SPLC's Hallucinations

So the SPLC, officially the Southern Poverty Law Center, but colloquially the Stupid Preposterous Lie Center, has released a new study showing (surprise!) "explosive growth" of right wing terrorist groups - as they have in every report for years.  Bear in mind that this is the group that monitors only scary right wing groups but specifically refuses to look at left wing groups that commit actual terrorism (like ELF, EarthFirst!) - and openly admits it! 

The SPLC opens with:

The number of conspiracy-minded antigovernment “Patriot” groups on the American radical right reached an all-time high in 2012, the fourth consecutive year of powerful growth by a movement that is becoming increasingly militant as President Obama enters his second term and Congress debates gun control measures, according to a report issued today by the SPLC…

Thankfully, Professor Jacbson at Legal Insurrection brings the smart:

The SPLC count is grossly exaggerated.  If there’s a Neo-Nazi website which lists branches in every state, SPLC counts that as 50 groups, even if the groups are only names on a website.

The SPLC has upped the number of “hate groups” in my home State of Rhode Island to 4, including the same supposed neo-Nazi and Klan groups which we repeatedly have pointed out do not exist.

They do the same thing all the time.  They see political disagreement and combine it with behaviors they don't understand ("why would anyone think the dollar isn't solid?") and come up with a list of bogeymen to be afraid of - real or imagined but pretty much all imagined.  The media laps it up without question because - hey!- the center has poverty and law in the name, it must be good!

Meanwhile, they inspire leftists, like the shooter who went to kill at the Family Research Council and got his list of targets from the SPLC.