That's exceptional, America: Printed crosshairs bad, but actual Glocks OK
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That's exceptional, America: Printed crosshairs bad, but actual Glocks OK
In my fair-and-balanced article today on hateful political rhetoric and the mass murder in Tucson, I noted that Philadelphia Rep. Bob Brady is proposing a law that would make it a crime to use certain violent imagery against members of Congress -- an idea that he acknowledges is inspired by Sarah Palin's infamous 2010 map that targeted Saturday's assassination-attempt victim Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, and others, with the image of crosshairs.
I'd like to go deeper on that at some future point, but let's just say for now that Brady's idea is wrong-headed and goes way too far. If he was truly offended by Sarah Palin's actions -- as he probably was -- then he had the remarkable power as a U.S. congressman to go on national TV and condemn her. The best remedy for hate speech is to drown it out with good speech. We don't need no stinkin' law.
But you do have to wonder about a nation that considers laws and other harsh measures against political rhetoric, but at this point is scared (bleep)less about even talking about whether we should even begin a conversation about the legality of purchasing the actual devices that kill or maim our fellow human beings.
I thought Gail Collins of the New York Times nailed this today:
Today, the amazing thing about the reaction to the Giffords shooting is that virtually all the discussion about how to prevent a recurrence has been focusing on improving the tone of our political discourse. That would certainly be great. But you do not hear much about the fact that Jared Loughner came to Giffords’s sweet gathering with a semiautomatic weapon that he was able to buy legally because the law restricting their sale expired in 2004 and Congress did not have the guts to face up to the National Rifle Association and extend it.
If Loughner had gone to the Safeway carrying a regular pistol, the kind most Americans think of when they think of the right to bear arms, Giffords would probably still have been shot and we would still be having that conversation about whether it was a sane idea to put her Congressional district in the cross hairs of a rifle on the Internet.
But we might not have lost a federal judge, a 76-year-old church volunteer, two elderly women, Giffords’s 30-year-old constituent services director and a 9-year-old girl who had recently been elected to the student council at her school and went to the event because she wanted to see how democracy worked.
Adds Peter Goodman on the Huffington Post:
We Americans have developed an agreed-upon social protocol for how to react to the gun-related horrors that regularly capture the news pages. Journalists spring into action with a standard-issue set of questions: What happened? Who did it? What made him snap? Should someone have known? Yet this whole exercise of seeking to identify the unique strain of madness at work seems more about enabling false comfort then fully elucidating how we got here, a sideshow distracting us from the hard work that would be required to take on the gun lobby and limit access to the only part of the narrative that weighs in as a hard, cold fact: the weapon.
Don't despair, you gun lovers who read this. One of the remarkable stories of our time is that even as deadly rampages like the one in Tucson increase, support for gun control among Americans steadily drops, and currently is at a historical low. How we got to this bizarre moment in time is something that will hopefully be disected and understood in the months and years to come.
The one good thing about this incident is that extremists on both sides might start feeling the pressure to tone-down the vitriol.
--snip--
Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona said she wanted to promote ways to “tone our rhetoric and partisanship down” in a note she sent Friday to Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson.
Giffords sent the email to Grayson Friday evening congratulating him for being hired as director of Harvard University’s Institute of Politics. Though from different parties, the two became friends while participating in a leadership fellowship in 2005, Grayson said.
In the email, which Grayson provided to cn|2 Politics, Giffords said she wanted work with Grayson on ways to encourage tamping down the current tone of political discourse.
“After you get settled, I would love to talk about what we can do to promote centrism and moderation. I am one of only 12 Dems left in a GOP district (the only woman) and think that we need to figure out how to tone our rhetoric and partisanship down,” Giffords wrote to Grayson.
She wrote the message the evening before attending a meeting with constituents Saturday morning in Tucson at which a gunman critically wounded Giffords and 12 others and killed six people, including a federal judge.
--snip--
Unfortunately, far more likely is that apologists for extremism will continue to defend the extremist rhetoric, and attack those who criticize the extremism. We've seen many such examples right here at Attytood.
Let's see if our beloved ARts attack Giffords as they have others who denounce the vitriol.— Talking point sleuth- What a joke, but considering this drivel comes from TPS, it's not surprising.
