To claim that rhetoric and propaganda have no influence is nonsense. The express purpose of rhetoric and propaganda is to spur people to action. To now claim that words are meaningless and have no consequences is hypocritical. If true, why use rhetoric and propaganda in the first place? To the contrary, words are very powerful. And often, the most emotionally fragile among us are the most easily influenced. But not always. The words of our founding fathers spurred the colonists to declare their independence from Great Britain. Lincoln’s speech at Gettysburg affirmed our commitment to democracy, liberty and equality. Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech led to the end of racial segregation in America and demonstrated the power that words can have over violence. There are many laudable examples of speech inspiring ordinary men and women to act in extraordinary ways.

Unfortunately history is also replete with examples of the opposite: The Holocaust was the consequence of anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant rhetoric and propaganda. 911 was the consequence of religious rhetoric and propaganda. Timothy McVeigh was influenced by white supremacist and anti-government rhetoric and propaganda and 168 people died in the Oklahoma City bombing as a consequence. The murder of Dr. George Tiller and others are the consequence of religious rhetoric and propaganda. The list of bad acts committed in the name of hatred, bias, and fear, whipped up by false prophets is long. How cowardly of these charismatic charlatans to now claim that they bear no responsibility for pulled triggers, detonated bombs or crashed airplanes.

I agree with Rachel Maddow, we cannot speculate on the motives, or do we know if he is linked with any particular groups yet. But--- it was reported on the CBS evening news that a friend of the shooter stated that he went to a past political event that Gabrielle Gifford held in 2007. Jared Lougner asked her an anti-government question, and Gabrielle Gifford ignored him, and didn't answer the question. The friend of the shooter thinks he got "fixated on this". Who knows?

When you are dealing with unstable, mentally ill people-- who are experiencing a psychosis--- anything is possible, they are violent, and totally unpredictable. Like Debbie Wasserman-Schutz said, " you are dealing with (a fragile mind)"--- I like the way she phrased that.

I hate to be insensitive and call him "crazy"--- of course he is--- "crazy mixed with incoherence"

Diana B

As an adjunct instructor at U of A, I have long been opposed to State Senator Harper's bill. I feel guns have no place on campus except with campus police. I believe in the 2nd amendment but I think you can have reasonable limits. For example, it's also legal to have a gun in a bar in Arizona and I don't think that is a wise idea either.

I doubt any gun laws will change as a result of this event in my town, but I would hope that just maybe the extended magazine clips that were used in the shooting would once again be banned before 2004.

I applaud TRMS and Ms. Maddow for looking at valid avenues of stopping senseless crimes like this one at Tucson. I think it is valid to have a discussion about access to guns and items like 30 round magazines. I think it is valid to address how we as a community deal with mental illness.

Would banning 30 round magazines have stopped this horror? Probably not, but it is worth discussing more including how we check for accuracy on gun permit applications and the like.

Would a better way and better awareness of referring individuals who seem to have psychological challenges to places of support and assistance have stopped this horror? Has a lot of potential.

I thought Ms. Maddow did a fair job discussing most of the issues surrounding the prevention of another tragedy like this one.

Dearest Rachel Maddow,

For every photo and video of Jared Loughner, it would be hugely awesome to provide the same for each person injured or killed during his violent rampage. It would be amazing to understand who each of those victims are/were, their contributions to the world or at least their families and friends.

Obviously Jared Loughner is a puppet, influenced by the media and right-wing rhetoric. Treat him like the piece of dust he is.

About guns, well unfortunately like Edgar Domenech said, " he fell through the cracks"--- gee that is too bad, huh?? and then a nut like this goes on a shooting rampage! When is Glenn Beck doing his next NRA rally?

About mental health programs, it is a problem. It was about 10 years ago, that many psychiatric in-patient facilities closed. This is because medical insurances stopped covering the $$$, also affecting a patient also unable to afford to just go to a psychiatrist for a visit. The medical community, 10 years ago, knew we would be facing a problem. I think these factors need to be not only discussed, but also-- initiated

1. anyone purchasing a gun needs to have a (psychiatric evaluation) accompanied by a physician note
2. anyone that has purchased a gun in the past 5 years also has to supply this--- all guns are registered, and gun owner's can be contacted
3. also make it (illegal) to use any words, such as (shoot, aim, target) in any political ad-- and make it illegal, too, to videotape using a gun in any political ad. If a political ad is made like this-- it should be pulled by the state. Is this censorship?? well maybe, but -- do we really want to see another massacre?

