Obama Chastises the Left, Will There Be An Apology?

Obama Chastises the Left, Will There Be An Apology?

President Obama ad-libbed a vague, but fairly clear chastisement of members of his own party and liberal commentators like Paul Krugman for their unfounded accusations that those on the right were responsible for creating an atmosphere of hate that caused the shooting of 19 innocent Americans in Tucson, Arizona on January 8, 2011.  The target of the shooter was apparently United States Congresswoman Gabriel Giffords.  Six were killed including Federal Judge John Roll and a nine year old girl.  Although the President devoted much of his speech on January 12th to a plea to tone down public debates and to the necessity of respecting other points of view, he said, “let us remember it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy -- it did not.”  While it’s not entirely clear why the President focused on uncivil debate if it did not in any way encourage the shooter, it was, nevertheless, a welcome word of sanity in a sea of vitriol that has spewed forth from the left since the tragic shootings.

Paul Krugman, who is a Nobel Prize winner in economics and an op-ed writer for The New York Times, is hailed as the guru of the left, but the hate and venom that came from his pen on January 9, 2011 bore no resemblance to rational thought.  It was unreasoned, undocumented, and clearly he was nearly unhinged.  He excused the often hysterical Keith Olbermann from any culpability whatsoever, blaming Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Michele Bachman, and even Bill O’Reilly for creating a climate of hate.  Mr. Krugman, look in the mirror, you and Olbermann are guilty of repeated character assassination.  You play fast and loose with the facts and go into a rage whenever your views take a beating in the marketplace of honest ideas.  Your rage obviously stems from having your ideas being rejected by the American people, not from any sense of concern for a free, civil, and open debate.  Krugman says…

 “Where’s that toxic rhetoric coming from? Let’s not make a false pretense of balance: it’s coming, overwhelmingly, from the right.”

Krugman himself is no model of civility having advised the “progressives” in the Democratic Party, i.e. liberals…

“By all means, hang Senator Joe Lieberman in effigy.”

With similar self-righteousness, recently defeated Pennsylvania Congressman Paul Kanjorski penned an op-ed column in The New York Times on January 11th in which he said, 

“We all lose an element of freedom when security considerations distance public officials from the people. Therefore, it is incumbent on all Americans to create an atmosphere of civility and respect in which political discourse can flow freely, without fear of violent confrontation.”

This is the same Congressman who on October 23, 2010 said of now Florida Governor, Rick Scott…

“That Scott down there that's running for Governor of Florida, instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him.”

When reminded of his incendiary remarks after the Tucson shooting, the ex-Congressman feebly pleaded that everyone knew he wasn’t serious.  

Sarah Palin, whose very name seems to drive liberals to the brink of insanity was one of the first to be blamed for causing the Tucson shooting.  Supposedly her PAC poster with a crosshairs over Gifford’s district was a contributing factor, although it’s doubtful that the shooter ever saw the poster.  Or perhaps he saw a similar poster from the Democratic left with a similar bull’s eye over Gifford’s district.

What an incredible double standard Krugman and Kanjorski and their multitude of misguided liberal friends in Congress and the news media have.  When the President said in Philadelphia during the presidential campaign that, “When they bring a knife, we bring a gun,” there were no calls for civility from the left.  When the President told a Hispanic crowd before the 2010 election to “punish your enemies,” there was no outrage.

And speaking of outrage, where is the outrage that Jared Loughner was not treated, jailed, or institutionalized after knowledge that he was a potentially violent and deranged person?   Loughner bears many similarities to the Virginia Tech shooter, Seung-Hui Cho, a very sick young man who also had exhibited signs of violent behavior.  Both Loughner and Cho were ignored by school authorities because their hands were tied by unrealistic laws and regulations that forbid restraining or institutionalizing them prior to actually becoming violent.  This is the real outrage of the Tucson shooting and the Virginia Tech shooting.  Where is the discussion of how to avoid these senseless murders in the future?  Where is Mr. Krugman?  Where are The Washington Post and The New York Times?
We now know that the shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, was not only living in a world detached from reality, but from his good friend we know that he was totally detached from politics—he didn’t listen to talk radio, he didn’t talk politics, he was not left or right.  Loughner was registered as an Independent and did not even vote in the last election.  In the face of these facts and the President’s admonishment, the left wing smear machine has quieted down.

But where is the apology?  After several days of almost unlimited attacks and slander of good and decent conservative men and women, where’s the apology?  Where’s the apology for even suggesting that legitimate political debate caused the shooting of the Congresswoman and 18 others?  Where’s the apology for dishonestly smearing good people just because you don’t agree with their political philosophy?  Silence is not an apology, it’s just a sign of unrepentant guilt.