The Real Issue

It took my 17 year old daughter to clarify the issue, "This wasn't a political issue, it was a mental health issue." Spot on, kid. She went on to tell me how terrible she felt that there were those in the media that were referring to Jared Loughner as a "monster," and a "psychopath,"and there were some pundits that actually went as far as blaming his parents. "How do you think his parents feel?" she asked. "What he did was horrible, but it's clear that he was mentally ill."

The left has gotten the issue precisely wrong. They are busy blaming political rhetoric for the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords and wounding 12 others and killing 6. My email inbox is already full of messages advocating stricter gun laws and toning down political rhetoric (of course, mostly aimed at Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin and folks of that ilk. The truth is that no amount of partisan restraint had anything to do with this. While pointing fingers at Sarah Palin, liberals missed a huge opportunity to raise a relevant and important social issue--- the treatment and care of the mentally ill. Since Ronald Reagan took office, government funding for research and treatment has been slashed. While they are busy protecting the wages and benefits of their constituents in the SEIU, those that truly need assistance aren't getting it. Prisons release inmates with inadequate treatment and follow up programs, virtually ensuring a return trip. Once an individual reaches adulthood and is out of the care of his or her parents, a mentally ill person has a very thin safety net. With state budgets in the shape that they are in, financing the care for the mentally ill will likely not increase anytime soon.

Fortunately, there are advocacy groups and one of the best is the National Alliance on Mental Illness (http://www.nami.org/). I urge you to donate to this fine organization. It does great work and has done much to assist families and remove the stigma from mental illness, along with advocating for the mentally ill with government on the state and federal levels.

As a conservative, I generally advocate limiting government's involvement in our lives. But the battleground (can I use this word in our new era of civil discourse?) between conservatives and liberals is often discerning between the "can'ts" and the "won'ts" and holding accountable individuals that are appropriately to be held accountable. I do accept the notion that government does have a role in caring for some that cannot care for themselves. There is no group that has been so overlooked as the mentally ill. And it is very unfortunate that liberals were so quick to push their partisan views. They missed the real issue entirely.

Please make a donation to NAMI. This group is on the right track and it is worthy of your support.

Finger Pointing

The tragic shooting this weekend of Gabrielle Giffords and several other people this weekend reminds us of how vulnerable we are. It's just not that difficult for a psychopath to do a tremendous amount of damage, and it wasn't lost on me that we just commemorated the 30th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon in a similar fashion. The shooting was heinous and deplorable. Fortunately, as open as our society is, and as protective of 2nd Amendment rights as we are, these events are relatively rare, and assaults on political figures are rarer still. We had the shooting of George Moscone and the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan some years back, but there have been no noteworthy assassinations or attempts in the last 20 years.

Yet, on the front page of Sunday's New York Times, without one whit of evidence that this act was anything other than a rogue sociopath, the left has started the blame game, fingering the vitriol of American politics, Sarah Palin (mostly for her imagery of "targeted" districts), and some of the excesses of a handful of Tea Party members. The town meetings last summer were heated, they argue. The rhetoric was inflamed. The politics was bitter and partisan, and overboard and it leads to incited incidents like this, claims the left.

Nonsense, I say. The opposite is true. True, American politics is a rough and tumble business at times. We argue constantly. We do it in town meetings at every level. We spout our views in newspapers. We do it on TV. We do it on the radio. We podcast it. We do it on Youtube. We email dissenting views. And then we vote on people that most closely represent our views. That is what we do, and have done for a couple of centuries. Does our rhetoric get heated? You bet. But check your history books and look at political cartoons from 150-200 years ago. We have more media outlets today, but the politics was pretty rough then, too.

Since Obama came to office, this administration has expanded the reach and scope of the Federal government beyond anything that we have every experienced. It has expanded its spending as a percentage of GDP beyond its historical norms. It is using the power of government to force people to enter into contracts with private parties approved by the government. It is telling us what kind of cars we can drive and what kind of light bulbs that can light our homes. It is now writing regulations for how large our microwaves can be and scheming of ways to limit our "carbon footprint." The White House website urged people to report "fishy" activities in opposing Obamacare and his director of Health and Human Services warned that "disinformation would not be tolerated." Obama publicly lectured the Supreme Court for its ruling upholding 1st Amendment rights for corporations in the Citizens United case and openly threatened to pass legislation to overturn this ruling. This is an administration that has worked overtime to quell opposition.

Yet, the opposition showed up at town hall meeting and showed up at the ballot box in a big way in November. The energy of the Tea Party movement was an important ingredient of the turnover in Congress last November. At its core, we will be in a heated debate for the forseeable future about how much government is appropriate and necessary and there is a large contingent, likely a majority that believe that what Obama and his crowd have in mind for us is much too much. And we will continue to say it and say it loudly.

I am truly sorry for Gifford's family and the families of the other victims. The perpetrator should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, and it is after incidents like this that I call into question my opposition to the death penalty.

But we should not bend to the left's argument that this incident means that we should shut up, and go quietly into the night while government continues its relentless path toward expanding its scope and reach and abrogation of individual and state sovereignty. I firmly believe that it is precisely because we have these free and open exchanges that political violence is so rare here.