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Which particular comments, Life? I've been extremely specific about what I find disgusting. How about reciprocating? That prevents it from being just a personal attack.
Haven't known you to hold back before.
Wow Unionist I didn't know they used a cookie cutter when they made progressives... (nice nut shot by the way
)
...And this is a big deal becouse it involed a member of the US Congress who was threated by the tea party. If you can't understand that (or don't give a fuck) becouse you so far to the left and can't stand the USA thats on you, not us here.
We ge it, really we do...
Back on topic: too much on the news right now I'll comment on this later. I hope this blows up in the tea parties face.
Honestly, I'm not sure I believe Palin's rhetoric can be blamed for the actions of the shooter.
However, it's not like the Republicans have ever been fair in their rhetoric, so I'm not going to loose too much sleep if they wear this shooting politically.
It would be nice if the shooting led to some tightening of the loose gun laws in the USA.
Story:
At the October 2001 meeting of our union local, someone put forward a motion to donate a rather huge sum of money to the families of the firefighters and police who died during the September 11 terrorist attacks. I spoke passionately against the motion, pointing out that we should be very careful about letting our emotions be manipulated by the media and forgetting about the big picture. I said that if we don't give such donations to the victims of terrorist attacks and colonial invasions elsewhere (and we don't), then it would be very wrong to change course on this one occasion. I said there was already repression taking place, and a danger of war, and we should act with caution.
A handful (small one) of other members voted with me against the motion.
When Canada (via executive decision of Jean Chrétien) joined the U.S. murderous invasion of Afghanistan, I brought forward a motion that we should oppose it. It was defeated - not by as big a margin - and members looked at me as if I was strange.
About one year later - long before Paul Martin and Rick Hillier committed to slaughter the scumbags in the Kandahar mission - our local union changed course, and condemned the Canadian "mission". Ultimately, the national union followed suit.
And some of you may wish to Google the name of Sunera Thobani.
No, I have no deeper shock at the attack on Giffords - or on the assassination of JFK - than I do at the terror attacks launched daily by our own soldiers, and the soldiers sent by Giffords and her colleagues. I have struggled to separate my surface emotions and empathy from the cold analysis of reality. I have striven (and I'm not there yet) to feel as much empathy when a politician in Pakistan is assassinated as when one of our southern cousins and neighbours is attacked.
And I know damned well that my views, and feelings, are not shared by some on this board. But that's why we discuss and debate and reflect together.
Oh and josh - it's not Giffords "views" that bother me. She is part of the decision-making body that sends murderers to foreign countries, and she voted and spoke and campaigned in favour of that. I'm not going to forget that when she gets in the way of a bullet, for reasons that none of us yet are sure about.
we get it -you are a much better progressive than the rest of us. Congrats, feel free to lecture people on how they should feel and attacking everyone who posted in this thread who feel differently than you based on your superiour status. Which is exactly what you did by using the language you did. But of course you will feel you are free to do it because you are 1) a better progressive and 2) do it veiled.
@ Unionist
Well you are consistent. Fine. It doesn't mean I have to agree with you.
But just so we understand each other I am just as alarmed by the murders of Pim Fortuyn and Theo Van Gogh as I am by this act because an attack on a social institution or freedom is more than an attack on a person.
One big issue is the new House of Congress and America and the world has to take head on is the increased call for violence by the American right, e..g. Sarah Palin and the Tea Party. There are roots in the American revolution and the American culture of guns and violence, but matters have taken to a new level recently, e.g. in the last year or two with the Tea Party, health care, immigratio, the economy etc... One commentator on the CBC national talked of attending a political rally near Washington D.C. for which people were urged to bring weapons. Hundreds of khaki clad males carrying AK-57s or whatever the favoured weapon is of the right is, (anybody guess how many right wingers are armed,compared to left wingers?) openly flaunted their weapons and cheered the call to overthrow oppressive government, like that socialist government headed by an African America. That sort of sight he said is not unusual in America today and there are outburst of political violence .