Diana B

If rhetoric and words and symbols and pictures had no consequence and no reaction, then the business in our country wouldn't be paying millions for the TV and radio stations to carry ads 24/7.

Need to share this:

The Wrath of Fools: An Open Letter to the Far Right
Monday 10 January 2011
by: William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

(Image: Jared Rodriguez / t r u t h o u t)
To: Palin-lovers, Fox "News," the "mainstream" media, and the Far Right, et al.

From: William Rivers Pitt

Date: Monday 10 January 2011

Re: The blood on your hands

Dear “Patriots,”

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords isn't much older than I am. She served in the Arizona State House of Representatives, and the Arizona State Senate, before being elected to three successive terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. She once described herself as a "former Republican," and is today considered a "Blue Dog" Democrat, meaning she holds a number of conservative political positions. This is not terribly surprising, given the generally conservative political bent of the state she has served for the last ten years. She was married four years ago to a space shuttle commander who had served as a Naval aviator, and who flew 39 combat missions in Desert Storm, before volunteering for astronaut training.

Last Wednesday, she was sworn in to her third term as the Representative for Arizona's 8th congressional district. One of her first acts in the newly-minted 112th Congress was to read aloud from the House floor, in response to the Republican Party's recitation of the Constitution, the following lines: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

She returned to Arizona not long after to assist in the implementation of that most vital of Constitutional principles, calling together a meeting of her constituents in a peaceable assembly so the citizens she represents could petition the government for a redress of grievances. Among the gathered crowd were a number of her staffers, a judge, and a nine-year-old girl named Christina-Taylor Green who was born on September 11, 2001.

And then all Hell broke loose.

A man named Jared Lee Loughner waded into the group and fired a bullet into Rep. Giffords' skull at point-blank range, before turning his weapon on others in the crowd. Christina-Taylor Greene, who would have celebrated her tenth birthday on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, was shot in the chest and killed. The woman who brought her to the event was also shot. Gabriel Zimmerman, who served as Rep. Giffords' director of community outreach, was also killed. He was 30 years old, and was recently engaged to be married. U.S. District Judge John Roll, who had served on the bench for twenty years, was also killed. Dorwin Stoddard, a church volunteer, died after putting his body between his wife and the hail of bullets. His wife was also shot. Two of Rep. Giffords' constituents, Dorothy Morris and Phyllis Scheck, were also killed. All in all, 31 shots were fired before several brave souls tackled Loughner, disarmed him, and wrestled him to the ground.

At the time of this writing, Rep. Giffords is lying in a hospital bed in critical condition. The God you Bible-spewing frauds love to flog the rest of us with must have been in that supermarket crowd with her on Saturday, with His hand on her shoulder, because it is nothing short of a full-fledged miracle she survived at all. Doctors are actually cautiously optimistic that she will survive, though the degree to which she will ultimately recover is still sorely in doubt. She can respond to simple commands, according to her doctors, and is marginally able to communicate. If she survives her wound, it is wretchedly certain her life will never, ever be the same.

I just thought you should know a few things about the people you helped into their graves and hospital beds this weekend.

Yes, you.

You false patriots who bring assault rifles to political rallies, you hack politicians and media personalities who lied through your stinking teeth about "death panels" and "Obama is coming for your guns" and "He isn't a citizen" and "He's a secret Muslim" and "Sharia Law is coming to America," you who spread this bastard gospel and you who swallowed it whole, I am talking to you, because this was your doing just as surely as it was the doing of the deranged damned soul who pulled the trigger. The poison you injected into our culture is deeply culpable for this carnage.

You who worship Jesus at the top of your lungs (in defiance of Christ's own teachings on the matter of worship, by the way) helped put several churchgoers into their graves and into the hospital. You who shriek about the sanctity of marriage helped cut down a man who was about to be married. You who crow with ceaseless abandon about military service and the nobility of our fighting forces helped to critically wound the wife of a Naval aviator who fought for you in a war. You who hold September 11 as your sword and shield helped put a little girl born on that day into the ground.

You helped. Yes, damn you, you helped.

