it a practice to go home to his district and his farm almost every night, even during legislative sessions.

Burks was murdered by his Republican Party opponent Byron Looper less than a month before his likely re-election. His widow, Charlotte, ran for his seat and won, becoming the first Tennessee State Senator to win as a write-in candidate and one of very few American politicians to win as a write-in candidate ever

[in_cog_ni_to]

7. That's a DEMOCRAT killed by a Repuke....as usual.

:(

[Elidor]

39. The man was to the right of Genghis Kahn

A DINO. And his widow is just as bad. But it did mark virtually the only time in history that the republicans urged everyone to write in a democrat. They distanced themselves from Low Tax just as fast as they could.

[RaleighNCDUer]

13. Not sure that counts.

Sure, he was conservative, but was he more conservative than his opponant? More conservative than his constituency? He was, after all, a Democrat.

[dbackjon]

43. Killed by Byron "Low Tax" Looper

Officially changed his name, officially a looney

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

6. John Tower?

H. John Heinz III?

[rucky]

10. Plane crash. n/t

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

11. And helicopter crash. Your point?

:shrug:

[rucky]

19. When you fly around in something known as a "doctor's coffin"

sometimes a cigar is just a smoke.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

47. Check the band on a cigar.

Oft times it's got some foil in it.

[slackmaster]

8. Considering the failed assassination attempts on Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford

And the non-fatal wounding of George Wallace, it seems the best explanation may be simply that conservatives are better shots.

:hide:

[unpossibles]

12. well, in my opinion, the attempt on Reagan was not made by a liberal

Hinkley originally wanted to go after Carter, and his father was a Bush supporter.

Not sure about the Ford one though, but I'd say the women who made the attempts on him were more crazy than politically motivated but I don't really know for sure.

[slackmaster]

17. So only a crazy person would try to kill a conservative

Is that what you're saying?

:sarcasm:

[unpossibles]

22. haha!

no, I mean that for the conservatives the use of assassination is a valid political tool, as evidenced by both history and current bloviators like Pat Robertson, Rush, etc., instead of the crime it is.

I considered the attempts on Ford to not be related, although honestly I don't know much about them.

[fascisthunter]

42. No.. He's Saying you Can't Blame a Liberal

conservatives are better shots maybe because they play with guns more because they feel the need to, which says a lot.

[JVS]

18. If you're going to do that, then you should strike RFK from the list because Sirhan Sirhan's...

motives cannot be drawn into a clear ideological line, ranging from anger over Palestine to just being batshit crazy.

[unpossibles]

21. well, I can't because personally I think he was a patsy

thus his motives are not the whole story at all.

[JVS]

29. Is this an extension of that old proverb?

I have friends, you have cronies
I am decisive, you are pushy
I am outspoken, you are a loudmouth
I am spontaneous, you are erratic
My politicians are assassinated, your politicians die in legitimate plane crashes
My politicians are shot by conspiracies, your politicians are shot at by lone lunatics

[unpossibles]

33. Not really.

I suspect "more" in some of both sides, such as the Reagan attempt and the Kennedys, in that I think more is involved than is admitted.

While not every assassination attempt is politically motivated, I think most are with the attempts on Ford one of the exceptions. I guess the problem lies in the definition of "politically motivated" verses just plain crazy, and sometimes the mix of both in a single person.

I fail to see why thinking there is a political motivation or a conspiracy behind the assassination of people trying to change things is considered "crazy" in our culture. People conspire to gain and/or retain power all the time, although usually not to the point of murder. In fact, questioning the role of the CIA in the Kennedy assassinations is considered crazier than believing in angels.

But whatever. Generally, I consider myself to be fairly skeptical, and I am not trying to start a fight or drag this into the dungeon. Happy new year.

[in_cog_ni_to]

45. Squeaky Fromme was/is just INSANE. Anyone who would hang with Manson

can't be all there. Supposedly, she wanted to talk to Ford about the plight of the Ca. Redwoods. She needed a gun for that?

[Nailzberg]

14. Reagan was part of the undead

Conventional bullets couldn't kill him.

[Buzz Clik]

48. Sweet Jesus! That is so funny in such an incredibly sick way.

One of those comments when you can't laugh out loud because you don't dare tell anyone what's so funny.