The new Congress just had its first sitting, swore in a new House leader and went home to their constituencies to do pretty well what one of their popular colleagues was doing,meeting constittuents, when someone attempted to kill her. And that popular Congresswoman coleague of theris had been targeted for defeat by the right and for violence by the right..Will the right wing, in its its legislative forums and in other forums, repudiate violence? Will they be called on to repudiate violence? Will the violence increase? T
Stop talking about me. That's a request - yes, perhaps the 10,000th time, but I have no other power than the power to ask, please.
Oh sweetie. I will the very second you stop doing it to others whether veiled or directly.
I just watched a 40-minute press conference by the Sheriff of Pima County and the Phoenix FBI guy, and the Sheriff was full of fury denouncing the over-the-top political rhetoric taking place in the US, and that it must stop - he blamed directly "a few mouths" without naming them. It was really something.
(X-posted to a number of forums I belong to)
Sheriff condemns atmosphere of hate in Arizona and around the country:
"The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And, unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the Capital. We have become the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry."
He made the comment I posted during the Q&A that followed, I think.
More of what he said:
"When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government. The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And, unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the capital. We have become the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry."
"It's not unusual for all public officials to get threats constantly, myself included. And that's the sad thing of what's going on in America. Pretty soon, we're not going to be able to find reasonable, decent people who are willing to subject themselves to serve in public office."
When you give people an unlimited amount of a free commodity it's quite normal for them to begin to abuse it. In this case it's speech. People can say whatever they want and have absolutely no limits placed on them. Crosshairs on her name? Hey, it's protected.
Lou questioned whether Palins rhetoric is connected.
Absolutely it is.
The poster repeated above has stylised crosshairs on the targets. Sure, they just mean in elections, and its stylized crosshairs. But look over her website, at least for last year, and you will find real people in gun scope sights. Not identified, and with reference to them being politicaly targeted.
At the same time, you have many people in demonstrations for carrying weapons in public, concealed and concealed. Posters at the same demonstrations with talk of targeting the evil Obama and Congresspeople.
You have lots of loose public talk about removing scourges, etc.
You have David Frum and other conervative commentators calling out this stuff as despicable and dangerous, and the de facto leaders need to put a stop to it. To my knowledge no Tea Party or allied type said boo.
You are right, Unionist. Sarah Palin did not put out a fatwah on Giffords. No proof she was targetted.
I actually dont remember all the details that I've recounted as clearly as I would like. They were horrific as I watched them unfold. And I havent been watching events in the States as closely as when I was observing all this stuff. But when ObamaCare came out, I did come for a bit into the reaction discussion here, and recounted all these gory details going on at that time... and said that its only a matter of time before some people get killed.
Gifford was definitely one of Palin's targets. And Palin is the guru of these nuts. She knows they are out there. When one of them kills, her washing her hands of it and saying how much she regrets it, is predictable. And calling it bad faith is a gross understatement. Gifford's particular politics is irrelevant in the context of being one of Palin and fiends' targets.
The problem with Unionist is that he doesn't understand that Americans are the worthy victims, and that elected officials, especially democrats, are the most worthy of all.
So when a mediocre random congressperson gets shot, it is in the words of the Obomber in Chief, an "unspeakable tragedy". When Pakistan villages are hit by Predator drones, that is business as usual.
Geez, Unionist, get with the program.
You mean all these murders in Pakistan since the New Year?
Those don't count, because:
1. Pakistan is not a democracy, like the U.S.
2. It was the Obama government that committed the murders.
3. There is no evidence that any of the victims were elected officials.
How am I doing?
I think a good indication of how even Palin and her handlers feel that it's connected or at least looks bad is that since it's been happening is apparently they've been systematically scrubbing their sites with the cross hair maps and removing other posts with this sort of rheoric in them. There are other blogs keeping track of the scrubbing going on as well as many of the facebook comments before they disappear. Guess they don't realize that onces it's out there on the net you can't 'disappear' it.
