Some Republicans responded with indignation—why should the alleged act of an apparently deranged young man with a record of barely coherent, and only vaguely ideological rantings get charged to their account?
Others acknowledged what they called an unavoidable reality—flamboyant or incendiary anti-government rhetoric of the sort used by many conservative politicians, commentators and tea party activists for the time being will carry a stigma.
A senior Republican senator, speaking anonymously in order to freely discuss the tragedy, told POLITICO that the Giffords shooting should be taken as a “cautionary tale” by Republicans.
“There is a need for some reflection here – what is too far now?” said the senator. “What was too far when Oklahoma City happened is accepted now. There’s been a desensitizing. These town halls and cable TV and talk radio, everybody’s trying to outdo each other.”
I got fifty bucks that says this is McCain. Or maybe Lindsay Graham.
Senators shouldn’t have to commingle with the riff-raff at town halls anyway — particularly when these proles come “armed” (and please, enough with the martial imagery; we need TOLERANCE!) with ideas they’ve lapped up from talk radio.
Principles are antiquated. Pragmatism is the new black. And the quicker we can return to the days of a pliant, uneducated and uninvolved electorate, the quicker we can get back to spending and Georgetown comity!
My bet is that it’s a lady from Maine.
I think we can reflect on how with our wretched and supremely failshit congresspeople of which the cowardly John McCain is a prime example it’s a miracle this is as rare as it is.
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Who bout none of them?
I realize there’s some craven slimeballs out there, but in both cases (The “democractic operative” included) should be identified.
A senator from Alaska, right?
Alaska has no Republican Senators, as far as I’m concerned.
Standing in a different light, don’t newly minted Senators propelled to their offices by the opinions of the Tea Parties, men like Sen. Rubio, Utah’s Mike Lee and Sen. Toomey of Pennsylvania have a distinct role to play in this discussion? I for one would expect them to be forthcoming in defense of a political movement that has given them voice.
People are afraid to merge on freeways in Los Angeles.
Maybe Lugar?
Funny – I thought Richard Durbin comparing American uniformed servicemen & women to Nazi death camp guards the most unbelievable provocation I had ever heard. American soldiers = Adolf Eichmann. We fought such people for 3 1/2 years and then we put some in jail and hanged some. Richard Durbin said our soldiers were just like them.
Any calls for moderating THAT speech?
Oh! My money’s on Orrin Hatch.
McConnell. He’s the go to guy when they need to find some “senior Republican official” to bow down to their assertions. It’s like he was born with a silver boot on his neck.
In an odd way, the Senator insisting on anonymity before making a statement like this is clapping a gag on his own future offhand public statements, lest he or she express the same sentiment in near enough language to be readily identified as the source of the ghostly expression, and thereupon excoriated for cowardice.
[…] written in black and white in the Constitution, he’s useless in Congress. That goes for the unnamed Republican in the Senate who wonders if we brutish louts in the hinterlands talk just a little bit too much for their […]
I thought craven cowardice was a prerequisite for the upper chamber, sdferr. Gotta keep that butt on a seat, doncha know. $174,000 per ain’t chicken feed, plus free health care and pension. Why, for a late 40-something, we’re only talking three terms and then easy street.
“A scared Senator is an obedient Senator.”
— Stuff Jefferson Said, Vol. XXXIX
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
Here’s a piece by William Galston, a Democrat thinker, which makes the case the we should be talking about how we handle mental illness, and follows with a discrete set of proposals to that end. [my emphasis] :
I do not know the history of the current approaches of the law to mental illness, where these approaches began, and how they came to prominence. Were they reactions to hideous abuses? Were they carefully thought out responses to principled considerations of individual rights? Or were they responses to the musings of men like Michel Foucault?
However it happened, we seem to be at an impasse in our desire on the one hand to protect the rights of individual persons stricken by madness, and our desire on the other hand to protect the potential victims of the tiny number of those mad people who will lash out violently. We should begin again.
Enoch and SarahW, over at POWIP, have also attempted to point us to a better discussion, and ultimately to a better arrangement of law.
PS: wouldn’t it be easier and safer all around if we just locked up congress when it’s not actually working? Then they could have lots of armed guards around them, 24/7.
