Here’s my take on the Arizona shooting:
The shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, doesn’t appear to have any discernable political leaning at this point. He looks like a very disturbed, very confused, and quite probably seriously mentally ill young man. From his Youtube page and other clips of his online presence, he appears to have strong anti-government sentiment, but also strong anti-social tendencies. He wants to create a new religion, a new grammar, and a new currency. This is hardly conservative – most conservatives aren’t known for their desire to start a new religion, for instance. His gold currency stuff might look pretty Ron Paulish but it might just be another piece of his lunacy with no real coherent ties to any one political philosophy. We don’t know, because the shooting was yesterday and there is very little in the way of information. It’s not saying “both sides do it” to point out that the shooter doesn’t seem to belong to either side. Those of you who think the dots all line up are assuming a great deal more than is prudent. Rushing to judgment won’t rush us to justice.
I don’t like the implicit violence in Sarah Palin’s target map. I don’t like 99% of the rhetoric I hear coming from right-wing talk radio or Fox News. I don’t like any of this. As I mentioned in the comments, I don’t even like guns and would rid the world of them entirely if I could wave my magic wand.
But I can’t come to this tragedy and immediately start throwing my fists around blaming everyone I don’t like for it before I know the truth, or whatever shreds of truth we might come to know. My speculation is that Loughner was acting alone and from an amalgam of political positions – he doesn’t strike me as at all conservative, though it’s quite possible he listened to fringy conservative opinion-making. It’s quite possible that right-wing radio made him more crazy or act out his craziness. But we don’t know. If somebody can actually show that he was influenced by any of these pundits or Sarah Palin or whoever, then I’d gladly eat my words. As it stands, I would just rather not politicize this tragedy any more than it already is.
If it ends up leading to less vitriolic and violent rhetoric in the media and from politicians, great – even if the two have no connection at all, we can always hope for more sanity. But I don’t like seeing people immediately use this tragedy to exploit their political opponents either, especially before the fog has lifted and the facts have come to light.
mellowjohn
and yet the false equivalencies keep coming.
JPL
The very act of targeting a politician, politicizes the fact. You are correct that the shooter appears to be deranged but the point stands that the political discourse in this country has become extreme.
Barb (formerly Gex)
Let’s compare and contrast the violence against government officials during the Clinton, Bush, and Obama years. What do you see?
E.D. Kain
@JPL: No doubt. And it should be condemned on its own merits. Implicit violence in political ads or in talk radio is reprehensible.
maye
The tragedy of a lunatic with a gun can happen anywhere at anytime under any circumstances.
However, public figures who use violent speech, violent imagery, and violent ideas to disseminate their messages to wide audiences bear responsibility for their actions. They are part of the problem.
Omnes Omnibus
Would you prefer high minded “pox on both their houses” attitude? You are unlikely to find it here since most people here, FPers and commenters alike, have been politically aware for the past few years and know which side has been amping up the rhetoric, which side’s supporters have been showing up armed at political meetings, which side’s supporters have worked hard to shut down debate on any issues, and which side has questioned the legitimacy of the other sides elected leaders. And, brother, it ain’t the Left.
Edited, copied, and pasted from an earlier thread.
E.D. Kain
@Barb (formerly Gex): We can have that conversation but it will still not shed any light on Loughner.
BrklynLibrul
The local authorities are searching for a middle-aged white male accomplice. That you should assume this young man was acting alone is also a rush to judgment. You’re guilty of the very thing you’re protesting here.
Hugh
I suspect he is schizophrenic, an illness that emerges in mid to late adolescence. His comments are quite delusional. Who is the guy who may have brought him to this event? That’s something to watch.
Maude
He shot point blank a Democratic politician.
The fact that is has been acceptable for broadcast media to employ people use violent language is the problem. It has created a toxic atmosphere.
ckelly
How can you NOT politicize a tragedy that targeted a political figure? This was an assassination attempt – of course Loughner’s crazy – most assassins are. As for Palin, I won’t hesitate to say her hateful rhetoric makes her no better than a terrorist. Spewing hate speech, riling up some deranged minion and off we go.
arguingwithsignposts
Thank you for posting this, EDK. I’m sure you’ll catch a lot of shit (some of it deserved), but I’m giving you props for posting.
Carol
E.D. Kain, you don’t get it, because since when has a major member on the right been murdered? But it’s from the right we get neo-confederate and degrading dialogue.
Would you give a pass to Bin Laden? He didn’t kill anyone either, but simply taught others that it was right to do so in the name of his cause. How do you explain Rwanda? or for that matter, Manson? Words can kill if they create an atmosphere where a disturbed person can find sanction for doing so. No, you won’t find a strict ideologue. Strict ideology requires a certain amount of mental coherence. But where did he get the idea that Gabrielle Giffords was an enemy he had to kill? Did he get encouragement in his delusion from some people who should know better? Unfortunately with the toxic rhetoric these days, he could have simply absorbed all of this in an obsessive listening of talk radio all day, Mentally disturbed people do that a lot, especially lonely ones, and since there is no one that can talk to them and no help often for them either, they listen to voices outside that agitate the voices inside. And people die.
nancydarling
Yes, there are lunatic fringes on both sides of the political aisle. The difference is that the left lunatic fringe is not running the democratic party. What media figure do democrats kowtow to like Republican politicians do to Limbaugh, etal? Who is the democratic equivalent of Palin and Bachman, not to mention O”Donnell and Angle and others of their ilk? Name them, Kain.
E.D. Kain
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m not sure how the Houses themselves fit into this story yet, certainly not well enough to issue poxes on either. That being said, I’m a long-time critic of the rhetoric coming from the right so I’m not sure I qualify for your comment.
cleek
well said, Mr Kain.
@JPL:
it’s been extreme for a long time. sadly.
dmsilev
@E.D. Kain: Of course it will. People react to their environment, and this is an environment in which vitriolic attacks on government officials are common. If you’re a crazy person about to snap, that will very possibly influence the way in which you snap.
dms
Ija
Hey look, our ombudsman is back to show us the error of our ways. DougJ, AnneLaurie, ABL mistermix etc, take note. You have been schooled by the master. Let’s all bow before his majesty.
David Fud
@E.D. Kain: And yet, that reprehensibleness is never called out by any major figure. It just keeps piling up, leading the deranged to acts of violence. It is never toned down.
How is it possible to condemn the continuing stream of implicit violence without becoming political when it all comes from one side of the political spectrum?
Do Democrats just have to keep tolerating this rhetoric without calling a spade a spade? The Republicans never learn. They will never stop it unless the violence is aimed at them.
Weird how that works, huh?
Starfish
Man, I would read what you write and then read all the screw you E.D. Kain comments and wonder WTF. But today is one of those days when I am on the side of those commenters.
The truth is that the party of “conservatives” is not conservative anymore. You wouldn’t have had things like Citizens United or the stupid Medicare Prescription drug plan coming out of actual conservatives. And yes, I know that one case is about “conservative” judges and another is about “conservative” legislators.
E.D. Kain
@arguingwithsignposts: Thanks and sorry for my intemperate comment earlier.
Bill E Pilgrim
Well, you start okay and then go right off the rails.
So from this, it’s clear that you think it’s quite possible that right-wing radio, with its both veiled and open calls for violence, made him act it out. Yet knowing that hate radio like that is vile enough to incite an insane person to do this sort of thing, you can’t quite bring yourself to condemn it?
All people inciting violence should be condemned. Shamed, ostracized, denounced, by the President and on down the line. You can actually just leave politics out of it, which is a win-win for us, because virtually all of the inciting violence is on the right these days, so that’s who it will apply to.
We don’t become inspired to call for stronger denunciations of these hate mongers when things like this happen only because we can prove, without a doubt, a direct cause and effect between one speaker and one act. The climate has been created, and it bears fruit.
If you can’t denounce them now — it’s astonishing.
And by the way: “I don’t like them” is not what I’m referring to with the word denounce.
pickledjazz
When would some of these bloggers/pundits/anchors stop defending and admit to the shit that is passing for political discourse in the country.??? When,pray tell? Just state the obvious,yes, it is hostile, inciendiary and vitriolic. Yes, it is… and it mostly comes from the GOP and its subsects and they all have a mean/racist look about them. I can switch on the tv and, whether it be man or woman, know it is ‘them’.
I don’t hear Democrats saying the offensive things and they always look freeer.
mistermix
I agree with E.D.’s overall take.
I think it’s worth bringing the Palin stuff back into the spotlight, and questioning her aggressively about it, in hopes that the kinds of gun imagery and hateful rhetoric she uses becomes unacceptable to the general populace and therefore politically unproductive. But trying to tie it directly to a nutcase is pointless.
Alex S.
Reposting what I said in the other thread:
It wasn’t just a random shooting. Giffords was shot with a single bullet into the head. And we do have the words of the sheriff who partly blamed incendiary rhetoric. And you acknowledge that the right is more responsible for that than the left. And I’d argue that the right has institutionalized this kind of language whereas the left has not.
E.D. Kain
@Ija: What an original comment! Kudos.
Malraux
Well the police seem to disagree.
c u n d gulag
I agree that it’s too early to really tell.
However, that doesn’t change the reality, and that is that there is a ton of eliminationist rhetoric coming from the right on TV, radio, print, and political campaigns, and that the MSM has to scrape up some comments by morons like me from liberal websites to find their oh-so-precious equivalency.
One side is screaming, shouting and shrieking, and the MSM having to find someone whispering in comments should prove to the dimmest media bulb that this IS NOT EQUAL!
Now, start covering that. Yes, both sides have issues, but one side is preaching violence and end times, the other IS NOT!
Now, fuckall, can you assholes stop trying to find bipartisanship and balance in everything and cover what is really going on?
ckelly
Frankly, I’m stunned with the passive, meek, door-mat response of this blog and others. What exactly does it take to get the Left angry? Apparently the point blank shooting in the head of a Dem targeted with crosshairs on Palin’s “hit list” isn’t enough to do it. No wonder we lose.
scottinnj
Note that the shooter shot the congresswoman representing his district. Whether it is relevant that she was a Democrat is something we don’t know yet. Would he have taken the same action if his district was represented by a Republican? We don’t know (and may never know). “We covet what we see every day”
Phil P.
ED, most of the bile spewed from Fox, Limbaugh, etc. isn’t conservative, it’s right-wing/Republican Party agitprop. I agree that these are (unfortunately) entirely different things, but it somehow that distinction doesn’t seem particularly important when it is consistently these right-wing/Republican outlets that are fomenting the violence.
Hell, we’d be in a much better state if what we were actually dealing with in our country was truly a liberal-conservative ideological divide, but it’s not.
E.D. Kain
@mistermix: Bringing down Palin would be a nice side-effect though…
ploeg
@Carol: Some lunatic put a cap in George Wallace’s spinal column back in the day. The point still holds that incitement is bad.
var
While I agree with your take in general – that this guy appears to be at least paranoid and delusional – one cannot say that him being paranoid and delusional completely absolves the right wing’s excessive rhetoric.
Loughner could have chosen any number of things to be paranoid against – his parents, his teachers, multinational corporations, etc. – but he seized on the government. Likely he has been bombarded over the course of the last 20 years of his life with anti-government rhetoric from the right. Now, his beliefs may not have coincided with what Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity believe, but a grain of thought was placed in his mind that grew the horrible pearl of violence we saw yesterday.
While it is fair to say that this person could have killed someone else at a different place had a different grain of thought grown in his mind, it is also the case that any advocacy of violence and anti-government language spreads these grains. And the violent rhetoric and the anti-government conspiracy language has come fairly exclusively from the right.
E.D. Kain
@Phil P.: Very true. Contemporary right-wingery is not at all conservative the way I like to think of it.
NobodySpecial
I wonder if Laughner ever attended Jesse Kelly’s gun bit to ‘help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office’.
Omnes Omnibus
@E.D. Kain: Whether or not Loughner ends up being a Teabagger, it is not unreasonable for people to use the occasion of the attempted assassination of a left of center politician to decry violent rhetoric aimed at left of center politicians. It is not quite a res ipsa loquitur situation, but, damn, it’s close.
Privatize the Profits! Socialize the Costs!
It’s quite possible that right-wing radio made him more crazy or act out his craziness. But we don’t know.
Yup, that’s right. As Thomas Paine once said, “Extraordinary claims deserve extraordinary proof.”
So yes, we all need to wait and see what the real facts are.
Do I have suspicions? Damn straight.
It is uncontestable fact that that lunatic that started shooting people at the Knoxville Unitarian Church last year was a wacko who had been filled with bullshit from rightwing radio.
And it is uncontestable fact that many, many prominent rightwingers have encouraged people to buy weapons and get ready to use them, and portrayed Democrats/liberals as being excellent potential targets for shooting.
So I think it’s quite reasonable to have suspicions…
But what’s the rush to judgement? I’ve been wrong before, and there’s every possibility that I may be wrong again…
MK
The inability of most Americans to keep two thoughts in their brains at the same time is stunning to me. Yes, this young man can be insane AND the right-wing’s rhetoric can be contributing to increased threat and violence. Both can hold court at the same time. I am not big on causal theories. I can however understand correlations. This was a ‘political’ mass assassination because its target was a member of Congress (a representative of the people). We can say that without parsing the term. So no, I don’t think that this young man necessarily targeted Rep. Giffords about health care but it is clear from his youtube and Myspace clip that he was anti-government. Therefore this act was ‘political’ in nature. It does not have to be partisan but it most certainly is political.
This brings me to the second thought that we should be able to hold at the same time. Elected officials and media people who incite people are of course partly responsible for the political climate that we are living in right now. They encourage people to be anti-government. As such, even a crazy person like this young man, can feel validated in having little to no respect for elected officials. He can dehumanize his congressperson because she is just seen as a representative of the ‘evil’ government. She ceases to be a person. THAT is how Sarah Palin’s “reload” and “crosshairs” is correlated to the actions of a madman in Arizona. It is ‘both and’ rather than ‘either or.’
NorthernMNer
I have two observations/responses so far:
1) To try and withhold any responsibility from the Palin/Beck crowd, even if the shooter was just plain loco, isn’t appropriate either. Major media figures have a serious responsibility to avoid using language and imagery that invokes violence.
2) Even after this and Virginia Tech, we still have no reliable mechanism to prevent the mentally unsound from getting deadly weapons. WTF.
Gen
Having spent the past week listening to a coworker rant about how Christians are the most persecuted people in the world, I know exactly how the right would be responding if this had been a Republican. But the party of the govt official that was shot isn’t the point. It’s that *any* govt official (and the people around her) was targeted.
Whether this particular individual’s action can be traced back to a single trigger doesn’t change the fact that right wing leaders have been inciting people to violence. If this continues, more crazy people will listen to the loudest voices. Like drawn to like, they’ll listen to the voices calling them to kill democrats, govt officials, social workers etc. And more of those people will die.
cleek
@Carol:
it’s not for lack of trying… Reagan was shot, there was an attempt on Nixon, two attempts on Ford, and two attempts (by Americans) on W.
E.D. Kain
@scottinnj:
Exactly right. And it may indeed turn out that Loughner was a Beck devotee, Tea-Partying psychopath. Or maybe not. Hopefully we find out.
John Cole
What the hell is wrong with some of you? There is absolutely nothing offensive or inaccurate in this E.D. Kain post. We don’t know all the facts, we don’t know what motivated him, and we don’t know if he acted alone. We know nothing at the moment. Kain’s post has no mealy-mouthed false equivalences, just basic truths.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@E.D. Kain: And this is where I think the problems are. I think we are dealing with complex systems, like climate, where there are a lot of inputs and the outcomes are uncertain. I definitely feel like right wing rhetoric is related to the spikes in violence during Democratic administrations. That we can’t show how specifically it may have affected this person doesn’t mean that that isn’t the environment in which he chose to perform his act.
I wonder if you would be willing to consider any of these people to be motivated by right wing rhetoric:
http://www.csgv.org/issues-and-campaigns/guns-democracy-and-freedom/insurrection-timeline
Villago Delenda Est
The guy did not go after a Republican. He didn’t try to kill McCain or Kyl.
Tells you all you need to know about this.
