The idiocy and cynicism of the left knows neither depths nor bounds. A reporter for National Public Radio (judging from the ratings, you're more likely to recognize NPR as a line item in the federal budget than having listened to it) expressed her relief that, upon hearing of the shootings in Arizona that claimed the lives of a federal judge and a nine year old girl, amongst others, and placed Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D. AZ) in the hospital with a hole in her brain, it wasn't a hispanic who had committed the crime. She termed her relief as "brown relief" (please read the link, it's a good article). Call me a racist if you will, but I thought brown relief was something I do after a big meal. In fact, she said it was a "collective sigh of brown relief" (Montezuma's revenge, perhaps?). I won't presume to speak for the collective browns, which I presume means hispanics, but I'm guessing most were, like me, more worried about the victims.
The reporter also frequently referred to the shooter as a "gringo", a term for white people noted as "usually disparaging" by most references that I could find. Funny, NPR fired Juan Williams for far less. She was afraid that the right would have used an illegal immigrant shooting the Representative as an issue. Funny, I think that would have been a legitimate issue, unlike the spittle being spewed on the country from the idiot left right now.
It wasn't long before Sheriff Clarence Dupnik of Pima County decided that the shooting was the fault of the entire population of Arizona and, more specifically, the vitriol of Rush Limbaugh, though he admittedly had no evidence of to back up such a claim. Apparently Sheriff Dupnik is auditioning for a role as defense counsel by providing excuses for the crime.
In the meantime, New York Times reporter Pual Krugman (I'd detail his idiocy properly but I'm not sure there's enough storage space on the google servers for that kind of post) blamed the right and Tea Party activists for the shootings. Luckily, Jane Fonda, that bastion of sanity that so actively rooted for the Communist North Vietnamese to kill American troops that she earned the nickname Hanoi Jane (I went with the least critical link I could find in Wikipedia, I suggest you read up on it more yourself if interested), decided to drop her two cents in and blame the shootings on Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck. These people are not unique in their opinions and are not out of the mainstream left, they are just examples of the irrationality of the blame game. But the plot runs a bit deeper than this. Amongst others named as instigating the shooting are Mark Levin (author of Libert and Tyranny, a great book) and Michael Savage (who I personally think takes things way too far, but is not responsible for what happened). Luckily, they were blamed by Chris Matthews at MSNBC, so the odds are slim that no more than twenty people heard the accusation.
Representative Jim Clyburn (D. S.C.) along with Representative Louise Slaughter (D. N.Y.) have called for the reinstatement of the "fairness doctrine" as a result of the Arizona shootings. If you aren't familiar, the "fairness doctrine" requires broadcasters to carry viewpoints to balance out the views of their radio programs by providing equal time to the opposition and requires the radio station to bear the cost. For example, Rush Limbaugh is on for three hours a day. Every radio station that carries the syndicated Limbaugh broadcast would be required to provide free air time to a liberal viewpoint for three hours to balance out the Limbaugh broadcast. Most radio stations, especially those in small markets, can't afford to provide three free hours of airtime, especially to a liberal, since almost no one listens to liberals on talk radio (see, e.g., Air America bankruptcy, Al Franken (shudder)).
There have been calls from both sides of the aisle to have all the members of Congress to sit intermixed rather than the traditionally separated parties at the next State of the Union. It sounds nice and all, but frankly, I prefer being able to tell what the parties agree and disagree upon during the speech by seeing when everyone stands and when only one side does. Not to mention, now that the Democrats have lost control of the House, it seems suspiciously like they are calling for everyone to get along since they can't shove things down everyone's throat anymore. The Republicans going along with the idea are just misguided though with good intentions (at least I think). I also believe legitimate debate is what the country needs, not symbolic bullshit that has nothing to do with anything.
It has gone so far that the governor of Rhode Island (a state with a population barely as large as Chris Matthews' audience) Lincoln Chafee (I., former R.) has banned public officials in his office from appearing on "for profit" talk radio programs. Apparently they can still appear on those non-inflammatory, non-profit radio programs like NPR. As long as they aren't a gringo, I guess.
All of this because of the obvious political motivation for the shooting and its source, right wing hate speech, right? Damned if the facts don't get in the way of that theory (not that the facts have ever stopped any left wing theory).
Jared Loughner was a paranoid schizophrenic. Don't take my word for it, a Harvard-trained M.D. A psychiatrist who was once Chief Resident in Psychiatry at Massachucetts General Hospital. I give you, Charles Krauthammer's analysis of the shooter.
There is not one shred of evidence that Loughner was motivated by anything other than misfiring neurons and chemical imbalances. Loughner reportedly didn't like watching the news and never listened to talk radio. He produced a rambling video tape about his "genocide school" and took photos posing in a red g-string with his handgun. Among his favorite books were Hitler's Mein Kampf and Marx' Communist Manifesto according to his own MySpace page. I submit to you that these are not conservative texts.
So, despite all evidence to the contrary, we suddenly have a climate calling for civility in the political discourse because of the shootings, despite the fact that political discourse had nothing to do with the shootings. Maybe the Pima County Sheriff needed to blame conservatives because Loughner had a pretty extensive history with his own office. The fairness doctrine push has been around since before President Obama took office. That liberals would use this occasion to push it to the forefront is despicable. That the left would use this as an opportunity to try and silence criticism, even in the seemingly benign form of abandoning a seating chart, is disgusting.
I invite your debate, your disagreement, and even your vitriol if you disagree, and I'll be happy to return it in kind. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson had some pretty rough exchanges, too.
