Contributors

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Doubling Down

For those of you who want a very specific example of why I am a Democrat, compare Sarah Palin's speech yesterday to President Obama's speech.

Instead of taking the high road, Sarah Palin decided to double down and use her position as a powerful force within the conservative movement in this country to fully illustrate why people should be talking about her in connection with the shooting.

If you don’t like a person’s vision for the country, you’re free to debate that vision. If you don’t like their ideas, you’re free to propose better ideas. But, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible.

So, Sarah Palin has now put herself on the same level as oppressed Jews accused of using Christian children's blood in religious ceremonies. Really? Let's compare here statement (which can be read in full here) with Keith Olbermann's statement read on the night of the shooting.

Violence, or the threat of violence, has no place in our Democracy, and I apologize for and repudiate any act or any thing in my past that may have even inadvertently encouraged violence. Because for whatever else each of us may be, we all are Americans.

You know what the above is called, folks? Taking Responsibility. 

All of this discourse over the last week has made me realize that, in general, the right wing of this country completely fails in two very distinct yet related ways.

The first way they epically fail is by loudly asserting in one breath that people need to own up to their actions and then completely failing to take ownership of any of their own actions in..well...anything...in the other breath. We saw this for 8 years with President Bush. He could never admit fault. We see it on here in any discussion of race. We see it with Sarah Palin in this situation.

Let's review some key facts:

1. Sarah Palin puts up a map with rifle crosshairs on it early last year targeting certain congressional districts for the fall campaign.

2. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' district was one of the districts targeted.

2. Gabrielle Giffords calls Palin to the map for saying this and speaks of "consequences" in an interview on MSNBC.

3. Giffords' office  is attacked along with fellow Arizona congressmen Raul Girjalva's office.

3. Ms. Giffords is shot in the head later in th year.

These four things are facts. They happened. And Palin wants to stifle any conversation about any of this? Then doubles down and uses the term "blood libel" in relation to herself. Does she know that Giffords is JEWISH? My commenters accuse me of having no shame and scoring political points. Are you fucking KIDDING me?

Imagine if Hillary Clinton had done that and someone had been shot in the head. Imagine if it were Muslims that put up a map like this. The reaction would be exactly the same as mine...likely worse...from the right. And they would be correct. The defense, from the right, for the crosshairs map is that the Democrats put one out in 2004. My question is a simple one.

DID ANYONE GET SHOT IN THE HEAD?!?

The second, and equally important, way that the right wing epically fails is their titanic resistance to the idea that people don't operate in a vacuum. Palin again from yesterday.

Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own. They begin and end with the criminals who commit them, not collectively with all the citizens of a state, not with those who listen to talk radio, not with maps of swing districts used by both sides of the aisle, not with law-abiding citizens who respectfully exercise their First Amendment rights at campaign rallies, not with those who proudly voted in the last election.

Wrong. David Adkisson walked into a Unitarian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee and killed two people, wounding seven others. During his interview, Adkisson said that he believed that all liberals should be killed because they are ruining the country. Books by Sean Hannity, Michael Savage and Bill O'Reilly were found in his home. People don't operate in a vacuum. Even if Loughner had been found with Palin's books and the crosshairs map, she still would've denied any responsibility...just as Hannity, Savage and O'Reilly all did back in 2008.

As I wrote about the other day, we are the product of our socialization. The way people behave is not simply a result of their own actions but the result of a lifetime of interactions with both the people and the institutions of our country. The media is an institution of our country that is overwhelmingly influential and poweful. Make no mistake, folks. I am not saying that Hannity caused Adkisson to go out and shoot these people. It was the combination of Hannity (et al), Adkisson's own warped mind, and the failure of the various agencies of socialization in Adkisson's life. It was the combination of all these factors. As a side note, this is why I think gun control is ludicrous. The guns aren't the problem...the agencies of socialization are the problem if they fail!

So, it's a double (and most epic) fail illustrated beautifully in the form of Sarah Palin. She can't own up to her own contribution to the overall problem and she can't admit that Jared Loughner is who he is because of the culture in which he lives. This is a fundamental (and most common) flaw in conservative ideology. Quite frankly, it's a flaw that needs to be corrected if our society ever wants to get any further down the road. We need to understand that it is both.

