Here's my very uncomplicated take on the Tucson shootings:
While it's clear that a mentally disturbed individual perpetrated the tragedy in Tucson, reports trickling out describing Jared Loughner's paranoia over government mind control, his obsession with gold and silver as a national currency and the warped views he's expressed about patriotism and constitutional rights, reads like a road map of every single Tea Bagger grievance one can hear right-wing pundits screeching about 24x7 on AM talk radio, Cable TV (Glenn Beck), and conservative internet blogs.
Therefore it most certainly stands to reason that ---
When the conservative Republican leaders and their propaganda outlets in the media and on the internet repeatedly tell their supporters that Obama is a foreign born, Muslim socialist Nazi who wants to allow implementation of Sharia law and turn America into a communist/Muslim bastion, outside observers are going to make the logical connection.
When the conservative Republican leaders and their propaganda outlets in the media and on the internet repeatedly tell their supporters that Obama and liberals want to implement health care "death panels" for the old and infirm and developmentally disabled babies, outside observers are going to make the logical connection.
When the conservative Republican leaders and their propaganda outlets in the media and on the internet repeatedly tell their supporters that Obama and liberals wants to turn over control of the American government to the United Nations and put dissenters into "re-education camps", outside observers are going to make the logical connection.
When the conservative Republican leaders and their propaganda outlets in the media and on the internet repeatedly tell their supporters that Obama is coming to take away their guns, which is followed by record gun/ammunitions sales, outside observers are going to make the logical connection.
When the conservative Republican leaders and their propaganda outlets in the media and on the internet repeatedly feed their supporters unfounded conspiracy theories about government control, which is followed by a spike in hate group and militia membership, outside observers are going to make the logical connection.
Let's face reality here -- the power brokers on the right wanted a movement to help them gain back control of the government (which oddly they claim to despise). They got that movement with the Tea Party. They could have used more honest and inspirational messages to accomplish their political goal, but since they had none, they decided to go another route. Now they have to take responsibility for the mob mentality and other unintended consequences of their paranoid/delusional fear mongering and they are none too happy about it.
Tough fucking shit. Man up and do the responsible, adult thing.
And as for myself - I for one am not going to back down one iota from my assertions that the radical right is not only responsible for the vast majority of the violence-tinged rhetoric that currently permeates our political discourse, they have also been primarily responsible for the majority of the actual physical acts of political violence that have occurred in recent years in this country. That is a fact and not a matter of dispute.
Feel free to share your views as to why you believe I'm wrong.
----k