Jason
I for the life of me do not understand the thinking here. It is as if some shallow exegesis of a bunch of YouTube videos outweighs even the facts on the ground. Even if the “Target Ad” did not exist, this man went to a political rally and killed people engaged in a political act (I’m not the first in this thread to point this out). That doesn’t even seem random! It’s not like there’s a legitimate question of what actually happened!
The phrase “I don’t like seeing people immediately use this tragedy to exploit their political opponents” as a response makes no sense, because absolutely nobody is calling to tone down political rhetoric as an exploitative act – and that is in fact the exact thing we are criticizing.
At first I thought the equivalence crowd just – as usual – preferred their democrats to be quiescent. All that “no shrillness!” stuff. Now I’m beginning to think they want us to see this man – not SarahPAC, not politicians, but the shooter himself – as factually innocent. I mean, why not? He hasn’t been proven guilty yet. Maybe he didn’t actually shoot anybody, and we’re all totally wrong!
JCT
There is ample evidence that this vitriolic, violence-tinged rhetoric is largely from the far right. Really, “time to take people out” in a campaign poster advertising an opportunity to shoot an M-16? Web graphics with crosshairs? Second-amendment “remedies”?
The difference now is that the Republican leadership has abdicated it’s responsibility to call out this sort of corrosive discourse in their never-ending search for votes. Classic example was Boehner saying that while he believes Obama was born in the US it is not his responsibility to “tell others what to think”.
Whether or not all of this talk “directly” led this guy to plan to murder a member of congress is ridiculous and will never be proven. It was a political attack by definition and if we stand by and play the hand-wringing game this will never, ever get better.
This is an opportunity for our leadership to take a principled stand. I won’t hold my breath.
cleek
@John Cole:
you’re pissin into the wind.
mistermix
@E.D. Kain: I really think that Palin’s career is all over but the shouting.
E.D. Kain
@John Cole: And as I said, if more comes to light showing that this was caused by right-wing violence fomented by right-wing pundits, I will be the first to condemn it. I condemn that stuff anyways, I just don’t know if it applies to this incident. Anyone looking at Loughner – what little we know of him – can see he doesn’t fit nicely into any political box.
And my first reaction on hearing this? Uh-oh, some crazy winger/tea partier just shot Giffords. I was surprised to see who did it, and just how hard to categorize Loughner is.
Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)
Law enforcement is still not sure whether he acted alone. We’ll know more soon, but I have a very bad feeling about this.
cleek
@mistermix:
well, her reality TV career is over. thankfully.
E.D. Kain
@mistermix: I certainly hope so. Then again, she never really scared me. The voting public is dumb but good grief, not that dumb.
Uloborus
What little I’ve seen so far of the man’s writing makes him seem like a schizophrenic – not because of his beliefs, but because of the implicit cognitive problems of how jumbled they are. They’re not just contradictory or weird, individual ideas are not coherent. I am not inclined to label him a conservative.
However, I put to you, Kain: He does not have to be a conservative to be a direct product of the right wing movement’s incitements to violence. A bullseye was very close to literally painted on Giffords. He is surrounded by political language suggesting the need to shoot politicians, and some of it matches his particular brand of insanity. Schizophrenics are sensitive to these things, and it shapes the way they act on their madness. It is possible, even likely, that whatever his political beliefs he is directly influenced by Palin’s campaign. But even if he isn’t, I think it is reasonable to view him as a product of the atmosphere of incitement to violence the right wing has produced. Rather than telling any individual to kill, they have created an environment that greatly increases the chances of events like this.
That is why Palin and Beck’s discourse is not merely tasteless and inappropriate, it’s immoral. If someone here urges a politician to die in a fire, it does not change their chances of being murdered. When Palin and Beck urge their followers to take up arms and suggest revenge killings on Democratic lawmakers, that does indeed raise the chance of something like this happening. With so many crazies and so many targets, it raises that chance enormously. Yes, there is blood on their hands. They asked for this to happen and ensured that it became a public message. Someone was crazy enough to grant their wish, which was the issue from the beginning.
Villago Delenda Est
Reagan was shot by a guy who was a member of a family who were friends of the Bushes, and was shot in order to impress Jodie Foster.
As for attempts on the life of the deserting coward, I’ve never heard of any.
mario
It doesn’t really matter if we was influenced by violent rhetoric or not – if this incident can be used to quiet down that rhetoric, than we use it.
What else should we do – wait until someone kills someone and declare they did it for Glenn Beck?
cmorenc
I’m watching “Reliable sources” on CNN, and it’s already clear what the GOP response is in a nutshell: the (apolitical) “lone madman/gunman” thesis. BTW: something Sarah Palin did ten months ago is immensely too remote to connect it to this incident, Palin had NOTHING to do with it. Ditto Beck, by the same reasoning.
The wife flipped to CNN following “‘this Week”, where “Reliable Sources” was just coming on. Every time I’ve ever tried to sit through this program, it’s not very long before I get the urge to throw my chair through the TeeVee at Howie Kurtz; this show is the epitome of the MSM going out of its way to favorably incubate GOP apologists and their talking point themes, in the purported pursuit of fair balance.
“Fair or Unfair” to bring Sarah Palin into this? On her webpage, she promptly posted her sincere condolences to Rep. Giffords and her family”. Bleh.
Alex S.
@Jason:
And almost noone here claims that the shooter was a member of the Tea Party or a conservative anymore.
scav
Just as a mental experiment, consider what the response to a beardy guy in a turban posting a list of ‘mercan politicos with surveyors marks on them (tastefully protected by Kalashnikovs in a grainy photo) from a difficult pronounce place in the middle east? For extra points, would a ‘mercan passport protect same beardy guy?
MattF
There’s a Politics 101 lesson that apparently needs to be repeated, repeatedly: If you seek power by appealing to thugs, nuts, and criminals, you are asking for trouble, trouble in trumps and in spades. This can happen on any side of the political spectrum, but as of now, in the US of A, it’s happening on the right.
The classic literary narrative that teaches this lesson is ‘Red Harvest’ by Hammett. It’s about the bloodshed that cures the problem of a mine owner recruiting Prohibition-era organized crime– but at base, it’s the same old story.
fucen tarmal
wait a second, and i don’t want to sound vitriolic, because i believe the conservatives who still believe the conservative mainstream is defined by the mainline protestant religions, with some catholic spice, are needed to heal their side.
but seriously dude, the whole fundie thing? that isn’t conservatives starting their own religion? its growth has coincided with the southern strategy and the evolution of the modern conservative movement.
WereBear
It’s pointless to blame this on the shooter’s mental illness and stop there.
Of course he’s mentally ill! He drew down on a crowd of innocent people and shot them!
It’s pointless to argue about whether this is political or not.
Of course it’s political! He aimed for a Congressperson’s head! He went to a political rally!
And it’s ridiculous to go about parsing percentages of blame.
Of course it was right wing rhetoric! They are the ones who have spent the last decade encouraging talk about shooting people they don’t like!
For the love of heaven, have we gone so far down the Stupid Road that we can’t see huge, obvious trees that have come out of the forest and are smacking us in the face?
Yes, he was crazy. He was crazy on the subject of government. And when he needed a target; he targeted people who the right-wing hate rhetoric has been aimed at.
Anything else is stupid. Bone, stick, stone stupid. It’s friggin’ obvious and I’ve lost all patience with anyone, no matter how fair-minded and well-intentioned they might be, who thinks otherwise.
Because they are being deliberately stupid; and it doesn’t matter what side they are on.
They are perpetuating the lies and should be ashamed of themselves.
Villago Delenda Est
@E.D. Kain:
30% of the voting public is indeed THAT dumb.
Cat Lady
It doesn’t matter what political views this nutjob had. He’s one of many thousands out there RIGHT NOW with no particular ideology but who hear the demonization of entire groups of people ROUTINELY on Fox (liberals, Democrats, immigrants, African Americans, ad nauseum), see that it’s acceptable discourse because there’s no outrage except here in left blogistan, and coupled with Beck weaving dark tales of conspiracy, insurrection and betrayal (and buy gold, too!), the ember is fanned. The crap on Fox is pumped into virtually every public space 24/7.
Their mission is to incite, and the Kurtz’s and the Blitzers and the Todds of the world exist to make sure no one, especially their “colleagues”, is ever held accountable for what happens as a result. Fuck the news media, they’re the poison that is making us sick. Boycott them and let them know why.
NorthernMNer
@Uloborus: He does not have to be a conservative to be a direct product of the right wing movement’s incitements to violence. A bullseye was very close to literally painted on Giffords. He is surrounded by political language suggesting the need to shoot politicians, and some of it matches his particular brand of insanity.
This should be one of the entries on here alone. This sums up how I feel exactly.
Gay In Maine
As someone that works on political campaigns and for an incumbent, this is extremely worrying. We work everyday with people that are mentally unstable and people that can’t control their anger. In the backs of our minds – and now, with this tragedy, the front of our minds – is that this could happen to any one of us.
I’ve worked in politics for a long time, and let me be blunt – the rhetorical devices that started with the “Republican Revolution” under Newt Gingrich in the early 90’s changed what is acceptable in public discourse, and now have been settled into our mainstream by Fox News and talking heads on the right.
As for false equivalency, it is not the same to have an anonymous blogger saying things that are out of line as it is for leaders of one of our major parties to do it. It is not the same when a Vice Presidential candidate says “Don’t retreat, reload” as it is when a diarist on DailyKos that is being read by 30 people to say something out there.
True, I’ve seen the You Tube postings of the shooter and he obviously had some mental issues. That said, when we as a society allow our political leaders and those that work for them to be dehumanized and use over the top rhetoric to define our opponents, it gives license to those that are already unstable to see violence as acceptable.
For those of us that work with the public every day, this is chilling. Regardless of whether or not any particular rhetoric helped push this particular man over the edge, the real possibility exists that it could happen again, and it could happen to any one of us that work in politics.
That alone makes this conversation relevant and not only worth having but a must have.
tomvox1
Loughner’s Manifesto
Sample:
Yeah, E.D., I wonder which side he’s been listening to… Way too easy to say this guy’s just some random nut with no coherent philosophy, however deranged. Also let’s the irresponsible agitators on the Right off the hook for all the hate speech they’ve been spewing, what with all that “2nd Amendment Solutions” talk.
Try again.
Bill E Pilgrim
@John Cole:
I disagree that condemning the incitements to violence coming from the right at a time like this (more strongly than “I don’t like it”) is “politicizing” it. From what you wrote earlier, you seemed to think the same thing:
You used the word “Republicans”. Is that “politicizing” it?
As I wrote above, there are reasons that we want to hear right wing rhetoric more forcefully condemned at a time like this, and it doesn’t require showing “that he was influenced by any of these pundits or Sarah Palin or whoever” to do so.
That’s what I’m disagreeing with.
You have a bad habit of writing things like “What the hell is wrong with you?” when you really meant “I disagree”.
ploeg
@Villago Delenda Est: We don’t know whether the guy who shot Giffords is any different from John Hinckley.
Can’t say I’ve heard anything about any attempts on Shrub, either.
Odie Hugh Manatee
I posted this in another thread a few ago:
This tragedy was fueled by the toxic atmosphere that the right has been fostering for too long. Crazy people are out there and they know that if they push the right buttons that they will get the response they want. Then all they have to do is sit back and enjoy their handiwork. The M$M will say ‘both sides do it’ and everyone will soon forget about it ever happening.
I have been reading and not posting because I really expected this to happen yet I still don’t know what to say about it other than to say that this isn’t over, nor will it ever be. I started to write something several times yesterday and every single time I read it I deleted it.
Six people are dead and many others are wounded, all because a political party wants to regain power in any way they can and some nutcase decided that they were asking for help. This guy is no leftie, not with all of the tenther and gold shit he has been screeching about. I have no doubt that this guy has been hearing voices telling him to kill people.
Republican voices, and they came through loud and clear.
cleek
@Villago Delenda Est:
indeed. but i can’t count how many times i’ve read “Giffords was a politician, therefore this was a political act”, etc. in the last 18 hours. and frankly, i agree with you (i think): context matters, motives matter. but i was replying to Carol, to whom, apparently, none of that matters.
Presidential Assassination Attempts.
David Fud
@John Cole: I think because we haven’t personally seen him go after the right-wing violence rhetoric. I do believe him that he has done it. He just hasn’t done it in this venue, and reading him here talk about “less vitriolic and violent rhetoric” without explicitly connecting it to the right-wing violence culture in this country is simply infuriating.
I, for one, am sick of all of these whackos (Beck, Palin, et al) being funded by rich libertarians to destabilize our society with any means possible: violence, threats of violence, implicit violence, outsized political spending for organizations that clearly lie about the state of the world, wingnut welfare, etc, etc, etc. I am absolutely sick of not seeing conservatives do what Buckley did in the past: make the whackos look stupid, kick them out of the party, keep the party sane.
So, it may not be a completely rational reaction on my part, but I couldn’t be any more tired of this, and even a hint of excusing the right with for this rhetoric twists a stick in my gut. Even simply saying “wait, we don’t know” about this particular instance doesn’t get the right wing off of the hook for the overall climate of violence that they have created.
Maybe he could post a comment with a list of posts at his normal joint with his criticism of right-wing implicit violence speech. I don’t know. But, it would be nice to see it loud and clear from someone right-of-center for once.
xian
no true conservative would use extreme right-wing language.
when is this fantasy version of conservatism going to stop protecting actual existing self-identified conservatives?
Carol
@Villago Delenda Est: Thank god its only 30%. And for our first-past-the post system. People have to at least pretend to be moderate to win elections nationally.
Dr. Squid
I think what a lot of people have been trying to get at is that the shooter’s actual political leanings are fairly irrelevant. His craziness kind of led to some weird mishmash of details around a central theme: “Things aren’t right, and I want to change that now.”
His craziness also makes him susceptible to suggestions of violent action. And we know where that came from.
Judas Escargot
@dmsilev:
People react to their environment, and this is an environment in which vitriolic attacks on government officials are common. If you’re a crazy person about to snap, that will very possibly influence the way in which you snap.
Yes, this. Mindset matters, even to a schizoid.
If you doubt this… ask yourself two questions: Why did he shoot her (rather than throwing a pie at her, or exposing himself, or any other number of crazy but non-lethal responses)? And why did he shoot her, and not someone closer to him (almost all murders are personal)?
Answer those two questions, and we just might find our way back to civilized discourse. But all this false-equivalency talk helps us achieve that… how, exactly?
azlib
The political rhetoric is overheated and it is empirically mostly coming from the Right these days and our Pundit class just accepts it. I watched Gifford’s April interview with Chuck Todd again. The most appalling thing about the interview was Todd’s dismissive attitude towards the violent rhetoric and his acceptance of it as the norm.
Our elites should strongly condemn those who allude to violence against or dehumanizing of political opponents in the strongest possible terms. But it does not happen. The result is a greater probability of the violence we saw in Tucson yesterday.
I am waiting for any of the Fox pundits to do what Keith Olbermann did yesterday and actually apologize for some of his own rhetoric. Will it happen? I doubt it. It will not happen because the Fox pundits are “entertainers” and their over the top rhetoric makes them money. If a few people die because of their complicity in ramping up the hate, that is just acceptable collateral damage. I suggest they tell that to the parents of the 9 year old girl killed yesterday.
Villago Delenda Est
Another thing.
Contemporary American “conservatives” are not conservative. Hell, Dick Cheney is openly contemptuous of the idea of “conserving” energy. They reject conservative approaches to finance, going with “innovations” that incidentally line the pockets of the “innovators”, rejecting a sound, conservative, low risk approach to finance. Indeed, co-opting the rating agencies with fees to look the other way at high risk vehicles and mark them as “AAA” instead is a way of life on Wall Street nowadays.
ckelly
EDK: “And as I said, if more comes to light showing that this was caused by right-wing violence fomented by right-wing pundits, I will be the first to condemn it.”
Wow, you really expect your shooting rampages to be wrapped up with a lovely, tight bow don’t you? How often are the motivations of a madman completely explained with all dots connected and every ‘t’ crossed? Never.
pablo
@cmorenc: Yes the MSM is enough to drive you crazy. Example…Dana Bash.
Montysano
@Uloborus:
Perfectly said.
BR
E.D. – you should watch Josh Marshall in this clip from last night’s countdown – his analogy is very right, and is a good one, explaining that to say the guy was nuts is not at odds with saying that the right-wing rhetoric out there pushed him over the edge:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/vp/40983311#40983311
ulee
Watch out Kain. Why did Palin scrub her website? This is complicity and you are coming out on the losing end.