The icing on the (hilarious) cake is that she falls back into what we clearly should all get past...as this latest tragedy so eloquently illustrates...she blames liberals, using the term "blood libel," and once again TARGETS them as evil. And we are right back in the shit...again!

Honestly, though, it's clear why she and other right wingers are pissed. Their insecurity is glaringly obvious. Nearly every discussion I've ever had with the right has been like this. This is why they accuse Social Security of being like a Ponzi Scheme:. They don't have informed opinions...only delusions that fit their anger....so they make shit up, pulling it deep from within their asses. The real reason why she and some others on the right are PO'd about this is that they have nothing else. They have to resort to insane levels of hyperbole.  "Don't retreat, reload" is their meat. If that mode of discourse is taken away, their position will be revealed for what it is.

Full of sound and fury...signifying nothing.

38 comments:

Anonymous said...

So you accept that it is partly your doing that Sarah Palin is now getting many more death threats, right?

Larry said...

First off, Mark, those "rifle crosshairs" are registration marks, commonly used in printing. I've never used nor seen nor ever heard of such a wackadoodle rifle scope that that crosshairs extend well outside the scope body. On the other hand, Democrats did run an ad showing J.D. Hayworth in the sights of a scoped rifle (not a printer's mark on the state of Arizona in a US map).

Palin would like asshats like you to stop libeling her.

I know you think Palin and Republicans and libertarians should STFU and eat whatever shit sandwich you choose to serve, but that's not going to happen.

jeff c. said...

Larry-was JD Hayworth shot in the head?

Mark Ward said...

I think anyone giving Sarah Palin death threats is amusing and must have a death wish themselves considering her base. I'd like to hear these death threats as well. We have the recordings of the Bart Stupak voice mails. Can we hear the death threats against her?

What I'd like, Larry, is for Sarah Palin to keep talking. If she puts in more performances like yesterday, her relevance is going to wane from the political arena. What's up with Ann Coulter these days? Hanging out with the Log Cabin Republicans.

Further, the point of this post was not for anyone to shut up but take ownership of their words and actions. Encourage people with gun lingo and there are consequences. If she had said, "Yeah, I talk that way and yeah it influences people that way. So what? I ain't changing" I'd have a lot more respect for her. Instead, she blames others and people like me.

If she wants to be a leader, though, she has to admit when she is wrong and embrace humility. I don't see that very often or at all from people like her.

blk said...

Palin insists that the kind of mean-spirited vitriol she, Limbaugh and Beck spout doesn't incite madmen to violence, but then she says:

But, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn.

Her entire argument boils down to a childish "I'm not doing it, you are!"

This performance, more than any other statement in her mediocre career, illustrates exactly why she is the wrong person for any job except her relentless self-promotion in the media. The same media she blames for all the ills in society, and the same media that has made her into the creature she is today.

We should just ignore her from this point forward.

Speaking Truth said...

> I'd like to hear these death threats as well.

Most of them are being sent via Twitter:

http://bit.ly/iegqSQ

YouTube has already taken down one video showing these threats. This one probably won't last long either.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BACY8OZ8nB0

Speaking Truth said...

Then there's this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3s4YfBKs39Y

Speaking Truth said...

a friend of the killer, Jared Lee Loughner, told "Good Morning America" that Loughner "did not watch TV. He disliked the news. He didn’t listen to political radio. He didn’t take sides. He wasn’t on the left. He wasn’t on the right."

— http://bit.ly/eo1t7N

This was known BEFORE M posted his latest hatefest.

So let me get this straight… We now know that

– Loughner didn't pay attention to politics (meaning he would NOT have seen the graphic from Sarah Palin, which was directly equivalent to the bullseye graphic posted on the DLS's own web site)

- that he apparently starting planning to assasinate Giffords well before Sarah Palin even came on the scene

- that he had been making death threats to numerous people which were ignored

-that he had a death shrine in his back yard

and therefore, the entire libel against her is FALSE; but you don't care about the truth. You've belligerently ignored every single piece of evidence which you were shown. Yet you're pissed off that she has the temerity to defend herself from your hyperpartisan assault?

Time to remind you:

“Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
— Matthew 7:1–5

You don't have a mere log in your eye, you have a full Redwood Forest growing out of both eyes, your ears, your nose, your mouth, and every single other orifice. I pity you. Having your own standard applied to you is gonna suck big time.

I'm done trying to open the eyes of this monstrous hypocrite.

juris imprudent said...

