Important questions all... My comments.
- Aren't calculated political assassination attempts by definition "political?" If so, then how can anyone argue that anyone is trying to "politicize" the Tucson shooting?
Was it a calculated political assassination? Yes and no. Yes because a politician was targeted, but so were many innocent bystanders. If it was only political, why the massive killing spree? Perhaps it could better be described as an act of political terrorism. The added elements of crazed zealotry and twisted ideology make this much more plausible as a terrorist act.
It could also simply be a crazy guy with a gun heading for the nearest target following the path of least resistance. The stream of violent vitriol from the media machine carried this man directly to his target and helped him pull the trigger… many times.
- Since the shooting, has a single conservative movement leader denounced violence-glorifying political rhetoric?
Yes, many of them. These leaders are politicians remember, and they only exist to serve their constituents, mostly by getting elected again. Sincere statements of principle are not in their DNA. Their denunciations of the violent rhetoric are perfunctory because the customers they are serving are violent and prone to over the top rhetoric.
The world they live in is carried along by a profitable media stream that is at its core a capitalist enterprise and as such, completely with out morals, good or bad. It's a for-profit movement that WILL take care of its bottom line. It sells over-wrought, over-the-top, sometimes-violent, borderline bigoted, hyper-active, wide-eyed "news." It's very successful and it will take a serious push back in the style of what's happening to Glen Beck to ever change the culture enough for it to trickle up to the leadership.
- If cultural conservatives believe violent video games and comic books are dangerous because they can foment violence, why don't those same conservatives believe violent rhetoric broadcast on TV and radio won't do the same thing?
Similar to the previous answer, the cultural conservatives aren't particularly concerned with the morals of their ideology. For them you can use the same answer as above but substitute "salvation" for "profit." If salvation is the only goal of cultural conservatives, it really doesn't matter what sin you accept or reject. Again, it's a profit motif not a moral one. If redemption is available all upon repentance, the license to sin is absolute in these folks view. The gap between what the say and what they do simply widens…
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