Category Archives: murder
Mad Men
President Obama acknowledged, at last night’s memorial pep rally, that accused Arizona murderer Jared Loughner wasn’t motivated by uncivil discourse . It was madness. It turns out that authorities were aware of Laughner’s problems in 2007. He was kicked out of college and told not to return without a psychiatric evaluation.
David Ignatius writes that the country is full of unmedicated mentally ill.
E. Fuller Torry says, in the WSJ, “These tragedies are the inevitable outcome of five decades of failed mental-health policies.” He estimates there are 21,000 untreated schizophrenics in Arizona alone, 10% of whom become violent.
Hard to see how more civil discourse will solve the problem.
Fighting Words
Sheriff Clarence Dupnik has used the Tucson tragedy as a platform to attack his political enemies. Paul Krugman did the same even before Dupnik’s yellow crime scene tape was up. Los Angeles Times columnist, Andrew Malcolm, takes a dim view of Dupnik’s police work. Victor Davis Hanson wonders, in National Review, why people like Dupnik and Krugman focus on Sara Palin’s crosshairs on a map but not the president’s search for an ass to kick. And finally, here’s the Krugman view expressed in a more thoughtful way by Jacob Weisberg in Slate.
If some deranged person strangles an elephant, I’m in trouble.
This item from today’s NYT is by Yale history professor Joanne Freeman on congressional violence – by congressmen!- back in the good old days. I met Joanne at a conference in Boise last October. She spent 10 years digging up stuff for a book about duels, fist fights, and other interesting behavior in Congress.
Senseless
Christina Green, the nine year old girl murdered in Tucson, was born on 9/ll/01. Dallas Green the former manager of the Philadelphia Philies was her grandfather.
On Facebook, “Ma Sands” notes that Christina died on 01/9/11.
Hating Hate Crimes Bill
The house recently passed a hate crimes bill. If you are unlucky enough to get killed by a mugger and he gets caught, he’ll merely be punished for your murder. But if you hit the jackpot and get murdered because you are gay, your killer will be not only be punished for your murder, he’ll also get punished because he didn’t like the fact that you were gay.
In other words he’ll be punished for his unpleasant thoughts. For Nat Hentoff ‘s thoughts on this, please go here.
Lockerbie Bomber Walks
The terrorist who killed 270 innocent people by blowing up Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland was released from prison on grounds of compassion due to his terminal prostate cancer. Here’s the story. He was given a hero’s welcome by an exceedingly compassionate crowd when he returned to Libya.
