Monday, January 10, 2011

Winging Politicians and The Left-Wing Blame Game

Let's start with the statistics from Saturday's brutal attack on Representative Gabrielle Giffords and others, as this is the most important thing to keep in mind:

Rep Giffords is still severely injured, but is has as positive an outlook as can be inspected.  She was one of 20 people shot.  Among the 6 dead are Judge John Roll, as well as a 9-year-old girl, , who was born on 9/11/2001.  President Obama ordered flags to half-staff and held a moment of silence at 11am today.  Congress has tabled this week's planned legislative slate to deal with the tragedy.  And people on the left and right have come together on this attack on Americans and America.

If there was any "good' news that has emerged since the dust settled and we got the body count from the attack in Tucson, it would be that the murderous piece of shit, Jared Lee Loughner, appears to be sincerely nuts.  As in put him in a rubber room for a couple decades nuts.  As in tinfoil hat-wearing rambling insanity nuts.  So I hope that if he's truly mentally ill, they put him away for a long time, maybe with a bit of shock therapy, and if not, may there be some sweet police brutality, followed by some good sweet jailhouse luuuuuuuv.

Which means the "good" news is that he wasn't a defined right-wing nutjob.  And that, as my last post highlighted, was what I feared.

However, that didn't stop some people on the left from blaming Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, the Tea Party, and all of the "hate speech" on the right for this nutscrew opening fire.

Some specific examples of this (source for italics):

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz warns that while "we cannot allow incidences like this intimidate" we still must remember that "words matter."

Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik used a nationally televised press conference to condemn the tone of political discourse in his state. He charged that public debate is now "vitriolic rhetoric," which has rendered Arizona "the mecca for prejudice and bigotry." Dupnik suggested that such rhetoric can have deadly consequences.

Then there's the American Traitor Bitch, Hanoi Jane Fond, who tweeted this bullshit:
Progressive Arizona Rep Gabrielle Giffords is shot. In her ads, Sarah Palin had her targeted in a gun site. Inciting to violence.

And followed that with more bullshit:

@ guilty too. Shame. It must stop!
And:
Violence against 1 woman is violence against every woman. So let all women commit 2 stopping this radical violence. NOW  
And:
It isn't enough that Palin just removed the map of Giffords district with gun crosshairs off her website. She holds responsibility
And:
holds responsibility. As does the violence-provoking rhetoric of the Tea Party 
And:
Here's the danger: once a society starts killing its politicians and judges, only the corrupt and brutal can or are willing to rule.

The upshot of all this, and the Daily Kos kooks rambling senselessly, and some of my lib blogger buddies on Facebook venting mindlessly (who just dropped in my opinion of them), and others on my Twitter feed retweeting crap (although I can credit, not all the libs I follow jumped on this idiot bandwagon), is that it's all the right-wing "hate" rhetoric that drives these nutjobs to start killing.  This despite the lack of evidence.  In many of these cases, the nutjobs turn out to actually like cuddling up to the Communist Manifesto (or at least keeping it in their library next to their copy of Helter Skelter and Catcher in the Rye).  Which, applying the blithering lack of logic that I've been hearing from the moonbats of the Left, means that they are to blame, since they churn out just as much "hateful' vitriol....

No.  The fact is that nutjobs are nutjobs.  Whatever they hear, they have to transform into insanity.  And we can't start sacrificing our freedom of speech when 99.9999999999999999999% of the people aren't going to hear it and decide to fucking shoot somebody.  So let's drop this dumb-assed idea that we can blame anyone who says anything heated for anything some assblock who isn't following the explicit directions or clear intentions of said person.  Because we'd all be guilty as fuck.


So tell me where the line is?  Tell me what no one can say?  And then, when I give you assloads of examples of the left saying the same kinds of shit, as well as perfect examples of just as heated vitriol directed at the Washington, Adams, and Jefferson administrations (with no resulting attacks, deaths and only one unconstitutional attempt to squash free speech), then you can shove the whole idea that this is unprecedented hate by the Tea Party that caused the tragedy up your ass.  Where your head obviously rests.

The fact is, we have always had heated, angry, divisive, and borderline threatening (but not clearly threatening) rhetoric.  We have always had one side calling the other side everything but lemony fresh, wishing death, dismemberment, and occasional forays with farm animals.  And we have always had a few people, some nuts, some ideological, trying to snuff politicians, and occasionally borrowing from the otherwise sane rhetoric of the day.  Nothing about this has really changed in our history, except the names and the specifics. 

So, for you cowardly partisan hacks who have to take a tragedy and immediately turn it into a reason to tell us on the right to shut the fuck up because our speech is evil, I dare you spineless fucks to comment.  Tell me that anyone's rhetoric (short of explicitly advocating violence (ex: "someone should shoot that bastard")) is inciting violence.  I guarantee that if I combed through every angry thing you said, I could find all kinds of "hateful speech" that could "incite violence." I  triple-fucking-dog-dare you to display your hypocrisy and zeal for censorship for everyone to ridicule. Bring it!

Because when we start forbidding speech, then ideas aren't far behind.  And then comes forbidding people.  And boy, can I come up with some juicy examples there....

7 comments:

Toad734 said...

No one is saying that it is anyone elses fault other than the guy who pulled the trigger...At least I don't think they are...However, since there are plenty of deranged and delusional people in this country, Glenn Beck included, and a whole shit ton of guns, and very little affordable care available to the loons, when they see the shit on Becks show, Palins web site or whatever, you have to know that this will eventually click something off in their head.

