Arizona Massacre Prompts Political 'Cheap Shots'

Media whitewashes ultra-right in Arizona massacre
Here the central role was played by the ultra-right media campaign mounted by Fox News, Talk Show hosts like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, and the Tea Party wing of the Republican Party, including one Republican Senate Candidate who called for a "Second Amendment solution" to political issues -- i.e., the use of Firearms. As the World Socialist Web Site explained yesterday (See "Arizona Assassination spree tied to political right"), the political conceptions in Loughner's Internet postings are...

America's worse sheriff
Image via Wikipedia IBD: It's bad enough that a fine congresswoman is shot down by a crazed assassin. But do those whose job it is to prevent such awful things have to insert their own base politics into the tragedy? As a key Law Enforcement figure in the Assassination attempt against Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik, a Democrat, might be expected to show some caution in commenting on the violent swirl of bitter, unsubstantiated and outright false accusation...

Arizona sheriff condemns Limbaughs irresponsible rhetoric
Stumble This! An Arizona sheriff responsible for investigating the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) confronted conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh Tuesday for the "irresponsible" Rhetoric he uses on his Radio Show. "The kind of Rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment he is irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information," Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik told ABC News. "[Limbaugh] attacks people, angers them against governm...

Only 32% of Americans Feel Political Rhetoric is to Blame for Jared Loughner Tucson Shooting Massacre
Once again Liberals, Democrats and yhe MSM find themselves on the wrong side with the American People … 57% of Americans believe that political Rhetoric was not to blame for the murderous acts on Saturday by gunman Jared Loughner. Only 32% believe Rhetoric was to blame as many jumped to conclusions and fueled their political agenda like Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik. Many Democrats, Liberals and their complicit liberal mouth pieces in the media were quick to exploit the Tucson

Tucson Shooting Suspect's Family "Hurting Real Bad"
NEXT » Yesterday, when the man suspected of shooting Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, as well as over a dozen others (leaving six dead), in an apparent Assassination attempt appeared in court, not a single relative of Jared Lee Loughner was spotted in the courtroom. Now details are emerging about the 22-year-old's family, who initially blocked the FBI from entering their home. And a neighbor told the NY Post that Loughner's dad is "pretty much the neighborhood prick." The neighbor, who also said...

Brave Woman Who Grabbed Clip from Shooter Blames Right-Wing Media and Rhetoric In Fox News Interview
Patricia Maisch, 61, was the brave woman who kept alleged shooter Jared Loughner from unloading a second clip into a Tuscon crowd on Saturday. Wounded herself from a bullet, she saw him attempting to equip his gun with another magazine, grabbed him and knelt on his ankle, delaying the reload and potentially saving many more lives.  So when Fox News interviewed her on Sunday, they clearly wanted to know if her strength could translate to psychic healing as Americans grappled with the tragedy...

Glenn Beck Defends Sarah Palin With New Pledge Scam
It was a no-brainer that Glenn Beck would jump on the hastily gerrymandered “FOX ‘News’ Protect Palin” bandwagon after the Tucson massacre. Beck has a lot invested emotionally in the Half-Governor. Not only is she his BFF—she was his first guest on Fox “News”—but he is also knew that an attack on Sarah Palin for her “target maps” would quickly spread to the Beckinator himself. As offensive as the bulls eyes might have been—and the...

"Sarah Palin made him do it!" means Narrative failure
"Sarah Palin made him do it!" means Narrative failure While it's still too early to say this conclusively, I think that people who want to read their various political narratives into Jared Lee Loughner are ultimately in for a disappointment. The man's mind is so messed up that he's the political equivalent of schizophrenic word salad (schizophasia): Judging from Mr. Loughner's own website, his mind was a mess of Conspiracy theories, influenced by tracts like "Mein Kampf" and the "Communist Ma...

The "Politicized Mind" Of Gabrielle Giffords
David Brooks is astonished, sickened, appalled that an attempted Assassination of a sitting congresswoman should be immediately regarded as something possibly ... wait for it ... political. In fact, Loughner must be seen in a context in which politics does not exist: The evidence before us suggests that Loughner was locked in a world far removed from politics as we normally understand it. So why, one has to ask, does this person with Mental Illness, carefully select for Assassination an alread...

Most Americans don't see link between Arizona shootings, political rhetoric, poll finds
A sizable majority of Americans said they did not believe that harsh political Rhetoric was the reason a gunman opened fire over the weekend in Tucson, killing six and wounding 14, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, according to a CBS News poll released Tuesday. The finding comes as Republicans and Democrats have sparred over whether recent heated political Rhetoric may have been a factor in the shootings. Giffords was among 20 lawmakers targeted in campaign literature by Sarah Palin, the conse...

Fox New Website Continues Partisan Attack On Sheriff Dupnik's "Vitriol" Comments
If Propaganda is to be believed, it should be repeated. Yesterday, in both an interview on "Fox & Friends" and an article on the Fox News website, Fox News featured critical commentary about Pima County Sheriff's remarks about the vitriol in our society - vitriol that, as he stated, is promulgated by the media. Obviously needing to deflect and divert from the appropriate substance of Dupnik's comments, Fox is maintaining its seeming scapegoating of the sheriff. Today's headline (first under the ...

Tucson Sheriff sticks foot in mouth over Rush Limbaugh comment!
Having an opinion is one thing, but making your opinion public can have Unintended Consequences.  And yes, even for Pima Count, AZ Sheriff, Clarence Dupnik, that rule applies.  Yesterday, he may have inadvertently stuck his foot in his mouth with his Rhetoric about Rush Limbaugh.  Take for instance, the comments made by Dupnik.  Yesterday in an interview, he told Diane Sawyer of ABCNews  that; Really?!  Do you really think he listens to Limbaugh's program, or is he ...

