Well, we can see that the initially horrified response to the tragedy in Arizona is starting its seemingly inevitable transformation into jabs and gotchas between left- and right-leaning militant groups and individuals, including Daily Kos.
http://www.reuters.com/...
I feel that it is particularly ironic that we on the left had a truly wonderful opportunity to strike a blow both for the nation as a whole and for the progressive community, but we have frittered it away and it is probably too late now to recover it.
We could have done this by not attacking any person or group on left, but instead calling for a reduction in emotional, violent rhetoric by all.
The most common response to this here is that it is a false equivalency and therefore will protect the right from taking full blame for causing violence-engendering tension to increase.
But consider this: yes, it is a false equivalency, and therefore, it will affect the right much more than the left.
That's right, kiddies: if we point fingers at any and every instance where finger-pointing negative ads, ad-hominem attacks, threats, fear-mongering and calls to violence have been used in recent and future political campaigns, we will indeed have to live with more than one embarrassing example where one of our own has transgressed. But the RW would have to accept 10 or 100 times more of this; they would have to retool and rethink their entire approach to politics!
All we have to do is to reproach any and all political speech that is likely to add needlessly to our national fear of ourselves and of “the other”, and any and all appeal to violence, no matter how veiled, and we will advance not only our cause relative to that of the right, but we may also create genuine change in the political atmosphere that could actually allow us to debate the issues and their potential solutions!
That would have been really great to see. I would have loved our side even more, and it would have been really satisfying to watch the RW begin to understand the magnitude of things they would have to change on theirs. It still would be, but like I said, it's probably too late now.
Greg Shenaut