Scarshapedstar
This is merely the exclamation point on a two year campaign of terror orchestrated by the richest and most powerful leaders of the conservative movement. Remember when every town hall turned into a riot? Shit, remember the Brooks Brothers Riot in 2000?
Many of us have long been wondering when the crazy would graduate from mere curb stomping to actual mass murder. Sorry that you just fell off the turnip truck, EDK.
JPL
@Cat Lady: IMO, the media decided that their ratings increased with their partisan language.
It won’t change.
Josh James
My comment, called –
Memo To CNN: http://writerjoshuajames.com/dailydojo/?p=1992
ed g
It’s almost always described a person motivated by their mental illness, as exhibited by their disjointed, hateful and bizarre comments, who commit these acts of violence. Would someone please explain how a person who makes the same disjointed, hateful and bizarre rants from the same dark place, can have a nationally syndicated radio show? Yes, Dr. Wiener, I mean you.
At some point the powers that market such lunacy must be held accountable for getting their dogs back under the porch.
jomo
E.D. To your credit – you have called out excesses on both sides. You haven’t just claimed that both sides do it and you have pointed to the wildly inappropriate Palin map. And you have braved the strong differences of opinion in this blog. I for one am glad you are here.
BruceFromOhio
I understand that it will be some time before the official inquiry is completed, and the full scope of the incident is laid bare.
I also understand patterns, and the pattern here bodes poorly. When the mouthpieces you noted can scurry for cover with no consequences for creating and sustaining the environment in which these thing occur, it effectively guarantees repeat occurrences.
The mouthpieces you cite (Fox, am radio, et al) remind me of the people who sit on the sidelines and scream “Kill him!”. There is no proof that can bring a mob to justice when its only one person doing the killing. How many more shootings and deaths does it take to “… actually show that he was influenced by any of these pundits or Sarah Palin or whoever…” when that sort of evidence is so subjective as to be forever elusive? I’m influenced by all of these sources, too, but what demonstration could I use to prove such a thing?
No, the direction from here is evident, and has been for awhile – continue the hatred, the divisiveness, the fear-mongering, and hate, fear and violence will be the result. It’s really not all that complicated.
ETA: It’s not saying “both sides do it” to point out that the shooter doesn’t seem to belong to either side. You are correct, it isn’t. It does, however, serve to obscure recent history that makes a pretty damning case against the “second amendment solution” and “RELOAD!” crowd.
schrodinger's cat
@E.D. Kain: I beg to differ, Bush was elected in 2004 after he took us to war on false pretexts and the current gains the Republicans made in the Congress after doing nothing constructive but spew hatred and obstruct the Dem agenda for the last two years. So I think yes Palin can be elected under the right set of circumstances.
WyldPirate
Someone has gone to the effort of compiling an extensive list of the right-wing crazy from the last two years. It is extensive and well documented and runs the gamut from Joe Six-Pack knucklehead statement and actions to elected representatives statements.
The list is simply jaw-dropping. Anyone that claims false equivalancy due to statements and actions from the “left” has rocks in their head and could and should be publically ridiculed for their assholery–especially media dickwads that do it. Some of the worst of those mental midgets actually have staff that could compile lists like this for them.
The link came from this post from Digby.
Rhoda
Let’s just be clear: over the last two years the Republican party stepped across the line in what was considered acceptable political discourse to the point that John Bohener campaigned for a guy who happens to love dressing up as a Nazi and re-enacting WWII as a Nazi. And people shrugged their shoulders and it was a two day story at the most. I’ve watched those on the right talk about second amendment remedies, threaten representatives over their votes, and frankly the bullying and screaming and yelling during those town hall meetings, not to even begin with all those racist signs.
I don’t know how this man and all; but I know he choose to shoot Rep. Giffords and given the hate speech against her it’s not hard to see an ill man pushed to that point. That this speech isn’t called out constantly and those engaging in it aren’t regulated to the fringe is what’s really terrifying IMO.There will always be crazies; it’s when it becomes acceptable to talk like the crazies that we’ve got a problem IMO.
Villago Delenda Est
@ploeg:
Actually, we DO Know that Loughner had political motivations. We know that Hinkley did not.
But the fact of the matter is, there was no torrent of rhetoric in 1981 from liberal talk radio personalities or politicians about how Reagan was out to create “death panels” or that “second amendment solutions” were needed to address his policies. There were no maps with targets on them going after Reagan’s supporters in the House.
Hinkley’s actions were independent of the political discourse at the time. Loughner’s are not. That much is obvious.
jk
@David Fud:
“I am absolutely sick of not seeing conservatives do what Buckley did in the past: make the whackos look stupid, kick them out of the party, keep the party sane.”
I’d love to see this happen, but there are no prominent conservatives left who have the balls to call out Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, or Rush Limbaugh. I’d settle for a statement from Olympia Snowe or Susan Collins but they’re both too fucking gutless to stick their necks out.
Admiral_Komack
@mistermix:
“I think it’s worth bringing the Palin stuff back into the spotlight, and questioning her aggressively about it, in hopes that the kinds of gun imagery and hateful rhetoric she uses becomes unacceptable to the general populace and therefore politically unproductive. But trying to tie it directly to a nutcase is pointless.”
Oh, please!
Sarah Palin gave a bullshit apology, and the Republicans are spinning like tops!
Sarah Palin will hide behind her tweets and the MSM will do nothing at all.
Skepticat
I too would like to have more facts available before I develop/present an opinion. As the attacker survived, we may have some answers soon.
I’m sickened by the violent rhetoric from the right, but not yet ready to assume that it causes each and every incident like this tragedy.
Violet
@NorthernMNer:
Doesn’t someone have to be declared mentally unsound by a mental health professional before they could be put on a list to keep them from getting weapons, should such a list exist? I’m not sure he had even got that far. The college he attended didn’t allow him to stay and unless he got mental health help that would show him not to be a danger to himself or others. But did he get that help? If so, did he continue to with treatment?
Our medical system, especially wrt mental health issues, is broken for sure. But even if someone is shown to be needing help, they don’t necessarily get it, or, if they do get it, stay with the treatment. Is there a good system for getting people diagnosed with mental illness onto a list so they can’t buy weapons? I have no idea, but would guess it varies by state.
You can’t force an adult to get mental health treatment unless they are deemed a danger to themselves or society. Obviously he was a danger to society, but was that as obvious before this tragedy? It’s easy to look at his crazy MySpace stuff now and connect the dots, but prior to this incident, I don’t know if it would have been as easy. I just don’t know.
Maybe it was obvious. The college clearly saw something that was a problem, but we don’t know if he even got treatment.
Joy
Part of the problem in expecting conservative leaders to condemn the rhetoric is that they have actually in many ways condoned it. The saner conservatives have been exiled from the party (i.e. Frum) and only the batshit crazy win-at-any-cost ones are left. The few sane ones still in Congress are fearing primaries against them.
Lit3Bolt
E. D. Kain, from the way I see it, I would be delighted to believe conservatives and their reaction to the horrible shooting except they sound so gosh darn defensive. Sarah Palin’s website and other conservative sites reflexively took down the “gun map” and other violent images/words like a child trying to kick his dirty socks under the bed. If conservatives have nothing to hide/fear/be ashamed of from this tragedy, why the guilty reactions?
Put it this way. Take away the gun imagery and let’s have something different but equally horrible…say cancer for instance. And say for years, conservative talk radio and TV shows and opinion pages were saying for years, “I hope Democrats get cancer, I pray that they get cancer, all Dems must die from cancer.” So when a Dem finally does get cancer, are you going to jump on the bandwagon defend conservatives saying, “Oh, but they didn’t CAUSE that cancer to happen!! It was just one unfortunate bad cell in that Democrat’s body!” That’s too bad, the association is there, the inappropriate language was there, and conservatives will inevitably get the fallout because of their rhetoric. Besides, when politicians get shot, the fallout is political. And you can’t whine and complain about things being all so political because that is itself political, and shows your own political bias.
Jennifer
Hey E.D., not for nuthin’ but, you know, if people like Palin weren’t putting rifle sights on maps to “target” political opponents, and saying things like “don’t retreat, reload” and people like Sharon Angle weren’t saying things like “second-amendment solutions” and the rest of their party, their followers, and the media weren’t pretending like these not-even-veiled references to violence premised on political disagreement were no big deal, we wouldn’t be having this discussion.
To wit: it doesn’t really matter whether or not this gunman was influenced by any of that; the fact that it was out there, has been out there, has not been called out by the people who have benefitted from it or the “liberal” media means that the question is going to come up, just as surely as the night follows the day. Which then leads to asking why anyone would engage in this violent rhetoric, knowing that there would be this type of blowback each and every time the inevitable happens? And the answer is: they wouldn’t, unless it somehow benefits them.
The rhetoric would have been indefensible even if yesterday’s incident had never occured.
StacyMN
I guess I’m curious as to how many more incidents have to happen before we can allow a discussion about the impact that extreme right-wing rhetoric is having on this country. I mean, we’ve had abortion doctors shot in the head, we’ve had a gay-friendly church shot up, we’ve had a guy fly his plane into a federal building down in Texas, and so on. Death threats against members of congress have quadrupled since the 2008 election. This isn’t a isolated incident, it’s the logical conclusion of what happens when you whip up an angry public with this sort of rhetoric. Which some of us have been cautioning about for years, and were dismissed as being over-reactive. This isn’t the first time this has happened in the past few years. It’s just the most blatant because it was a political figure that was gunned down.
And I agree with others who have said – we cannot talk about this in any frame other then political. Shooting a politician in the head is a political act. Period.
It doesn’t matter. Anyone looking at the rhetoric coming out since the 2008 election ramped up knows that the most extreme rhetoric is coming from the right. It may be that Loughner is a political moderate (in an extreme sense) that holds extreme right wing and left wing views. But there is only one political party that is mainstreaming and condoning the extreme views, and that is the Republican party. They are the ones looking out over a population that is increasingly angry and frightened due to the economic state the country is in. And they are attempting to direct those sentiments at Democrats. It’s them. They are the ones responsible for your hardships. Them. This is incredibly irresponsible, because even if these acts are from nutjobs, it doesn’t change the fact that that sort of rhetoric is allowing the nutjobs to feel justified in what they are doing when they commit acts of violence.
Think of the guy that flew his plane into the building down in Texas. All in all, he was anti-government because he felt the IRS had fucked him over, which cause people to say he was a right-winger. He also happened to be very anti-religious, which caused people to say he was a left-winger. But it doesn’t matter, because we don’t have prominent Democrats in congress or trusted pundits on the television screaming that Christianity is trying to take over the country and bring it to it’s knees. We do have Republicans in congress and trusted pundits claiming that the government is. As such, this guy, screwed up as he was, was given the justification for attacking a government office. Attacking a church instead wouldn’t of had that same sort of justification in the mainstream discourse.
numbskull
@E.D. Kain:
Cole, if you don’t see that this is a perfect example of why people revile anything ED writes, well, then I suspect you’re going to continue to be disappointed in your blog commentators…
BruceFromOhio
@Judas Escargot: Mindset matters, even to a schizoid. This. And good questions, ones worth answering.
Odie Hugh Manatee
.’@ed g:
They say that free speech doesn’t mean you get to yell FIRE! in a crowded theater. The cranks on the right have been yelling FIRE! and here are the results. Among the dead, a nine year old child. A child whose parents have to bury her. A child who was a complete innocent, who did no wrong, is dead. All because some nutjob listened to the Republican voices in his head and acted on them.
They yelled FIRE! so he did just that. Just for them.
WereBear
@JPL: It won’t change, because we’ve lost sign of how the right wingers changed it in the first place.
They changed the laws.
They changed the laws about media consolidation, the Fairness Doctrine, the whole way the discourse shifted to “it’s their god given right to make as much money as possible” from the original intent which was “demanding a public service for use of the public airwaves.”
These are public pathways being used to promote sickness and death. We need to take them back; not for one side or another, but for the public discourse, and for fairness.
Stop trying to think “oh this, this is terrible, this is so terrible they will shut up and feel shame at last.” If the deaths of the toddlers and infants in day care in Oklahoma City did not shut them up, we must accept that nothing will.
These are no ordinary talking heads. These are people winnowed over three decades to have no shame.
The only thing that will stop them is the law.
And that is what must be changed.
Cat Lady
@JPL:
I don’t know. Every time I mention to people that I’ve stopped watching the news because they’re no longer interested in informing, only in framing a narrative that supports an agenda, I get a lot of agreement. The cable news shows are all fighting for the demographic who stay home and watch TV all day. Those people are old. Watch the ads sometime.
Nazgul35
Let’s not pretend that this is the first violent act carried out by a crazy person since the right began its hate fest…
I know of at least five violent or intended violent actions over the last two years.
The right had plenty of warning that their language was causing problems, the decided to push on and take the crazy to eleven, all for political gain.
This attack against the Congresswoman isn’t a surprise at all to anyone who has been paying attention.
Treating these things as individual acts unassociated with a larger climate of eliminationist rhetoric is part of the problem that allows it to continue.
someguy
Good to see you’re still around ED. Good also to see that you’re a willing apologist for the people who created the climate that spurs a disturbed mind like this to commit mass murder. Because the one thing that this blog lacks, unlike most of the blogs on the right and among the libertards, is an apologist for mass murderers. It was a big hole in John’s game, post-2005. Good to see he drafted well to round out the team. Now if we could just get a parakeet blogger to go along with the cat & dog blogging…
stuckinred
George WIll and Dick Armey will now explain this to us on ABC.
BR
E.D. – if this story (warning, Fox News link) is right, then you may have your answer, that he was influenced by a right-wing anti-immigration/supremacy group:
http://politics.blogs.foxnews.com/2011/01/09/dhs-memo-suggests-shooter-may-be-linked-racist-organization
Joey Maloney
@mistermix: That was true on November 5th of 2008. The problem is that woman has a lot of shouting in her.
JPL
@Jennifer: That’s how I feel the rhetoric is indefensible and incites anger. Death panels, crosshairs, soc.i.a.lism are used to end discussion not promote discussion. I don’t have cable and haven’t for a few years but last time I watched CNN or FOX I did not see honest discussions on tax policies or military spending or health care.
stuckinred
Armey,
“no big deal, happens all the time” “We must do out duty to protect our liberty”
jk
@WyldPirate:
That’s a great list. Hopefully, Olbermann, Maddow, or O’Donnell will cite it in an upcoming broadcast.
@Rhoda:
Even that smarmy douchebag Eric Cantor managed to distance himself from Nazi lover Rich Iott.
Davis X. Machina
@c u n d gulag:
This, exactly.
It’s as if David Neiwert had never existed. He’s been at this since 2002, for God’s sake.
JFitz
This thing happened a mile and a half from my house, at my grocery store. Gabby is my congresswoman. Living in District 8 and witnessing the campaign this past fall I personally wouldn’t have been surprised to hear that it was Jesse Kelley himself that did the shooting. The guy is a repulsive creep, and so are his followers. They make Sarah Palin look like Mother Teresa.
Dave C
@BR:
Thanks for that info.
Alex S.
There is a “strong suspicion” that the shooter is linked to the hate group American Renaissance:
http://gretawire.blogs.foxnews.com/latest-on-shooting-of-congresswoman-giffords-motivation-anti-semitic-and-she-was-the-target/
Edit: Ah, BR already linked to it.
numbskull
@Cat Lady:
Ana Gama
ED Kain,
Maybe you can speak about the political atmosphere in AZ.
How has the political environment been enhanced by your governor, while seeking re-election, lying about headless bodies being found in the desert?
How has the political environment been enhanced by various politicians in your state trying to convince voters that violence on the border is escalating when, in fact, it’s been in decline?
The way I see it is that the Sarah Palin’s of the world have given license to people who should be more responsible to gin up political rhetoric to the point of falsehoods and out right lies, and that is why she is dangerous.
Interestingly, TPM has a story up now where Palin’s spokeswoman is now trying to say that the crosshairs were not gun sights, but surveryor’s marks. HA!
The fact that they scrambled to take down the maps is indicative of a guilty conscience.
Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)
@Cat Lady: This. Michael Enright, the student who stabbed a Muslim cab driver also appeared to be mentally ill and after asking whether his cabbie was a Muslim, he attacked a member of a group being demonized by Fox news (during the “Ground Zero mosque” debacle). Doesn’t matter that everything Michael had done prior to that appeared to be apolitical – the anti-Islamic rhetoric on the news seemed to provide a mentally ill person with the idea to go after a Muslim target.
The unemployed guy in San Francisco who was listening to Glenn Beck and decided to target the ACLU and Tides foundation before getting into a shoot-out with police was probably also mentally unstable.
Politicians and the news media need to be careful about violent rhetoric and the power of suggestion for people who are not mentally stable.
John Cole
I know he hasn’t. I’ve been reading him for several years. He’s a good person, and while I disagree with him from time to time (sometimes even on the front page in multiple back and forths between the two of us), he is a good person, he is fair, and I really dislike he way many people here have treated him. Quite frankly, at times, it has been embarrassing.
I have no problem with people calling him out when he is wrong or does make false equivalencies, but there has been a general feel that people impute bad faith to Kain, and I reject that. People can be wrong without being bad people.
numbskull
@WereBear: This.
Admiral_Komack
@Rhoda:
Republican response:
“But one has nothing to do with the other!”
To which I say, BULLSHIT!
JPL
@WereBear: E.D. Kain is a libertarian but seems to understand the need for some regulation. If he is still around I wouldn’t mind his views on this.
russell
Whatever.
IMO it’s pretty reasonable to say that we’ve had enough freaking rhetoric about “2nd Amendment solutions”, “watering the tree of liberty”, etc..
Giffords shooting or not.
But, post Giffords shooting, even more so.
Time for pistol-waving hotheads (whether literal or figurative) to chill the fuck out. My two cents.
Villago Delenda Est
Geeze, those wikipedia reported “assassination attempts” on the deserting coward are pretty weak sauce.
Nothing approaching the guy flying the Cessna into the WH lawn during the Clinton administration.
John - A Motley Moose
Jumping to conclusions is the act of a shallow mind. On the other hand, the ability to connect the dots is the sign of intelligence. Admittedly, there is quite a bit of the first on display over this tragedy. However, there are an awful lot of dots in this case and they are really easy to connect.
Matthew
@NorthernMNer:
Money, dear boy. I think the NRA, and the companies it represents, could take a significant hit from any such legislation that defines unsound mind too broadly (or broadly enough, I guess). I’d be willing to bet that the sentimental/sensational urban cowboy crap is for the rubes, and when they’re talking amongst themselves they feel the same way about their customers as the majority of liberals do.
Dave C
@numbskull:
I honestly don’t see anything unreasonable in that statement. Can you please be specific as to why you find it so objectionable?
The Dangerman
I heard this after Oklahoma City, too…
…and, at the time, it may have been correct…
…and then 9/11 happened. You think the Right politicized 9/11 to their advantage?
The Right owns this shit.
BR
@John Cole:
My general problem with his posts is a certain smugness that comes through, even in the posts that include boilerplate humility. (And given that I don’t feel I learn anything from his posts, the smugness seems unwarranted.) I don’t think he’s a bad person.
Dr. Squid
And in case you don’t think that Sarah Bailin is getting really defensive…
A hint…she’s lying. (about not calling her crosshairs on the map literal targets, not the Al Gore thing)
maye
Why DID Sarah Palin scrub her web site of all the gun imagery? Did her marketing team advise her thus? And why would they do that?
C’mon Sarah, man up! Don’t back down now on your core beliefs. Just tough your way through this and there will be more $$$ on the other side of all this free media.
Rethink this and get your priorities ($) straight.
Villago Delenda Est
@The Dangerman:
As I recall, the OKC bombing was at first, by our brilliant morons of the MSM, being touted as the work of them darn swarthy middle eastern guys who probably pray towards Mecca five times a day.
Then it turned out to be a white guy, and Army vet, part of an entire nest of right wing crazies incensed by David Koresh torching his own compound that was besieged by the jackbooted oppressors of the Clinton administration.
duck-billed placelot
Shorter E.D. Kain: Mass murder at a Democratic political event is an excellent opportunity to shame commenters for being too political.
Dr. Squid
Sarah Palin is starting to sound like Sarah Michelle Gellar at the end of Cruel Intentions.
Dave C
And the smear campaign against Sheriff Dupnik for his wise words during yesterday’s press conference begins.
It’s only a matter of time until Rush and Friends are raging against this guy on air, thus proving his point.
stuckinred
@maye: I was told last night that she scrubbed and then un-scrubbed?
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
Why speculate?
I didn’t think that people should bring guns to constituent events then. I was afraid that eventually a Congressman would be shot. One was.
I didn’t think it was appropriate to put targets on Congressmen, as Palin did, then. I thought the idea was offensive. Now that a Congressman has been shot, I think it’s even more offensive.
I didn’t blame anyone or speculate.
You did speculate. The fact you did it in a Sully-friendly, centrist way, to buttress your centrist cred, is a strike against you, not one in your favor.
morzer
To me the combination of an obsession with government control (via whatever bizarre means), a currency backed by gold and silver, and a willingness to see violence as the solution points fairly squarely to Glenn Beck and talk radio’s particular constellation of memes and craziness. Yes, Loughner is clearly not thinking rationally, but the form his particular irrationality took seems to fit one particular pattern. I don’t think that Sarah Palin is the direct influence here, but given her willingness to call for violence, and the willingness of the right wing/tea baggers to invoke “second amendment remedies” I have a very hard time not seeing this as an act of violence birthed and blessed within the right wing frame of reference.
mcd410x
Days like yesterday — and the last two years — really make one think: If Gore had been president on 9/11, would the neo-Confederates have begun open rebellion in the streets of the United States?
I think, yes, they would have.
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
You’re not going to win this argument with me. So put the update where you backdown up now instead of waiting a few hours.
EDIT: I am speaking to Kain.
BR
Give it two weeks and Palin will use legitimate criticism of her rhetoric to gin up resentment among the GOP base towards the librul media, and it may give her a second wind…
WereBear
How about a mental comparison?
We have two industry groups having a marketing battle; one for Iceberg lettuce, and one for Arugula.
The Arugula people are saying things like “More vitamins in Arugula, it’s better for you.” And the Iceberg people can’t claim otherwise for their product, so they go with, “Arugula is for effeminate intellectuals. Shoot all Arugula eaters on sight!”
And then some deranged person goes on a rampage in a produce section. After years of deranged people targeting produce sections, farm stands, and vandalizing salad bars?
Does it really take a rocket scientist to connect these dots?
WarMunchkin
You did good with this post E.D. :) Just thought I’d add a tally to whoever keeps score for all this.
That said, it’s just a matter of talking about the individual versus talking about the context of the crime. I think we are right to talk about the violent speech in our society, but we should be careful in our evaluation the strength of said violent rhetoric as it pertains to this particular individual.
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
@John Cole:
I agree, but he’s wrong here, and I’m right.
urbanmeemaw
@E.D. Kain:
Sorry. I have to disagree with you on that one. Just because Palin may be history, that doesn’t mean people are intelligent. It means they’re tired of her and need a new mole to pop up out the of the box in the game called Right Wng Whack-a-mole. Beck, Limbaugh, Fox, Palin et al are NOT “The Problem”. They are symptoms of “The Problem” and they are energy vampires who feed off of the energy of the people in this country who need them to feed their own hatred. It’s a very sick, symbiotic relationship.
jk
@stuckinred:
George Will is a prissy, preening, Patrician douchebag. Listening to him pontificate should qualify as a form of enhanced interrogation. Charles Dickens couldn’t have dreamed up a more appropriate name for someone than Dick Armey.
@Admiral_Komack:
“Sarah Palin will hide behind her tweets”
Palin’s strong suit is evading responsibility or accountability for her rhetoric and her actions. She’s the quintessential gutless chickenshit conservative. Shame on John King, Wolf Blitzer, and the other assholes in the MSM for drooling over her tweets and Facebook posts.
stuckinred
@DougJarvus Green-Ellis: Who the hell are you talking to?
Kay Shawn
Last night I said to my SO, “I hope he’s just a nutjob, I hope he’s not left or right,” and he was astonished to hear it. Keeping the screaming down is all I want these days.
Cat Lady
@Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people):
They need to be careful, yes, but THEY NEED TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE. They won’t hold themselves accountable, and the other establishment media
criticswhores like Howard Kurtz won’t either. The only way to hold them accountable is to write, organize and force them to deal with their audience. Boycotts and letter writing campaigns work. No one is going to write them to tell them to keep up the false equivalencies and vitriolic rhetoric. They’re making that decision themselves, and need to be called on it.DearOldDad
I think we can all agree that this guy was paranoid and delusional (unless of course he is a Muslim in which case he did it because Islam is an evil religion and all Muslims hate our freedoms and want to kill us)
Jennifer
The bottom line remains: if Palin hadn’t ever put up the map with the crosshairs and various and sundry conservatives and their followers and apologists hadn’t made numerous references to violence and defenses of violent rhetoric, no one would have to wonder if this guy was influenced by extremist speech.
You don’t have to defend the irresponsible things you’ve said if you never say them in the first place.
scav
@WereBear: Rocket Science, HA! Everybody knows the Baby Jebus is picking up those Rockets in his Holy Hands. Well, those Holy Hands that aren’t cranking the tides in and out, of course.
chrismealy
Is there any difference between “thoughtful” and “pointless waffle”?
IL JimP
I agree it’s too early to tell if this was a partisan attack. It definitely was political.
The violent rhetoric on the right is despicable. I’m just not convinced that it is a factor yet in this case. I’m often wrong, but I’m slow to make judgements before all the facts are in.
scarshapedstar
Allow me to inject some fairness to the discussion by reminding everyone that an Iraqi guy threw
a shoeTWO SHOES at George Bush.sublime33
I see a lot of parallels between the 1994 congressionial takeover and the 2010. In 1994, Republicans stirred up a lot of discontent with the electorate and amped up the ant-Clinton rhetoric to new heights. And then Timothy McVeigh bombed Oklahoma City, and a lot of people stopped and got a lot a lot more concerned as to the loudest opposition voices.
Tucson may turn out to be a similar case. In the long run, the OK City bombing helped Bill Clinton politically. But if the bombers had been foreign, and especially Muslim, it would have been a fatal blow to Clinton.
duck-billed placelot
I wonder if open-carry at political events were not the new normal if someone would have reacted more quickly to the shooter? I wonder if someone died who wouldn’t have a few years ago because asshole conservatives demanded the right to semi-subtly threaten politicians and civilians to shore up their anxious masculinity?
DougJ, I’m so glad you fight this hack.
Odie Hugh Manatee
Compare what the sheriff of Pima county said yesterday:
to what E.D. has said here. I think the sheriff knows what he is talking about, he knows what is going on in his state. E.D. may be a nice guy but his writings are those of someone with little life experience under his belt.
Hopefully his opinions will mature as he gets older. I don’t mean this in a mean way, or condescendingly, I’m just saying that he comes across as wanting to be seen as worldly and knowledgeable but his writing falls far short of that.
ETA: E.D. comes across as a young man who has a lot to learn about life.
scarshapedstar
Didn’t even realize that Giffords was the first Jewish rep from Arizona.
WyldPirate
@Matthew:
There is already legislation that prevents people from obtaining weapons if they have been deemed mentally unsound in my state (NC) and in many states. I think that it is based upon having had a prior hospitalization for mental health issues.
The problem is that with laws, it is easy for the determined or the crazy to ignore them. Given enough determination, this same sick person, under the right circumstances, could have caused just as much mayhem with a couple of gallons of gasoline, some styrofoam, acid and metal shavings
IT is rather unwieldy to require all purchasers of firearms to demonstrate their mental soundness prior to purchasing a firearm. It also seems rather ridiculous to ban firearms as well. They are here to stay and will remain in our society even if the guns were made illegal.
WereBear
You sound like we just need to unravel the thought processes of the shooter. But there are none. He’s mentally deranged!
Now, the target; what thoughts he had he put into his target or targets.
And what did he target?
People who shoot up their workplaces have a target. People who shoot women who reject them have a target. Middle East terrorists have targets. Anti abortion terrorists have targets.
As much as we can understand these people, we look at their targets.
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
@duck-billed placelot:
Actually, I think the open carry part (which I brought up) is a red herring. ED was right about that.
It’s the issue of people bringing guns when they meet with their Congressman in the first place.
NobodySpecial
@John Cole:
This is the funniest shit I’ve heard all week from Cole. No, really.
NorthernMNer
@Violet: I know, this is a complex problem. But apart from our (grossly inadequate) mental health care system, isn’t there anything that can be done to keep guns away from the mentally unstable?
Its a crowd-source question, I guess.
Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)
@Odie Hugh Manatee: By the way, the sheriff’s statements have already been attacked by Senator Jon Kyl.
Ana Gama
@Jennifer:
This! a thousand times, plus one.
eemom
You know what we need? Less speculation and more self-righteous scolding over speculation like this post.
That will REALLY help the situation.
This is all so unbelievably stupid. What the fuck do you people expect? That everyone’s going to STFU and wait quietly “until all the facts are in” to react to this at ALL?
Hello? Have you suddenly forgotten that we live in a media-obsessed world where the latest thing that happened — even stupid meaningless shit, much less unspeakable tragedies like yesterday’s — dominates all public thought and discourse until the next big thing comes along? That is 98% of what powers this very blog.
So, after we’ve all said “thoughts” and “prayers” out the wazoo — then what do we do? Shutting the fuck up “until all the facts are in” is not only a non-starter in the world of 2011, it’s against human nature.
And it could be — though I’m not holding my breath — that human nature could work in our favor for once. If the “rush to judgment” against Palin Beck et al were by some miracle to shut THEM up permanently — even if the shooter never heard of them — then let’s fucking rush to judgment.
Cacti
Which of these is incompatible with the conservative movement?
The right wing hates the government, and various groups of people they deem undesirable.
Chad N Freude
@cleek: Thanks for the link. Apparently, a guy firing at the White House from the street is an assassination attempt comparable to Hinckley’s shooting at Reagan or Oswald’s assassination of Kennedy, as is
For some reason, I am unable to see either of these as targeted attempts to assassinate W equivalent to the others.
NobodySpecial
/snicker
eemom
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
Yeah. That too.
Alex S.
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
Yes. At the very least, the situation on the ground gives reason to suspect a political motivation. The sheriff knows best what’s going on there. The FBI mentions a right-wing hate group. There is still the search for a second suspect in some kind of relation to the shooter. The police very likely already have a testimony from the shooter. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that this other guy is a member of this hate group and used the mentally disturbed shooter to kill Giffords.
mr. whipple
Pretty much.
Cat Lady
@Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people):
Did he ask to see his countertops?
scarshapedstar
EDK ought to be a defense attorney.
“If you can’t find where he put in writing that Sarah Palin personally instructed him to shoot these particular people… you must acquit!”
Petes Place
@Gay In Maine:
I too have been working for an incumbent politician over the past 6 years and have come into close (and terrifying) contact with obviously imbalanced individuals who you so succinctly describe as ‘unable to control their anger’. It is ALWAYS, ALWAYS, talking points heard from Fox and right wing radio that they repeat endlessly. Fox and their radio counterparts have long provided a safe harbor for extremists looking for vindication and justification in their delusions. They feed the fear. I don’t even believe this is about politics for these media stars – at its’ true core this is about what people will do for money. The media extremists know better, but have long ago sold their soul for a piece of silver.
Davis X. Machina
@NorthernMNer: Depends on the state.
Article 1, section 16 of the Maine state constitution, passed by referendum in 1987, makes me wonder whether any regulation, if challenged, would survive judicial scrutiny:
The referendum amended an earlier version by striking a reference to ‘the common defense’, and adding the last clause.
bemused
@Dr. Squid:
That’s quite a stretch saying those weren’t crosshairs, they were surveyor map symbols. Sounds like panic time in Wasilla.
I wonder how she will explain her tweet calling the crosshairs as “bullseye” icons.
hueyplong
Over the next days, weeks, whatever, the shooter is going to be examined by mental health experts, and any statements he made in custody before demanding legal counsel, or on websites prior to doing the shooting, are going to come to light.