Her entire argument boils down to a childish "I'm not doing it, you are!"

As does M. I guess there just isn't much chance of him remembering how he promised to elevate his discourse after reading and posting on Manzi's article.

Too bad M, that was actually you being interesting. Now? Not so much. If this is where you are determined to stay, bitterly clinging to your failed vision of a progressive Democratic paradise, well, there may not be much for me here.

Last in line said...

Good post Speaking Truth.

For the record - nobody on here has compared Palins speech to Obamas speech yet - you've avoided quoting Obamas speech thus far.

In light of what he know now from the shooters best friend...that the shooter did not listen to talk radio and did not follow politics much at all, are you folks on here standing by your statements of the last few days on here relating Beck/Palin, et all to the shooter?

Mark
There's no way in hell that anyone would take Palin's crosshairs seriously.

I'm really sick and tired of these same people deflecting responsibility for starting all of this.

We are seeing the same thing today...idealism of the right is turning violent.

Until the right comes to grips with these simple truths, we won't get anywhere.

When you have leaders of a movement acting as Palin, Limbaugh, and Beck do on a daily basis, there are going to be consequences.

his has been going on for two years and will continue unless the leaders of the conservative movement cease with these tactics.

It's real simple, folks. The right stops with this bullshit and I don't comment on it.

You are avoiding the culture that has built up on the right wing completely and deflecting it with smaller and lesser known examples.

It is my contention that someone as clearly mentally disturbed as Loughner was enabled by what passes for normal discourse from the likes of people like Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin.

Santa
Now the right is idealistic to a fault and violent today.

Blk
The right and its media enablers swim in a pool of outrage, fury, deceptions, half-truths and outright lies.

But the mood of the country is like a thermostat. Beck, Coulter, Limbaugh, Brewer and far too many other Republicans are cranking it way up. And when the nuts at the far right end get too hot they start to pop.

Angela
"Hmm....maybe Mark is right about this and it's time to take folks like Beck and Palin to the mat for saying crap like this."
----------------------------------------------------------

You can all double down and say the stuff you referenced contributes to the negative tone of politics nowadays but are you all still standing by your statements that the shooter was influenced by Beck/Palin/Limbaugh?

Obama said...

"But what we can’t do is use this tragedy as one more occasion to turn on one another."

"Rather than pointing fingers or assigning blame, "

"let’s remember that it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy – it did not"

"For the truth is that none of us can know exactly what triggered this vicious attack. None of us can know with any certainty what might have stopped those shots from being fired,"

"Bad things happen, and we must guard against simple explanations in the aftermath."

We can see who is doubling down, and it isn't just Palin.

Mark Ward said...

Hey ST, no spammed comment! That's a good thing. I wonder if we are finally past all this. I checked the filter a couple of times today and saw nothing.

Sadly, though, you are still missing my point. The friend's view is gospel now? Clearly Loughner paid attention to that grammar guy, David Wynn Miller and that was on the internet. His other statements smack of the gold/currency wackos and he used the internet. That's not paying attention? His statements alone on the Constitution juxtaposed with the statements the right makes all the time about said document are quite similar. I guess I just don't get the vitriol. It's clear to me that the left got out of control in the 60s and turned violent. Their leaders were responsible. Why is this so hard for you to see...especially given a case like Adkisson?

There may not be causation in the case of Loughner but there is correlation given the environment that we are in and the right is largely responsible for creating it. It's a money making industry now so it's no wonder they are all up in arms about these sort of commentaries. Their wallet is now being threatened because it might be that no one will (gasp!) listen to them anymore.

GuardDuck said...

Mark,

You say the causation of the nuts is because of the right, and decry the right for not stopping.

Then you proudly claim the causation of the right to be because of the acts of the left. Where is your cry for the left to stop?

Teabagging nutjob said...

Wow. Everywhere else, I see the left backing away from this idiocy, but not here; not marky.
He has this vision of why this happened, and dammit, facts are just not going to get in the way of that.
Dude, your president just pretty much said it was a load of horseshit.
As for the blood libel definition, that's not owned exclusively by the Jews, but I guess I shouldn't expect you to be any more educated on that than anything else you opine about.
Don't get stuck on stupid, mark. You've lost this one. Be gracious, admit defeat and move on.

Anonymous said...

