Let's go after the real perps: the NRA and their supporters

Sarah Palin's Moronic 'Blood Libel' Claim in Jared Loughner/Gabby Giffords Horror
​America's mainstream press is so polite, so scared. At least the overseas papers know when to call "bullshit" during coverage of the Jared Loughner saga. Sarah Palin's claim of being a Victim of "blood Libel" is so ludicrous as to defy belief. Or as Damian Thompson, blogs editor of the Telegraph (U.K.), says in a headline, "Seriously, this woman is nuts." Hey, Palin! "Blood Libel" -- a phrased usually used these days only by Muslim fanatics -- is the centuries-old myth of Jews' sacrificing...

Rep. Dreier Introduces Budget-Busting Tax Bill
There's no question that the nation's tax code needs to be revamped and the whole tax-filing process expedited. Thousands of rules make what should be an easy process a daunting task, especially for millions of small businesses. According to Rep. Dave Dreier (R-CA), chairman of the Rules Committee, Americans spend more than 6 billion hours a year preparing their income taxes. In response, Dreier has introduced the Fair and Simple Tax Act, which his office says will "vastly simplify the preparati...

American history and the fallacy of right-wing violence
Calmer voices are beginning to be heard over the fading din of accusations following last Saturday’s shootings. Now comes the search for answers to two questions that are joined at the hip: (1) How do we protect our elected officials from harm by would-be assassins? (2) How do we go about rescripting our political dialogue so that its tone is constructive rather than incendiary? A putative answer to the first question has already been suggested in the somewhat misguided proposal that all 5...

The Newspaper Just Went Off
Now is the time at Ed Driscoll.com when we juxtapose! As spotted by David Foster of the Chicago Boyz blog, here’s E.J. Dionne warning us that “abstractions are the enemy of responsible government” E J Dionne, an establishment liberal who writes for the Washington Post, complains that many House Republicans “behave as Professors in thrall to a few thrilling ideas”-ideas, that is, about limitations on the power of government-and says: Their Rhetoric is nearly devoid

Fired Park Police chief ordered reinstated
The Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent U.S. agency established to protect federal employees from partisan political and other prohibited personnel practices, ordered the Park Police Tuesday to restate Chambers within 20 days, The Washington Post reported. The board said Chambers, currently Riverdale, Md., Police Chief, is entitled to retroactive pay starting from July 2004 and to have her legal fees paid back. The board said it found insufficient evidence she violated federal rules r...

Charles Krauthammer: 'The origins of Jared Loughner's delusions are clear: mental illness. What are the origins of Paul Krugman'
Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist, political commentator, and physician, Charles Krauthammer, so often a voice of sanity and reason (he is, after all, a Psychiatrist) ... says today exactly what's been needing to be said, in what Peter Wehner refers to as "a 'spectacularly good column' that concludes with a devastating knockout of the New York Times columnist Paul Krugman." Here are a few excerpts to pique your interest. The money quote is "The origins of [Jared] Loughner's delusions ...

Loughners photo
The Washington Post’s Paul Farhi looks at how various Newspapers treated the unsettling police-released photo of Jared Loughner Tuesday and finds his own employer to be the outlier. The New York Times, Daily News, New York Post all went big with the image – with the New York Tabloids even silhouetting it against a black background. But the Washington Post opted for a vigil photo, with Loughner’s small head shot tucked beneath it. The Washington Post, by contrast, chose to il...

Sarah Palin Invokes Anti-Semitic Term Blood Libel in Reaction to Arizona Shootings
There has been extensive discussion about whether intensified hateful Rhetoric used in partisan debate may have incited accused Arizona shooter Jared Loughner to try to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords at her Congress on the Corner event Saturday, wounding 13 others and killing six.  Loughner himself has not yet explicitly expressed a motive, though Law Enforcement has uncovered evidence indicating an extreme political dislike for Giffords. Journalists such as Keith Olbermann and others ...