We all know that waiting for that to happen is best, but we are pushed the other way by (1) the anxiety and impatience that arises from reacting to real events as opposed to mere posts and (2) watching the right wing noise machine swing into action to create a narrative that will absolve itself regardless of what is later learned.
Because he uses some of the terminology of the right, and raises points that look a lot like the hated “false equivalence,” we’re jumping on the author of this piece.
Raenelle
It seems pretty evident that the shooter was responding much more to the voices in his head than to any he received from the external world. Blaming anyone or anything at this point seems stupid.
However, it is undeniable that the political atmosphere in this country is poisonous. People are being stirred up. And that produces ripples. E.g., go for a drive. If someone rudely cuts you off, it’s irritating–bad ripples. If someone kindly allows room for you to change lanes, it’s calming–good ripples. The ripples in this country right now are poisonous.
And it is also undeniable that Sarah Palin and her ilk exhibit a reckless disregard for the potential consequences of their language. I’m sure the last thing Palin wanted was for one of her targets actually to be shot. But I also believe she lacks any genuine wisdom about the responsibility for compassionate listening and calm speech. IMO, she’s immature and only measures her words in terms of the applause she gets.
Sure, Sarah Palin’s not to blame. Right-wing hate radio is not to blame. But both are certainly ugly facts of American life that violate the central moral law of life–to help rather than to harm.
BR
@eemom:
In other words, like most college libertarians.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@WereBear: But exactly why did he target her? John Hinckley, Jr. shot Ronald Reagan for Jodie Foster. Reagan was a political target, but it wasn’t because of taxes or his dealings with Iran.
We, I, want this shooting to be because of the stuff he was hearing from the right, because we want some evidence we can present to them that they have gone too far. But we don’t know that those were the reasons. Some things that have popped up almost imply that he’s memorized 1984, and think the government is trying to control our language (which is weird since no one seems to be able to put a brake on the number of words that enter the language each day).
So we have to wait.
ETA: If we jump, and then we find out he’s just been paying attention to the voices in his head, then what? Afterward, every shooting will immediately be followed by “they’re accusing us again, just like last time.”
eemom
That’s another thing. Kind of odd for the leadership of the “Democrats are ineffectual p*ssies” brigade to urge us all to sit quietly on our hands while that happens.
Cacti
@eemom:
As was mentioned yesterday, sending “thoughts and prayers” requires neither effort nor sincerity. It does give people who have said irresponsible things a socially acceptable skirt to hide behind.
In reality, it has all the practical value of the late Duane Allman’s comment “I’ll eat a peach for peace”.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people):
I saw that and I am sure that the rest of the righties will be tuning up the Mighty Wurlitzer to crank out their bullshit when the Monday ‘news’ cycle starts. I’m sure that the sheriff will be getting a taste of exactly what he was talking about. Judging from his statements, he isn’t likely to be cowed by the likes of Kyl. It’s the crazy people he has to worry about.
Now the nuts on the right are going to be taking aim at him, egging on the nuts to do something with that aim of theirs.
Emma
My family arrived in this country in 1970. I was a 14-year-old, and I jumped into this new, free world with both feet. My extended Cuban family calls me “the most American” of all. But lately I have been feeling that America has taken a turn I can’t understand, and in some ways it’s fueled by people like E.D.
I like E.D. I don’t always agree with him, but I think he’s the kind of conservative I think we can do business with, politically speaking. But lately I have watched conservatives like E.D. twist themselves into pretzels to give the crazies the benefit of the doubt. This is a perfect example.
Words matter, E.D. If a mentally ill person is constantly surrounded by a drumbeat of violence against a certain kind of people, it is a very real possibility that he will take that to heart and act.
Violet
@NorthernMNer:
I think different states have different laws about that. Honestly I don’t know enough about gun laws to know, really. I am just aware of hearing about it on the news off and on, especially after a tragedy like this or Virginia Tech occurs.
I think the whole system is terribly broken and it’s very difficult to get treatment, even if diagnosed properly, and even more so if you don’t have insurance. After someone is diagnosed I have no idea how the information that someone is, say, schizophrenic, gets to whatever agency is in charge of a list of who is allowed to buy guns. I can imagine that that sort of transference of info might not happen quickly and can also get bogged down or backlogged.
There is also the problem if misdiagnosis. Perhaps the person only goes to their GP, who misdisgnoses depression, when someone is in the early stages of a major psychotic break. Perhaps they only see a pychologist, who isn’t licensed to prescribe meds, instead of a psychiatrist, and even if the psychologist recognizes they need more assistance, the patient doesn’t follow up on it.
People struggling with mental health issues very often need an advocate, like a spouse, partner, parent, etc. to help them navigate the very challenging mental health system. The very nature of mental health issues means the person’s mental capacity is affected and they may not be able to get help on their own. And the advocate has to be extremely assertive in making sure the person gets the help they need. The first diagnosis, doctor, meds, may not be right. It requires a lot of commitment and energy. Many people do not have this kind of support.
There are so many pieces involved in just getting someone to get help and any part of that might fall apart. Like I said above, I don’t know how someone can be forced to get treatment unless they are a danger to themselves or society and until then, can they be put on a “no gun purchase” list? I just don’t know.
Malron
Sure is fascinating watching Kain try to pretend conservative rhetoric and hatemongering didn’t contribute to the uptick in violence in this country.
polyorchnid octopunch
@Malraux: Hey, is this the Malraux from iwt? I be jake123.
NobodySpecial
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): After seeing what’s happened to the word, ‘liberal’, do we really want to be discussing how NewSpeak seems closer than ever? Or for that matter, the fun stuff like ‘collateral damage’?
New words enter all languages all the time. How they’re shaped and what they’re shaped into is another story.
jurassicpork
That’s not true. Many things he said in that 7 minute-long Youtube video were outlandish and mostly incoherent conspiracy theories about the gov’t controlling our grammar and longing to go back to the gold standard. Who does that sound like? Certainly not us liberals.
Mike Flannigan weighs in on this very issue of violent, right wing rhetoric and imagery in his newest article, “The OK Corral on Your Corner.”
Dr. Squid
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
You could call Reagan a political target, but he was also arguably the most famous person in the country at the time. Targeting the most famous person in America: not necessarily political. Targeting a Congressperson who is likely unknown to more than half the population of her district: political.
Cacti
@bemused:
Or her “Don’t retreat – reload” comment.
Artnoize
Bottom line:
“It’s the guns, stupid”.
We need freedom of speech, and we need to control gun ownership.
WereBear
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): Hinkley shot Reagan, and another mentally disturbed person crippled Wallace, and they were after famous people to become famous themselves.
This isn’t a mystery, nor did it take very long, to find out why motivated them; they wrote diaries they expected to have published after the deed! The whole point was that people would know why they did it.
And this is somehow not noteworthy? That the people who shoot right wing politicians are NOT politically motivated, but have some other compulsion driving them?
This has nothing to do with the fact that left wing politicians do not advocate violence, or use it routinely in their rhetoric?
While the people who shoot politicians on the left wing ARE politically motivated (no matter how deranged.) Because they also say so. According to the video this Arizona shooter made, it was government and the gold standard, and that’s the kind of ranting you only hear from one political party.
How does this not prove my point?
Alex
Thank you ED. People here need to etch this into their fucking skulls over and over and over again. The man is, in all likelihood, a delusional psychotic. If this is true (and it’s more likely than any alternative explanation at the moment), then this horrific event would have occurred — and repeat these words over and over in your head — regardless of the reigning political rhetoric of the last two years. Anybody — and I mean anybody — who mentions Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, or the right wing within a million words of Gabriel Giffords and/or Jared Loughner has marked themselves as out as a miscreant who is attempting to manipulate a brutal murder to satisfy their own political prejudices. These people should be endlessly derided, persecuted, and spat upon. This applies not only to direct assertions of a connection but also the soft-minded tripe we see on the front page here and on Sullivan and on the disgusting digby’s blog about the political tone in this country.
Paris
That post added nothing to the discussion.
Occam’s Razor, dude.
FWIW – most of the little Protestant denominations that keep appearing and splintering seemed to be more and more fundamentalist and bigoted. Due to their desire for purity and lack of tolerance, founding new religions seems to be what conservatives do.
Nick in PA
Bullshit, E.D. Unadulterated ass-covering bullshit from people who caried monkey dolls to Palin rallies in 2008 and still scream about ‘the blood of tyrants.’
Sorry, chief — fuck them and all who defend them.
So what if Loughner was a nut? Gee — who would have thought? Keep screaming about all the crap wingers do, and eventually, someone ‘reloads.’
jk
@Raenelle:
“Sure, Sarah Palin’s not to blame. Right-wing hate radio is not to blame. But both are certainly ugly facts of American life”
Thankfully, tonight is the season finale of Palin’s stupid reality show. Supposedly, TLC hasn’t committed to a second season, so tonight’s episode may also be the series finale.
Georgia pig
No one is attributing bad faith to e.d., it’s just that he’s obtuse. No one thinks that Palin or other conservatives want dem politicians to be shot, but they’re such irresponsible opportunists that have near zero disregard for any responsibility to be factual or to consider the possible consequences of their actions. The issue isn’t whether there is a causal relationship to this particular shooter, but whether these assholes will pause and have doubts about whether their actions contribute to this horror, for example, their ridiculous assertion of absolutist positions on gun control that makes it ok to, for example, bring a weapon to a political appearance.
Violet
@bemused:
Fixed.
Sarah Palin is moving to Arizona. Her lawyer has already moved there. Her daughter Bristol has moved there. Rumors are they’ve already bought another house in Scottsdale.
Those winters in Wasilla can be mighty cold.
NobodySpecial
@Alex: You know who else was a delusional psychotic, right?
eemom
@DougJarvus Green-Ellis:
And THAT. Ferfucksake:
What are we, idiots?
Cacti
@Nick in PA:
And this what Hate Inc. needs to be beaten over the head with.
This is what “second amendment remedies” look like. People lying dead and bleeding in a grocery store parking lot.
dslak
Given that not all delusional psychotics go on to attack other people, an explanation other than (or in addition to) “he was a delusional psychotic” is required when one of them chooses to attack someone.
NorthernMNer
@Violet: I can’t imagine how it might be for someone with a mental illness to try and get the help they need in our incredibly broken mental health system.
The more I think about that angle, the more this is awful and depressing.
GregB
Doesn’t Palin’s moronic spokesperson realize that crosshairs are what is inside of the gun sight?
It is the most stupid thing I have ever heard.
Also, they are in spin mode because they feel guilty.
Also, I am in tears about the brave young intern who rushed to Gifford’s side and helped start triage.
A fucking hero in our midst.
And Frank Luntz and his all killing all the time focus group talking point can go fuck himself.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@bemused: Well, we all know how proud Sarah is of her surveying skills.
FeFiFo
And what do we think now that the shooter has ties to American Renaissance, a white nationalist group with ads for the Tea Party on their front page?
RoyalEw
Oh, c’mon, Kain. You don’t roost the anti-government sentiment of the Tuscon shooter with any particular political philosophy and the strongest link you can find is that the shooter’s currency nuttiness “might look pretty Ron Paulish.” Bullshit.
Was I dreaming through the last campaign cycle when every Republican and Tea Party candidate and consultant, and every Fox News commentator talked about the silent coup that Obama had effected and the Democratic Party’s unconstitutional usurpation of power? Wasn’t that the whole point of the Greatest Show on Earth reading of the Constitution that just took place? And I suppose it was simply forgetting my medication that led me to believe that probably a hundred recent Glenn Beck shows featured discussions of the decline and fall of America’s currency explicitly linked to revolution and an apocalyptic future. Get a job with Fox News; they’re doing the same thing, making the case that the shooting had nothing to do with the increasing fixation of the right wing on guns as the solution to everything.
jk
@bemused:
“Sounds like panic time in Wasilla. I wonder how she will explain her tweet calling the crosshairs as “bullseye” icons.”
Sarah Palin is the teflon airhead. Ever since the 2008 election, nothing has ever stuck to her. The “Best Political Team on Television” along with the rest of the MSM will continue giving her a free pass as long as they’re able to make money off of her.
dslak
(continued from 208) Some of those reasons might be opaque, if we cannot penetrate that person’s thought processes, but that does not make it irrational or immoral to speculate about environmental factors that may have influenced that supposedly psychotic person to act out. Were someone to give a weapon to a person with violent, psychotic tendencies and taunt the person, we would not then infer that the person attacking the taunter was caused simply by the person being “a delusional psychotic.”
Keith G
The fact seems to be that we do not know what philosophy, background noise, and/or illness fed this man’s actions.
We do not know if Loughner tried to kill a Democrat or just tried to kill the closest “big name” official when he snapped.
We do not know, but I am fairly certain that links will be found and connections will be make. Where will those connections lead?
Further, it seems to me that some are conflating two different points. I have certainly made the case to others that the right’s rhetoric has been totally unacceptable in its eliminationist attitude. Palin et al need to stop. Still it is too soon to their culpability for the actions of a disturbed individual.
I am saddened and disappointed by all the imagined certainty, and in some cases, chest thumping. Too bad. As a lifelong liberal, I have always taken pride that my side were the rational ones.
Cacti
@FeFiFo:
Both sides do it!
Vishnu Schist
I doubt that the shooter ever read Burke or pondered the implications civil rights laws on the freedom to engage in interstate commerce or what ever the fuck is the haughty intellectual basis for “conservatism” du jour. And I’m quite sure that the shooter was not thinking the he was going to commit and deeply conservative act when he decided in his fucked up mind to kill people. But I do know this, that what passes as conservatism these days is nothing but the tried and true demonizing of the other to try to keep the reigns of power for one more election cycle. We could go on until the cows come home, but the bottom line is this. The “conservatives” need an enemy and when the commies went away they decided that Eisenhower was close enough and started to call him one, so everyone that was a “moderate republican” was now a commie and was here to take away your freedoms. Well the old 3/5 crowd was still around so they could continue to beat on that drum too. So now they had the internal enemy defined as the perjorative “liberal”. And ol’ Ronnie let it be know that the government was the enemy too and that was also associated with the fucking liberals. And your asshole golfing buddy thought it hilarious that his buddy gave him a liberal hunting permit, along with a terrorist hunting permit. And your Dad now thinks the SEIU is the second biggest threat to the country behind the 3/5’er running the fucking show. And them fucking liberals!!! So when some asshole with a mental problem decides he needs to do something (prodded by others or not) well it just seems so logical to just go shoot the enemy doesn’t it? I mean they are the enemy right? They are government, Ronnie said they were the enemy. And they are liberals! They are democrats right? And sure as shit they are activist judges right? But what am I thinking, it’s all coincidence, nothing to look at here. Just some nut job, no way he was effected by Burke, or anything else. He just up and decided to shoot someones ass at the Safeway, and there was a crowd there for something. Frankly, I’m assuming he wanted to shoot up one of those fucking puppy giveaways, that makes much more sense.
Cat Lady
@Alex:
Clueless fucktardness, thy name is Alex.
Malron
Conservative guilt on display:
I’d love to hear more conservatives say this when the right is “politicizing” a tragedy. 9/11 anyone?
adolphus
@Jennifer:
I’m with you and Kain. I cannot and will not draw a direct causal relationship between this shooting and Palin, Angle, Bachmann and any other right wing violence peddler until there is evidence.
On the other hand I the hate-filled, violence rhetoric was awful before this incident and it hasn’t changed. Had this incident never happened I would feel the same. These leaders, and they are whether we like it or not, rely on gun and violent rhetoric to rouse the chest-thumping, macho-man-pants wearing, jingoistic belligerence that resonates with certain populations. They use this emotions for short term political and financial gain. They cannot turn around and act all contrite when what they call for actually happens whether they are directly responsible or not. That they did not intend for these results (and I believe they didn’t) means that they used the rhetoric of guns and violence frivolously in a world where they are anything but.
For some reason I have not been able to get Twain’s War Prayer out of my head. Asking for the good things of war is also asking for the tragic whether you want the tragic to happen or not. You can’t look away when both happen.
Any politician who uses this imagery in posters and language should be asked immediately if they really mean for this to happen. Is that what you really want? If not, what do you say to all the people who have lost loved ones to gun violence?
Again, I don’t hold these politicians directly responsible for the tragedy yesterday. I hold them responsible for their actions already committed which is enough.
Lets not let this horrific tragedy make us forget there were also three bombs sent to MD and DC government office buildings last week. What happened there? Do we know yet?
