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The "Arizona Massacre" has occurred, leaving at least 6 dead and many others injured. Congresswomen Gabrielle Giffords had a bullet through her head (she is just now breathing on her own), and we have many others who are in serious condition.

Worst of all, a nine-year old girl has been sent to her grave. And now WBC is protesting at her funereal. The same WBC that protested at my school. The same hate group who spreads hate throughout this nation, believes that God sent the killer.

Then I read this article about that girl...It really shows the extreme degree of tragedy with which we are dealing. 

Welcome to American Politics in 2011?

Is this the Nation in which we want to live? Do we want to see our politics so polarizing, that people feel that this kind of harmful action be taken to express political ideology?

This freakazoid, Jared Lee Loughner is obviously a deranged individual. He says his favourite book is Mein Kampf, and I find that especially creepy because Ms. Giffords, like myself, is Jewish.

This guy did what he did because he felt it necessary to express his opinions through violence. He saw bullets as a more effective tool than ballots.

His actions, while uniquely violent, were spawned by two years of non-stop 24/7 political rhetoric, which has just about ruined this nation's political process, and made it imposable to have a simple discussion without someone exercising Godwin's law, or saying something racist, or at least being unwilling to listen or pluralize with their opponent.

Sarah Palin says that she "hates violence" in a letter to Rush Limbaugh, two people that I just love so dearly. Give me a freaking break.

Lounger is a terrorist. So is Palin. They both employ violence, physical or rhetorical/verbal to get their points through, and they are both unwilling to listen to others. In fact, I believe that any politician or any speaker of rhetoric who employs fear and terror to get his or her point across is no less a terrorist than the ones who killed almost three thousand Americans nearly ten years ago.

In this country we have the Conservative party- the Democrats, the Ultra Conservative party- the Republicans, and now we have the near fully established Tea Party, which is more just plain batshit then conservative. One trait of conservative parties, at least in the United States, is their inability to see things from other's points of view. These three parties are very much like that....unable to sit down with each other and have a conversation, and perhaps even make progress.

No, instead the three parties just talk smack about one another in a feeble attempt to score political brownie points. This is mostly in the form of attack ads or stump speeches. Instead of Player 1 speaking out against Player 2's opinion, (which is how democracy works in other civilized countries) Player 1 is now speaking out against Player 2's existence. Where Player 1 used to say "I believe that Player 2's economic policy will be harmful to this nation," (indicating that Player 2 has the wrong idea as to how to help the nation), Player 1 now says something like "Player 2 wants to enact policies that will hurt this nation" (indicating that Player 2 wishes harm to the nation, and is thus a bad person).

The preceding is just a mild example of what's happening in this country. It's political destabilization at it's slowest, but destabilization nonetheless. We're looking at a situation where the lies and threats and unkind words are said by these people on a 24-hour news cycle with the intention of brainwashing as many people as possible. If you say it enough times, whether or not it is factually or morally correct, it starts to appear as fact. 

People fall for it because they are ignorant, and ignorance is a citizen's worst enemy.

Avoid ignorance by seeing things from other's points of view. Seek many opinions. Most importantly, think for yourself and form your own opinions. Don't do or think something because some political party or special interest group, or politician you really like because s/he watches the same TV show as you, or some blogger (like me) told you to. And whatever it is that you think, always be able to see things from other's points of view. Be pluralistic about it. Don't be afraid to change your mind in public if someone gives you a new idea  that you had not before thought of. If you think for yourself, you can do anything, and there is no limit on what you can do or how many people you can help. Peace out.