The Shooting

I haven't really done any writing here for a bit...

Spouting off opinions on random shit.

I have had things to do, so deal.

If you have been enjoying the lack of actual commentary here, well, it will be back to filler in just a moment.

The whole shooting deal in Arizona seems worthy of a note. Not that my insights are really any more revealing than any of the bog of blathering politicians and the media have been reduced to.

We can all agree that the crazy dude with the gun was bat shit crazy, right?

That is pretty much it.

He is a fucking loon and did bad things...

The whole deal doesn't really connect to the right or the left, when the thinking behind it is of the bonkers variety...right?

I mean sure, there is a political context to the Arizona shootings.

In that same line of thought, though, when can illustrate that much violent crime in America is political.

Politics contribute to each of our personal situations and as such are a factor in our decision making - even if we are not conscious of it in daily life.

Is the thug pulling a drive by considering how his actions might impact the political landscape?

Probably not, but you are lying to yourself if you don't recognize that politics have factored in the life situation of said thug...

I think the rush to pin a party affiliation on Loughner is plainly politicized and a continuation of the rhetoric of that medium...

The dialog has a level of "with us or against us" and has for some time.

Perhaps the tone of our current conversation has honed in on that backing thought, with/against, but it is certainly nothing new...

What about the McCarthy witch hunts? That was some rhetoric taken to the Nth degree.

Folks have been using this tactic since about the time people started grunting about how their tribe was more right than the other band of Neanderthals.

Loughner is just a whacko who read some political things, had a gun and shot a lot of innocent people.

I mean, hell, I have read books by Marx, Mein Kampf and a bunch of other political manifesto sort of shit. I am also a gun owner. If you have been reading my jibberish for any period of time, you should be well aware of my ability to put nutty things on the internet.

The crucial difference between Cue Ball and myself is that I am able to keep the screws in my dome tight enough to recognize that capping old guys, kids and congressional leaders is bad...

Loughner was deranged and did an awful thing.

Had he gone to shoot up the college he was expelled from, rather than the insanity he chose to act out, the political angle would barely be a part of the conversation.

Tacking a party or group affiliation on the dude, using this as pro-gun/anti-gun talking point, all of that...is just flapping heads using the tragedy to further their own agendas.

A layer of sad on top of tragedy...