Just curious: If the congress member who was shot was an old ugly white conservative male, would we have the same amount of national mourning as we see today? I don't think so.
Do you think President Obama would have had a televised moment of silence if, say, Rep. Dean Heller, was the shooting victim? Somehow, I don't think so. I don't even think if Shelly Berkley was the victim, we would have the same amount of coverage or mourning.
So, are we getting the extra coverage and mourning because Rep. Giffords is a good looking young woman? Or because she is a Democrat? Or both?
Sadly, this is the state of affairs of journalism and politics in the United States.
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I think the extra coverage and mourning is due to the circumstances of the assassination attempt. If Michelle Bachmann, who is universally reviled by the left, had been meeting with constituents at a suburban strip mall in her district and was shot by a crazy man, most lefties would be horrified and would grieve for the threat to our democracy, just as most conservatives are horrified by what happened in Arizona.
ReplyDeleteJill, you give liberals more credit than I do. If Michelle Bachmann was a target of an attack, I think many on the left would celebrate the attack, or at the very least, blame her for thew aatack.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, if Nancy Pelosi was attacked, I think the right would be pretty nasty about it.
Dan, I completely agree with Jill. I would not celebrate an attack on anyone, with the very possible exception of Dick Cheney. But I'd rather see Lynne unplug him in the middle of the night than see him attacked.
ReplyDeleteI think it is worth noting that the image held in the heads of the extreme right of "what a liberal is" or "how a liberal acts" can be skewed mightily from reality. The reverse is probably also true.
For an illustration, watch "An American Carol" by David Zucker. If you find it at all funny, it is because you see liberals in a certain way. To me, it was drop dead unfunny, because there wasn't a joke in the movie that had any note of truth to it. Zucker took liberal stereotypes--which are already exaggeraged--and exaggerated them even more.
That's what you did with the "many on the left would celebrate the attack" line. That's your exaggerated take on how a liberal would react. You might find the odd comment at HuffPo or Democratic Underground who wrote something nasty. But there are ass hats in both parties (and that is NOT a false equivelancy!).