This could be bad... Congresswoman shot in head

[Monkeyleg]

This AP story attempts to connect this violent act with the rhetoric against the health care law.

First it was the Times Square Bomber who was angry about the health care law (and probably a "Tea Bagger") and now this. I've never seen one law drive so many to kill. 

[AJ Dual]

First it was the Times Square Bomber who was angry about the health care law (and probably a "Tea Bagger") and now this. I've never seen one law drive so many to kill. 

Which is ironic, because many on the left are angry at her because she was seen as one of the key Democrats who were against the single payer option.

Daily Kos posted a blog about how "she's dead to us" just two days ago.

Further digging seems to indicate he was angry at her for not being lefty enough. Which would be typical. However there's enough nutbaggery in his postings and YouTube vids that the MSM will be able to try and spin him however they like.

If it's true he was a volunteer in her last campaign, and the blog postings he made being angry over her betrayal of a single-payer option, that will be hard to spin or refute though.

[gunsmith]

Geraldo on Fox is also trying to point to anger at the obamacare law.
 
I was only able to watch a few minutes of it, he had on that hate monger Sharpton-who's own violent rhetoric caused one of his nut job followers to kill.

[AJ Dual]

Well, it might actually be over Obamacare, but the other way, for not being extreme enough.

[Laurent du Var]

Austrian media is talking about a complice to the shooter who
was seen on site:

Sheriff Clarence Dupnik told the press that the authorities were looking for a possible
complice in his fifties who came to the scene of the crime with the shooter without firing any shots himself.

Wie der zuständige Sheriff Clarence Dupnik mitteilte, suchen die Behörden nach einem möglichen Komplizen "in den Fünfzigern", der mit dem Schützen zum Tatort gekommen sei, aber keine Schüsse abgegeben habe.

A nine year old girl, omg.

[De Selby]

Well, it might actually be over Obamacare, but the other way, for not being extreme enough.

How does that figure? The guy is repeating the "fiat currency is a scam" line, that almost certainly tags him as on the right.  

This is one of those times when we'll all learn the value of not playing the guilt-by-association game; it gets done to religions, to leftists, and now it will play out with the right like it did with McVeigh.

[MicroBalrog]

How does that figure? The guy is repeating the "fiat currency is a scam" line,

So did the Communist Party of Russia in its 2008 campaign, when it attacked United Russia over inflation issues. Doesn't make them right-wing.

[De Selby]

So did the Communist Party of Russia in its 2008 campaign, when it attacked United Russia over inflation issues. Doesn't make them right-wing.

It almost certainly connotes right-wing politics in the United Sates, where this looney resides. 

[Iain]

Like the Nazi's - he's the other sides responsibility.

A blog I occasionally read has posted up a list of his favourite books from what is supposed to be his Myspace account:

Books: I had favorite books: Animal Farm, Brave New World, The Wizard Of OZ, Aesop Fables, The Odyssey, Alice Adventures Into Wonderland,

Fahrenheit 451, Peter Pan,
To Kill A Mockingbird,
We The Living,
Phantom Toll Booth,
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest,
Pulp,
Through The Looking Glass,

The Communist Manifesto, Siddhartha,
The Old Man And The Sea,
Gulliver's Travels,

Mein Kampf,
The Republic, and Meno."

followed by:

Of course, a number of these books are classics beloved by millions. What does the list tell us, if anything? I have heard that his postings on YouTube were consistent with those of a mentally ill individual (I have not seen them.)

What do you think?

One of the first responses:

I think the list will mean whatever the person looking at it wants it to mean.

So very true.

If those are his videos, it matters little what his political views were, I'd suspect the single motivating factor was paranoid mental illness.

[dogmush]

It almost certainly connotes right-wing politics in the United Sates, where this looney resides. 

Not really, several of my more liberal acquaintances have jumped on that crazy.  The left spin is that it's the rich folks and banks controling the fiat money and holding them down.  Fiat money=scam goes both ways now.

[KD5NRH]

If those are his videos, it matters little what his political views were, I'd suspect the single motivating factor was paranoid mental illness.

How old are those videos again?  They're so completely over the top that they almost look like a smokescreen intended to lay the blame on (a raving liberal's impression of) the Tea Party conspiracy theorists.  My guess is that he wasn't planning to survive this plot, and decided to try to make conservatives look bad while taking out the not-liberal-enough politician that he was mad at.

[De Selby]

How old are those videos again?  They're so completely over the top that they almost look like a smokescreen intended to lay the blame on (a raving liberal's impression of) the Tea Party conspiracy theorists.  My guess is that he wasn't planning to survive this plot, and decided to try to make conservatives look bad while taking out the not-liberal-enough politician that he was mad at.

Seriously?  A paranoid liberal's plot to frame the tea party is behind this?  Seems to me an extreme reach.

It's more likely that he was a nutter who latched on to tea party memes, and ran with them.  As happens to any movement - nuts latch on and run.  Anti-abortion activism, religions, etc. 

[red headed stranger]

Well, the circus of crazy is nearly complete.  I have seen reports that Fred Phelps is coming to Arizona to picket at the funeral of the 9-year-old girl that was killed yesterday.   

[KD5NRH]

Seriously?  A paranoid liberal's plot to frame the tea party is behind this?  Seems to me an extreme reach.