Congress to honor Giffords, others
Published: Jan. 12, 2011 at 12:40 PM House Speaker John Boehner decried the rampage in Tucson, Ariz., in which six people died and 14 people were injured, including Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. UPI/Kevin Dietsch Ariz. lawmakers seek ban on Funeral Protests WASHINGTON, Jan. 12 (UPI) -- House Speaker John Boehner decried the rampage in Tucson, Ariz., in which six people died and 14 people were injured, including Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. "These are difficult hours for our country," Boeh...

Murray Fromson: Guns, Blood and Truth
I have seen too much human blood spilled in my lifetime -- of people I did not know -- mostly in wartime. I was trained to use a rifle and a Handgun at Fort Ord. California before shipping overseas as a GI. In self-defense, I killed Chinese Soldiers in Korea. In Vietnam, I had to write a letter of condolence to the parents of a gallant U.S. Army advisor who was killed a few feet away from me in a Vietcong ambush. Now, whenever I go to Washington, I make a point of visiting the Vietnam memorial...

Remedies that go too far, Part II
The things we already fear and already desire more thoroughly to control are most vividly salient to us. We seize on those: guns, crazy people. Did Jared Lee Loughner shoot government officials with a gun? Ban guns within 1,000 feet of government officials! Was Jared Lee Loughner detectably crazy? Make involuntary commitment easier! Did Jared Lee Loughner buy a gun while detectably crazy? Tighten background-screening requirements! Did Jared Lee Loughner's gun sport an extended magazine? Ban exte...

Video: Maybe Loughner watched Chris Matthews
Could this have been Jared Lee Loughner’s call?  Probably not, but if Chris Matthews  continues to go down this blood Libel road, he and his guest should be held accountable as well for even discussing the notion of another massacre of Americans for President Obama to use to regain a connectedness to the American People.  An easier way, with no bloodshed, would be for Obama to govern from the center and according to the will of the consent of the governed, ins...

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach: The Angry American Male
No sooner had Gabrielle Gifford been rushed to the Hospital with a massive gunshot wound to the head when the blame game got into full swing. Egged on by the comments of Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik the theory quickly emerged that right-wing conservative Tea Party Rhetoric had all but pulled the trigger. Conservatives shot back that the accusation was a "blood Libel," bereft of evidence and designed to score political points. Moreover, they argued, the left had spewed far more venom dur...

Monkey Wrench: Friend of Giffords Shooter Jared Loughner Says He Did Not Watch TV Disliked the News
whthfk on Police Visited Home of AZ Shooter on More Than One Occasion. Clarification on GOP Rep. Allen West: I Have No Plans to Tone Down My “Strong Language” in Wake of Giffords Shooting… Rep. James Clyburn, Sheriff “Vitriol” Dupnik and Paul Krugman simultaneously hardest hit. (TV Newser)- This morning on “Good Morning America,” ABC’s Ashleigh Banfield sat down with Zach Osler, a High School friend of Jared Loughner, the s...

The Political Consequences of Violence
I believe that The New Yorker’s George Packer has mistaken the meaning of a line in my column this week. He writes: Douthat wrote, in the spirit of phony equivalence, “If overheated Rhetoric and martial imagery really led inexorably to Murder, then both parties would belong in the dock,” but also this: “the Attempted Murder of a Democratic congresswoman is a potential gift to Liberalism.” In other words, everyone goes over the line now and then, no one actually want...

Questions for Charles Krauthammer and others on the right
I agree with Charles Krauthammer: It's wrong to blame the Arizona shooting on any specific conservative commentators or individuals, as he argues in his column this morning. But in the spirit of civil debate that everyone is suddenly clamoring for, I have a couple of follow up questions for him -- or anyone else who feels like answering them -- that I hope he will address, which he could do anytime he likes over on the Post Partisan opinion blog. Krauthammer argues that claim that the rhetor...

Rep. Brodeur files Doc, dont ask gun bill
TALLAHASSEE — Doctors and other medical providers would be barred from asking patients - or the parents of child patients - if they have guns in their home under a measure that promises a major showdown between powerful lobbying groups. The National Rifle Association’s top Florida Lobbyist and a Florida Medical Association member both say the issue is among the top priorities for the session, with the groups holding diametrically opposed positions on what doctors and thei...