So yeah I guess if anyone goes to Sarah Pac or facebook and whatever sites she has now to take a gander you won't find some of the stuff that was there 24 hours ago. Though the targeting maps are easy enough to find all over the net.
I've also read some of the stuff that people have found that may have come from the guy arrested for this. His myspace page has been removed but been cached and some there's some youtube videos. There's a manifestio of sorts winging around the nets as well as some messages which appear to be 'goodbye' types posted a few weeks ago. If these do end up being the guys stuff then it looks like it was planned for a while. The alledged myspace page lists all his interests in the past tense "I liked these books" "I had this" etc etc. As far as what he says and his politics, he's all over the place. No mention of teaparties but lots of ranting about bad currency, illigitimate government , the gold standard, being pissed and not trusting in god, non-constituional stuff around the 10th ammendment and the FED and 2 illegal wars. Currently the righter wing is trying to 'paint' him as a hard leftie, because of his anti-god rhetoric he mutters about legaling pots and the fact that in his list of favorite books he has among dozens, The Communist Manifesto and Mein Kempf listed and in this revisionist bubble Nazi's are lefties of course. They're ignoring Ayn Rand's stuff for some reason.
Without getting in to a debate over the rest of this thread, I observed to my family how there was probably only one person shot who was not a gun advocate and she was 9 years old.
I am not without sympathy for anyone who has been hurt today but the little girl caught in the middle who did not understand the madness of a society that lets people tote around guns like they are cell phones has the bulk of my sympathy.
I would like to hear from some of those people there today at some point in the future when they have done some healing about what they think about the gun lobby and the unlimited right to bear arms but I am afraid I am not optimistic and the little girl is dead. I can't start or finish anywhere else.
Powerfully said, Sean. I agree.
Odd picture of the shooting emerging...
People who knew him described him as philosophical, a person who read a lot of books. On his YouTube page, Loughner listed among his favorite books "The Communist Manifesto," "Siddhartha," "The Old Man And The Sea," "Gulliver's Travels," "Mein Kampf," "The Republic" and "Meno."
One former high school friend Tweeted about knowing the accused gunman:
"He was a pot head and into rock, like Hendrix, The Doors, Anti-Flag," she wrote. "I haven't seen him in person since 2007 in a sign language class. As I knew him he was left wing, quite liberal and oddly obsessed with the 2012 prophecy. He had a lot of friends until he got alcohol poisoning in 2006 and dropped out of school. Mainly a loner, very philosophical."
http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-jared-lee-loughner-profile,0,34681...
I agree.
I just read some info ( unconfirmed) that this girl was featured in the book "Faces of Hope Babies born on 9/11" Sort of twistingly blackly ironic if it's true.
@ Sean
Well Malcolm X assessed the situation as well as anyone, before he became a victim of it himself.
I read one report earlier today that some in the crowd who were armed actually started firing at the suspect. No idea if that is true or not.
Unfortunately I think it will take a lot more than something like this to change such an ingrained and fiercely-held mindset. More than likely people on all sides will look for blame everywhere but themselves.
I would hope it would change something but I think it's a dim chance. My cynical side says, "Lots of 'soul searching' huff and puff for a bit in the MSM, platitudes, this little girl will be morphed and changed into some sort of rhetorical symbol for use as political hay and then it goes into the memory hole and business as usual, while the hard partisan bloggies argue forever on whose 'side' he belongs too and how it's proof that your side is violent, traitorous and destroying America.
When I think of people down there praying to their god for Obama's death I wonder if there is anything that can shake sense into them.
Unionist - admittedly the right wing nut job talk right now is just speculation. But I really think you're missing the bigger picture, even if this congress woman did support the war in Afghanistan. Tea Party hysteria is breeding, dare I say it, a quasi-fascist political climate. If it turns out this shooter, who would probably be better described a terrorist, was influenced by Tea Party politics, that is not something we should overlook simply because this congress woman supported the war in Afghanistan. It would mean that the Tea Party had consciously contributed to breeding a mass hysteria so overpowering that any political opponent, even one whose agenda is clearly not that far off from the Tea Party's, was a potential target of assisination.
