Monday, January 10, 2011

Political Rhetoric to blame?

Well, it's been all over the news- the shooting of several people in Tuscon Arizona, with one of the critically wounded being Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford.

People are jumping to the idea that political rhetoric is to blame. But, there hasn't been any evidence to suggest that. It appears that the young man responsible for the shooting, was a nutter on his own run and not tied to anyone political action committee or side.

So, to me, rhetoric from the GOP or the Democrats aren't truly to blame. Now, the shooter may have gotten a few ideas from some sides of the divide, but it appears as if he had his mind made up on his issues from jump street.

It was so incredibly shocking that the cable news networks- CNN and MSNBC- were quick to jump to political rhetoric being to blame, before even having an idea on what was behind the shooting or who the shooter was themselves.

This is how media influences, or, at least, tries, to influence the debate and how it is structured. The irony of it all: is that the media is blaming the politicians for spewing rhetoric for insighting the shooter to violent action, but they are flaming the debate themselves by choosing sides and casting blame in a negative light. They didn't get away with it as some reporters with integrity, particularly Wolf Blitzer from CNN, caught it right away and asked them to change their tune-- much to the shock of the other talking heads who were trying to shade the debate.

It's not a good thing to hear these types of assassination attempts. It's also not goo to flame the debate and jump to conclusions. We will have to see how this develops over the next few weeks.

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