The "mainstream" media is already working overtime playing up the "Disturbed loner" angle with all their might. There is no doubt, from the available evidence, of Mr. Loughner's transformation into a disturbed individual. But here's the funny part: all the crazy crap he spewed, about the gold standard (a favorite of Glenn Beck, the master of Fox "News" fearmongering...so he can sell his gold scam to suckers) and government mind control and everything else before going on his rampage, is straight out of the Right-Wing Insanity Handbook. His personal YouTube ramblings were a mishmash of right-wing anti-government nonsense...the kind that attracts sick minds like Loughner, the kind that only reinforces their paranoia, the kind that finally pushes them over the brink and into the frenzy of violence that took place on Saturday. The kind that the likes of you have been happily spreading by the day.

He did not act alone. You were right there with him. You helped.

I'm talking to you, "mainstream" media people, who created this atmosphere of desperate rage and total paranoia out of whole cloth because of your unstoppable adoration for spectacle, and ratings, and because the companies that own your sorry asses agree with the deranged cretins you helped make so famous and powerful. It was sickeningly amusing on Sunday to watch Wolf Blitzer bluster and bluff on CNN about how the media owns no responsibility for this disaster. It was like watching a ten-year-old try to explain how a lamp got broken while he was running through the living room, but no, it wasn't him. It was, in reality, a pathetic display...but that is what you generally get whenever Wolf is on your screen.

"Mainstream" news personalities like David Gergen and John King bent over backwards warning people not to blame Sarah Palin and her ilk for this calamity. It was a sick man who did this, they said. Bollocks to that. I hate to break this to the "mainstream" media know-betters, but words matter. When people like Palin spray the airwaves with calls to violence and incantations of imminent doom, people like Loughner are listening, and prepared to act. The "mainstream" media lets it fly without any questions or rebuttal, because it's good for ratings, and here we are. Words matter. Play Russian Roulette long enough, and someone inevitably winds up dead.

Remember the run-up to the Iraq invasion, and the subsequent occupation? "WMD everywhere, al Qaeda connections to 9/11, plastic sheeting and duct tape because we're all gonna die!" was the central theme of the majority of your broadcast schedule for years...until it was all proven to be a lie. You helped the liars, you were the liars, but you knew that. You also got your spectacle, and the corporations that own you got paid a king's ransom, so everyone was happy, except the dead.

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Tell me this is any different, I dare you. For the spectacle, the ratings and the pleasure of your owners, you ran names like "Sarah Palin" across the sky in lights, even after she should have faded into well-deserved obscurity, and helped this blister of right-wing rage fester until it finally burst. This was your show, and in perhaps the most wretched irony of all, I would bet all my worldly possessions that your ratings are through the roof right now. You got what you wanted. I hope you are pleased.

And yes, I'm talking to you, Sarah Palin, you unutterably disgusting fraud. You pulled it off your ridiculous website, but it's out there: you put cross-hairs - literally, cross-hairs - on Rep. Giffords, you blithered about "reloading" instead of "retreating," and you made this country more stupid and violent with every breath you took. Well, congratulations, you failure, you quitter, you inciter of mobs. You put the cross-hairs on her, and someone finally pulled the trigger. Run from it all you like, Lady MacBeth, but this blood will never be washed from your hands.

I'm talking to you, Sharron Angle, you walking punch-line, who talked about "Second Amendment remedies" being necessary if you didn't get your way on health care reform during your failed Senate campaign.

I'm talking to you, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity, and Bill O'Reilly, and Michael Savage, and Ann Coulter, and Laura Ingraham, and to every other right-wing tripe-spewing blowhard blogger and Fox News broadcaster. I hope you are proud of yourselves, because this is the day you get to reap what you have been relentlessly sowing since you were forced to encompass the unmitigated outrage of a Black man winning the office of President of the United States.

That's right, I said it. Anyone who thinks good old-fashioned American bigotry and racism are not the core motivation for a vast majority of these so-called "revolutionaries" should get their heads examined. You've heard of the "elephant in the middle of the room?" Well, this is the burning cross in the middle of the room, and no amount of spin will douse those flames.

I'm talking to you, Koch Brothers. Your money to create and spread this disease was well-spent; you now have one less Democrat in the House to worry about, at least for the foreseeable future. Congratulations, you un-American sacks of filth.

And I'm talking to each and every one of you who listened to these traitors and believed the nonsense they spewed at you for no other reason than to pick your pockets for campaign/organization contributions. I'm talking to you who wore your silly fatigues and carried your badly-spelled fact-deprived signs to protests with pistols on your hips and rifles on your shoulders. You who threw bricks through the windows of politicians you disagreed with. You who shot out the windows of Rep. Giffords' office not even a year ago.