As far as mentioning political violence in Pakistan, it's largely irrelevant to what we're discussing here. The existence of political violence in Pakistan does not make political violence in the United States any less meaningful.
Overall, quite truthfully, I didn't understand just what your point was.
If it turns out the shooter was a Muslim, what conclusions will you draw then? Or a Mossad agent? Or just a very unhappy young person?
The attempt to tie this to the "Tea Party", without any evidence, is scary in my humble opinion. It's a mob mentality of preconceived notions.
Let me ask you some questions:
Which political forces created the climate for the assassination of JFK? Who was Lee Oswald influenced by? Richard Nixon's Republicans?
How about RFK? Who was Sirhan working for?
Or Martin Luther King Jr?
Or John Lennon?
Or Timothy McVeigh - was that the Tea Party? yes? no?
Surely after all these years, there ought to be an answer to some of these questions.
My answer: It's a brutal and anti-human society, which murders its own people via lethal injection and impoverishment and unbridled capitalism and racism and homophobia and sending them as cannon fodder abroad - and murders the innocent people of other countries every single day.
So, why should I care enough about one random (yup, you heard me) act of violence to start drawing phony self-serving political conclusions about how the Tea Party is evil, Sara Palin is evil, and Obama, well, poor Obama.
It's all nonsense.
Yes it does. No one in this thread thought the mass murder of people in Pakistan was as important to spend time commenting on as this random act of violence today. What is more, some people in this thread thought that we should be particularly concerned about the assassination of "democratically elected" officials - as opposed to the other kind, I guess - and he was suggesting that Giffords was "democratically elected"!
So there's a serious issue here, one requiring a mirror. Why do we care more about this event than far more horrible ones - facilitated and approved by people like Giffords - happening every day? How do we separate these things in our minds? Why does the "congresswoman" make the headlines, even on babble, but the 9-year-old child and the Pakistani villagers do not??
How about now?
This is one of the reasons I'm cynical that it will change anything.
I won't hotlink because it's a sewer but here's the admin messagae from a rightie blog.
Posting called '1 down, 534 to go.'
'link posted to new article about the shooting' and then
Then comments agreeing.
And the argument against those not agreeing and saying 'no all bad' is how murdering politicians that are doing wrong (some based on Christian moral grounds) is completely legitimate and necessary and to some even a mandated duty as a patriot.
It's not the only place I've seen this type of sentiment expoused. You can even find them in the comment sections of the news stories on MSM sites and places like yahoo.
The alleged shooter has been identified as Jared Lee
Loughner:
<http://tinyurl.com/2emt2ec>
In 2008, Daily Kos targeted Giffords with a bulls eye:
<http://tinyurl.com/2uzg4h8>
See this blog post for use of the bulls eye and targeting rhetoric by Democrats:
<http://tinyurl.com/yeduszv>
A few days before the shooting, someone posted a rather vile attack against Representative Giffords on Daily Kos, which has since been removed, but you can find a web cache of the page here:
<http://tinyurl.com/39bo7av>
(The alleged shooter may have been the poster.)
Daily Kos states that the alleged shooter "was/is a left winger" based on tweets from people who knew him:
<http://tinyurl.com/3yodmww>
See also this screen shot photo of what purports to be his Facebook page:
<http://tinyurl.com/38e49ru>
Link to what people believe is Loughner's YouTube Page:
<http://tinyurl.com/2g4pxsk>
Bottom Line: This is a horrific tragedy carried out by an individual who based on the videos posted to his youtube channel appears to be clearly deranged.
As to the attempts to politicize this tragedy?!?
Politicizing A Horrific Tragedy
<http://tinyurl.com/33zbpfk>