If you want to find out where the "climate of hate" is coming from, google the following names:

Richard Poplawski
Jiverly Voong
James von Brunn
Maurice Schwenkler
Bill Sparkman
Amy Bishop
Joseph Stack
Faizal Shahzad
Chris Powers

No less than 9 times in 2 years, the left has rushed to blame the actions of the above people on the right.

No less than 9 times in 2 years, the left has rushed to smear the right with the actions of these people, some of whom (like Bishop) were avowed leftists.

But apparently none of that matters. Mark still apparently feels justified in labeling a third of the population of this country as violent racist psychopaths, willing to condone, if not advocate, murder.

"Climate of hate", indeed.

Last in line said...

Reductio ad Absurdum again.

I never said the best friends words are gospel, I just have a hunch he knows the shooter a little better than you do.

Your point is seen in the above statements I quoted of yours - that this particular shooting was directly caused by right wing rhetoric. We have multiple sources around this guy saying that he didn't really listen to talk radio, didn't really like GWB and was a looney. My point is that the people around him are saying he didn't listen to Glenn Beck or Sarah Palin. (now I suppose it will be my job to prove them wrong)

Obama doesn't know what triggered this attack but you do? At least Obama is guarding against simple explanations. Same cannot be said of you folks. You sure are quick to bring up the tradegy (Adkisson) that best fits your narrative while avoiding comment on Obamas speech which directly addressed assigning blame, pointing fingers, and guarding against simple explanations (ie, exactly what you have been doing since Saturday). You also brought up Palin right away too because it's easy for you to focus on the perceived dingbats on the other side.

Last in line said...

Hey - I forgot something.

Mark would like all of you to STFU out of respect for the victims! Remember?

TheBigGig said...

Mark are you really this divorced from reality? You write:

"This is why they accuse Social Security of being like a Ponzi Scheme:. They don't have informed opinions...only delusions that fit their anger....so they make shit up, pulling it deep from within their asses."

Conservatives don't have informed opinions? Social security isn't a ponzi scheme? It most certainly is and it is easily proven. The number of current recipients has grown relative to the number of workers paying taxes. That's a ponzi scheme Mark. Pretty simple. Just use your brain.

The Left (you) are not reflective and are emotion based. This entire past week was one BIG LIE from the Left. They'll say anything to destroy the Right.

TheBigGig said...

Mark - Palin's PAC website used surveyor's marks. Go to the U.S. Geological Survey document called "Topographic Map Symbols." It will show you the exact marking that Palin used on her map. Have the courage to post her map versus the map which appeared on the website of the Democratic Leadership Committee back in 2004. Please make note of the use of the word "enemy" to refer to Republicans, as well as the phrase "ripe targets for Democrats." You've already notice that on this map there are no surveyor's marks. What you have are bull's-eyes. Yup ... bull's-eyes. Clearly the type of bull's eyes you would use for a target for shooting purposes.
Indeed, Democratic consultant Bob Beckel went on Fox News and said he invented the bull's-eye maps.

BTW, will you now stop shopping at Target? Or at least insist that Dayton change the name of the store?

Is there anything liberals get right? Wake up.

TheBigGig said...

Mark -

The effort by Liberals to blame the unhinged act of a lunatic on the language of the right is an effort to silence conservatives and is nothing new. It began back in 1963 when commentators pontificated about a right-wing “climate of hate” in Dallas, Texas, that supposedly explained why a crazed Communist — pro-Soviet, Castroite 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald — shot President Kennedy.

George Will said it best: "This McCarthyism of the left - devoid of intellectual content, unsupported by data - is a mental tic, not an idea but a tactic for avoiding engagement with ideas."

Two years ago, we were still being told dissent was the highest form of patriotism; now it’s the root cause of murder. Modern leftists are tacticians. They’ve convinced themselves of the rightness of their cause, obviating the need to be consistent or faithful to facts. For them, it’s all about how the episode can be spun to help the cause.

TheBigGig said...

Actually it appears the Tucson murderer was a Leftie! Probably influenced by your hate speech Mark! Turn yourself in!

As for Loughner being influenced by Palin, tea partiers, Fox News and talk radio -- wrong. According to all available evidence, Loughner is a liberal.

Every friend of Loughner who has characterized his politics has described him as liberal. Not one called him a conservative.

One friend says Loughner never listened to talk radio or watched the TV news.

According to voluminous Twitter postings on Saturday by one of Loughner's friends since high school, Caitie Parker, he was "left wing," "a political radical" "quite liberal" and "a pot head."