Reforming our Gun Culture
Submitted by findingavoice on Wed, 01/12/2011 - 6:15am. Well, your second-amendment solution reared its ugly head this week in Tucson with the shooting of Gabby Giffords, a blue dog Democrat who was re-elected in November. Those folks who try to say there is some equivalence between angry liberal talk and Sarah Palin’s “cross hairs” Rhetoric are self-serving deniers who refuse to acknowledge the part they play in the deterioration of Civil Discourse in our country. On Sunday w...

Biden arrives in Pakistan for talks (Reuters)
Islamabad (Reuters) – Vice President Joe Biden will pressure Pakistan to intensify its crackdown on Militants in talks on Wednesday with Pakistan's leadership, but will tread carefully to avoid further straining ties. Biden arrived in Islamabad after two days in Kabul, where he said on Tuesday that Pakistan needed to do more to help the United States in its battle against Taliban and other Militants in Afghanistan as it prepares to withdraw its Troops from there. "It's going...

Biden arrives in Pakistan for talks
ISLAMABAD — Vice President Joe Biden will pressure Pakistan to intensify its crackdown on Militants in talks on Wednesday with Pakistan's leadership, but will tread carefully to avoid further straining ties. Biden arrived in Islamabad after two days in Kabul, where he said on Tuesday that Pakistan needed to do more to help the United States in its battle against Taliban and other Militants in Afghanistan as it prepares to withdraw its Troops from there. "It's going to require more p...

Family of alleged shooter releases statement
The family of the alleged shooter of an Arizona congresswoman and more than a dozen others released a statement Tuesday. The family of Jared Lee Loughner released a written statement to the press in outside their house in Tuscon asking that the press respect their Privacy. Loughner is the primary suspect in the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and twenty others. "This is a very difficult time for us. We ask the media to respect our privacy," the statement, published online by th...

The Four Most Dangerous Words To Your Portfolio
As we head into the New Year, media outlets ranging from CNBC to The Washington Post are full of financial commentary addressing this question. On the surface it seems like a logical query. But if you were getting ready to go out, would you ask “What Should I Wear?”… without describing where you are heading?  Of course not. The clothes you’d wear to shovel snow in will be very different from the clothes you’d wear to a Wedding. That’s why “How Shoul...

Beck Stokes Fears Of "A Ban On Guns" Following AZ Shooting
Beck Claims Politicians Are "Pushing" To Ban Guns Following AZ Shooting Beck: Lawmakers Are Pushing "A Ban On Guns." On his Fox News show, Beck claimed that lawmakers are pushing "a ban on guns" in response to the Arizona shooting. Beck stated: BECK: It didn't take long for Washington to come out with their solution to the problem of the alleged violent Rhetoric. The solution, however, comes despite not having a shred of evidence that this crazed gunman was motivated by anything other than his...

Cynicism, Willful Ignorance and Malice
Charles Krauthammer, a board certified psychologist, talked to Bill O’Reilly about Jared Loughner who Krauthammer believes is a paranoid schizophrenic. Krauthammer said Loughner has all the signs, and basically lives in his own mind - a dream world. He also said there is no evidence that Sarah Palin or anyone on the right had anything to do with Loughner’s Mental Illness or the Tuscon shooting. He believes the debate we should be having is what to do with the mentally ill. Li...

Arizona Passes Bill Making It Illegal to Protest Near a Funeral
Christina Taylor Green ​Following up on today's earlier post about the Westboro Baptist Church's intended picketing of the Funeral service for Christina Taylor Green, the 9-year-old killed in the shooting in Tucson on Saturday, we've learned that Arizona legislators have approved emergency Legislation that would make it a Misdemeanor to Protest within 300 feet of Funeral or burial sites. The House and Senate voted unanimously on the bill, which goes to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer today ...