Who's To Blame for the Tucson Massacre?

The left said he had to be a tea party extremist because, police say, he shot a Democrat. The right said he had to be a leftist because he read "The Communist Manifesto." The way we jumped to conclusions about Jared Loughner's political affiliations — before we knew anything about this suspected mass murderer — clearly showed just how polarized we are as a people.

The reaction to the Arizona massacre exemplifies our real problem. Police say this 22-year-old man killed six people and wounded many others in his planned assassination attempt on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, but they haven't told us what they think his motivation was. However, where this particular homegrown terrorist falls on the political spectrum is not as important as the vitriolic climate that has created such a monster.

That's our real problem. Whether Loughner is a left- or right-wing nut is not as troubling as an environment that makes each of us assume he is "from the other side" in terms of political ideology.

We live in a society in which spewing hatred and even inciting violence have become acceptable, in which politicians target one another with the cross hairs of gun sights, in which threatening to take arms against the government through "Second Amendment remedies" is considered patriotism instead of an act of treason.

And let's face it; though many flame-throwing conservatives are backpedaling with egg on their faces now — explaining that Loughner doesn't come from their ranks — most of the vitriolic rhetoric, the fear-mongering and the polarizing has been driven by the extreme right. It doesn't matter whether Loughner is a right-winger; what matters is that right-wingers created the environment for a monster to kill.

It's about the cross hairs maps on Sarah Palin's website, targeting 20 opponents, including Giffords, during the November midterm elections. Sarah Palin "has the cross hairs of a gun sight over our district," Giffords said prophetically last March. "When people do that, they've got to realize there (are) consequences to that action."

It's about people taking guns to political events. It's about Giffords' opponent, Jesse Kelly, a right-wing Republican and tea party favorite who, as he campaigned against Giffords, invited his followers to join him and "shoot a fully automatic M16." It's about Sharron Angle, the Republican candidate and tea party lunatic who spoke of "Second Amendment remedies" when she ran for the U.S.

It's about the right-wing hate radio and Fox News pundits who get ratings and hefty salaries for promoting fear, intolerance and hatred of anyone who doesn't think like them. It's about the tea party rallies where gun and war metaphors prevail, where speakers have been known to say that "if ballots don't work, bullets will."

It's about a loud minority of Americans who are driving this country down a wrong and dangerous path.

Some of them still have the gall to pretend that the Tucson massacre has nothing to do with them. Others have the audacity to claim that these are simply the actions of one deranged individual. They must be totally blind, but they claim they don't see the connection between the nation's climate of hatred, especially in Arizona, and the massacre in Tucson. They refuse to see the blood on their own hands!

Yet while many gun-toting conservative extremists still are in denial of their complicity, Pima County Sheriff Clarence W. Dupnik, who is overseeing the investigation of the massacre, became the voice of reason Saturday when he explained: "There's reason to believe that this individual may have a mental issue. And I think people who are unbalanced are especially susceptible to vitriol."

He said people who make a living "inflaming" the American public may call it free speech, "but it's not without consequences," he added.

"The anger, the hatred (and) the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And unfortunately, Arizona, I think, has become sort of the capital," he said. "We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry."

Of course, that's not news to those who have followed Arizona politics lately. The state's efforts to racially profile and violate the civil rights of its Hispanic residents, to trample on undocumented immigrants, to allow guns even in schools and to legislate itself back to the days of the old Wild West already are known worldwide.

Our only hope now is that this painful tragedy will turn the tide against those who promote political change through angry and inflammatory rhetoric, leading demented individuals to vote with bullets instead of ballots.

If they don't tone down their dangerous political rhetoric now that six Americans are dead and a congresswoman is clinging to life, if they don't do it now that our democracy has been assaulted, what will it take?

To find out more about Miguel Perez and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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