Monday, January 17, 2011

Jared Loughner and the Tucson Shootings

Dr. Christopher Lillis at this link provides a thoughtful and professional diagnosis that Jared Loughner suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. Rather than pretend to be a doctor myself and cut and paste a description of this tragic and ferocious mental illness, I encourage readers to read his article.

That's not enough for not-very-thoughtful and non-professional bloggers, columnists and pundits of all types who are finding a link between conservative politicians and talk show hosts and the killings.

Some conservatives, on the other hand, are claiming that President Obama's Tucson memorial speech was a "campaign speech." Since politicians have been known (I know this is hard to believe) to use such occasions for political gain, I carefully read the President's speech to see if I could detect any political bias in anything he said. If it was there, it would take a more astute reader than me to find it. 

So the left thinks conservative politicians and talk show hosts fueled Jared Loughner's rage, and the right thinks the President's response in Tucson was a campaign speech. It seems to me there is more than enough stupidity going all the way around.