Tragic...

This is absolutely tragic on so many levels.

First and foremost is the deaths and injuries associated with this psychopath's actions in Tuscon. That a 9-year-old child, visiting her first political event as a newly-elected Student Council member at her local grade school, was one of the victims makes it even more ugly than one could possibly imagine.

This murder spree wasn't even hours old when the talk associated with it turned to the partisan political sphere. I got home at about 10 PM (EST) and the TV was full of pundits and experts blaming everything from Palin's pro-conservative campaign ads to talk radio hosts and their rhetoric.

In short, on top of the human tragedy this event has brought to the front, we now have the indictment of the entire conservative movement as "responsible" for giving this whacko the drive to kill these people in the manner he did.

I'm as conservative as the next man on the street... but I do NOT think any blame for this can be placed on my political views. This guy, by definition, was unbalanced and crazy even without the current political topics raging across the media venues. This is no more a factual association than saying that Lee Harvey Oswald was motivated by the "conservative" media to commit his crime, or that Mark David Chapman hated Lennon's "give peace a chance" message.

It is a disservice and an insult to those effected by this madman's bullets to blame "politics" for his murderous actions. I hope this is realized very soon.