Oh jesus god now it’s our turn – a Democratic representative and a federal judge and a bunch of aids shot at an outdoor meeting.
I’ve been to meetings with my representative, often. They’re wide open. You can chat with him up close and personal as well as during the meeting.
Salman Taseer refused to hide, Gabrielle Giffords held a public streetcorner meeting…and look what it got them.
We’re all doomed. I feel sick.
Comments
31 responses to “Bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang”
Troubling (the same way being told you’re home just got broken into is troubling) but I’ll keep my statements to wishing everyone injured well and hoping that Rep. Giffords manages to walk away from this. And of course that Boner eats it even if I doubt he wants anarchy anymore then the rest of us.
Refuse to be terrorized.
I heard that a nine-year old girl was killed in the shootings. I think anyone who shoots unarmed people and children has to be out of their mind.
He seemed to regard himself a terrorist if we are to interpret his nutty youtube videos:
http://www.youtube.com/user/Classitup10#p/a/u/1/nHoaZaLbqB4
“I think anyone who shoots unarmed people and children has to be out of their mind.”
Sadly it’s much easier then you imagine.
As much as I’m ashamed to admit it, if this turned out to be the work of someone with a mental illness likes schizophrenia I would actually be relieved. It would mean I can look forward to my next deployment still being overseas.
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And here he is volunteering at the local book fair
http://gallery.pictopia.com/azstar/photo/8842226/
Gawker are pushing that the congress woman was on the ‘crosshairs’ map pushed by Sarah Palin.
http://gawker.com/5728545/shot-congresswoman-was-in-sarah-palins-crosshairs
Lots of people are. Dan Fincke posted this on Facebook:
Sounds like Giffords is expected to survive.
And Arizona goes from strength to strength:
http://www.dailykosbeta.com/story/2011/01/08/887984/-New-Arizona-gun-law-allows-concealed-weapons-without-permit
The killer is clearly unhinged. I doubt Sarah Palin even entered into the schizoid equation when Jared Loughner decided to go ballistic.
Seeings his age ( 22), and his recent behaviors, I,d say it all boils down to a case of severe mental illness, schizophrenia.
And as for Arizona’s gun laws and such being at fault? Well, those of Vermont, Bernie Saunders country, are even more liberal, and yet stuff like this doesn’t happen.
When you brain has a chemical imbalance, laws and logic don’t count for anything.
I mean, this guy appears to have killed an innocent nine year old girl at point-blank range.
Horrible
Most of the comments which follow the Washington Post article seem to be written by psychopaths. One lunatic with a gun is understandable but the glee the incident has provokrd among the rightwingers is far scarier. Just sick.
Well, strictly speaking it can occasionally happen, but gun laws would not prevent it.
This whole thing can easily become irrationally polarized by the political/social biases of the observer
Postings blaming Tea Party and or Sarah Palin (even if they are wackos), people calling Palin’s ‘targeting’ ad incitement (if that’s incitement, free speech is in deep trouble). Religions nuts will pick up on the fact that he’s a self proclaimed atheist… I’ve seen posts over on Randi.org calling out that since he lists ‘Animal Farm’ as one of his favorite books, he must be one of those evil anti authoritarians (as both an atheist and an anti authoritarian I’ve got to brace for that one). Plus the ongoing gun nut/anti-gun nut battles.
If he is schizophrenic, then this will be a set back for those trying to get civil rights (living arrangements, jobs) for the mentally ill. Perhaps we’ll have another wave of people calling authorities on every crank teenager who as a weird Facebook page.
Some reports that he was a pot smoker… so the drug war crowd may weigh in too
Note, however, that we don‘t have the opposition party praising the killer, we don’t have crowds showering him with rose petals.
Not that bad, yet.
Well, Jay, perhaps the man who killed Taseer was also mentally deranged. So mental derangement does not necessarily preclude the influence of religious and other incitements to political violence. Given the USA’s long history of political assassination (in which I include the assassination of providers of abortions at the instigation of, among others, Bill O’Reilly) and the nature of the American Right, do you reallly think that Palin’s macho ‘cross-hairs’ are really so harmless? Free speech is, we all agree, an excellent principle, but should it be made into an absolute?
Nooooooo.
I think it is incitement, but that doesn’t mean I think the gummint should ban it. I do however think there should be immense social pressure against that kind of thing. Yes gun sights are incitement. Free speech isn’t in trouble if threats are socially unacceptable.
People showering a murderer with rose petals is also free speech, but it’s disgusting, and should be seen as disgusting. Free speech can survive that.
I’m currently watching BBC News covering a live conference with Arizona Sheriff Clarence Dupnik who has more than once made pointed references to ‘talk radio hosts’, ‘vitriol’, ‘talks about tearing down the Government’ etc with reference to the public discourse which is producing the sort of environment in which this sort of thing happens; without naming names he’s really quite clear about what – and who – he is referring to and is admirably passionate about how things need to change. I’ve never seen him before but he’s very impressive so far.