:evilgrin:

[in_cog_ni_to]

9. Also.... Mel Carnahan and Ron Brown...Democrats who died in plane crashes.

:(

[SoCalDem]

15. Boggs... n/t

[Blue_In_AK]

26. With Begich...

whose son Mark (Anchorage's mayor) will probably be running against Ted Stevens next year. Boggs' and Begich's bodies and plane have never been found.

[HeraldSquare212]

16. General in Texas just before JFK?

I forget the name, but he was a conservative icon of his time. There was an unsuccessful attempt on him (further supporting your point). I forget, was Oswald involved in that, also?

[TN al]

24. Edwin A. Walker

and yes, Oswald did that too.

[zbdent]

20. and don't forget that the anthrax was not sent to conservative politicians

[leftofthedial]

23. it is the ultra-conservative wack jobs who are in the assassination business

it is also the ultra-conservative wack jobs who send death threats by and large

[yardwork]

30. I think that this is generally true, yes.

[underpants]

32. Do McVeigh and Ted Bundy count?

No probably not they weren't "assassinated"

[WinkyDink]

38. Bundy wasn't a "political" murderer. His execution wasn't a "political" sentence.

[onenote]

34. each attempt is different

Yes, three successful assasinations that occurred in the past fifty years, JFK, RFK, and MLK involved progressive leaders. However, each case is different. MLK clearly was killed because of his position as a leader of the civil right movement by someone who held views antithetical to MLK's. However, whether or not one accepts the Warren Commission or not, there is little reason to think that Lee Harvey Oswald's involvement (whether or not he was in fact responsible for the fatal shot) was not motivated by conservative thinking -- he considered himself a marxist. Maybe he was a patsy for more sinsiter, conservative forces, but he himself wasn't acting out of animus to JFK's progressive positions. And RFK wasn't killed by a conservative either, whether or not Sirhan Sirhan was someone else's patsy.

Similarly, assassination attempts on the lives of conservative politicians - Wallace, Reagan, Ford, reflected a range of motivations from the basically nutty (Hinkely/Reagan), the revolutionary zeal(Fromme and Moore/Ford), and the desire for attention (Bremer/Wallace).

Also, people tend to overlook other attempts that didn't succeed and that largely were ignored by the media. For example, Francisco Martin Duran fired a couple of dozen shots at the white house in OCtober 1994, thinking that he was shooting at Bill Clinton. He didn't end up hitting anyone and was sentenced to 40 years in prison. Duran was basically nuts, rather than political (although he was opposed to the assault weapons ban).

ANd chimpy arguably was the target of an assasination attempt when a guy named Arutinian threw a grenade at a podium where chimpy and the Georgia Republic president were standing, but the grenade misfied. Arutinian was sentenced to life in prison

[Didereaux]

35. way back when 'liberals' were anarchists, yes they took a whack at one or two.

[htuttle]

40. Nowdays, the 'conservatives' are all Made Men...they can't be whacked without a sit-down first.

[fascisthunter]

41. not as many, thats for sure (nt)

[theboss]

44. There were attampts on Wallace, Nixon, Ford, and Reagan

No successful ones though as far as I know.

[book_worm]

46. So Wallace and Reagan, both of whom almost died, were decoys to make it look like

not only progressive leaders are assassinated? Yes, your tinfoil hat is on pretty tight.

[Buzz Clik]

49. When these things happen, I see them as an attack against the country, not a political ideology

This whole discussion is yucky.

[pitohui]

50. wallace was paralyzed and taken out of the running

however this may be evidence of your argument, since wallace would have taken votes away from nixon and if you believe a conspiracy was involved, the purpose was likely to avoid splitting the GOP vote

i have heard some people don't believe the lone nut theory re wallace but i don't know the details now if i ever did

i believe his attempted assasin has since been freed! also reagan's attempted assassin was found not guilty by reason of insanity and never went to prison and an obvious reason for removing reagan would be to get bush in office MANY years earlier than he could have gotten there on his own steam

believe you me, conservatives can and do kill their own, they may screw it up, but i believe they try, it's just good game strategy

[NewHampster]

51. Because they actually use their guns

But remember that Reagan almost went down.