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Alex:
Wingnuts Away!
Fucking git.
Short Bus Bully
Implied incitement to violence for political purposes — AOK.
Criticism of said incitement to violence after violence occurs — vile political point scoring.
Got it.
Oh, wait. That’s called rank hypocrisy.
Friend of mine wrote this and it’s a concise distillation of the bullshit false equivalence meme that’s swirling around the toilet bowl of this discussion, and posts like this are a perfect example. E.D., you’re full of shit on this.
Judas Escargot
@bemused:
…or how “take aim” and “reload” are actually surveying terms.
Cassidy
Re: looking for an older white male accomplice
Insurgents in Iraq started using the mentally ill for their suicide vest runs. Not unprecedented.
NobodySpecial
@Cat Lady: Well, he was gonna say, ‘shot’, but that’s insensitive.
adolphus
@Malron:
Or the VA Tech tragedy when so many espoused the opinion that if students were allowed to carry on campus someone would have taken out the culprit.
Now that this has happened Gun-toting, Wild West, He-Man Arizona we aren’t hearing that so much.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Violet:
The Tundra Tart and her hubby don’t need that paltry dividend/welfare check Alaskans get every year for living there now that she has her own private gravy train to live off of.
A fool and their money are soon parted and her supporters are fools.
WereBear
So let me get this freakin’ straight.
They actually call for it.
AND
It actually happens.
BUT
They are then not “directly responsible.”
Do I have this right? What part of Western Logic does this fall under?
Cassidy
@Alex: Interesting. It seems every person who goes nuts with a gun and has right wing leanings is a delusional psychotic. Except Eric Rudolph; he’s a hero.
Maybe the delusional psychotics are those who refuse to take responsibility for their words and actions.
sukabi
E.D. that’s the thing with labels, they don’t fit anyone. It doesn’t matter that you can’t pin a definitive political label on Loughner, to imagine that he’s not been influenced by the violent political rhetoric on TV, radio, billboards, in his home or community is to deny that the violent society in which we live exists. It’s also a denial that what we say and what we hear does have consequences.
If you think you haven’t been influenced by what Palin, Beck, O’Reilly, Hannity say, or how the yapping mutts on TV, in the paper or on the internet cover it then you’re not a very self-aware person. The fact that you can find Palin’s map disgusting or the violent rhetoric coming from RW radio / TV repulsive shows that it does have an influence on YOU, and shapes YOUR thinking to some degree. It’s having a negative influence, but it’s an influence.
Unfortunately, there are folks out there that will be influenced to ACT because of the effect of this kind of rhetoric. It serves as a “justification” as well as a rhetorical match to set off their fevered imaginations and unleashes their darkest impulses. It goes from being a “harmless” political catch phrase the moment it leaves the paper or palm it’s written on and is verbalized by someone perceived as being important. It becomes permission to act to those so inclined, whether they align themselves with your political viewpoint or not, but especially for those people teetering on the edge of sanity.
smith
@FeFiFo:
If this is true and if true that he had an older accomplice, it will get tougher and tougher for the right-wing morons to keep trying to spin the shooter as a “liberal” and “hippy leftist” as they are desperately trying to do.
Chyron HR
@Alex:
Yeah, that’ll teach THOSE people to claim that Republicans dehumanize and call for violence against their political opponents.
bemused
@Cacti:
That too but it’s kind of fascinating to watch the attempt to whitewash the crosshairs thing and then read that someone had already discovered Palin’s own words (or approved surrogate’s words) chortling about the success rate of the bullseye icons targeting the 20 Dem candidates and wondering how she is gonna ‘splain that away.
BGinCHI
When Sharron Angle said “Second Amendment remedies,” she became responsible for what that really looks like.
Not some fantasy Hollywood Alamo defense of America, but a 9-year-old girl dead in a grocery store parking lot.
Incitement by Angle, Palin, and right-wing radio aims the gun that shoots politicians and bystanders.
bemused
@Judas Escargot:
Heh.
cleek
@Chad N Freude:
i didn’t claim they were equivalent. i didn’t claim they were likely to succeed. i merely mentioned them to note that Americans have tried to kill prominent America right wing politicians. people try to kill politicians – it’s just a simple fact. that’s all.
Cacti
So it seems the shooter may have had ties to a white supremacist org.
What now, cyber-school marms?
Bob Loblaw
@John Cole:
Because certain people have decided the sole desired response to this is to run one single politician they don’t like out on a rail. Because there’s a big shiny (probably irrelevant) doodad to pin the blame on Sarah Palin with that map.
Except for the fact that the guy who shot up the crowd was from that congressional district. I’m betting he knew who the congresswoman was, with or without the map, with or without anybody ever even knowing who Palin was. He didn’t have to hunt Giffords down, he had to drive to his own local grocery store.
And the media voices and political guidance he heard aren’t just going to be the big names on Fox that people out here in the broader world know about. They’re going to be blogs and local radio stations and citizens with names you’ve never heard of and never will. This was done in a state that swept itself up in a tide of extreme intolerance and bigotry, by a person seemingly obsessed by bimetallism, abortion, and government mind control.
This goes deeper than Sarah Palin. Hell, this goes deeper than the entire Republican Party.
JPL
Republicans have won several seats by promoting fear, bigotry and using vile soundbites for decades. They are not going to stop. As an example illegal immigration is lower now than it was under the previous administration but they decided that it was a good tactic to get their supporters to the polls.
Cacti
@BGinCHI:
It’s the “Operation Rescue” school of political rhetoric. Stop just short of calling for the assassination of your political/philosophical opponents, then act aghast when it actually occurs and hide behind the First Amendment.
I believe in the First Amendment, and I also believe in social censure for those who exercise that right irresponsibly. There isn’t nearly enough of the latter these days.
Suzan
It goes without saying that we don’t know what motivated him. He seems mentally ill so we probably won’t ever know. And if the target had been a republican, I’m sure Fox and Palin and Rush would be digging up blog comments showing intemperance on the left.
But every sentient being knows it is not the same. We didn’t impeach W (no, I won’t get over it). Joe “you lie” Wilson should have been humiliated by his own party for what he said. Everyone on the right should have told Palin there were no “death panels”. The GOP should have been shamed for impeaching Clinton, staging fake “mobs” in Florida in 2000, and the birther and Foster-was-murdered nonsense should have been murdered in their respective cribs instead of allowed to fester and bubble up to “respectable” people.
What bothers me most about someone on the right scolding me for assuming this has something to do with the violent rhetoric on the right is that you don’t scold the right when they say Obama is out to destroy American with his socialism. Ok, yes, maybe you said it a time or two on a blog post someplace, but so few of you, with the exception of John Cole and Andrew Sullivan, say “this is wrong and I will not be associated with a party or group that does it.” There should be consequences for the rhetoric of the right but instead, the GOPs party leaders are now Palin, Rush, and Beck. So it will continue. And if you really are concerned about the debt, you should insist that your elected officials do something about it, like Clinton did, and not continue to vote for people who use “terrorists” and “debt” and “socialism” to win elections and once in office refuse to propose anything remotely serious about any of our problems. All the while accusing us or treason for trying to provide health care for our fellow citizens.
Tom M
@Dave C:
Well, he did use Mecca as a metaphor and therefore is a Muslim who wants to build a mosque at ground zero which as we all know is next door in New Mexico.
gbear
@Cacti:
In keeping with the lie that those were supposedly surveyors symbols, she’ll stick with the AutoCAD theme and say what she really meant was ‘don’t refresh – redraw’.
She is never ever going to go out on a book tour again.
AuldBlackJack
@Barb (formerly Gex):
Exactly. This
There are FDA approved drugs on the market that ‘we don’t know‘ the exact mechanism of action for. But we know from the science of statistics that they work. They cure disease.
Our courts convict when ‘we don’t know‘ via a smoking gun the guilt of a criminal. Beyond a reasonable doubt is a sufficiently high enough standard.
And any reasonable person reading your linked article can be left with little doubt.
adolphus
@WereBear:
You have found correlation but not causation. I can call for the death of anyone I want. I will feel guilty if that ever happens. But in order to tie that act to me you have to show that the killer was conscious of what I said, was motivated by my words, or show I helped in some way. Maybe I am morally responsible, I believe I would be as I believe these talk-show hosts and politicians who use this rhetoric are morally responsible,(As I believe are all of the people who could rein them in or challenge them but don’t, like journalists) but they are not directly responsible until you can show causation. Maybe we will ultimately be able to do that. This incident happened only 24 hours ago. Give it some time.
The same thing that repulses me about the violent rhetoric on the right is the same thing that keeps me from jumping to conclusions in this case a scant 24 hours after the incident. a desire for a calm, reflective political and social discourse.
EDIT: Oh, and it falls under the Western Empirical Tradition. It relies on actually being able to prove cause and effect with actual data, not our emotions, superficial appearances of correlation, or deducing from first principles.
Larry Signor
@Cacti: Oh, they’ll tell us, again, not to rush to judgment. I’m not rushing, I’m already there. Fuck apologizing for detesting the right wing assholes that caused this. Yes, Caused this. This can’t be explained away or deleted. These fucks (Palin and pals) are guilty.
sukabi
@Bob Loblaw: the thing is, while “local influences” may have had a more direct impact on this person, do you think the surrounding population, the community leaders and those that “set the tone” in that area DON’T listen to talk radio, the TV or read their favorite political rag? All the hateful crap flowing from Sarah Palin, Glen Beck, Hannity, Limbaugh and all the others sets the tone and lowers the bar for discourse, whether you listen to them or not… The violent rhetoric they use filters into everything and becomes “acceptable”.
Jason
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
If we jump, and we find out he actually meant to kill Roll and not Gifford, then what? If we jump, and it turns out that his treatment was a great success story and that he was as close to rational as could be expected, but wanted to kill Gifford so that a Republican would be placed in her seat, then what? If he wasn’t schizophrenic but just stupid, then what?
It is indeed likely that, in the absence of inflammatory rhetoric, Loughner would be as capable of shooting a politician purely as the result of a mental sickness.
It is just as likely that, in the absence of mental illness, Loughner would be as capable of shooting a politician purely as a result of the presence of inflammatory rhetoric.
These are hypothetical ideas that rest on the presumption that there are pure motives, and that motives mitigate any social or cultural context. And I’m not sure anybody’s denying that. It doesn’t matter: you will not be able to prove either, jump or no.
What we do know is that anger over blanket character assassination in political rhetoric predated this shooting, so unless you can say without reservation that this:
“None of you would even care about things like the SarahPAC ad if this shooting didn’t happen.”
is not in the same sort of “what if” construction, but a pretty sure fact, then I’ll take the “Blame
AmericaRhetoric First” crowd as having a pretty good point, and worth pursuing.As opposed the reasoned consideration and introspection we usually get, I suppose:
http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/westboro-baptist-church-arizona-shooting.pdf
http://www.alaskadispatch.com/blogs/palin-watch/8205-palin-staffer-calls-using-tragedy-to-score-political-points-qobsceneq-
Citizen_X
@cleek: OK, but you also said there had been two attempts, by Americans, to kill Dubya. I saw only one: the guy who shot at the White House from the perimeter fence. The only other actual attempt on Bush’s life was the grenade attack in Georgia (the one in Asia).
numbskull
@Dave C: Because ED is pretending like a ridiculously high standard must be met in order for him to denounce the violent rhetoric of the Republican party, and more importantly, for him to expect the Republican leadership and “conservative” commentators to denounce it publicly.
As others have more eloquently stated, assassinations don’t come in a nice neat package with a bow on top. It doesn’t need to be shown that this guy was automon-like following the orders of Beck or Palin to know that rhetoric such as theirs leads to what happened in Tucson. We have the data. We know from history what happens.
matoko_chan
Go away u poseur and let us grieve for our dead and our dying nation in peace.
you and Douchebag and McMegan and Friedersdorf are EXACTLY as responsible as cross-hairs Palin for this.
i fucking hate you right now.
BGinCHI
@Cacti: A friend of mine asked me yesterday what was the difference between Palin and a terrorist.
My reply was that Palin is too lazy to get her hands dirty. Enabling others to do it, though, and benefiting from the posture of threatening violence if you don’t get your way (what bullies do), is her stock in trade.
You’re right on about the OR comparison. Same tactics.
Mike D.
Hmm. When Glocks are outlawed, only outlaws will have Glocks, and they will have Glocks. Meanwhile, quad-band jammers, GPS spoofers, multi-watt laser projectors, UV spotlights, 69 different rainy-day projects involving microwave ovens, and a couple dozen amateur radio license violations are way out of the barn and there was never any point pretending the door could be “locked” in the first place. Heinlein was right; you can’t classify physics.
Imagine the “series of tubes” crowd trying to stay a step ahead of a nation of broke, terminally ill, animated-by-vengeance lone gunmen. You have to chuckle, if only to avoid laughing out loud and distubing the neighbors.
Keep lovin’ that chicken, you magnificent Second Amendment foes. I’d follow you anywhere, if only out of curiosity.
Bob
@John Cole:
Exactly. I was going to make that point.
harlana
@Cacti: Heh, well now, let’s define first, just what exactly being a “conservative” is these days so we can decide whether Loughner was a “conservative” which seems to be the concern of this post. I hope the author will explain further, because, unless I am mistaken, that label has come to encompass more and more cultural and social extremes that were never traditionally considered part of the “conservative” package. I thought conservatism was about reduced spending! (hint, hint)
Being schizophrenic (and perhaps untreated) and not being what is deemed a standard “conservative” (whatever that means these days) does not mean you cannot be inflamed and moved to horrific violence based on right-wing flame-fanning.
Short Bus Bully
@Bob Loblaw:
THIS. A thousand times this.
E.D. Kain
@jomo: Thanks for the vote of confidence, I appreciate it as always.
Chad N Freude
@cleek: C’mon. In one case, it’s not clear that the feckless shooter was gunning for anything more than a symbolic building. In the other, the shooter was Georgian, not American, and the attempt night have been on Saakashvili, who was on the podium along with Bush and others.
matoko_chan
@Alex:
no, fucking cudlip.
Allow me to insert the cattle prod of wisdom into yur wide bovine ass.
ED IS to blame.
McMegan and Sully and Douchebag and Salam and Larison and even my hero Dr. Manzi are ALL EQUALLY to blame.
ED is no different than Cross-hairs Palin in his core ideology.
He tries to give a cloak of reasonableness to conservative psychosis.
hes a shit shill like the rest of the feedlot drenchers.
pretty soon we will hear from Douchebag and McMegan that liberals caused Judge Roll’s death because we wouldn’t enforce anti-immigration policies, just like it was our fault that Dr. Tiller died because we won’t overturn Roe.
WAKE UP YOU RETARD!
bemused
@jk:
I read about Bristol but not that the rest of the family was moving too. Why? What’s in it for the Palins to move to AZ?
Cain
@John Cole:
Like right wingers, some of us (and sometimes I’m included) get upset if something written upsets the framing that is in our mind. When people say “whoa, lets get the facts..” that translates to a fear that we are not going to go after what a lot of us think is the real cause of it, hateful right wing rhetoric. We really want to put the shiv into Limbaugh and others. Frustrated already by cable news false equivalences we act emotionally.
5 cents please.
cain
Brandon
A lot of the discussion is entirely missing the point. It is 100% irrelevant what this guys political persuasion is. The argument that has already been made is very, very easy to for even E.D. Kain to follow.
1. There are crazy people in the world
2. Many crazy people are highly suggestible
3. Violent discourse can be the inception of a violent act in a person who is highly suggestible
4. Therefore, using violent language in the presence of crazy people can result in a violent act
Ways to stop this process would be to, (a) get rid of, control, or remove the brains all crazy people, or (b) have sane people stop using violent discourse. Because the person is not sane, the political beliefs of the crazy person or victims is not relevant, nor is content of the rhetoric beyond the fact that it is violent. What is relevant however are the motivations for the source of the violent discourse to not stop perpetuating it.
matoko_chan
@John Cole: yup, in that post….but pretty soon McMegan and Douchebag will pop up with posts about how the Libruul Agenda RELLY caused Judge Rolls death just like it caused Dr. Tillers.
ED is just another conservative shill for feedlot drench (recycled shit).