You worked very hard to create exactly this atmosphere in America, and now it has come to be. We have entered the age of the Wrath of Fools, and we now must again exist in an America where the word "assassination" has become all too relevant.

You helped this happen. You.

You know it. I know it. Have the guts to admit it, even if only to yourselves.

I know many Republicans and conservatives, and consider them to be dear friends. The single most influential person in my life (aside from my mother) was a rock-ribbed conservative Republican, and there is no person I respected more than him. I do not count these people, and those like them, among those whom I address here. They are as sickened and repulsed by you as I am.

This is not the end of the story, but is just the beginning. The good people of the United States of America, the true patriots, have finally seen you with your media-painted masks ripped off. They have seen what comes to pass when hate, venom, ignorance and violence goes unchecked and unanswered. You have been exposed, and the fact that it took such an unimaginably horrific act for that exposure to take place only increases the fierceness with which you will be answered. You will be repudiated, not with violence, but with the scorn and rejection you so richly deserve. Spin it as you will, scramble all you like. You are found out, and you have nowhere to hide.

Oh, P.S., if anyone reading this is operating under the delusion that the overheated right-wing rhetoric that went a long way towards almost getting Rep. Giffords killed, and had a strong hand in putting six people in the ground, is some sort of new Obama-era phenomenon, well...

"I tell people don't kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus - living fossils - so we will never forget what these people stood for."

- Rush Limbaugh, Denver Post, 12-29-95

"Get rid of the guy. Impeach him, censure him, assassinate him."

- Rep. James Hansen (R-UT), talking about President Clinton

"We're going to keep building the party until we're hunting Democrats with dogs."

- Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX), Mother Jones, 08-95

"My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building."

- Ann Coulter, New York Observer, 08-26-02

"We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too. Otherwise, they will turn out to be outright traitors."

- Ann Coulter, at the Conservative Political Action Conference, 02-26-02

"Chelsea is a Clinton. She bears the taint; and though not prosecutable in law, in custom and nature the taint cannot be ignored. All the great despotisms of the past - I'm not arguing for despotism as a principle, but they sure knew how to deal with potential trouble - recognized that the families of objectionable citizens were a continuing threat. In Stalin's penal code it was a crime to be the wife or child of an 'enemy of the people.' The Nazis used the same principle, which they called Sippenhaft, 'clan liability.' In Imperial China, enemies of the state were punished 'to the ninth degree': that is, everyone in the offender's own generation would be killed and everyone related via four generations up, to the great-great-grandparents, and four generations down, to the great-great-grandchildren, would also be killed."

- John Derbyshire, National Review, 02-15-01

"Two things made this country great: White men & Christianity. The degree these two have diminished is in direct proportion to the corruption and fall of the nation. Every problem that has arisen (sic) can be directly traced back to our departure from God's Law and the disenfranchisement of White men."

- State Rep. Don Davis (R-NC), emailed to every member of the North Carolina House and Senate, reported by the Fayetteville Observer, 08-22-01

I could go on, and on, and on, and on, but you get the gist.

Most Disrespectfully Yours,
William Rivers Pitt

If you study American history, you'll see that vitriolic political rhetoric has been a reality since the founding of this nation; doesn't make it right, but doesn't make it new. We protect such speech, however foolish, so that the day never comes when someone decides what you have to say is foolish. Relative to guns, it would be wonderful to live in a utopia where force is not to be feared, or needs to be countered. But we do not. The reality of our existence, from insect to dictator, is that force is consistently applied to oppress, resist oppression, and enforce justice (as defined by law). A madman who's willing to do something like this isn't going to be stopped by a gun law. The only solution, there, would be to remove guns from society. Per my point above, we must not do this. Therefore, it is logical we allow citizens to protect themselves with an equal weapon. Aside from Loughner's personal accountability the real failure here lies with his parents, friends, his college possible, etc. There were plenty of signs this man was deranged and dangerous. Had someone taken action early, this would likely not have happened. Address the root cause of this mayhem, not the tools they used to commit it. He could have driven an automobile into the crowd - what then? Good post, Rachel. While I rarely agree with you I always find you thoughtful and reasonable :)

Late adolescence and early adulthood are the primary timeframes for adult onset schizophrenia. We need to focus on the mental illness aspect of this and fund further research like any other disease.

There are many reasons to require licenses in our society, and allowing the truly unhinged access to purchasing a weapon is one of them. Unfortunately the relatively sane gun advocates defend the rights of the ill-equipped to own weapons without restriction.

