Late Night: Try to Be Nice, And Look What It Gets You

An Eclipse of Tragedy and Opportunity: When Media Spin Transforms
While many Americans were enjoying a brief weekend break from the tedium of a typical work week, Tucson, Arizona saw a tragic drama unfold that would shock the entire country. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, while conducting a neighborhood meeting at a Grocery Store in Tucson, was shot in the head by a lone assassin along with 19 others at the meeting. A Federal District Judge, John Roll, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, was killed along with a nine year old girl who was born on ...

More on Violence And Right Wing Rhetoric
Despite all the evidence to the contrary, Conservatives who fail to understand the arguments from liberals about Right Wing Hate Speech act as if Jared Loughner lived in a vacuum and acted with absolutely no external influences. This is despite multiple reports indicating Loughner’s interest in fringe politics. NewsOne reports on yet another connection, alleging that Loughner is a fan of right winger Alex Jones. I find it curious that Conservatives have been attacking liberals this week ...

Noah Baron: The Libel of "Blood Libel"
Recently I've heard a lot of people talking about how the shooting in Arizona was merely the product of violent Rhetoric on the part of America's right-wing. Such claims, I feel, are disingenuous. What information I can find about the situation points to the killer being more mentally unbalanced than a political actor. Nonetheless, I feel that this situation presents an opportunity of us to seriously examine the way we discuss politics in our country -- and, especially, how we value Speech. Re...

Liberals’ “Civil Discourse” Calls for Palin’s Assassination
As we pointed out earlier today, liberals/Democrats/whatEVER have totally ignored THEIR president's call for "Civil Discourse" in politics.   Some pretty vicious anti-Palin posters were put up in San Francisco  even before he finished his Speech in Tucson.   Fox News reports it is getting much worse. There is a campaign on Twitter calling for Sarah Palin's Assassination. Is the FBI involved yet?  Critics of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin have turned to Twitter ...

Naming Names: Some Of The Liberals Who Were Overjoyed About The Tucson Shooting
Sadly, there have always been mentally disturbed people who’ve acted out violently. Sometimes it’s against their families, at their jobs, schools, places of employment — and sometimes it’s against famous targets. Most people, when they hear about events of this sort, feel sorrow for the senseless loss of innocent life. We wonder why God allows bad things to happen to good people and we mourn for those affected, their families, and friends. This is how most Americans fee...

Liberals Preach Civility and Call for Sarah Palins Death
As we pointed out earlier today, liberals/Democrats/whatEVER totally ignored THEIR president’s call for Civil Discourse with vicious Palin posters in San Francisco put up even before he finished his Speech in Tucson. Fox News reports it is getting much worse. There is an organized social network push calling for Sarah Palin’s Assassination. Is the FBI involved yet? Critics of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin have turned to Twitter to post hate “tweets” suggesting that ̶...

Media misses their own mark on Tuscon
The massacre that took 6 American lives last week in Tuscon, Arizona seems to have left more questions than answers.  While media outlets, political pundits, and elected officials attempted to lay blame anywhere but on the shooter himself, the White House was decidedly silent on the subject of motive. While the nation waited with baited breath for a leader to emerge offering signs of hope and stability following a horrendous act of terror, political chatter and talking points lit up the air...

Keep Politics Out
Do you like this story? Related posts The Arizona Shooting and the Death of the Wild, Wild West (0) Joan Walsh Helps Craft Obscene Defense For Arizona Shooter: Blame Palin and the Tea Party (16) Cowardly Liar David Frum Exploits Shooting To Urge People to Think About His Pet Subject That had NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with the Tragedy (3) COMMISSAR KOS: There’s No Time Like A Mass Murder To Pimp A Leftist Book (7) Yes, We’re Putting Liberals In The Crosshairs (0) tags: Arizona Shooting,...