I’m glad somebody is talking about mental illness and the tug-of-war between State and individual interests where the potential for harm exists. If our friends on the Left wanted to make Saturday’s events a springboard for political debate, this topic would have been far more appropriate than the little PDS temper tantrum they engaged in.
I’m tempted to say why don’t we abide by the dead child’s father’s wishes and not attempt to curb any more liberties in the name of safety, but I do think there might be some tweaking at the edges of the stalking laws to facilitate cracking down on the dangerous. The problem with leaving this issue in the realm of mental health is that most attempts usually start with defining who is nuts and that is a subjective issue.
Is an autistic person nuts? They frequently spend hours banging their heads into walls. Certainly look like they are crazy. Hell, I’ve got Aspergers and have a weidr fascination with patterns to the point that I solve pyramid solitaire so that the suits end up red/black/red/black or red-red/black-black in the discard pile. I must be dangerous, too!!!
How bout if we just stiffen up the laws regarding stalking and such and make it easier to incarcerate and use leg monitoring devices and put people who have had these remedies applied on the “no guns” list for people who stalk, menace and threaten others? Oh, yeah… that puts too heavy a burden on the justice system to actually do some constitutionally mandated “protect and defend.”
This guy should have been allowed to go on his merry delusional way but for the fact that he had a history of calling people and threatening them. Yet the law was still powerless to stop him even after it was presented with the evidence that he was professing violent tendencies. That seems to be where the tightening needs to be at a maximum. That would have the added bonus of snaring those who are in the throes of domestic abuse, too.
link
link
That link at #21 is a magnificent takedown, router. I may need to bookmark it for the next time my sainted mother asks “what liberal media?”
Sarah Palin haters on the Twitter: better watch this video quickly; YouTube will pull it down within 24 hours.
wow those people need to get a grip
Why hf?
They’ve been so awesome at playing 6 degrees of KB re Palin and the shooting that it’s only a matter of time til those on the twitter video suggest the same for evil Christer hoochies.
I don’t understand
is that like an analogy?
I have a cold you know
Mr. Cowboy’s youtube doesn’t threaten nobody he just wants everybody to have a good time and get home safe even though it’s hard sometimes cause they’re all drunk or out of their minds on drugs or both
get weweed up soon
I’m just sayin they’re coming for Palin and they’ll be coming for others next. Where does it stop? Where would you draw the line on whose rights to participate in the marketplace of political ideas should be silenced?
I think Palin has special qualities what make these sorts of silly attacks particularly effective really. This wouldn’t have gotten so much traction on the vast majority of people.
i’m glad i kept that bumpersticker –
mccain/palinyou can put it on your car
“I think Palin has special qualities what make these sorts of silly attacks particularly effective really.”
effective for whom and why?
So let’s just sacrifice her in the cause of the furtherance of classical liberalism or conservatism or whatever. Who ya gonna put in front of the next bus? We’ve got sooooo many folks on our side that inspire people to speak up and protest that we shouldn’t run out of em any time soon. TPaw might be a goodun. He’s soooo tingle inspiring…or Romney or Thune. Progs get the vapors when they speak, don’t they?
Seriously, you are arguing from the keep your head down and don’t make yourself a target rule of politics. Get a clue.
she’s really not our responsibility to sacrifice or not
Why do you think RINOs are RINOs? They have no principles that would put them in the crosshairs AND they like to keep it that way. God forbid the progs and their propaganda arm turn their sites on them, so they play the comity game and fall into line behind the Grand Kleagle’s of the conservative witch hunt.
what does that have to do with Sarah Palin?
Way to back up a spokesman for the cause, HF. I’m so glad to know that your predeliction when witnessing a lynching is to DO NOTHING. Might as well be following the Grand Kleagle.
she’s just so adorably lynchable
what is this now? lynching number 8?
9?
what does that have to do with Sarah Palin?
Ummm that has everthing to do with not making yourself a target and playing the RINO game. She doesn’t and you are faulting her for that. What was it you said? Oh, yeah…
she has special qualities
Seems to me the only quality that justifies this witch hunt is her effectiveness which made her a target. She should get with the HF program and just go along. Then there is nothing to make the progs go after her.
