The shooting last weekend in Arizona left six people dead and many others critically wounded including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. While speculation is rampant, most would agree that this was an assassination attempt on Giffords.
Almost immediately and without any proof or apparently thought, the media went on the air and in print to condemn those politicians on the right and most specifically Sarah Palin for this attack. The reasoning is extremely flawed. The Sarah Palin PAC ‘targeted’ this Democratically-held congressional district as an area to concentrate resources and to try to elect a conservative to the House.
Now we get to the language of politics. The Sarah Palin PAC used the term ‘target.’ That term by itself does not incite violence. Neither does the all the other terms we use in discussing politics. We refer to close elections in ‘battleground’ states. We discuss how much money a particular candidate has in his/her ‘war chest.’ And yes we ‘target’ an office holder if we want to win.
This shooting was done by a nut –a nut who will get a great attorney to tell a jury that he is crazy and should not be held responsible for his actions. This nut will then get to spend life in prison because he is deemed insane. I will save that a rant for another day.
One final thought: this nut (notice I am not going to give him the publicity of actually printing his name) probably acted alone because most nuts don’t have the social skills to be involved in a ‘conspiracy.’
~ Patty
