Back in June of last year, just as the 2010 general election campaign was kicking off, Rachel Maddow took Angle to task over her casual references of "Second Amendment Remedies".
Some just laughed it off, but this was really a serious problem...
That we're now realizing can reach frightening conclusions.
Her father Spencer Gifford[s], 75, wept when asked if his 40-year-old daughter had any enemies.
"Yeah," he told The Post. "The whole tea party."
The dad, who was rushing to University Medical Center in Tuscon, said that politicians constantly faced danger.
"They always get threat[ened]," Gifford[s] cried.
This is the horrifying result of making light of "Second Amendment Remedies".
Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who represents a district adjacent to Gabrielle Giffords's, said that Saturday's shooting is a consequence of the vitriolic rhetoric that has arisen over the past few years among extreme elements of the Tea Party.
"The climate has gotten so toxic in our political discourse, setting up for this kind of reaction for too long. It's unfortunate to say that. I hate to say that," Grijalva said in an interview with The Huffington Post. "If you're an opponent, you're a deadly enemy," Grijalva said of the mindset among Arizona extremists. "Anybody who contributed to feeding this monster had better step back and realize they're threatening our form of government."
Grijalva said that Tea Party leader Sarah Palin should reflect on the rhetoric that she has employed. "She -- as I mentioned, people contributing to this toxic climate -- Ms. Palin needs to look at her own behavior, and if she wants to help the public discourse, the best thing she could do is to keep quiet."
Remember that Sarah Palin put her district in cross hairs. And remember that Giffords' GOP/"tea party" opponent, Jesse Kelly, proudly stood by his M16 rifle in campaign ads while suggesting "Second Amendment Solutions" and boasting of "placing the cross hairs squarely on Giffords".
In an luridly prophetic MSNBC interview back in March of last year, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Arizona) warned of the consequences of allowing overheated rhetoric to boil over into violence.
I mean, this is a situation where -- I mean, people don't -- they really need to realize that the rhetoric and firing people up and, you know, even things, for example, we're on Sarah Palin's targeted list. But the thing is that the way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of a gunsight over our district.
When people do that, they've gotta realize there's consequences to that action.
Sadly, Gabrielle Giffords herself, along with 24 others in Tucson yesterday, were victims of those consequences. And while questions remain over the actual motives of the suspect in this case, it's increasingly clear how the "tea party" and its escalating flirtation with violence hasn't helped matters.
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Maven and Desert Beacon are right. How could we not see this coming? As I said yesterday, our political leaders from across the political spectrum need to dial down the heated rhetoric. And hopefully, we'll never again hear Sharron Angle, Jesse Kelly, Sarah Palin, or anyone else speak so lightly of "Second Amendment Remedies".
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