On Saturday, a mentally unstable 22-year old man opened fire in a shopping center in Tucson, Arizona, seriously injuring a congresswoman, murdering six and wounding eleven more.
According to the New York Times, “Bloodshed Puts New Focus on Vitriol in Politics.” The Washington Post’s coverage could have run under the same headline: “The mass shooting Saturday morning that gravely wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D‑Ariz.) and killed a federal judge raised serious concerns that the nation’s heated political discourse had taken a dangerous turn.”
No mention of the person who actually pulled the trigger. Instead, insinuations that those who have strongly expressed their political opinions are the real culprits.
“The rhetoric has devolved and descended past the ugly, and past the threatening, and past the fantastic, and into the imminently murderous,” argued MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. Olbermann’s guest, Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, while admitting he didn’t know the shooter’s motivation, suggested the violence was the “inevitable” result of “violent political rhetoric” and “incitement.”
The Huffington Post trotted out Arizona Democratic Congressman Raul Grijalva to relay the day’s message against “vitriolic rhetoric” from “extreme elements of the Tea Party.” Grijalva attacked Sarah Palin, arguing, “if she wants to help the public discourse, the best thing she could do is to keep quiet.”
Let us mourn the deceased, support the injured, prosecute the guilty. Yes. But it is indecent to twist an act of violence into an excuse to smear opponents and silence robust political debate.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
16 replies on “Killer Apprehended, Vitriol’s to Blame”
This really irritates me that some people will use a trajedy to push their political or idealogical agenda. I love to watch “Medium” shown on NBC where there are all kinds of strange/violent killings. Why not blame it on NBC if you are looking for a villian? But then you would be blaming a left leaning media outlet and that wouldn’t suit their purpose. It seems like this is straight out of the left’s playbook. Any kind of political discourse other than theirs seems to bother them.
Unfortunately, the left does not believe in “robust political debate” if you disagree with them. If this crazed young killer had been a tea partier, we probably would be far closer to martial law right now. Instead, they can only attack verbally with more lies. Yes, my opinion of the legacy media and current crop of political employees is at a very low ebb. I don’t expect an uptick in the too near future! But, I’m hopeful!
Too little is said about the victims of this monster and my heart is breaking for the family of that little 9 year old girl.
It appears the Mad Hatter has arrived at the Tea Party/
It is the “Chicago Way” to take advantage of any crisis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slmQDzMpBM0&feature=related
(A must see video)
Arizona is a right to work State.
Pima County,AZ is run by the SEIU/1199 Union.
This Union has sued the State of AZ… Sheriff Dupnik, announced last year he would NOT uphold the law SB 1070 to arrest illegal aliens.
AND Congress-critter Grijalava supports a financial boycott against the entire State of Arizona.
These are the crazies, who must be stopped!
When the rights of majority are circumvented to appease some special interest groups by the DOJ- Department of Justice as was the case involving Eric Holder and the voters intimidation, it is surely a path to the destruction of individual rights and the demise of a nation.
We need to get the laws that seals away the records of the mentally unstable folks from law enforcement.
I could have just checked out of the local mental health clinic and check the NO box re mental health and buy any thing and no one can check into my mental status due to this stupid law. So instead of fixing the law they will add more oppressive laws against the lawful gun owner
Seems like just a week ago I was reading all about how the left was calling for violent revolution, and figured that this would inflame the nut-jobs.
Now a week later, this nut job startes shooting and severely injured a democratic congresswoman.
Pretty predictable.
What is surprising is that now so many left wing pundits are decrying the violence.
Guess that when they called for violent revolution…
they didn’t mean against themselves.
Is is still supposed to be a secret that the shooter was an avid follower and advocate of socialism and communism?
Just remember Sarah Palin and her gun sights.
This Washington Examiner column makes some very important points about free and open debate reducing the potential for violence:
http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/opinion-zone/2011/01/shootings-obscure-americas-depressingly-bland-and-timid-political-culture
The knee jerk reaction of some people in the wake of these events seems to me to be one more example of the belief that, whatever it is, “It’s not his fault.”
The gun did it.
The rhetoric did it.
Conservative talk shows did it.
Anything but he did it.
We must be careful when dealing with this situation that we do not try to prevent all such incidents from ever occuring again, which seems to be a recurring theme in some circles. We should each ask ourselves whether we want to live in a society where the propensity to commit an action is considered as serious as committing the action.
Do we really want to hospitalize or incarcerate people who are predisposed to violence?
The insane Projection projectile spewing from the lockstepping Goebbelsesqe parade of propagandist, polemicist, pamphleteer drive-by enemy-dia, clearly demonstrates that Tuscon’s “Democratic” (National Socialist Workers’ and Gangsters’ and Criminal Aliens’) potty sheriff and its most recent mass mass murderer are not our beloved fraternal republic’s only crazies.
[…] Killer Apprehended, Vitriol’s to Blame […]
[…] of the horrible shooting spree in Tucson, Arizona, a week ago, not everyone jumped on the “vitriol” […]
Good point. I hadn’t toghuht about it quite that way. 🙂