I’m advocating for the prog position of politics…. you don’t sacrifice anyone on your team for anything ever. You’re advocating for “give her up” we can afford to lose her. Sounds alot like the attitude of the folks at American Family Institute boycotting CPAC cause we don’t need those gays on our side.
I think she’s vulnerable to being witch hunted and accused of being a senseless demagogue cause she’s substanceless and reliant on demagoguery to a notably greater degree than even Mike Huckabee, which is something of an achievement.
And that’s her problem, not Team R’s. And it shouldn’t be America’s.
Ah, but they aren’t accusing her of being a substanceless demagogue. That was sooo last year. “Death Panels” put the lie to that real quick. And it is reinforced everytime another article appears about Obamacare and the latest bureaucratic decrees.
That is why they have gone back on the march. They won’t rest until she’s retired from the battlefield. And you’re happy to oblige.
“I think she’s vulnerable to being witch hunted and accused of being a senseless demagogue”
yes because when you make things up out of thin air you can do that to a person. asks that guy in atlanta in ’96.
I don’t see why it’s incumbent on me you or anybody to pick sides in the dirty socialists vs. Sarah Palin deathmatch.
Let em fight it out and then we only have to deal with one of ’em.
Wow. Just wow.
I don’t think it’s incumbent on me or you or anybody to pick sides in the dirty socialists vs. Pence deathmatch.
I don’t think it’s incumbent on me or you or anybody to pick sides in the dirty socialists vs. Ryan deathmatch.
I don’t think it’s incumbent on me or you or anybody to pick sides in the dirty socialists vs. the constitution deathmatch.
Cause after a while, we’re kinda out of bodies to throw at the problem.
But you go ahead and keep worrying about that document and failshit America cause pretty soon their ain’t gonna be anyone left in that foxhole but you.
Then you will only have to deal with dirty socialists on your own. I don’t think they are gonna be askeered. It’s not like you supported that fight before.
“the dirty socialists vs. Sarah Palin deathmatch.”
so your ok with the dirty socialists winning.
Sarah Palin isn’t in the fight. She’s a distraction from the fight. She’s a cable news whore poseur what used to be a governor until she got run out of office. Who apparently has some kind of a problem involving violent infographics. I read it in the internet. Sucks for her but we’ll just have to carry on as best we can.
“involving violent infographics. I read it in the internet.”
so you get your info from leftoids?
I think it was on gawker
It’s very hard to be fair to someone we don’t like.
I suppose that’s why it reflects so well on us when we’re actually able to do so.
(Imagine that NBC “the more you know” music in the background. Like here, she could have just screamed “Windsprints!” though.)
Also, drugs are bad, m’kay?
if the stupid Tea Party hadn’t let this opportunistic bim co-opt their brand this wouldn’t be here nor there
and I am being fair I acknowledge that they’re smearing her with dishonest innuendo I just don’t care
I don’t think saying she’s reliant on demagoguery is fair.
At the moment, she’s actually the only big shot who’s endorsed Paul Ryan’s plan. Which is sort of the opposite of populist demagoguery. Did so in the WSJ. Or Gawker maybe. I get them confused.
I have a cold
I recommend protein and windsprints… and maybe some fluids.
I’m an unemployed stay at home housewife what golfs and a member of the tea party what visibly and publicly posts on the internets for tea party positions and puts together pamplets and materials and passes them out to my neighbors. I wonder if the tea party has a problem with what I do. Maybe I should contact the head of the tea party and see if they mind?
Houston, we have a problem.
I can’t seem to find who to contact to make sure I pass the “not an opportunistic bim” test to see if I can get some credentials. I know the tea party is concerned with having just the right people at their rallies.
you’re cool is ok
Stephanie, are you copying HF’s verbiage or is there some regional dialect I hadn’t been previously aware of that combines using “what” instead of “that,” run-on sentences and distinctive words like “failshit” et. al.?
Just trying to put it into language the pikachu understands.
I understand perfectly you’re a team player but the happyfeet
stands
alone
which is probably for the best cause of I have a cold
First they came for Palin and I did not speak out because I was not a Palin fan.
Then they came for the Limbaughs and I did not speak out because I was not a talk radio listener.
Then they came for the Christers and I did not speak out because I was not a Christer.
Then they came for me and there was only the No-Label ones left to speak out for me, and they only said “Hush now, to speak is to label”.
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