MSNBC should scrap Lean Forward and go with Rachel's declaration Facts Matter.

Maddow missed one that would have fit in with her timeline: The Jewish Federation shooting in Seattle. on July 28, 2006. A few decades ago there was the Wah Mee Massacre in Seattle. and The Montréal Massacre of December 6, 1989.

Sigh..those of you who cling to the delusion that white male conservatives are outraged over the ascendency of non-white males to power need to look at Colin Powell, Condi Rice, and, yes, Sarah Palin. Black, Black Woman, White Woman - all nearly revered by white male conservatives. Let this go. When I disagree with my President it is purely on an idealogical plane. Obama in the White House should have put an end to this question and to THIS hateful rhetoric, not spurred it into yet another generation. How will we ever get past race or gender as a divisive issue if we keep making it one? There is no mainstream bias here. I feel your pain for the past, but look forward.

As a university professor who has been threatened by right-wing racist and fascist students, including having students getting out of their desks to confront me, including having groups of students confront me in the hall, including having my office door tagged with racist and fascist threats, I like the idea of being able to carry a concealed handgun. I talked my way out before, but it took a toll. The police dismissed my complaints, in writing, and refused to even investigate the incidents, in writing. The administration says all our students are "good kids" (a direct quote), and when incidents like this happen (by my count, five faculty have faced these same situations to date) they automatically blame the prof unless we prove otherwise. In every case, we have proven otherwise, and the people in charge refuse to change their tune.

It took a formal "outcry" notice to the entire university administration to get a security camera mounted outside my office, but the one thug they caught got only a wrist-slapping, if that (they will not let me see the outcome of the disciplinary hearing).

In case you're wondering, my teaching has been first-rate. Student opinion surveys regularly ranked me near the top of the chart, and not for easy grades. Even on RateMyProf I got excellent ratings. I kept my course up-to-date and challenging, in a way designed to get people thinking. That latter may have something to do with the threats; fascists hate people who make them think. Of course, my progressive politics (Naderite) and strong anti-racist positions are the immediate causes.

This all happened at a Texas university. No surprise, eh?

Anyway, I want the right to carry concealed. The police refuse to take the threats seriously. A Pocket Protector may one day be the only way out.

Mr.Pitt that was one of the best letters I have read,Thank you Sir for saying all that needs to be said .

How do we prevent the next gun massacre?

You can't. I'm sorry, but that's the truth.

Ban all guns, people still have them, right?

Collect all guns, all 280 million of them, ban all gun purchases, no private gun ownership. It will just move underground, illegal black market guns will arrive daily just as drugs do.

Universal health care, better mental health screening, intervention, we could all make our best efforts. Unless the me, you and bureaucracy is absolutely perfect, someone who should have been helped will "slip through the cracks." Not to mention the sociopaths and psychotics that can hide right in front of us.

The psychotic or just the guy who slips through the cracks will get a gun somehow, and there will be another american gun massacre. We'll all sit back, bewildered, and say "this wasn't supposed to happen."

You can't stop it. Any more than we've been able to stop the flow of drugs into this country, despite decades and billions of dollars, despite draconian and racist enforcement and imprisonment, despite education, good wishes, and every effort made to reduce or eliminate the illegal drug trade, it continues.

You can't stop it. Any more than we've been able to stop child molesters, domestic violence, rape, or any of the other worst crimes within our society. We are a violent society, not all violence is committed with a gun, but they tend to get our attention more. These mass shootings are not the result of gun laws, or poor mental health, or vitriolic speech. They are a result of ALL OF THEM along with a hundred other facets of our social structure and interactions.

To stop the mass shootings you have to stop ALL the violence, we have to change our society.

I need to echo @2doghome's comment. Rhetoric is not some antediluvian instrument that is added to discourse--it is, to quote Kenneth Burke, "an indelible mark of what it means to be human." It is, in short, an ever-present element of all human discourse because as 2doghome points out, it is needed to bring about human action, to motivate reason and desire.

As a professor who has studied rhetoric and human nature for more than 15 years, it never fails to amaze me how misguided our understanding of rhetoric is. It's not rhetoric itself that is bad--it's the ends to which it is directed that are bad.

