In case you missed it, the McClatchy high freshman who made local headlines last week for being questioned by the secret service for her anti-Bush MySpace group is now making headlines all over the world. I’d like to admit ashamedly that my post on The Sac Rag received slightly less than the 120,000 hits the Bee’s original article received.
The girl’s parents seem to be having a tough time of it:
“The negativity has been a bit tough,” said Julia’s mother, Kirstie Wilson.
Her husband said the public reaction reflects the country’s “venomous” political climate.
“It’s very disappointing and it’s a sign of the times,” Moose said. “The political discourse in the country is so vicious. There’s no serious debate.”
Again, this is a story about their daughter’s “Kill Bush” website and apparently homemade cartoon of Bush being wounded. But apparently voicing judgements about their parenting skills, which many of the 300 or so commenters on the Bee story have done, is venemous in relation!
But to her credit, the kid really seems to understand what’s going on–she doesn’t think her First Amendment rights were violated, she realizes she did something wrong, etc. Maybe this exposure will be a good thing. Most teenagers who harbor violent thoughts and draw cartoons about it only end up on the news after they do something horrible. I wonder what is different about this wealthy blonde young woman? Who knows how the media make these kinds of decisions.
Also I find it interesting that the 2 places this story is cited to have popped up in are China and Egypt, both societies that hold free speech and the opinions of women in about the same level of regard as Julia Wilson values the President’s hand. I wonder if in Egypt anyone glossing the details — “girl,” “speaking out,” “dagger,” “hand” – assumed that a girl’s hand was cut off for speaking out. Too venemous?
The Sac Rag 
CoolDMZ, I just false-started three different comments until I realized there’s really nothing to add to your commentary. It’s great!
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Obviously the parents and the girl share blame in this. She was wrong, whether it’s Bush, Clinton or any other President.
I’ll just pull a few choice comments from Free Republic, here: http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1718746/posts
She’s either mentally ill or retarded.
Put the entire family in chains. I hate liberals, especially those that threaten our President and promote defeat through surrender.
The next thing you know, Little julia will bring a “machine gun” to school and gun down those she considers republican students.
Charge her as an adult and put her little Commie a$$ in prison. She will be conservative when she gets out if you only give her 6 months. As a bonus she will lose her right to vote.
From:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1719446/posts
***** like this one are what gulags are made for.
Nope. You’re right. No venom there.
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The very reason you should email your congressman and ask them to support a ban on Myspace.
Keep out of Myspace
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Chinese and Egyptian newspapers perhaps just find the whole story funny, much like Australia, Europe and the rest of the world probably does.
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What I probably find most disturbing of the whole story is that, at least according to the Bee article, Julia quit MySpace months ago. Where did the secret service thing she went, to start a sect of 8th graders hell-bent on stabbing GW in the hand?
This was a case in point of the inordinately small penis size of homeland security.
Maybe they’ll read this comment and talk to me so I can get famous. I’m in it for the book deal.
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To clarify, “thing” was supposed to be “think.” Proofreading is not my forte.
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Not so fast… From the original Bee article
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Carl, your comment got marked as spam, sorry. Did I say there was no venom in the public response to this? I think that at least 50% of the venom in the political realm is caused by out of control Bush hatred, and it is funny to me when someone whose family contributed to that remarks on the venomous response they get.
Somehow those freeper comments didn’t make it into the Bee story…but thanks for having the time to go find them!
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