Fuck you too for inflicting this wretched intellectually dishonest conservitard pimp on us.
may shaitan burn your testicles in gehenna an hour for every second ED has spent vomiting up specious halftruths and spin here.
numbskull
@Alex: Oh, well, if you say so then it MUST be so.
How about this: Anyone, and I mean anyone, who is named Alex is a fucking delusional tool Anyone. They should forever be derided as unhinged. They should be cast from the colony. They should be made to wear the letter “A” for “Asshole”.
Makes about as much sense as your authoritarian screed, Alex.
Cain
@Villago Delenda Est:
It shouldn’t matter if he did. It’s still wrong and we still need to decry violent rhetoric even if if like a snake it spins and bites the person holding it. If you lose control of the weapon it can turn and kill you and then it is everyone’s problem at that point.
cain
BGinCHI
@bemused: Weather. New rubes.
Jason
@bemused: Arizona has a lot of mountains, valleys, and caves, I guess.
Let’s all remember that I never said anybody was exactly like anybody else, and that I’m likely “just” schizophrenic.
Cacti
@bemused:
A future Senate run.
Old man McCain is, well, an old man the deserts of Arizona are fertile ground for the type of right wing gutter politics she peddles.
WereBear
@adolphus: Upon rereading your comment, I was a bit intemperate in jumping on you over it.
I apologize.
“Directly responsible” would be the person who gave him a ride to the rally, if it turns out there is one, as well as the shooter himself.
But if the shooter had made a You Tube video where he explained why he was planning to do this, and it echoed several right wing memes; I’d have to be stupid not to see some influence on the violence incitement, and the subsequent violence.
PS
@Brandon: I agree with your 4 numbered points, though not entirely with the paras that top & tail the comment.
ED, I think, is at best seriously misjudging his audience. People are angry, and with good reason. And the tone of his original post suggests that he is not angry, except at the rest of us. I suspect he did not mean that, but it would be nice if ED could admit error. Because he made one.
Stefan
Note that the shooter shot the congresswoman representing his district. Whether it is relevant that she was a Democrat is something we don’t know yet. Would he have taken the same action if his district was represented by a Republican? We don’t know (and may never know). “We covet what we see every day”
Note that Lee Harvey Oswald shot the president representing his country. Whether it is relevant that he was a Democrat is something we don’t know yet. Would he have taken the same action if his country was represented by a Republican? We don’t know (and may never know). “We covet what we see every day.”
Cain
@John Cole:
This. I want my beliefs to be challenged otherwise I wouldn’t know if they were right or not if it didn’t come under scrutiny. The blog is better when we have other voices. The problem is of course that we label people and then build a strawman against them based on the label so even what one writes doesn’t matter when people only see the strawman.
cain
morzer
@PS:
Well, he’s more used to a right-wing, and rather bizarre audience over at the LOOG. He’s basically a voice of reason over there, which means neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but somehow always splitting the difference.
polyorchnid octopunch
@WereBear: Yes. I live near the US border, and tune in to the talk radio stuff from time to time, usually if I’m in a car running up the Canadian side of the St. Lawrence (easiest to pick them up there). They are completely off the hook. It’s the reason I call utter bullshit on the false equivalancy; there is nothing, but nothing like the crap I’ve heard on American talk radio over the last decade or so.
The last time I was doing that run and tuned in to some of that was when I was going up near Cornwall with the rock band I played with at the time. We were running around the dial looking for something to listen to, when we came across some ranting loon from a stateside radio station. We listened to it for about ten minutes laughing uncontrollably and looking at each other and saying “Good lord, americans are fucking crazy!” The other sentiment was that we couldn’t believe that people were allowed time on the spectrum to talk like that.
scav
as a mental break for those that don’t follow football, we could be speculating as to just what methods her media-team are using to keep Lady Starbursts from using this clear opportunity to own the center stage of media attention as is her usual wont.
numbskull
@Suzan: I agree.
PS
@morzer: Yes, that might explain it. But he’s not just a commenter here, he’s a poster, and he really needs to think harder about his audience. In fact, he has a point, up to a point, but the way he made that point was quite unnecessarily pointed (OK, I’ll stop), let’s say provocative, under the circumstances, and bordered on sounding condescending and paternalistic, which around here is absolutely incendiary.
bemused
@Cacti:
Ha. Palin running against McCranky would be pretty entertaining.
Citizen_X
@Mike D.: What the fuck was that about? If guns are outlawed, deranged loners will build lazer death rayz in their basements, and haw haw that’s funny?
I’m all in favor of letting sane people own guns. Given that post, I don’t think you qualify.
ksmiami
@someguy: And this is why I barely comment here. ED Kain is yet another apologist for the crazy, delusional and breathtakingly irresponsible Right. Moderate Dems and others here knew where this road was headed the moment Sarah Palin launched her VP campaign to a crowd of angry wingers…. THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT THE RIGHT WANTED and so they have no justification in claiming that they have no responsibility. And the best part is that they are the ones who claim to be right to life. ED JUST FUCK OFF! People in the
sukabi
@scav: well, besides scrubbing her websites, facebook wall and twitter feed of all the bullseye graphics, and violent, inciting rhetoric they are busy trying to spin her campaign target graphic as not being gun related bullseyes, but rather surveyors marks on a map…
it should be an interesting couple of days, as Palin herself has referred back to the graphic as a “bullseye”…
reality-based
Aren’t we all forgetting the TRUE victims here? The poor right-wing loonies, who – not even stopping to wipe the blood off their shoes first – are sobbing in the NY times about how MEAN everybody is being to them.
Look, the wingnut strategy is already clear –
1. call the shooter a liberal
2. claim that political anger and violence affects BOTH sides
3. Howl about how UNFAIR and MEAN every is being to Palin, the teatards, Glenn Beck, etc.
all of which is demonstrably untrue.
But it won’t matter – by Tuesday or Wednesday, when the cops have laid a clear chain from the shooter to the right-wing Two Minute Daily hate, the “ALL parties have to tone down their rhetoric” story will be the agreed-upon Village line, and the crazies will get off scot free. Again.
After all – when the loonie shot up the Unitarian church – was it front page news? Did you even HEAR about it on TV, or that the nut was a teatard?
The media won’t call it what it is – right-wing, fascist violence – and the Slouching Toward Kristallnacht will move steadily forward.
What I want to know is – when the shooter/right-wing rhetoric connection is clearly proven, in a couple of days – will E.D.Kain come back here and post a mea culpa? A REAL mea culpa, not one in which he excuses today’s post by pointing out his superior reasonableness of temperment and native caution?
(he’s never apologized before for the myriad factual errors in his posts – so this would make a refreshing change. )
morzer
@PS:
I have defended Kain posting here, and will continue to do so, but there are times when he really makes me think that:
I believe he means well and is sincere, but I sometimes think he simply does not understand the reality of the times we live in.
Keith G
@morzer: Is he proposing that nothing be done?
@PS: I am part of his audience. And though we often disagree, the only times I have had trouble with his work is when the reasoning was lazy. This is not one of those times. He is not the one whose writings are based on fallacious reasoning.
terry chay
What I learned from E.D. Kain and others is that it’s okay to yell fire in a crowded theatre as long as the person yelling has an (R) by their name on national TV.
Whoo hoo!
cleek
@Citizen_X:
i was counting the guy who said he was going to shoot W but got stopped on the way.
2, 1, no difference to my point: people do try to kill right wing politicians.
@Chad N Freude:
please, read the entire sub-thread.
Poopyman
@polyorchnid octopunch:
The Fairness Doctrine was abolished under Reagan, and things went rapidly downhill from there.
Used to be that people thought the airwaves were public property, and broadcasters were keepers of the public trust. Ahhhh, those were the days ….
morzer
@Keith G:
I think he does effectively take that position here, by minimizing the fairly obvious links between what Loughner is saying and what Glenn Beck et al are saying. I have said, and will continue to say, that I think he provides a refreshing change of viewpoint, and argues it in a temperate and courteous way, but there are times when he really seems to be arguing himself in circles.
Midnight Marauder
@John Cole:
What’s really embarrassing is how fucking increasingly pathetic your perpetual defense of E.D. Kain obtuseness has become. For fuck’s sake, no one gives a shit if he is a bad person. People think he is a smug, oblivious, glibertarian asshole. Period. End of discussion. No fucking judgment of his human essence involved. But fuck, that’s the FIRST AND ONLY thing you go to when E.D. dribbles out inanity of the highest order. NO ONE GIVES A FUCK IF HE IS A GOOD OR BAD PERSON!
This is a real thing.
This is not a real thing.
Apparently, this is something you just discovered. You should read your own comment section more often.
nancydarling
The “wise” old men of the Republican party are all Dr. Frankensteins who can no longer control their monster. I don’t know when it all began, but it intensified with the Southern strategy of Nixon. St. Reagan kicked off one of his campaigns in Philadelphia, Mississippi. They threw red meat to the great unwashed in the form of abortion—they never intended to do anything about that one, but if ever forced to, their wives and daughters would not have to worry as they could always jet off to Switzerland for the operation or a doctor friend from the country club would oblige them. Now they have added gay civil rights and other hot button issues to the menu. They should be called the GAG (god, abortion, and guns) instead of the GOP. They can’t win elections without this ill-educated rabble that they have enabled. and now the chickens are roosting in their back yards.
In my darker moments, I fear for my country. What scares me the most is how a person like E.D. Kain wants to be associated with these sociopaths as he is obviously not stupid—ignorant maybe, but not stupid. Is he a billionaire? Does he live in a gated community with his own private army? He does have to breath the same air as the rest of us. Is he against the EPA regulations that cleaned up our air and water (after the Cuyahoga River literally caught fire in 1969)? Is he a climate change denier too? Explain your self E.D. and I’m still waiting for the names of the Dem. equivalents of Palin, Bachman, etc.
morzer
@Midnight Marauder:
Some people have the extreme negative view of Ed Kain that you are propagating here, but not all of us. Please don’t presume to speak for everyone.
Alex
@matoko_chan: I simply won’t take criticism from a stupid illiterate like yourself who writes like someone with Down Syndrome. You are a fool and a joke, whichever comment board you show up in. You are a court jester. Someone as breathtakingly ignorant as yourself should know your place and shut up when it isn’t your turn.
Midnight Marauder
@morzer:
I guess that is why I was not presuming to speak for everyone then, right? Because that is something that you are just projecting based on nothing I actually said. You will note that I said “People think” as opposed to “Everyone thinks.” That presumes there are people I am not speaking for.
But thanks for the protip.
PS
@Keith G: Actually, I was not saying that his reasoning per se was fallacious in this instance, but his sensibility and phrasing. Usually, I’m with you: I may disagree with him but I think he has a point of view worth expressing and arguing (for and with). In this case, ED was, in my opinion, inappropriate. He wandered into a fire, not exactly with gasoline but with a copy of the morning paper that he should have known would burn.
Warren Terra
Late to the thread, and haven’t read it, but it calls for a response, and that response is clear:
Fuck you, Kain.
You don’t get to play the Reasonable Conservative on this one. You don’t get to say that Loughner was a delusional paranoid psychotic and a mixed-up kid, and that we just can’t know what happened. You don’t get to maintain your act of disdaining the unfortunate enthusiasms of your ideological fellow-travelers while downplaying them. The entire conservative movement is at this point completely permeated by a miasma of conspiracy theories, Godwinist screeds, pseudo-Jeffersonian visions of armed resistance and domestic terrorism, and of course apocalyptic visions both religious and secular. All of this has been very useful to work up the energy of the conservative base, and it’s a lot easier than offering a positive vision. But it’s picked up on by the delusional paranoid psychotics, too, and they cherrypick the parts that fit and are encouraged to inflict violence on the political enemies they share with the hate-chorus of the right. Your pretense that because you’re a nice guy your pals should not be in any way held responsible for the logical consequences of their entire strategy just won’t wash. Shame on you.
Poopyman
FYI, updates on Ms. Giffords’ condition and what the wounds are are here.
pragmatism
i have a 4 mo old baby and a sick wife so i ventured out fairly early this morning. early enough to feel like i was hitting the early bird brunch at the del boca vista retirement community. i live in a very red portion of a blue state and parked between a mini cooper with an obama = SOSHULISM bumper sticker with obama as the joker and a F350 with a repeal obamacare bumper sticker and a true conservative sticker with a smiling reagan on there. i camped out for a couple of hours and had several cups of purportedly fair trade/organic coffee and observed when not entertaining my daughter. some interesting conversations to say the least. the overall mood was giddiness. at the next table the news was seen as the wake up call. one elderly gent explained how this would activate the oath keepers who will quell any attempt to go after people who kill “enemies” (read liberals) and then turn the tables on the armed forces/police. twice i heard “she deserved it” with various reasons why. heard a few knee jerk justifications for palin’s website. good times.
just a sunday morning in america. never did get around to eating. lost my stomach for it/had to much fauxganic coffee. but i did notice that these people didn’t seem to care what the politics were (except for protecting palin). they just unabashedly liked the results.
pragmatism
i have a 4 mo old baby and a sick wife so i ventured out fairly early this morning. early enough to feel like i was hitting the early bird brunch at the del boca vista retirement community. i live in a very red portion of a blue state and parked between a mini cooper with an obama = SOSHULISM bumper sticker with obama as the joker and a F350 with a repeal obamacare bumper sticker and a true conservative sticker with a smiling reagan on there. i camped out for a couple of hours and had several cups of purportedly fair trade/organic coffee and observed when not entertaining my daughter. some interesting conversations to say the least. the overall mood was giddiness. at the next table the news was seen as the wake up call. one elderly gent explained how this would activate the oath keepers who will quell any attempt to go after people who kill “enemies” (read liberals) and then turn the tables on the armed forces/police. twice i heard “she deserved it” with various reasons why. heard a few knee jerk justifications for palin’s website. good times.
just a sunday morning in america. never did get around to eating. lost my stomach for it/had to much fauxganic coffee. but i did notice that these people didn’t seem to care what the politics were (except for protecting palin). they just unabashedly liked the results.
Jenn
I honestly don’t get half the responses here to Kain’s post. Those of you saying he’s acting as an apologist for right-wing extremism — did you actually READ the post? He condemns right-wing violent rhetoric, he admits it’s possible that that rhetoric influenced Loughner’s actions, but that at this time, we just don’t know. There’s nothing wrong with saying, I condemn Palin/Angle/[insert your favorite right-wing seditious fuckwad here], I condemn Loughner, but I’m not going to draw The Arrow of Cause and Effect between the two at this time.
__
I do disagree with what I think Kain’s saying in his last paragraph: it’s entirely appropriate that we have the discussion about how violent rhetoric (that at this time, is almost entirely the province of so-called conservatives) has consequences. I think that discussion has to include the general fact that it’s actual Republican politicians making such statements, rather than random commenters on some blog or other. And that discussion definitely has to include the general fact that the media has entirely abrogated its responsibilities. But I do agree that we should hold off on attributing cause and effect in this specific case until the facts are in — just because the Republicans wouldn’t stay their hand, doesn’t mean we should follow their example. Frankly, I can’t think of ANYTHING about the current crop of Republicans that I’d like to emulate, much less this.
pragmatism
fywp. sorry for the double post. forgot that you can’t spell soshulism without an junk enhancing product’s name.
mapaghimagsik
@Georgia pig:
Honestly, I think its not that grifters like Palin want anyone shot, they want nothing in their way. If a few “eggs” get “broken” well, that’s just part of winning.
What I find frustrating about ED’s writing here is he seems to be saying he wants clear ties between recognized conservative hate-groups and the shooter, and that when *all* the information is in, he can make a grand pronouncement.
As another writer pointed out, people like Niewart have been looking at this stuff for years. This isn’t some new thing, this is another event in the old thing.
At the same time, that means that every conservative and or liberal group can be tainted because one crazy shows up at some time. Believe me, if he attended any left wing events, Fox would be all over it. I think they’ll do it for weak right-wing groups too, since they’re still very much about stirring up the pot.
I also get frustrated with E.D. because there’s a bit of “conservatism can’t fail…only be failed here.”
dogwood
Just my 2 cents, but it seems we miss the point about the effects of talk radio and Fox on the public at large. I have no idea if the assassin ever listened to Rush or Glenn Beck. You don’t have to. We have friends, neighbors, and co-workers who listen/watch and then spread the talking points in their neighborhoods, churches and work places. There are millions of gullible Americans who believe the hateful conspiracy theories and doomsday rhetoric who have never listened to talk radio or logged on to Sarah Palin’s facebook page. They get it all second hand from the zealots who do.