The Unstable Sheriff of Pima County, AZ
Jim Geraghty in his Morning Jolt email takes on Sheriff Clarence Dupnik (pronounced "Dumbsh....") who has managed both to neglect his duties AND try and dismantle the First Amendment: Say this for Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik. He may have dropped the ball on numerous red flags and other signs of a potential threat from the Tucson gunman, and he certainly didn't bother to assign any deputies or other police personnel to the "Congress on Your Corner" event that turned into a massacre, des...

U.S. public says Giffords shooting, rhetoric unrelated
Most Americans see no relation between the attempted Assassination of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the political tactic of lacing vitriolic Rhetoric with Firearms analogies. That’s the conclusion of a CBS News poll that found most Republicans (69 pct), most Independents (56 pct) and even a plurality of Democrats (49 pct) believe the two phenomena unrelated. Those numbers add up to 57 percent of Americans overall — a true majority though not quite big enough to break a Se...

Friends, Critics Dispute Arizona Sheriffs Remarks on Political Rhetoric in Wake of Rampage
Just hours after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, an Arizona Democrat, was shot in the head by a crazed gunman, Pima County Sheriff Clarence W. Dupnik — addressing the media for the first time — made headlines for saying that “vitriolic political rhetori......

Hate, violence, extremism: Krugman on the Arizona shooting
By Michael J.W. Stickings Just to drive the point home, allow me to quote Paul Krugman, who yesterday made the case that many of us have been making the past few days: When you heard the terrible news from Arizona, were you completely surprised? Or were you, at some level, expecting something like this atrocity to happen? Put me in the latter category. I've had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach ever since the fina...

Video of the Day: AZ Sheriff Slams Irresponsible Rush
Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik is at it again. He gave a politicized Press Conference after the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, blaming “vitriol.” Then Sunday, he admitted to Fox News’ Megyn Kelly he had no proof Loughner had been influenced by politics at all. But now he has reversed course and blamed Rush Limbaugh for his “irresponsible” Rhetoric, anyway. Way to issue a blood Libel there, Sheriff. ...

Double Standards
Rush Limbaugh and the right wingers are all over Sheriff Clarence Dupnik for having the temerity to express an opinion about the causes of the shootings in Tucson last weekend.Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik thrust himself into the spotlight in the aftermath of the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 19 other people in Arizona on Saturday, decrying the heated political atmosphere and calling for more civility. "It's not unusual for all public officials to get threats constantly, ...

Early Morning Swim: Sherrod Brown and Rachel Maddow Discuss Violence in Our Politics
Meanwhile, God bless Sheriff Dupnik. The Arizona sheriff investigating the Tucson shooting that left U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords critically wounded had harsh words today for those engaging in political Rhetoric, calling conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh “irresponsible” for continuing the vitriol. “The kind of rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment he is irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information,” Pima County Sh...

Does Beck Think Americans Are Weak?
Tue Jan. 11, 2011 8:37 AM PST Why doesn't Glenn Beck have confidence in America? During his Monday Radio Show—when the subject was the Tucson tragedy—Beck came to the rescue of his friend Sarah Palin, who had come under criticism for a map her political action group had created last year that placed cross-hairs over the districts of 20 Democratic legislators it had targeted—including the one represented by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). Beck read to his audience an email f...

ABC News Chief: We're Going To 'Fix' 'This Week'
PASADENA, Calif. — The new president of ABC News said Monday that his organization needs to work with more unity, and its weekend coverage of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' shooting proved it. Unlike rivals CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox News Channel, ABC did not broadcast Saturday's false report that Gifford had died in Tucson, Ariz., which originated with National Public Radio. But for 10 minutes, the ABC.com website used an incorrect headline in a banner. "It really hit me in the heart when I liste...

How Glenn Beck And Fox News Successfully Painted AZ Shooter As Hitler, Marx Devotee
Within hours of the Shooting Spree in Arizona, conservative blogs lit up with the news that the suspect, Jared Loughner, was an aficionado of Mein Kampf and the Communist Manifesto. A Hitler/Marx devotee, the logic went, is someone too idiosyncratic or crazy to be part of any mainstream political movement. Some went further, and cited the information as proof that Loughner was the sort of big-government liberal they had nightmares about. As with so many of these fast-propagating conservative m...

Heritage Foundation whines, "It all started when he hit me back!"
Conservatives never take responsibility for anything: Slavery, segregation, Racism, coddling Hitler, Central American death squads, Pollution, mass Incarceration, three decades of Budget-busting Deficits, 9/11, Katrina, the Iraq War, the Wall Street meltdown & the Great Recession--the list goes on and on. So why would their reaction to the attempted Assassination of Gabrielle Giffords be any different? And it's not, as the Heritage Foundation whines, "It all started when he hit me back!" Libe...

Zandar's Thought Of The Day
Pima County Arizona Sheriff Clarence Dupnik dared to voice the opinion that eliminationist Rhetoric from the right is a problem in this country. How do the eliminationists respond? 48 hours later, the right is holding Dupnik responsible for the shooting. Hot Air: Any cop can tell you whodunnit but it takes a supercop to tell you What It All Means about our political culture. A nagging question: Should supercop maybe have figured out that Loughner was a menace before he gunned down six people out...

On Jared Loughner: The politicized mind
Before he allegedly went off on his shooting rampage in Tucson, Jared Loughner listed some of his favorite books on his YouTube page. These included: “Animal Farm,” “Brave New World,” “Alice in Wonderland,” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” “Through the Looking Glass” and “The Communist Manifesto.” Many of these books share a common theme: individuals trying to control their own thoughts and government or some other f...