HuffPost TV: Roy Sekoff On GOP Dilemma: Tea Party Delivers Both 'The Energy And The Crazy' (VIDEO)
Roy Sekoff appeared on "The Ed Show" Thursday to discuss the Tea Party's response to the tragic shootings in Tucson last weekend. When host Ed Schultz referenced a statement from Tucson's Tea Party Leader, which suggested Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords should have been more prepared for the attack by bringing security to her event, Sekoff replied, "The one-word response is wince." "What we've seen from the Tea Party and Sarah Palin is that they excel at playing the Victim," Sekoff said. "Th...

Try to Be Nice, And Look What It Gets You
I've not especially followed the Bad Rhetoric = Violent Massacre stuff. Yes, Wingnut rhetoric is dangerous and irresponsible and loony. But worrying about whether or not Wingnut rhetoric is responsible for the Tucson nutjob, well, that's like worrying about shutting the barn door after the horse has been shot and fucked and sold for glue. Surely: this shooting was horrific. But then, Wingnut rhetoric has directly led to mind-boggling numbers of deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan; it's ru...

Get ready, America, for The Hermanator Experience
By RightKlik It looks like Herman Cain is dead serious about running for president. The progs at The Atlantic have written up a pretty good piece introducing the uninitiated to "The Hermanator Experience." They called him crazy (without citing any evidence) and then proceeded to slather him with praise: Although often outrageous, he has a shrewd sense of his appeal. At a GOP confab in New Orleans last year, Cain railed against liberals, who, he said, slander Conservatives as “Racist, re...

People Falsely Accused of Wishing for Sarah Palins Death
In that video of disgusting death threats against Sarah Palin (Aaron posted Screenshots of them here), there were a couple that I think were included by mistake. To me, this is clearly a repudiation of those who blamed Palin. If there were any doubt, the author of the message explains: Anybody who knows me, has read my books, has read my blog, has read my Tweets, has breathed the same Internet air I breathe knows I’m a Reagan-conservative-moving-swiftly-to-libertarian Mormon with a side of...

The GOP Needs Solidarity
From True North GOP Men and Selling out Sarah by Sheila Kihne What makes the elephant charge his tusk in the misty mist, or the dusky dusk? What makes the muskrat guard his musk? Courage! I was just talking the other day about Conservatives who are foolish enough to let the media use them and lo and behold, one of my favorites, NJ Governor Chris Christie did just that this morning on Good Morning America and in the New York Times when he sold out Sarah Palin.  He wants to give her speaking ad...

Per GOP spinmeister Frank Luntz, saying your opponent wants to kill you is just as bad as saying you want to kill your opponent
by Ken No, boys and girls, saying unkind things about someone is really and truly not "violent Rhetoric." Even saying that the Right is made up entirely of ignoramuses, lunatics, liars, criminals, and economic predators isn't "violent Rhetoric." It may be unkind, but then, what are you supposed to say when it's the honest-to-gosh truth? Just not say anything? Well, that seems pretty much what the Right has in mind: freedom to spread its psychotic lies without any answer at all. Here are some t...

Limbaugh, Beck, and other conservatives do not approve of how Tucson reacts
In the past 24 hours many prominent Conservatives have questioned the "tone" of the memorial service held last night in Tucson.  The event was held in honor of nineteen Victims, including six dead, of the shooting last Saturday at an event hosted by Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ).  Most of the reviews from "mainstream" media were positive.  President Obama gave an emotional Speech which called for the country to "live up to the Democracy" that nine-year-old victim Christi...

Cafferty: Palin Can't Be President Due to 'Inflammatory' Reply to Critics
Jack Cafferty's Palin Derangement Syndrome reached a new level on Thursday's Situation Room on CNN, as he attacked the Republican for her reply to those who tried to tie her to the Arizona shootings: "It was just awful, defiant, [and] inflammatory." Cafferty also ripped Palin for using the "blood Libel" phrase and stated that the reply would "effectively end her chance of ever being elected president." The commentator devoted his 5 pm Eastern hour Cafferty F...

