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Fred Drumlevitch
Tucson, Arizona
January 10th, 2011
7:33 am
I live in Tucson, in Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' district. Having been a longtime observer of Arizona politics, I can attest that the political atmosphere in this state during the past several years has devolved to a highly toxic condition. Arizona state government in both the executive and legislative branches is completely dominated by far-right Republicans who openly express the most outrageous, xenophobic, anti-federal, and anti-progressive positions imaginable. The two U.S. senators from Arizona are an embarrassment. The newly-elected Arizona Attorney General (who was formerly Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction, and was previously banned-for-life from securities trading by the S.E.C. for his past financial actions) made his opposition to the Hispanic ethnic studies program in the Tucson schools a centerpiece of his campaign. Paranoia and hatred of illegal immigrants runs wide and deep. Beyond the usual FOX "news" and other highly-paid national right-wing rabble-rousers, we also have had a stable of local AM talk-radio blowhards spouting inflammatory diatribes.
And in what I consider to be a great sin of omission, local television news seldom substantively investigates or confronts any of these things, instead preferring to either ignore them or tread a non-committal middle ground that gives exposure and credence to absurdity (and, of course, avoids offending right-wing viewers and thereby decreasing viewership and ratings). This misleading "even-handedness" has continued even after the shooting; late Saturday January 8, one (non-FOX channel) Tucson television news "crime reporter", who has for years played to, indeed encouraged, public fear in his "reporting", talked about the excesses on both sides of the political spectrum as though they were equal.
No, they have NOT been equal! Democrats have certainly called for opposition to Republicans, but virtually always via non-violent political and legal processes; occasionally this has extended to calls for investigation, impeachment, or a war-crimes trial, as was the case with regard to a Republican administration that started an unnecessary war in Iraq. I know of no Democratic candidate who has put any Republican opponents in a crosshair-graphic map, as Tea-Party Republican Sarah Palin, for example, did for 20 members of the Democratic opposition. Or as Matt Bai noted in his New York Times article (in print December 9): "Consider the comments of Sharron Angle, the Tea Party favorite who unsuccessfully ran against Harry Reid for the Senate in Nevada last year. She talked about 'domestic enemies' in the Congress and said, 'I hope we're not getting to Second Amendment remedies'."
Gabrielle Giffords would generally be considered to be one of the "Blue Dog" Democrats. I and many others of traditional progressive leanings often did not agree with Ms. Giffords' political positions, finding them much too conciliatory to the right-wingers, and too pro-military. But rabid opposition to her came overwhelmingly from the right. And influential that opposition has been; in the November election, Ms. Giffords barely managed a win over a Tea Party Republican opponent whose pronouncements on the campaign trail and in televised debates were, in my opinion, both absurd and vitriolic. Her opponent's website (post-shooting sanitized — but partially cached by Google) included statements such as (upon the passage of health care reform): "Today is the day when the liberal politicians of both parties stand before we the people, and are held accountable. It is the day when those who have sided with socialism, unlimited power and a corrupt establishment are judged". And, as reported by Jennifer Steinhauer in this newspaper (in print January 10), "Last summer, Ms. Giffords' Republican opponent, Jesse Kelly, had a campaign event in which voters were invited to 'shoot a fully automatic M-16' with him to symbolize his assault on her campaign." (The full Kelly invitation, quoted elsewhere on the web, has a significantly more violent allusion).
Now it has come to outright violence by someone who may very well have been influenced by that campaign and broader outrageous rightist rhetoric. That someone has violently targeted an elected representative who was (in today's political atmosphere) essentially centrist demonstrates just how dangerous the right-wing demagogic "narrative" has become. But bipartisan calls to tone down the rhetoric notwithstanding, it is naïve to expect any long-term move towards civility. Too much power and money are at stake, for both politicians and their patrons.
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