A guy known as a leftist to his former classmates suddenly starts making videos as the liberals' caricature of the tinfoil-hatted Ron Paul disciple just a month before he commits a terrorist act and you don't think there could be a hidden motive behind his sudden change of heart?

It's more likely that he was a nutter who latched on to tea party memes, and ran with them.

If he was really that far out in la-la land, there would be dozens of people lined up to tell us how crazy he's acted for years.  Talk about an easy 15 minutes of fame; just give your story about the local looney ranting on a streetcorner or whatever.

[Jamie B]

Disgusting that this Catie Parker chick is being the tail to the killer's dog to get her 15 minutes of fame.

Saw this clown's videos, and I am pleased that they make no sense to me, as he is cracked.

Prayers for the injured and those killed.

[Jamisjockey]

Seriously?  A paranoid liberal's plot to frame the tea party is behind this?  Seems to me an extreme reach.It's more likely that he was a nutter who latched on to tea party memes, and ran with them.  As happens to any movement - nuts latch on and run.  Anti-abortion activism, religions, etc. 

Not nearly as extreme of a reach as gunning down a dozen innocent people.  I think in the end we're going to find out he's actually crazier than most of us think. 
Assigning morals and values to someone who had fallen so far as to gun down so many innocent people is fallacy.  He is *expletive deleted*ing nuts.

[Perd Hapley]

Please tell me where the videos are that make him look right-wing.   

[Jamisjockey]

Please tell me where the videos are that make him look right-wing.   

The left is desperately scrambling to do damage control and using the "fiat currency" line, rather than realizing what the right knew long ago:  Some people are just beyond being part of civilized society, and no amount of gun control would ever stop them from committing acts of violence.

[De Selby]

The left is desperately scrambling to do damage control and using the "fiat currency" line, rather than realizing what the right knew long ago:  Some people are just beyond being part of civilized society, and no amount of gun control would ever stop them from committing acts of violence.

I'm agreeing with you here - but also noting that the left has no monopoly on doing this with crazies.  It gets done to Muslims, Leftists, Anti-abortion activists, and Christians whenever a loon takes up their banner, even when the loon is obviously, well, looney, like this guy was.

[Ron]

The whole flap about using targets is disingenuous to say the least. It is not an uncommon practice to use war metaphors and imagery in politics or the corporate world.



http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci....bid=171

From the DNC website during the Bush years no less.

Those blaming the right, the tea party etc. are pathetic IMHO.

This guy didn't need any motivation other than that he was unhinged from reality.

[Perd Hapley]

How old are those videos again?  They're so completely over the top that they almost look like a smokescreen intended to lay the blame on (a raving liberal's impression of) the Tea Party conspiracy theorists.  My guess is that he wasn't planning to survive this plot, and decided to try to make conservatives look bad while taking out the not-liberal-enough politician that he was mad at.

What videos?

[roo_ster]

Journalists urged caution after Ft. Hood, now race to blame Palin after Arizona shootings
http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/01/journalists-urged-caution-after-ft-hood-now-race-blame-palin-afte

"...public officials, journalists, and commentators were quick to caution that the public should not "jump to conclusions" about Hasan's motive.  CNN, in particular, became a forum for repeated warnings that the subject should be discussed with particular care...

...Fast forward a little more than a year, to January 8, 2011....the network that had shown such caution in discussing the Ft. Hood shootings openly discussed the possibility that Loughner was inspired to violence by…Sarah Palin."

[Monkeyleg]

Does anyone remember the media trying to pigeonhole Charles Whitman as a Democrat, Republican, or member of the Boy Scouts (a major terror group, to be sure)?

This pin-the-tail-on-a-party game is ridiculous, and I would think below the members of this forum.

[AJ Dual]

He was a Lefty, or at least was before he took a look at his mental map and made a turn for "due magnetic WTF". He claims in a blog that he volunteered for Gifford's campaign, and felt betrayed she did not vote for a single-payer version of Obamacare.

If NPR is leading with "vitriol" as the root cause, they're now backing up to try and lay it at the Tea Party's feet by proxy.

http://www.npr.org/2011/01/09/132764367/congresswoman-shot-in-arizona

When the official line starts being "he was just crazy" and the "political climate" just set him off, that's American MSM code for he was nominally more Left than Right, and they're downplaying it. And trying to imply, "See what happens when the Right dares to stand up and oppose the Left?"

If you're one of our European members who doesn't quite completely get how biased the Mainstream American Media is, it probably seems a bit tin-foilish. Trust me, it's true though. Fox news is considered a "Right Wing mouthpiece" because their reporting is actually neutral and centrist if anything. And the rest of them are so used to a nominal-Left bias in the media, they react with shock to it. Fox does have a majority of right-wing punditry, but they do a better job than the other networks of keeping it separate from the actual hard-news programming. The other networks are content to let it blur quite a bit.

Does anyone remember the media trying to pigeonhole Charles Whitman as a Democrat, Republican, or member of the Boy Scouts (a major terror group, to be sure)?

This pin-the-tail-on-a-party game is ridiculous, and I would think below the members of this forum.

That's well and good, but I think we both know who started that game. And the consequences can be quite real.

I think we'd all be content to shake our heads and say "What a nut" and leave it at that, if the Mainstream Media wasn't immediately pumping out conjecture laying the shooting at the feet of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party.

[Battle Monkey of Zardoz]

As long as the leftwing media continues to color stories, either in a Dan Rather fashion or okay fast and loose with the facts, incidents like this will only get worse.