I am never going to blame Marylin Manson, NWA or Slayer for anything that they put on their records when someone wearing a Slayer shirt kills someone or shoots a cop or whatever. So I won't blame Palin for this either but you have to wonder if deep down these people really want shit like this to happen. I mean, do you really think that if it had been Obama that had been shot that Beck or Limbaugh wouldn't secretly be smiling??

It's like when the Klan or Nazis find and or prey on the weak minded losers and start planting ideas in their head hoping one of them will finally take action but then wash their hands of any wrong doing because they didn't actually pull the trigger.

I know Slayer doesn't really want you to sacrifice a virgin or create an altar of death or anything like that but I am not so sure about the intentions of some of the nuts on the right.

I mean cross hairs?? From a gun nut?? And when you actually make shit up to scare people like this, and then they react, don't you have share a responsibility in the outcome?? For instance, if I yelled fire in a crowded theater or a bar and everyone stampeded to the door and 3 people got crushed, and there was no fire, aren't I partially responsible for the outcome since there was no real fire?? If there were a real fire, and I yelled fire and three people got trampled but it saved the life of 100 others, I would be ok. But when you say Obama wasn't born in America, that he is a Kenyan Muslim who is coming for your guns and raising your taxes and going to force you to get rid of your health coverage so he can give it to poor black people and that he is going to create a muslim socialist state with a one world currency...and you scare the shit out of someone enough to react...When NONE OF IT IS TRUE...Don't you then bear some responsibility in the consequences?? This guy was lied to and it flipped him out, plain and simple.

Patrick M said...

No one is saying that it is anyone elses fault other than the guy who pulled the trigger...At least I don't think they are...

Let me stop you there. reread the three examples, from the idiot Sherriff (who went on to blame Rush by name), to the politician (and here, it's mostly implying), to Hanoi Jane, as well as many others in the blogosphere, Facebook (including yourself), Twitter, and the New York Times (Paul Krugman jumps to mind).

And there's later in your rant when you say:

It's like when the Klan or Nazis find and or prey on the weak minded losers and start planting ideas in their head hoping one of them will finally take action but then wash their hands of any wrong doing because they didn't actually pull the trigger.

While the facts have proven otherwise, the meme is still circulating, mostly in the "we should tone down the rhetoric" form.

This guy was lied to and it flipped him out, plain and simple.

Again, the facts do not bear that out.

So while you started with "No one is saying that it is anyone elses fault...", you continued the very same meme for another few paragraphs.

Is it any wonder why people tend to berate you as a fucking moron when you comment?

Think about it.

dmarks said...

Toad said (and I add numbers)

"But when you say Obama [1] wasn't born in America, that he is a [2] Kenyan Muslim who is [3] coming for your guns and [4] raising your taxes and going to [5] force you to get rid of your health coverage.

Well, 3,4 and 5 are true. #5 especially. Many companies have been forced to cut back on health care by the Obama plan, and many more will follow. Check the facts, please, Toad. Most of the claims on the list you said were not true are actually true.
--------------

Patrick said: "Is it any wonder why people tend to berate you as a fucking moron when you comment?"

I think Toad sometimes forgets what he typed 6 or so words after he types it.

At least he didn't say that Clinton brought down the national debt in this one.

Patrick M said...

Dmarks: RE: the Clinton budget crack.

I know (roughly where you live.

It's not that far of a drive.

And I have anvils and a warped perspective from watching too much Lo0oey Tunes listening to talk radio.

You were warned. :)

Toad734 said...

Dmarks:

THanks for proving my point...You have been lied to and you believe it. Obama has expanded gun rights more than any other democratic president in 30 years...That is a fact.My taxes just went down thanks to Obama and he has now agreed not to raise taxes on the rich who export your jobs and no one with health care coverage is going to be forced to get rid of their coverage..>Read the bill.

This is exactly what I am talking about...There is one side that lives in reality and the other side that lives in this fairy tale land where more guns make you safer, the President of the US is actually Kenyan and you reduce the deficit with tax cuts and Clinton didn't create a budget surplus and CO2 isn't a greenhouse gas...It boggles the mind...And if you aren't good this year, Santa won't bring you any presents

Toad734 said...

Patrick:

Absolutely the facts point to him being lied to...He had it in his head that the US was going to flip to a one world currency and that the government is the enemy.

And no, no one force him to do what he did and no one is legally responsible for what he did other than him but I can see how things they said, would push a guy like that over the edge and or desensitize him to the violent analogies being aimed at Democratic politicians these days.

And what, now at least three shootings or attempted bombings can be linked directly to Glenn Beck:
Byron Williams (Oakland)
Richard Poplawski (Pittsburgh)
and the thwarted attacks by Kenneth Kimbley (Idaho)

Again, did Beck call these guys on the phone and order them to to these things and kill these people? No, he didn't but they acted on the lies and suggestions that were put into their head by Glenn Beck and I doubt Beck regrets any of it.

So don't pretend that crazy people don't inspire even crazier people to do even crazier things...I mean, how many Jews do you think Hitler personally killed himself?? Probably none.

Toad734 said...

And let's not forget the Joseph Stack incident in the Austin IRS office...I doubt this guy was watching Countdown with Kieth Olbermann.