Coats for Kids fires guy for agreeing with Obama?
Short version: Glen Busch was the Chicago director of the nonprofit Coats for Kids, right up to the point where he (on his own personal Facebook page, and on his own time) made the completely accurate and noncontroversial points that Tucson shooter Jared Loughney was not, in point of fact, a right-wing crazy; and that later evidence that Loughney has left-wing beliefs didn’t prove anything about the situation, either.  A day later, Coats for Kids national president Paul Darby (of Virgin...

Coats for Kids fires guy for agreeing with Obama?
Short version: Glen Busch was the Chicago director of the nonprofit Coats for Kids, right up to the point where he (on his own personal Facebook page, and on his own time) made the completely accurate and noncontroversial points that Tucson shooter Jared Loughney was not, in point of fact, a right-wing crazy; and that later evidence that Loughney has left-wing beliefs didn’t prove anything about the situation, either. A day later, Coats for Kids national president Paul Darby (of Virginia...

Limbaugh: Obamas speech was poll-driven pep rally
Glenn Beck and his colleagues on Fox News may have been complimentary of President Obama’s Speech last night, but Rush Limbaugh sure wasn’t. He criticized the timing of the memorial service on Wednesday, four days after the Tucson shootings, saying it should have happened sooner. “The reason they waited as long as they did is they were waiting for polling data,” he said. “If they polling data had been different, the Speech would have been different.” CBS rel...

It's A Madhouse! A Maaaaadhouse!!
(I wrote most of this a day or so ago, so, it may be dated, but, I still stand by it. Useless Wizbang points for the first to guess where the title came from!) You'd think I would learn by now that the liberal species knows no shame. Be it lefty politicians or their boot-licking media toadies, everytime I think they couldn't possibly scrape any more sludge to suck from the bottom of the intellectual barrel, they come down with a more advanced case of mental constipation. An extra-strength dos...

Bill OReilly While Discussing Sarah Palin: There Isnt Anybody More Vilified Than Beck
Fox’s Bill O’Reilly-who delivered what he describes as a “devastating” indictment of those who linked the shootings in Arizona to politicians like Sarah Palin-does not see the former Alaska Governor as the ultimate Victim of hypercharged political Rhetoric. It’s Glenn Beck. In a discussion with Fox & Friends co-host Gretchen Carlson and Fox contributor Margaret Hoover , O’Reilly dismissed suggestions that there’s a gender bias in politi...

Limbaugh's 'Straight Shooter' Tucson Billboard is Removed
Even gun metaphors need a rest now and again. In the wake of the Tucson, Ariz., shooting at an event hosted by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Talk Radio host Rush Limbaugh has been emphatic in his assertion that he and other right-wing political figures in no way contributed to the mindset of suspected gunman Jared Loughner. But an unfortunate billboard advertising Limbaugh's show has given his critics some ammunition of their own. You must login to comment. The Fox Nation is for those opposed to into...

Civility Flashback: Wanda Sykes Jokes About Death/Torture of Rush Limbaugh Obama Yuks it up.
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A Tale of Two Speeches: Roundup and Reactions
As far as I can tell, the reaction to Palin's video statement and President Obama's Speech has been pretty disparate, and interesting. One theme shines through: Both were commenting on the same event, but the focus was very, very different. The video is The Nation's John Nichols commenting on the differences and similarities. His conclusion: If Democrats claim the mantle of civic involvement and responsibility, that's not such a bad thing. Tristero over at Digby's blog thinks this Speech transce...

NYT on Obamas speech: Thank goodness he spoke out against this weeks rhetorical ugliness especially Palins
Before this week, I would have chalked this up to simple dishonesty. They know perfectly well who he meant last night when he talked about “pointing fingers or assigning blame” in a way that “wounds,” I’d have said, but they’re such miserable shills for their liberal readership that they feel obliged to cocoon them from the truth. But after four days of voodoo and magical thinking? I don’t know. If the left can hallucinate a right-wing motive for Jared...