CATO study on which on political violence is not flawed it is intellectual dishonesty

[Thiel]

I have been hearing Democrats and their media mouthpieces quote this biased baloney study from the Cato institute.

They essentially started with the results and worked backwards. We are supposed to forget 9/11, the Waukesha Christmass massacres and the 2020/2021 violent George Floyd riots across the nation.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk has unleashed a predictable wave of left-wing gaslighting that would make any reasonable person's head spin. Within hours of this horrific crime, the same left-wing voices who spent years justifying and downplaying actual violence from their own side were rushing to condemn political violence and trying to flip the script by claiming that political violence is predominantly a right-wing phenomenon.

To perpetuate this narrative, they've weaponized a deeply flawed study to rewrite history and cast conservatives as the real villains in America's political violence problem. The go-to talking point making rounds among Democrats and their media allies centers on a study from the Cato Institute's Alex Nowrasteh, which purports to show that right-wing extremists commit the majority of politically motivated killings in America.

The left has parroted this convenient narrative everywhere to deflect attention from the fact that a radicalized leftist just murdered one of conservatism's most prominent young voices in broad daylight.

When I saw a graph from the study showing murders in politically motivated terrorist attacks (excluding 9/11), two things immediately jumped out at me.

The first is the big spike in 1995. While obviously because of the Oklahoma City bombing, the question I had was how Nowrasteh categorized it. As I suspected, he categorized Timothy McVeigh's ideology as "right-wing," but this classification is debatable. McVeigh was an anti-government extremist whose rage stemmed from anger over the 1993 Waco siege and the 1992 Ruby Ridge standoff, not from conservative ideology. McVeigh rejected both political parties, described himself as agnostic, supported abortion rights, and drew inspiration from militia and anarchist movements rather than conservatism.

The second red flag is even more damning. Notice how the data conveniently shows a dip in 2020, the same year America witnessed the most destructive riots in its history. The George Floyd riots not only caused billions in property damage nationwide, but at least nineteen known deaths. Yet somehow, none of these deaths made it into Nowrasteh's tally of political violence. How convenient.

Others have found problems with the study as well.

The Daily Caller's Amber Duke dug into Nowrasteh's methodology and exposed it as sloppy and biased. His list misclassifies several killers as "right-wing," often stretching the label to absurdity. Duke highlighted many of these flaws, but even she missed a few glaring examples. Take the 2022 Club Q shooting in Colorado Springs: Nowrasteh called it "right-wing" despite the shooter, Anderson Lee Aldrich, identifying as "non-binary" and suffering from severe mental illness. He killed five people. Likewise, Peyton Gendron, who murdered ten people in a Buffalo supermarket, was branded "right-wing" even though his manifesto explicitly described himself as an "eco-fascist national socialist." The same goes for Patrick Crusius, the 2019 El Paso Walmart shooter who killed 20 people. Nowrasteh slapped a "right-wing" label on him as well, even though his own writings revealed an eco-fascist worldview nearly identical to Gendron's.

Duke also discovered that Nowrasteh omitted genuine left-wing killers from his list entirely, including the Waukesha Christmas parade attacker who drove his truck through a crowd in 2021, killing six people.

One could easily see that a more thorough examination of the data would turn up more errors and omissions.

The broader pattern here reveals the left's desperate need to control the narrative around political violence. When their side commits horrific acts, they immediately pivot to studies, statistics, and academic papers designed to muddy the waters and shift blame elsewhere. Meanwhile, they conveniently ignore their own side's long history of excusing and encouraging violence.

The truth about political violence in America can't be hidden behind manipulated data and selective methodology. While the CATO study tries to paint conservatives as the primary threat, real Americans remember which side spent the summer of 2020 burning down neighborhoods and which side has been calling for more civility in political discourse. They remember which politicians refused to condemn the rioting and which media outlets described burning buildings as "mostly peaceful protests." Most importantly, they can see through the transparent attempt to use Charlie Kirk's assassination as an opportunity to smear the very movement he died defending.

The left's coordinated response to Kirk's murder reveals their true priorities: not preventing future violence or promoting genuine unity, but in covering up their culpability in political violence.

The left's rush to rewrite political violence after Charlie Kirk's assassination is classic gaslighting. They weaponize flawed studies to paint conservatives as the villains while ignoring their own side's riots and terror.

[Thiel]

Alex Nowrasteh is the Joe Scarborough of the CATO Institute. It is  incredibly poor research. This atrocious study is so dishonest the institute should retract it.

[Thiel]

The bold-faced lie that there is more political violence on the right is as false as Joe Biden saying that white supremacy is the greatest internal threat to America.

[Oliver the Second]

Nobody believes leftist propaganda anymore. People can see with their own two eyes what is really going on.

[Herman]

Nobody believes leftist propaganda anymore. People can see with their own two eyes what is really going on.

I thought the CATO institute was libertarian not prog propaganda.

[Herman]

The bold-faced lie that there is more political violence on the right is as false as Joe Biden saying that white supremacy is the greatest internal threat to America.

The attempted assassination of Trump is not left wing political violence but nazi low rider violence in prisons is? What in the hell is that bullshit.

[Shen Li]

Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib blamed "white supremacy" for the Jersey City shootings that killed a detective and three citizens at a Jewish supermarket. The shooters were reportedly part of a black nationalist, anti-police religious sect.

White supremacy is always at fault even when the perps are Black. White supremacists are automatically attributed to conservatives. Conservatives kill people they disagree with politically. That sums up that horseshit study.

[Shen Li]

Antifa releses death threat video against Andy Ngo after Charlie Kirk's assassination. Not counted as leftist political violence by that fake as fuck study.

[Lokmar]

Antifa releses death threat video against Andy Ngo after Charlie Kirk's assassination. Not counted as leftist political violence by that fake as fuck study.

Once again, I'll point out that we need American Civil War 2.0. About 30 million dead U.S. Citizens will be a good start.

[Shen Li]

Once again, I'll point out that we need American Civil War 2.0. About 30 million dead U.S. Citizens will be a good start.

Start with the white population of Portland. Nah, make it the entire West Coast including British Columbia.

[Lokmar]

Start with the white population of Portland. Nah, make it the entire West Coast including British Columbia.

If the russians nuke the ENTIRE left coast, we would benefit as a nation!!! Everything north of D.C too on the right coast!!!

[Shen Li]

If the russians nuke the ENTIRE left coast, we would benefit as a nation!!! Everything north of D.C too on the right coast!!!

If the Russians ever did launch a nuclear strike it would be as a last result because the US kept bullying them. That will never happen with Trump in the WH.

[Lokmar]

If the Russians ever did launch a nuclear strike it would be as a last result because the US kept bullying them. That will never happen with Trump in the WH.

IDK and IDGAF! Nuclear war doesnt worry me at all!. FACT!

[DKG]

The attempted assassination of Trump is not left wing political violence but nazi low rider violence in prisons is? What in the hell is that bullshit.

Democratic lawmakers and their supporters do not care that the CATO study is a joke.

[Brent]

In my city after junkie George died, we had a Canadian version of BLM protesting, damaging property and attacking anybody that disagree with them. The RCMP did not call it political viiolence, but the peaceful anti mandate protests against Trudeau were.

My point is that Canada is the same. Progs control the narrative.