TheBigGig said...

Okay everyone - take this Quiz:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/01/right_wing_hate_speech_quiz.html

Let me know how you do.

I got an 8.

TheBigGig said...

Hi Mark,

Great column by Taranto in the WSJ today. He makes an excellent point:

“Back in the 1960s, who’d have imagined that a septuagenarian white sheriff from Arizona with a hostility to free speech would one day become a hero to the left?”

You see Mark, at their heart, liberals are totalitarians. You WILL tell others what to do because the great unwashed are fools. Free speech be damned, right? Isn't that the meat of your latest post?

TheBigGig said...

Mark, Point me to equivalents from the Right of any of these where elite conservatives call for the murder of libs:

Recall that the kill-Bush talk and imagery started very early. When Governor Bush was delivering his 2000 convention speech, Craig Kilborn, a CBS talk-show host, showed him on the screen with the words "SNIPERS WANTED."

Six years later, Bill Maher, the comedian-pundit, was having a conversation with John Kerry. He asked the senator what he had gotten his wife for her birthday. Kerry answered that he had taken her to Vermont. Maher said, "You could have went to New Hampshire and killed two birds with one stone." (New Hampshire is an early primary state, of course.) Kerry said, "Or I could have gone to 1600 Pennsylvania and killed the real bird with one stone." (This is the same Kerry who joked in 1988, "Somebody told me the other day that the Secret Service has orders that if George Bush is shot, they're to shoot Quayle.")

Also in 2006, the New York comptroller, Alan Hevesi, spoke to graduating students at Queens College. He said that his fellow Democrat, Sen. Charles Schumer, would "put a bullet between the president's eyes if he could get away with it."

Schroeder's Mom said...

Old narrative: dissent is patriotic.

New narrative: dissent is dangerous.

Mark Ward said...

Where is your cry for the left to stop?

Because they did stop. They haven't been violent since the 70s. Did anyone shoot President Bush as a result of the film about him? (side note: Boy did you miss the point of that one!). Where are the liberals waving guns at rallies and calling for the burial of NCLB with Gerald Ford? Keith Olbermann has issued his apology and there aren't any leftists out there for which he even has to apologize! I'd say that's pretty big of him.

"That's a ponzi scheme Mark. Pretty simple. Just use your brain."

I think you must've missed this debate but you need to begin by looking up the definition of a Ponzi Scheme and then explain to me how SS is fraud.

Further reading:

http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/statements/2010/oct/03/john-loughlin/loughlin-compares-social-security-ponzi-scheme/

http://web.archive.org/web/20041001-20051231re_/http://www.ssa.gov/history/ponzi.html

Refute the facts listed here with a reasoned argument. Be a critical thinker about the differences (unlike the others I have had this debate with) and I will engage you further. Otherwise, I won't.

As to your other posts, there are a lot of factual errors there. Clearly, you need to do some more research on Lee Harvey Oswald. Start with his relationship to Guy Bannister, a member of the John Birch Society.

Loughner was a registered independent so that means he was not a liberal. As for examples from the right...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/42406957@N04/sets/72157622225596987/

Santa said...

Not a single comment from the usual suspects on the Adkisson shooting. Were Hannity, Savage, and O'Reilly responsible for that shooting? Yes or no? I'd especially like a response from BigGig.

juris imprudent said...

http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/statements/2010/oct/03/john-loughlin/loughlin-compares-social-security-ponzi-scheme/

You do realize that link doesn't prove anything, but you wave it around as though it was a holy artifact.

Loughner was a registered independent so that means he was not a liberal.

Really? Every single liberal in America is a registered Democrat? Boy will that surprise some people that I know.

Go look in the mirror M - you will see someone that can't admit an error because then he won't win the argument.

Anonymous said...

Because they did stop. They haven't been violent since the 70s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_Bishop

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Liberation_Front

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_G-20_Toronto_summit_protests

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_G-20_London_summit_protests

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20101212/NEWS/12120334/-1/NEWS01

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/regional/item_e4GDFfEFW8Xdv5CeOGREoJ;jsessionid=529FE37D1B396A4D2FE574A35A17E9AF

http://radioequalizer.blogspot.com/2009/08/libtalker-malloy-i-hope-glenn-beck.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APZ3-Lcbwmc

You lie.

dirk said...

