01.10.2011 10:24 PM

Wish I had seen these before I wrote tomorrow’s Sun column

20 Comments

  1. Michael says:

    Holy hell!

    I wonder how many Tories up here use gun-related events to raise funds? I know Colin Carrie’s Oshawa Tories did. They had a trap-shooting fundraiser some months ago.

    • Paul says:

      And what, precisely is wrong with that? The last time I checked, trap-shooting is a perfectly legal activity enjoyed by many people in this country. As is hunting and target shooting on approved ranges. I’m tired of the insinuations that gun owners are “nuts” and the rhetoric about the so-called “gun lobby” (which is really no more than a group of people who are fed up with all of the demonization and pushes for more and more regulation of their legal activities.)

      On of my friends is a left-leaning Liberal. A big fan of Chretien in fact. She owns several rifles and (gasp!) a semi-automatic handgun that she shoots regularly at her local club.

  2. Mr. Chamberlain says:

    Regrettably, the Arizona shooting will be cast as an
    isolated incident that cannot be linked to anything in particular,
    and the rhetoric, after a temporary cooling off period, will ramp
    up once more. The powers that be will continue to push the limits,
    with the acceptably occassional horrific loss of life as something
    that is managed in the same way as any other disaster — emergency
    services will move in and begin the process of rebuilding the lives
    of those most immediately impacted and it’s back to business and
    life as usual. That is our new cycle. It will be managed if not
    normalized. Not all that different from how we must accept that
    communities are devastated by flood or tornado. We likely won’t see
    a change until a politician is successfully prosecuted for their
    role in it. In the meantime, it would a big step forward to at
    least have charges laid, if then dropped. Force them to sweat a
    bit.

  3. Mike says:

    “And it is why there is a reflex to blame conservatives first.”

    And the reason why Will throws it back at progressives? Seems to me “susceptibility to superstition” is symptomatic of more than “many” on the right, except the right traces all behaviour to an inability to believe in magic. And talk about social engineering–the right has cornered the market on that score. Think of Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh. Will is clever; cleverness does not make him credible.

  4. smelter rat says:

    Quelle suprise.

  5. Ted H. says:

    Of course you wouldn’t, given the right wing bent of every comment you submit to this site but the fact that a candidate for political office would appear in quasi combat garb holding a gun in his campaign photo, advertising a fundraiser where M16’s are fired off to help “remove” a political rival from office shows just how sick, gun crazy and militarized American society has become. Paul Krugman had it right in a recent article, it is the “exterminationist” rhetoric that is so troubling, anti-democratic, and mainly emanating from the Right.

  6. Cath says:

    Curious about two things WK. How would you have changed your column and why post this at all if you’re not looking to cast blame or ramp-up what most are trying to break down?

    • Warren says:

      You’re not curious at all.

      You know perfectly what they suggest, so don’t play dumb. They suggest that the right have, deliberately or otherwise, created a climate in which calls for violence are acceptable.

      But you knew that already.

      • Cath says:

        Ridiculous as it may sound to you, I make no assumptions about what or what not you’re telling me through your blog posts or columns. I’m not in your head, nor are you in mine. The assumption left with me is that if you had seen this first your column would have been different. In what way? Would you join the ranks of the finger-pointers and blamers? I didn’t think the column that WAS published did that…but actually played things very safe.

        • Michel says:

          Hi Cath,

          You don’t have to be in anyone’s head. Rather, all you need is some basic critical reasoning. Go on and try it: you’ll find that it will help you understand others and that it’s a skill most individuals use in everyday social interaction.

          Best,

          Michel

          • Cath says:

            So tell me “Best Michel” how much critical reasoning what threaded through this particular killer, who, according to the experts of the day, was mentally disturbed. So much so that everyone said they all saw the signs……..and did nothing.

            That the kind of critical reasoning you’re talking about? Didn’t think so.

  7. Aongasha says:

    Just as a matter of interest Paul Krugman is an economist, very hard left and also upset with President Obama, who he says, had not gone far enough in his redistribution of American wealth.
    In reading American commentators it is always interesting to see how the so-called unbiased media (not of course MSNBC – which makes no secret of its biases) failed to note the target shooting ad used by the Decomcratic National Committee a while back, nor did they manage to recall candidate Obama’s remark that when their opponents bring a knife to the party, the Democrats will bring a gun.
    Selective memory is a wonderful thing.

    • Namesake says:

      Selective memory is “a wonderful thing”:

      I suppose; without it, there’d probably be never be any lasting marriages or re-elected governments, among other things.

      But sanctimony? Or kindergarten-logic or -morality to try to silence or divert the issue? Not so much.

      Because no one was really seriously asserting that any media sources and espectially columnists were “unbiased,” so there’s little point in that Straw, er, Bozo Man argument.

      And, “But he did it first / too” really isn’t a good defense when they should BOTH be sent to sit in a “calm down corner.”

  8. Mike says:

    If Paul Krugman is “very hard left” then Stephen Harper is a Liberal. He really fooled you, didn’t he. What is remarkable about Krugman is an unapologetic (and realistic) stance that he is indeed a “liberal” thinker. Unlike most right wing “sheeple” he criticizes others on the left when they (in his view) deserve criticism. Oh, and so does the author of this blog. Speaking personally, I find the trait admirable.

  9. Bruce M says:

    350 million people in North America and every once in a while a lunatic goes out and slaughters innocents, and the knee-jerk analysts take to their rhetorical ramparts and attack/defend their unchanging beliefs in media, desensitization, misogyny, societal blame, economic stress, single-parenting, Godlessness, religiosity, class division, access to legal/illegal firearms, and, as Yule Brenner said in “The King and I,” et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
    Seriously, people are blaming Sarah P. for having cross hairs on a map of targeted districts? WK, doesn’t your and every other “war room” adopt every military “tactic” to “target” ridings, “divide and conquer” the opposition,” and fundraise in “target rich environments.”

    This whole blame game is revolting and does a disservice to the all the injured and murdered, from a talented congresswoman to a little girl who was just getting interested in politics. Sickening.

    • Michel says:

      Yes, Warren, Bruce M raises an excellent point that only begs the question: exactly how many M-16s were at your disposal in the ‘war room’ when you ‘adopted every military tactic’? And it is definitely a matter of public interest that you post all the pictures, all of them, of JC and every other Liberal MP that you worked for in their combat fatigues, toting automatic rifles in their campaign literature. I think I’ve seen a bootleg picture that’s in circulation of JC pinning down some old lady, crushing her neck under his jack boot. I know you have them!

  10. Roll Tide says:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIJORBRpOPM

    A Democratic Ad from West Virginia.

    Silence from the left.

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