To understand how this is so we need to think about what it means to live a life that is in harmony. Aristotle believed that there is an inherent beauty in harmony; to that, St. Thomas Aquinas added that harmony itself is a Good that we should pursue. Thus, if we direct our use of rhetoric to bring about harmony--whether it is harmonizing our thoughts, balancing the influence of our emotions or desires, or it is harmonizing society--we can say that rhetoric is Good. If, on the other hand, we use rhetoric to maintain a form of imbalance or to disrupt what is already in balance, we can say that rhetoric is bad.

Now if Burke is right in thinking that our use of rhetoric is unavoidable, and if the ends to which rhetoric are put are what makes its use Good or bad, then we can say this:

First, it is very possible that the shooter in Arizona was influenced by rhetoric--however immeasurable or fleeting that influence might have been--insofar as he convinced himself that his thoughts and actions were Good, and insofar as he was likely to have been convinced by "others" that his thoughts and actions were Good. (One has to assume that the shooter wasn't living in a cave devoid of media contact and that the vituperative environment in southern Arizona had to have had some effect on his thinking.)

Second, that if rhetoric is employed in such a way by people for any reason other than to bring about harmony (whether of the mind or among society), then that use of rhetoric is bad. This in particular is something that we need to think about--in particular those who have access to tools of mass communication and those who must keep in check their desires for power and/or influence. They must understand that as they employ rhetoric, they must do so to intending to harmonize us; if their employment of rhetoric is intended to bring about disharmony--especially for selfish reasons (i.e., political gain or advantage), then that particular form of rhetoric is indeed BAD.

I have worked with the mentally ill for years. In some instances political propaganda does matter. They get fixated on the general atmosphere of what's going on in the world even tho. they can't process it clearly. During the cold war and post cold war a lot of schizophrenics had delusions surrounding the KGB, CIA or FBI. ( Remember when it was Napoleon?) Of course it can be anything or anyone that they become obsessed with but politics is a big source.

Surprisingly, schizophrenics are very sensitive to the environment around them. That's why negative feelings, emotions and events can set them off. All this vitriol going on in politics CAN contribute to their sense of paranoia and unease.

Besides what's been going on in politics is just plain rude and nasty. It's even driving those of us with a ounce of sanity crazy!

(Sorry in advance for the imagery.)

Everyone carrying guns to prevent mass public shootings is like hikers all carrying shovels to prevent horses#!t from falling on popular forest trails. It might be a useful tool to have if a situation does present itself, but the situation could still present itself.

Horses will always do their business. Fact. As for messy trails, hikers have choices. Step in it. Step around it. Stop hiking and let the horses run free. Carry shovels. Designate horse-free foot paths? Wait. That last one might just be interesting, but it will certainly require some debate and cooperation.

People ought not to be going to public places with bad ideas and loaded guns and shooting other people. Can't we all agree at least to this much, identify the cogent points in this statement, and see if we can actually identify the best way to discourage the situation going forward?

Detached mental illness, blind rage, murderous hatred, the source matters not. People are dying. What are the other common threads here we can work with?

Do we have any idea how to stop this disaster?

We can only try and, perhaps, lower the number of killed and/or injured. So far, every account of the incident I have read or heard points out the same thing - he had 33 bullets before there was an opportunity to advance against him. That's 33 opportunities to maim and/or kill. That suggests to me that a ban on increased capacity magazines would be a first good step. A second step would be a ban on automatic weapons.

But I fear that the lack of a readily available automatic weapon won't stop them, but it would have been harder, perhaps to pull a pickup bomb up to the supermarket. Then again maybe not.

I would also suggest not giving the psycho what he craves - to be famous. Famous or infamous it's the same thing; he made history. The world is talking about him. He is on the TV 24/7 right now right through to the hearing and beyond. Jackpot! This encourages the next crazy to become "famous."

Another suggestion is the same that others have said, medical intervention. Imagine if we had something like, I don't know, maybe Universal Healthcare making it easy for these patients and their loved ones to seek care, medications and advice. Gee why hasn't anyone thought of that?

Loved the interview with Senator Brown last night. One correction, though. He said that the law prohibiting the sale of guns to the mentally ill cannot be utilized because the mentally ill are not in the care system. While it is true that many mentally ill do not access the system of care, those who do are not prevented from owning a gun except by self report. I am a mental health professional and in all my years of work here in Texas, there has never been any formal way to report to any database any concerns we may have over an individual owning a gun or being able to purchase one. Our only policy is "duty to warn", meaning a direct threat of harm to self/others must be reported to the person who has been threatened or the family looking after the client's care. The police may also be called. But as far as any systematic method of reporting mentally ill clients to get them on some list that would trigger an alert if they attempt to purchase a gun, I know of no such system in the state of Texas. I have worked in psychiatric hospitals and with numerous psychiatrists and other mental health professionals and there as never been a method in place to report.

