I had to stop and read
San Francisco Chronicle Editor At Large Phil Bronstein's column on how he says Fox News Megyn Kelly "dismembered" Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik. I came away rather disappointed with his take, but entertained nonetheless. So, since Phil
has referred to me as an "insurgent" in the Old Media World, a tag I love, it's time to strap on my helmet and have at it yet again.
First, let's get some things really straight here.
Megyn Kelly represents the ultra conservative Fox News. That means Republican. So here, into that Fox News den comes the Democratic Sheriff Dupnik. Anyone would expect Kelly, who's carrying Fox News boss' Roger Ailes' water, to try and attack Dupnik for telling it like it was: the hard rhetoric from the far right in Tucson - where Dupnik works and the shooting happened so he should know - did create a climate that triggered Jared Loughner's violent actions.
As I say here:
Second, Jared Loughner has all the marks of an
anti-government type like Joe Stack. Remember him? I guess memories are short. Stack was the Austin, Texas man who crashed his plane into the IRS Building, and left behind hand-written trail of crazy thoughts against the government. Big goverment. While Jared doesn't have that "smoking gun" document around (so far as we know), there is a growing picture of the politics of the man,
as listed by Wikipedia:
Loughner was a believer of numerous conspiracy theories, and espoused views such as that the United States Government was responsible for the September 11 attacks, a New World Order would bring about a one world currency, there would be a 2012 apocalypse, NASA had faked spaceflights, and the government was using mind control to brainwash people by controlling grammar. He was a member of the online conspiracy theory message board Above Top Secret, though members of the site did not respond warmly to his posts.[15][16][17] Reports appearing after the shooting noted similarities between the statements made by Loughner, concerning grammar and mind control, and the views of conspiracy theorist David Wynn Miller.[18] Miller himself stated “I expect he’s been on my website... He’s just repeating things I’ve had up on my site the past 11 years.”[19][20]
Now that's a picture of Jared Loughner as essentially a libertarian. Add to that the overall climate of a Tucson, Arizona that has a healthy number of conservatives and anti-government types issuing all sorts of protests specifically against Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, and then the fact that Loughner was mentally-ill and you have the perfect brew for the trajedy that ocurred.
All of this has to do with politics. Sorry Phil Bronstein, but if the job of a reporter is to question assumptions, the job of the blogger is to question the reporter's approach. That's what I'm doing.
Why take up the matter of defending Fox News at this time? Why not piece together the information we have and fill in the blanks where necessary with some syllogistic reasoning?
Everyone knows that young voters in the West have been
more likely to register as independent because they're new to the political process, so Fox News parroting the idea that Loughner's really independent as if to say he's apolitical, is so silly it's unbelievable.
But here we are.
With Phil defending Fox News.
Or is it really Phil taking up for the hot, smart, leggy blonde TV anchor in Megyn Kelly? Easy it is to be blinded by a curvy body, even if she's
the darling of conservative bloggers.
I'll give Phil a half-pass, but that's it.
Jared Loughner was the extreme product of a Tucson society mostly against President Obama Health Care Initiative, yet stuck with a Democratic fighter for it in Gabrielle Giffords. His mental illness took him to a place we only talked about, with all of the nastiness coming out of the Health Care town hall meetings, but never thought we'd actually see.
Until last Saturday.