I think the WSJ said it best, snippster.
"To be clear, if you're using this event to criticize the "rhetoric" of Mrs. Palin or others with whom you disagree, then you're either: (a) asserting a connection between the "rhetoric" and the shooting, which based on evidence to date would be what we call a vicious lie; or (b) you're not, in which case you're just seizing on a tragedy to try to score unrelated political points, which is contemptible. Which is it?"
So which is it, TPS? Are you a liar, or just contemptible? - You really are a dope. If you have the courage (something I doubt)take a look at an illustrated (and documented with outside links) at this blog post:http://michellemalkin.com/2011/01/10/the-progressive-climate-of-hate-an-illustrated-primer-2000-2010/
Unlike your cowardly leftie heros these are not selectively edit for effect. Read the stuff you lying POS.— georgel - Point well taken, but sheesh, Malkin really had to scrape the barrel, didn't she? It's a wonder she didn't scour Attytood archives for TPS' comments, eh?
- Guns don't kill people....blah blah blah. Even though the majority of the western civilized world has realistic gun laws and exponentially far fewer guns deaths per capita. But hey! How will momma Grizzly wrastle up some vittles for her cubs without a hi-capacity Glock?— CiceroSpuriousDeodatus
- Someone else for our much beloved ARts to attack:
The woman who grabbed the gun from the shooter. I mean, she has the audacity to say that "the extreme right has gone too far."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnHdGbdpDR8&feature=player_embedded#!— Talking point sleuth - I suppose less people would have been killed had he tossed two or three flaming wine bottles into a crowd? Or drove a Chevy Suburban right through the receiving line? Random killings by lunatics isn't stopped by focusing on implements.— valentsgrif
- Unfortunately, guns are their weapon of choice, and also the weapon of choice for law-abiding owners who wish to protect themselves. Would you tell the latter that they could just as easily defend themselves from intruders with molotov cocktails, so why bother owning a gun?
- "Weapon of choice" is whatever is available. Loonies who want to get in the paper and have bloodied victims' biographies played incessently on the tube don't care. Bombs, pick up trucks, swords, guns (a single round from a 12 guage shotgun can disperse nine 9mm slugs in ONE pull of the trigger. Whats next, take away the farmer's shotgun?), who cares. You're just dead. — valentsgrif
-
More vitriol to be denied, diminished, or defended by our beloved Attytood Republican toadies and extremist libertarians.
--snip--
Slain federal judge was target of hundreds of threats in 2009
John M. Roll, the chief federal judge in Arizona, has been the subject of hundreds of threats, some so serious he was once under 24-hour protection...
[...]
Roll was the victim of hundreds of threats in February 2009 after he allowed a lawsuit filed by illegal immigrants against a rancher to go forward. "They cursed him out, threatened to kill his family, said they'd come and take care of him. They really wanted him dead," a law enforcement official told The Washington Post in May 2009.
U.S. marshals put Roll under 24-hour protection for about a month. They guarded his home in a secluded area just outside Tucson, screening his mail and escorting him to court, to the gym and to the Catholic Mass he attended daily.
--snip--
Now jump, RG, jump.— Talking point sleuth 
This was ok with Liberals and Democrats- they actually were saying it is funny- and no harm is being done toi anyone on the Talking Head shows- now what?
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/29/palin.noose/- Batty, I hope you agree that it's just as inappropriate, and not being offered to justify right-wing hate speech. Like Beck pretending to poison his cardboard Pelosi's glass of wine on his FoxNews TV show. I think we're on the same page, right?
- Hey TPS are Anarchist more liberal or on the conservative side of issues?
I see you rail against the Anarchists and their choas and destruction often here........ - One more question TPS- do you think Sarah Palin needs security? Do you think she gets threats from whacked out Liberals and democrats? Google before you answer.
- Yes, Palin's been stalked by some nutcase from McAdoo now for some time (he's under the delusion he once dated her?). Luckily she and law enforcement know who he is, and she's been able to get a restraining order. In a sane world he could also be prohibited from purchasing, owning or possessing a firearm. What Palin also has is a good PR machine which 'coincidentally' leaked more details to TMZ today. Now the whole world knows who he is. I've got no problem with that.
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