Gone Berserk: What’s with Calling the Opposition ‘Terrorists’?

If it was some frothing-at-the-mouth liberal blogger calling Republicans “terrorists,” we could dismiss it as the mindless babblings of a hyperpartisan nitwit.
But incredibly, it is not. It is leading Democrats including the vice president of the United States who are referring to their fellow Americans who disagree with them as terrorists:

Vice President Joe Biden joined House Democrats in lashing tea party Republicans Monday, accusing them of having “acted like terrorists” in the fight over raising the nation’s debt limit, according to several sources in the room.
Biden was agreeing with a line of argument made by Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) at a two-hour, closed-door Democratic Caucus meeting.
“We have negotiated with terrorists,” an angry Doyle said, according to sources in the room. “This small group of terrorists have made it impossible to spend any money.”

It is New York Times columnists:

You know what they say: Never negotiate with terrorists. It only encourages them.
These last few months, much of the country has watched in horror as the Tea Party Republicans have waged jihad on the American people. Their intransigent demands for deep spending cuts, coupled with their almost gleeful willingness to destroy one of America’s most invaluable assets, its full faith and credit, were incredibly irresponsible. But they didn’t care. Their goal, they believed, was worth blowing up the country for, if that’s what it took.

It’s MSNBC host Chris Matthews, who not only referred to conservatives as “terrorists, but also as “wahhabis of American government.”
In fact, referencing terrorists, or Osama bin Laden, or al-Qaeda when describing conservatives who decided to put their foot down and demand a change in how Washington works — this done in order to save the country from a fate worse than default in a few years — has been the du jour pastime among Democrats of all levels. “Hostage takers” is another bric-a-brac tossed around when describing Republicans as well.
All of this name calling is supposed to remind the public that the tea party and those who agree with them are “extremists.”
But what is “extreme”? You can start by saying that running a $1.4 trillion deficit — recession or no recession — is “extreme.” You can also call it “obscene,” “nauseating,” “incomprehensible,” “irresponsible,” “imprudent,” and throw in a “nutzo” for good measure. And don’t get me started on what you should call running trillion dollar deficits for as far as the eye can see. My thesaurus would catch fire.
And the (at least) $66 trillion in unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare? I’m sure there are some excellent, guttural German swear words we can find to describe that situation.
The name callers never mention what precipitated this behavior by the “extremists,” never acknowledge the extraordinary danger such deficits — and the $14 trillion national debt — place the country in. Should we mention what Greece is looking like these days? Or Portugal?
It’s amazing. It’s like the actions of tea party conservatives exist in a vacuum so that we can ignore all the external stimuli that is responsible for their position while only acknowledging  the existence and the legitimacy of the hysterical criticism they are receiving.
It is an eye-popping turn in the debate over the deficit and one which Democrats will almost certainly regret one day.