The New Road

Tennessee shootings; Savage, Hannity, O'Reilly

The man who shot up a church, killing two and wounding five, in order to attack what he called the 'liberal movement', was also a fan of Savage, Hannity and O'Reilly. Books by these three were found at the man's house. One can only assume that this was part of his 'inspiration'.

Where is the outrage about this? The man was clearly motivated by the hate spewed forth by these people on the radio, on television and with their books. I don't hear anything about this in the mainstream press. Fox News is of course completely silent on the issue. And the only things I hear about it on the right are either justifications for it, or feeble attempts to pass the blame.

Two people are dead. Two innocent people are dead. Dead because some moron radio hosts want to make a lot of money by demonizing people. Hate always sells. But this hate results in people dying.

I was talking with a good friend of mine about this stuff just last week. Saying that this hate radio is really hurting us. Lori has repeatedly been cut off and flipped off by right wingers angry at the bumper stickers on her car. My step-father's tires were slashed after he put a Dean bumper sticker on the back of his car. This is violence. It's not at the level of these killings. But anyone with eyes to see can understand how you get from demonizing people to committing acts of violence against them.

The only good part of this is that the assailant is still alive. I want to hear what he has to say. Did he view the people inside the church as human? Or are liberals 'sub-human'? I think his story about how he was driven to violence by the hate coming out of the radio is our most compelling answer yet to this sad cycle of violence.

Let's just hope we can nip it in the bud when it's just a few isolated incidents. Though I fear as the economy descends even further that we will see more of this as the hated liberal gets blamed for our woes.