Warren Terra
@Jenn:
Jenn, the point is that this is Kain’s schtick. This is what he does. He write measured posts about how, OK, some things are wrong with the Conservative movement, but we mustn’t call them on it, or we must remember they include nice people like him, or some of their issues have a point. Well, fuck that sideways. A nine year old girl celebrated getting elected to the student council by being murdered in an atrocity that is the logical consequence of the entire culture of today’s conservative movement, and Kain’s response is to point out that Kain is nothing like that, and that the precise degree of guilt in this instance isn’t yet clear. As if that would make the entire modern conservative culture less depraved, or would let us ignore the several other murders with apparent incitement by right-wing propaganda in the last couple of years, or ignore the dozens of acts of vandalism, or ignore the reports of individual (fringe, presumably) conservatives celebrating that are popping up all over the web (including just above, posted by “pragmatism”). Fuck him.
numbskull
@reality-based:
No, but I don’t think he should post a mea culpa within that framing of the issue, which is exactly how ED and the apologists want it framed.
It is of less consequence whether there is a direct link between the murderer and the right wing rhetoric of violence. Of greater importance is that we know from the history of mankind what happens when violent rhetoric is espoused by and approved by political leaders.
“Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?”
ED seeks to frame the issue as one of requiring demonstrable, narrow, and linear causality, ignoring history and human nature. It appears to be a libertarian stance of framing an issue in complete isolation, one without preceding or following events, nor milieu.
Warren Terra
@mapaghimagsik:
Indeed, the whole narrative is almost a perfect “No True Scotsman” argument.
Judas Escargot
@Alex:
Someone as breathtakingly ignorant as yourself should know your place and shut up when it isn’t your turn.
Or what? You’ll shoot him/her?
I hear that’s cool now.
numbskull
@Alex: DougJ, is that you? Excellent spoofing, man.
numbskull
@Jenn:
Well, so then you DO understand why people are pissed at ED. You’ve just posted it with this comment.
Alex
@Judas Escargot: No, more like be subject to appropriate ridicule for asserting that certain conservative bloggers are EQUALLY CULPABLE for the shooting as the actual shooter. Nice attempt at a smear though, you obscene motherfucker.
johnny walker
Kain Derangement Syndrome anyone? As though it isn’t schtick to label everything the guy writes a false equivalency regardless of the actual content. How some of you get “both sides do it!” or anything of that sort outt’ve Kain saying that we don’t know what happened and there isn’t strong evidence of a particular ideology up to this point is beyond me.
A point I’m not really seeing made is that Palin’s gun rhetoric, target map etc. are wrong regardless of whether or not they had anything to do with this Loughner guy’s actions. I don’t know if it’s that some people are coping with this via the red team/blue team thing or what, but I’m not getting the urge to connect this to Palin’s map before we know anything beyond a few scattered details about where this guy was coming from.
I mean, long story short: there are people over on Gateway Pundit right now saying this guy was a liberal because some news outlet talked to a girl who knew him in high school and that’s how she described him, but those people are horrible because as we know rushing to apply political blame in this kind’ve situation is wrong. (ahem)
Tyrone Slothrop
The great thing about BJ is that, while being entertained by both the front-pagers and the commenters, you can get a real visceral sense of that smarmy strain of hatred, venom, and general vileness that has always existed within the Left. Certain right-wing blogs provide the same service for their own permutation of the bile, but the particular flavor of anger that fuels the righteousness and moral-superiority that abounds throughout the southpaw side really reaches an apogee within the BJ commentariat. It’s much appreciated, as a generous dosage of sneering mockery and boiling outrage inevitably spices up an otherwise tepid browsing experience.
Thanks, John Cole.
numbskull
@johnny walker: It seems to me that several dozen comments here make exactly that point. However, since that is the point that I, too, think is the important one, maybe my understanding of those comments is biased.
Judas Escargot
@Alex:
Ridicule is one thing (of which I whole-heartedly approve).
But “Know your place and shut up” is some pretty strong language there, sweet-cheeks, ‘specially after yesterday.
My mother’s dead, btw. Thanks.
numbskull
@Tyrone Slothrop:
Oh, baloney. You’re just trying to get something you post used as one of those quote thingies Cole puts up in the header.
Ha! We’re not fooled!
Alex
@Tyrone Slothrop: Amen. Truer words were never spoken.
Jason
@Alex: But if the actual shooter is “quite probably seriously mentally ill” – or even maybe likely moderately emotionally ill – and is found to be not capable of discerning from wrong and right, will that make them more culpable?
ImNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
My $0.02 in this too long thread:
1) In the first paragraph, ED reasons Loughner is not “conservative”. He implores “those of you” not to “rush to judgment”.
2) He says he “does not like” violent political imagery or rhetoric on the right.
3) He then introduces a strawman:
But I can’t come to this tragedy and immediately start throwing my fists around blaming everyone I don’t like for it before I know the truth, or whatever shreds of truth we might come to know.
I think it is the combination of these three things that infuriates many of the critics here. He wants to jump to conclusions to support his side without much in the way of evidence in #1. Roughly, ‘I don’t know what this guy is, but he’s clearly not on my side.’ With some weaseling thrown in for balance (“no coherent ties to any one political philosophy.”) He’s not specific about the “those of you” he’s criticizing.
#2 strikes me as having and opinion like: “I like turtles” or “I don’t like McDonalds”. Writing style, I guess, but I don’t think it strengthens the post. It apparently is an attempt to show he’s reasonable, but isn’t effective IMHO.
#3 is asking for flames. If you’re going to accuse people of “blaming everyone”, be specific. Otherwise, don’t be surprised if you get reactions that you weren’t intending. Don’t do it after you yourself have drawn conclusions that you claim others can’t draw yet. Personally, I find black-and-white framing of positions to be aggravating. ED is doing it here. Who exactly is “blaming everyone they don’t like”?
So, ED, no more strawmen, please.
My personal view on this shooting is a combination of many of the thoughtful comments that have already been posted, with differing emphasis.
1) Even if he was deranged, as seems likely, it can be a political act. At a minimum, it will have direct political consequences.
2) Even if he didn’t plan the shooting, and just happened to be driving by and had the spur of the moment thought to do the terrible deed, it can be a political act. At a minimum, it will have direct political consequences.
3) People are products (to a large extent, but not exclusively) of their environment. “Where you stand depends on where you sit.” The political speech of those on the Right, especially in AZ, contributed to the environment and his thought processes. It influenced him.
4) Violent rhetoric and imagery and dragging weapons to public events should be called out with great vigor and intensity and greatly frowned upon. Simply saying “I don’t like it” isn’t enough.
I don’t mean things like DIAF. I don’t know where the line should be drawn, but there needs to be a line that the political parties (and the press and the pundits) agree shouldn’t be crossed. Incitement must be discouraged because there’s always going to be a small percentage of people who will use it to feed their delusions.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Wile E. Quixote
@E.D. Kain:
Jesus Christ, Erectile Dysfunction Kain is back. Just what we need, another pathetic failure of a human being making “No True Scotsman” arguments about conservatism to whitewash this tragedy. What the fuck was Cole was thinking when he invited you to be a front-pager? Was Brick Oven Bill not available?
Wile E. Quixote
@Warren Terra:
Amen. Erectile Dysfunction’s while schtick is as lame as Rich Iott’s attempts to justify his Nazi fetish and whitewash the history of the 5th SS Panzer division and is pretty much the same argument, “not all of the Nazis were bad, some of them were fighting for freedom on the Eastern front, and joined the party because they liked the idea of building autobahns.” Again, what the fuck was Cole thinking when he invited this buffoon to be a front pager?
Alex
@Jason: My intuition is that you’re being cute with semantics, but I’ll bite. You might be right that, if clinically insane, the shooter might not be technically “culpable” for the crime. He would nevertheless be objectively responsible. That is to say, he would still be the but-for and proximate cause of the shooting. This philosophical digression, of course, does not detract from the obscene and vile nature of matoko_chan’s comment. How completely must one’s moral compass be unmoored such that a comment like that one wouldn’t be universally repulsive, even here?
pragmatism
@Wile E. Quixote:
there is no true self appointed ombudsman.
i enjoy ed posting his perspective here. its good to see where ideologies overlap or don’t. i also appreciate him jumping in on the comments and he’s slowly getting a thicker skin.
schrodinger's cat
@Wile E. Quixote Extremely Dull Kain reminds me of Cecil Vyse (remember Day Lewis excellent portrayal in the movie?) in the Room with a View.
Bill Murray
@pragmatism: maybe someday he’ll dump the strawmen in his arguments and No True Scotsman-ing conservatism
pragmatism
@Bill Murray:
not very likely. its enough to hope that he quits playing the victim and digs in and defends running rhetorical cover for the right. i find myself agreeing with him every once in a while when he’s not doing his koch-approved bit. today is a time where i completely disagree with him but he will merit the pat on the head he’ll get for his preemptive defense of the right and narrative furtherance.
dogwood
As the awful news unfolded yesterday, what was so dispiriting to me was the sheer inevitability of it all, and the certainty that after a few days of handwringing it will be sucked down the memory hole. The violent rhetoric is not going to stop, and there’s nothing Democrats can do about it. In the next few months 8 to 10 GOPers will announce for the presidency and this thing will go to 11. There will be huge rallies of angry teaparty types demanding red meat. It doesn’t matter if Palin runs or not; she will be in the thick of it either way. The 2012 election cycle will make 2010 look like child’s play.
MTiffany
@ImNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
Anyone who points out that the not-so-subtle exhortations to violence are coming solely from the Right, apparently. E.D. is missing the point that it is entirely possible that the people that are clearly to blame for fostering a climate of hate that results in violence can also be people we don’t like, usually for that very reason.
schrodinger's cat
@dogwood: EDK and other “reasonable” conservatives will be still making excuses for them all as will the Beltway media.
fasteddie9318
@johnny walker:
I agree, there’s not much false equivalence here. What there is, instead, is “only one side really does ‘it,’ but we must not speak about the potential consequences of ‘it’ even after those consequences just got a member of Congress shot in the head and a nine year old girl murdered.”
Frankly, I’d prefer a nice false equivalence. You don’t have to drill as far into those to get to the chewy, craven, apologist center.
Morbo
Yes, damn us liberals for bringing down the level of discourse by pointing out that violent rhetoric might make some people believe that violent action is acceptable.
dogwood
@schrodinger’s cat: Of course; that’s why nothing will change. Not a single Republican looking to run in 2012 has any leadership aspirations. It will be a contest to see who can follow the tea party all the way to the White House. No single leader can change the tone of politics, but he or she can set the tone for the party. Democrats were just as angry in 2008 as Republicans are today, but the Democratic candidates weren’t inciting left wing anger. John Edwards was the angriest candidate by far, and his events were love-ins compared to what the far right produces these days. Even toward the end when Clinton started to look a bit desperate, you can’t find a single campaign event where her adoring crowds behaved inappropriately. Find an Obama event where people got out of hand. You can’t. Republicans have decided it is politically more advantageous to follow than to lead. Unfortunately, they are being led around by an angry mob and a group of TV and radio celebrities looking to make a quick buck.
Phil P.
@var: @Phil P.:
I am a little late returning to this thread after a long interstate drive, but I think you may be missing my point, ED…
You may not claim the media outlets (Fox, etc.) that are spewing bile that helps push these marginal folks into violent action, but they claim you. These days, some hair-splitting about what’s truly conservative and what’s not is largely irrelevant. Regardless of the specifics (probably pretty hazy, since he seems very disturbed) of his political beliefs, this shooter was acting upon and within the context of today’s all too prevalent extremist, anti-government rhetoric. Sarah Palin’s crosshairs map wasn’t a carefully argued essay a la Thomas Paine, it was a brutal, crude broadsheet aimed at the marginal elements of our society, who are for better for worse called the “conservative” bloc now. Some hand-waving about how you don’t want to share the label may be entirely heartfelt and accurate (and I believe that you don’t want to), but it doesn’t mean too much right now.
As DougJ put it, no speculation is required now. This violence is a consequence of some concrete decisions that your side (call it “right-wing” “conservative” “reactionary”….whatever) argued for.
Phil P.
@var: @Phil P.:
I am a little late returning to this thread after a long interstate drive, but I think you may be missing my point, ED…
You may not claim the media outlets (Fox, etc.) that are spewing bile that helps push these marginal folks into violent action, but they claim you. These days, some hair-splitting about what’s truly conservative and what’s not is largely irrelevant. Regardless of the specifics (probably pretty hazy, since he seems very disturbed) of his political beliefs, this shooter was acting upon and within the context of today’s all too prevalent extremist, anti-government rhetoric. Sarah Palin’s crosshairs map wasn’t a carefully argued essay a la Thomas Paine, it was a brutal, crude broadsheet aimed at the marginal elements of our society, who are for better for worse called the “conservative” bloc now. Some hand-waving about how you don’t want to share the label may be entirely heartfelt and accurate (and I believe that you don’t want to), but it doesn’t mean too much right now.
As DougJ put it, no speculation is required now. This violence is a consequence of some concrete decisions that your side (call it “right-wing” “conservative” “reactionary”….whatever) argued for.
AxelFoley
@Alex: I’ll take “STFU” for $1,000.⁰⁰,
AlecAlex.Kerr Lockhart
Does the “E” in “E.D.” stand for Enabler?
Kerr Lockhart
Once upon a time there was this guy called Henry II who said — to no one in particular — “Who will rid me of this meddling priest” and then somebody did and Henry was real sad because the meddling priest used to be his best friend, and he knew he was to blame for opening his big stupid mouth.
Props to Henry for not going around claiming he was misunderstood or that he was just kidding. He was a king and knew how to man up.
Jason
@Alex: Yeah perhaps the finer semantic points about apportioning responsibility can wait until everybody’s a little less angry. Still, I have to wonder if the insistence on painting Loughner as “only” insane, or having his mental issues diminish direct connection to party or faction, doesn’t in the end magnify the evil of the indirect causes – making them, in a way, not even equally culpable, but a little worse.
Jaim
A Dem congresswoman is shot in the face and a Federal judge who presided over reasonable acts of immigration reform is dead. (And Judge Roll was no stranger to right-wing death threats.)
But oh no sir, no politics in this at all.
Get bent.
THE
There is no way the feral right can walk away from the sheer malignancy of their glamorization of violence and gun culture.
It is not “edgy”, witty or clever.
It is vicious and irresponsible.
The argument that the perpetrator is insane is no defense.
Those who are sane have a “duty of care” to the community, not to raise the rhetorical temperature to the point that the mentally unstable become confused.
A rational person always deals with reality-as-it-is, and not abstract perfections.
The empirical fact is that there are crazies out there,
and so influential public figures must always temper their speech to avoid provoking them.
There is a survival-advantage in civility for social beings.
matoko_chan
@Alex: adhom adhom adhom.
fucking cudlip dont pretend you dont unnerstand what im saying.
you are a retard that enables toxic spinners like ED and Douchebag.
own it.
@E.D. Kain: YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE.
this is a political assassination JUST LIKE TILLER was a religious assassination.
stfu with your weasel word apologia u dishonest pustulant syphilitic intellectual whore.
matoko_chan
Oh yeah.
DIAF ED.
please.
reality-based
@Tyrone Slothrop:
.
Yeah, but we don’t shoot and kill people, though.
That’s the right-wing’s schtick.
Wanna talk about the mass murder at the Unitarian church? Or Oklahoma City?
So how’s the weather in the alternative reality known as planet Beck?
matoko_chan
@Tyrone Slothrop:
we mock you because you are stupid, and we are outraged that we must bear the backsplash from your cudlip stupidity.
we get spattered with the drench of recycled conservative shit the feedlot management is pouring down your dumb bovine throats, and it pisses us off.
State of Thought
My take is this: http://thoughtstate.blogspot.com/2011/01/stop-whipping-up-crazy-people.html
Regular Balloon Juice readers might notice that the header of what I’m saying there was inspired by a John Cole’s Balloon Juice entry at https://balloon-juice.com/2011/01/09/day-2-the-excuse-making-begins/, which was a very good point.