No Country for Democrats

Alleged gunman Jared Lee Loughner, 22, a Tucson resident, shot Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D) once in the back of the head on Saturday as she was meeting with constituents outside a Safeway supermarket. It was Ms Giffords first town hall meeting after being sworn in to the 112th Congress.

Eyewitnesses said Mr. Loughner first shot the congresswoman, then opened fire killing six and injuring 14. Among those killed were federal judge John M. Roll, Christina Taylor Young, a 9 year old who was at the town hall as part of a class assignment, and Ms Giffords’ director of community outreach Gabriel Zimmerman, 30. The others who were killed were Dorothy Morris, 76; Dorwin Stoddard, 76; and Phyllis Schneck, 79.[i]

Reports from the crime scene indicate Mr. Loughner fired 30 shots from a Glock 19 automatic handgun that he legally purchased at Sportsman’s Warehouse located in Tucson, after Mr. Loughner passed a “federally required background check.”[ii]

Mr. Loughner is described as alienated, disturbed and prone to erratic outbursts when in class. Last October, he was suspended from college and was not allowed back until he produced a letter from a psychiatrist attesting to his mental fitness. He tried to join the military, but was rejected for reasons currently undisclosed. He has a criminal record, but the police are not releasing details.

Also, Mr. Loughner has a You Tube channel in which he posted several disparate thoughts involving the gold standard, the constitutionality of police and other rambling, disjointed antigovernment musings.

I read some of Mr. Loughner’s statements and they are completely undecipherable. His thought process is erratic. There is no logic or reason to them.

At a news conference, Pima County sheriff, Clarence W. Dupnik was visibly frustrated when he said the political discourse on radio and television may have played a secondary role in the crime. “When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous,” Sheriff Dupnik said. “And unfortunately, Arizona has become sort of the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry.”[iii]

Immediately, the hand wringing began. Politicians and the mainstream media espoused their collective guilt over the tragic incident. As usual, they framed the argument into two equal positions, the left and the right are equally at fault for the corrosive nature of our politics today.

Except that’s a false argument. If there ever was a time to point fingers in one direction, it is now because one side of the political spectrum is clearly at fault.

President Reagan demonized the word liberal until it became an political epithet. He also said government was not the solution to the problem, it was the problem.

The Republican Party sent its staffers and supporters to disrupt the ballot recount in Florida in 2000.

Vice President Cheney, among others, said terrorists were rooting for a Democratic presidential victory in 2004 and 2008.

During McCain presidential campaign rallies, people were yelling, “kill” when Obama’s name was mentioned.

Michelle Bachmann, on Hardball with Chris Matthews, said the media should investigate Democratic elective officials to expose their un-American activties.

Glenn Beck infamously said President Obama has a deep seated hatred of white people. Rush Limbaugh uses rape imagery to describe the president’s policies.

Tea Party and conservatives stormed and disrupted town hall meetings conducted by Democrats during the health care reform debate.

Gun enthusiasts, hardly bleeding heart liberals, defiantly flaunted their weapons at Tea Party rallies.

Sharon Angle, Tea Party and Republican candidate for Senate (Nevada), proposed “second amendment remedies” against the tyranical rule Senator Harry Reid.

A male Rand Paul supporter stomped on the face of a female Moveon.org activist as she was trying to get Mr. Paul's attention by waving a placard.

Newly sworn in congressman Allan West had nominated talk radio host Joyce Kaufman for the position of chief of staff, but she ultimately refused the position after she was criticized for saying, at a campaign rally, “If ballots don’t work, bullets will. I’ve never in my life thought the day would come that I would tell individual citizens that you are responsible for being the militia the Founding Fathers designed. They were very specific: you need to be prepared to fight tyranny.”[iv]

It is the Republican Party, aided and abetted by Fox News, that denounced President Obama’s policies with ad hominem attacks, such as he’s a communist, socialist, fascist and un-American.

In addition, the Republican Party refuses to denounce the Birther movement, a group that is convinced President Obama was not born in the United States. Combine that erroneous assumption with President Obama’s policies will destroy America, and you will create an extremely combustible political tinderbox.

Republicans, conservatives and Tea Party activists are in denial if they believe their words and deeds do not have consequences.

Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips condemned the shooting, but mentioned Ms Giffords is a liberal.[v]

Actually, she is conservative, but she does not pass the Tea Party/conservative purity test because she voted for the Obama health care reform bill.

Former Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin posted a map of the United States on her Facebook page with 20 crosshairs, each symbolizing a Democratic representative she wanted defeated. Afterwards, she posted, “Don’t retreat – Instead RELOAD!” on Twitter.[vi]

At the time, Ms Giffords said, “For example, we’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list, but the thing is, that the way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district. When people do that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action.”[vii]

But Rebecca Mansour, who works for Sarah-Pac, said, “There is nothing irresponsible about our graphic.”[viii]

House Speaker John Boehner said, about the attempted assassination of congresswoman Giffords, “an attack on one who serves is an attack on all who serve.”[ix]

But he is not completely innocent. Last year, he said congressman Steve Dreihaus “may be a dead man. He can’t go home to the west side of Cincinnati.”[x]

Mr. Dreihaus was in danger because he voted for President Obama’s health care reform bill.[xi]

Liberals or Democrats have not disrupted the political process in the United States. This is a lopsided fight. If it was a boxing match, the referee would have stopped the fight because the left is barely able to defend itself and fight back.

This is not a debate about honest, political disagreements. Political discourse is currently framed through the prism of false reality, the Republican Party is righteous and is America’s sole protector against the apolyptic evil manifested by the subversive, unpatriotic policies of the Democratic Party.

If the attempted assasination of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was politically motivated, then this is not a left-right problem. The fault lies solely in conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Using this divisive strategy, the Republicans captured the House of Representatives last November and are poised to win the Senate in 2012. I doubt the Republicans will become soft because, as Thomas Jefferson famously said, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

By the way, the context of Jefferson’s quote was misinformation could lead to lethargy, therefore liberty is at risk – our current state of political discourse. We are being mislead and misinformed by a political party and a news organization to the point where fact and reason have become the enemy and those who defend fact and reason are a threat to the United States.



[i] “Giffords Called Responsive After Attack,” Marc Lacey and David M. Herszenhorn, New York Times, January 9, 2011.
[ii] “Gun used in Tucson was purchased legally; Arizona laws among most lenient in nation,” James V. Grimaldi and Fredrick Kunkle, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[iii] “Arizona Sheriff Slams Media Vitriol,” Politico, January 8, 2011.
[iv] “Ballots or Bullets Radio Host Not Joining West Staff After All,” The Maddow Blog, November 11, 2010.
[v] “Bloodshed Puts New Focus on Vitriol in Politics,” Carl Hulse and Kate Zernike, New York Times, January 8, 2011.
[vi] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[vii] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[viii] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[ix] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[x] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[xi] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.