There is apparently a campaign to try to get the gun-toting photo of Sarah Palin deleted from the web.
She did nothing to cause this crime. It’s the idiot that pulled the trigger that caused the crime (for that matter we don’t even know if he ever saw Palin’s site)
There are probably MILLIONS of people who viewed her site and did not kill anyone. Millions.
Think about it. Are the publishers of the Motoons responsible for the deaths incurred? After all they ‘could have predicited’ that violence would have occurred (you can’t even say that much about Palin’s site).
You’re opening up an incredible Pandora’s box, if you can be assigned guilt, post facto, because deranged criminals misinterpreted your words.
It was reported by a poster on excellent Rational Skepticism website that the right wing Free Republic website and discussion board was so overloaded with celebratory postings that it crashed. I can’t confirm this because I can’t bring myself to visit that site, but having seen comments from it in the past, I can believe it. Free republic is one of the top teabagger discussion boards.
Jay,
Au contraire, We’re not the ones who opened the Pandora’s box. We’re the messengers who point at the irrational, and where does irrationality lead?
This calls to mind a comment I read earlier.
I don’t endorse the thought, but I found it interesting.
it is not a Pandora’s box to point out that words have consequences. That is why we use them, after all.
Nothing in life is free. Free speech comes with the price of responsibility. Where and how that responsibility must be exercised is a matter of judgment, but denying its existence is an act of irrationality.
It is people like Palin, their supporters, their enablers, and people who reduce everything to the ‘misunderstandings’ of deranged individuals who have opened Pandora’s box. ,
‘Note, however, that we don‘t have the opposition party praising the killer, we don’t have crowds showering him with rose petals.’
Did you read the comments beneath the Washington Post article?
I don’t think anyone can comment on the shooter’s motivation – maybe he just fancied Jodie Foster – but the fact that rightwingers see this as a vindication of their own prejudices is unbelievable.
Here’s a list of his favourite books:
“I had favorite books: Animal Farm, Brave New World, The Wizard Of OZ, Aesop Fables, The Odyssey, Alice Adventures Into Wonderland, Fahrenheit 451, Peter Pan, To Kill A Mockingbird, We The Living, Phantom Toll Booth, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Pulp,Through The Looking Glass, The Communist Manifesto, Siddhartha, The Old Man And The Sea, Gulliver’s Travels, Mein Kampf, The Republic, and Meno.”
Make of that what you will, but Mein Kampf aside, my own list would be more disturbing.
What? You don’t remember Oklahoma City? There’s only ever one victim, and that’s the right.
jay,
Words have consequences. Legal consequences? In this case, no. But social and political consequences need to be paid.
A few here seem to have assumed that the shooter is schizophrenic and that that must be the reason for his actions. I’m not sure why this idea is even floated about. Schizophrenics have a greater tendency to be violent towards themselves than society at large. They are also, as is true of non-schizophrenics, more likely to be violent towards family members rather than strangers. In addition, they also often tend to be on the receiving end of violence. The following is anecdotal information, but here it is anyway: I worked with the severely mentally ill, mostly schizophrenics, for 18 years. During that time I knew of no schizophrenics who committed murder, but of at least 3 who were themselves murdered. Most of the hundreds of schizophrenics I knew during that time were kinder than the average “normal” person.
That said, even if this man was schizophrenic, that doesn’t mean that he couldn’t be influenced by current events, including Teabagger-style politics. We certainly cannot assume that Palin’s gun sites propaganda were even seen by the shooter, but we also cannot assume that he did not see them and cannot assume that he was not influenced by such similar rhetoric. The republicans wish to create a state of general paranoia and fear. It would be perfectly understandable if someone who is paranoid and fearful to an unusual degree to begin with would feel that they should do something to protect themselves and their country, which is, after all, precisely the propaganda that the extreme right expresses repeatedly. If this man is schizophrenic, it is quite possible that he did not even invent his own delusions, but rather they were invented for him and he took them more seriously than his fellow teabaggers-in-crime. (I realize that I’m making the assumption of tea party influence when this is not known yet).
In the end though, this man needn’t be crazy in any traditional sense to commit the crimes he did. He may simply have been brainwashed by certain right wing media personalities and just angry (about something. It seems that many ‘Mercans are angry at something, but they’re not sure what – this just indicates how well the right-wing propaganda campaign is working).
Appy. Polly. Logies. for the lengthy post.
PZ linked to this additional piece of rhetoric.
http://www.blogforarizona.com/blog/2010/06/jesse-kelly-event-is-this-wording-intentional.html
No appy necessary, pulse; excellent post.
Sarah Palin has finally sent a very brief Facebook condolence message to all who suffered at the hands of the Arizona murderer. It is followed by lots of preening comments about how wonderful she is herself – not so much about the actual sad tragic circumstanced the bereaved and suffering find themselves. So very distasteful, in my summation.