Hey, why doesn't someone have "You Lie" put on the butt of an AR-15? Oh wait, they already did. Spare me the babe in the woods act, righties. You fucks run around all day about wanting to kill people and stop Obama from destroying this country and then squirt Hershey if someone dares to call you on your psychotic violent Kabuki. BLk is right. Every serious act of violence that has been committed in this country in the last 20 years has been from a conservative nut bug.

Larry said...

dirk, that's complete bullshit. I know you love playing "Pin the Blame on the Elephant," but you either have no clue what you're talking about or you're lying. Some have come from the so-called Right, others from the Left, and others from the Disturbed.

GuardDuck said...

Because they did stop.

Mark, your brain has got to be comprised of the densest material known to mankind. You didn't even recognize your own pseudo-logic tossed back at you.

Probably my own fault for not laying it out step by excruciating step. I'll try to correct that. Follow along.


1. You claim that a nut's actions are because of things the right have said.

2. You claim that the right says these things because they are mad.

3. You claim that they are mad because the left is in power.



A. You say that the proper action to keep nuts from doing bad things is for the right to stop saying things.

That is your very own logic there, but you have not taken the next step.

In order to keep nuts from doing bad things, the right has to stop saying things. In order to stop the right from saying things, they have to stop being mad. In order for them to stop being mad, the left has to stop being in power.

That's where the question "Where is your cry for the left to stop?" comes into play.

By your own logic we 'don't live in a vacuum', and step by step you want to pass responsibility off up the ladder. So take responsibility Mark. See how you are responsible for the left being in power, thus for the right being mad, ergo for the nut in Arizona?

You Mark, might as well as pulled the trigger yourself.

Remember, this isn't my logic, it's yours.

Of course you could just admit that you are reaching when you try to lay the blame for AZ on the right. You could even go so far as say that the actions of one cannot be the collective responsibility of others. You might even stop trying to claim that we all are involuntarily influenced by others.

But I don't lay odds on that happening.

Anonymous said...

James von Brunn - Bush hater, Fox News hater, 9/11 Truther

Maurice Schwenkler - Democrat Party activist

Amy Bishop - Democrat Party Activist, Obama voter

Joseph Stack - Bush hater

Chris Powers - Democrat Party Activist

Jared Loughner - Bush hater, 9/11 Truther

All of the above were immediately blamed on the "climate of hate" from the right.

So Dirk, you're claiming that none of the above people actually exist? Or are you claiming that the person killed by von Brunn, the 3 killed by Amy Bishop, the person killed by Stack, and the 6 killed by Loughner were not "serious"? I think the families of those 11 people might disagree.

Or that the who-knows-how-many firebombs set off by ELF and ALF are not "serious"? Or the untold numbers of dead or injured loggers who encountered spiked trees?

But obviously all those Bush haters and 9/11 Truthers were influenced solely by the right, huh?

Before you go pointing fingers, it might be wise to clean the blood off your own hands.

Santa said...

I'm still waiting for a response to my question. How about Guard Duck? Were Hannity, O'Reilly and Savage responsible in the Adkisson case? Yes or no?

Anonymous said...

Hey, why doesn't someone have "You Lie" put on the butt of an AR-15? Oh wait, they already did.

I haven't seen that. I've seen "Smile, wait for flash" around the barrel of a pistol though, so I guess that means photographers are all homicidal nutjobs.

Santa said...

http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/weigel/archive/2011/01/12/the-joe-wilson-you-lie-ar-15-lower-receiver.aspx

Palmetto State Armory would like to honor our esteemed congressman Joe Wilson with the release of our new "You Lie" AR-15 lower receiver. These lowers are the same great quality you have come to expect from Palmetto State Armory and feature "You Lie" as the first six digits of the serial number. Only 999 of these will be produced, get yours before they are gone! These forged lowers are made using high quality 7075-T6 aluminum and are marked "MULTI" to accommodate most builds. Finish is Black Hardcoat Anodize

And I'm still waiting...

Anonymous said...

Palmetto State Armory would like to honor our esteemed congressman Joe Wilson with the release of our new "You Lie" AR-15 lower receiver.

But according to you, unless and until someone gets shot with one, it's entirely irrelevant to the discussion, just like the "Kill Bush" meme that went on for 8 solid years.

juris imprudent said...

And I'm still waiting...

You ain't the only one.