First off, I apologize for the hit and run diary, but I must return to work here in a bit.
But I wanted to point out that there are 3 factors that continually have been discussed regarding the tragedy Saturday in Tucson.
- Violent rhetoric
- Guns
- Mental illness
To the Tea Party & GOP, I say the following: on which of these fronts do you want to make progress?
So far as I can tell, the right-wingers have no intention to tone down their rhetoric, will never support sensible gun laws, and aren't interested in funding mental health services for the people of this country that need it.
They'll say that they support providing mental health services to those that need it (as a way of distracting from their disgustingly violent rhetoric), and then attempt to repeal the health care reform bill which explicitly makes mental health services available to more people (as noted in the link).
As long as the Republican Party continues to reject doing anything productive on points 1 and 2 above, and as long as they attempt to go backwards on point 3 above, it is clear that they have zero solutions to prevent events like Saturday's shooting from happening again.
If the GOP is serious about reducing violence, they must pick at least one of the three problems listed above and make a real attempt to find and implement solutions.