If were are going to have a law making it illegal for the mentally ill to purchase a gun, there must be a system in place to make that possible. That would mean we would have to have a serious discussion to determine which diagnoses would be considered for that list and who makes the decision to report. I have never heard of any such discussion in my state.

Hi Rachel,

Thank you for your report, How to Stop the Next One. I'd like to approach this topic from a different angle.

I have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder for over 15 years. I've suffered from paranoia and delusions many times over. I've also attempted suicide during one of my deep depressions. Jared Loughner gives people like me a bad name. These mass shootings are an example of insanity at its worst. Part of the problem lies in the stigma surrounding mental illness. 5.7 million adult Americans are diagnosed with a mental illness in a given year [According to 2004 U.S. Census, National Institute of Mental Health]. And that's not including many who feel isolated and too ashamed to get help because of social stigma. Many don't have proper healthcare benefits.

I happen to believe in the Second Amendment, Right to Bear Arms, but if everyone who has had a history of mental illness or has had a prescription for an antidepressant, antipsychotic, mood stabilizers, etc., well, that would exclude a whole lot of Americans to bear arms. Given my background, should I own a gun? I can honestly say, ABSOLUTELY NOT. I can't help but wonder what kind of mental state Sara Palin was in when she put up that crosshairs map. No doubt, someone who is psychotic could mistake that for a hit list.

The last thing I want to do is target Palin or anyone else in the political arena. What needs to be addressed is dismantling the stigma of mental illness and, of course, proper healthcare benefits. The brain is just like any other organ, when it's sick it exhibits symptoms. When someone is diabetic, they need to take insulin. A chemical imbalance in the brain needs to be treated as well. If we can help solve those issues, along with more stringent gun control laws, I believe we might be able to lessen the staggering statistics you mention in your piece.

Sincerely,

Janine Crowley Haynes, Author of My Kind of Crazy: Living in a Bipolar World


Bio:
My book was chosen as Honorable Mention in the Inspirational category of the Writer's Digest 17th Annual International Self-Published Book Awards
My book is now being used by psychology professors and by psychiatrists and psychologists in private practice.

I am a guest speaker for the DBSA [Depression/Bipolar Support Alliance]
I have helped raise awareness and funds for Silver Hill Hospital and NAMI [National Alliance of Mental Illness].

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Persons with schizophrenia misinterpret hate speech and can be stirred to violence.

The tenor of the discussion about the shooting in Tucson needs some clarification about the nature of schizophrenia and the ways hate speech affects the mind of the person with schizophrenia. As we consider the mental status and motivation of the Tucson shooter it is worth reflecting both on the political climate and the nature of certain mental illnesses and the relationship between the two. During the past few years the rhetoric from the political right has included many admonitions to resort to "the second amendment solution" to resolve our differences. In reality, the second amendment solution, " a well regulated militia, being necessary for the security of a free state, the right of people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." in no way supports the individual acts of violence suggested by Sarah Palins website, and others on the political right.

On the other hand, the dismissal of the shooter as a degenerate, a wack job, crazy, deranged evil monster, is offensive to all persons with mental illness and a gross misunderstanding of the nature of the illness this individual's behavior most clearly demonstrates, schizophrenia. These characterizations misrepresent the nature of mental illness and downplays the effect of hate speech upon the mind and the behavior particularly with persons with schizophrenia.

I am addressing this issue of mental illness not as a politico but as a nurse clinical specialist in chronic mental illness. Schizophrenia is a thought disorder. It includes two characteristics that make persons with schizophrenia particularly susceptable to suggestions to commit acts of violence. The combination of the two effects of this devastating disorder --delusion and literal thinking lead the individual to focus upon writings and images that support their delusions. A delusion is a misperception in terms of a belief and/thought. Paranoid delusions are often directed toward the government. Clearly his experience of trying to enter the military and being turned down would among other experiences, make him susceptable to manipulation and/or influence by those who also express distrust of the government. Jared clearly indicated on his youtube video that he was experiencing paranoia about having his webpages read by government spies. So, Jared is not a maniac he is a person with a mental illness who is paranoid about the government. The second characteristic of mental illness, is the last link in the chain connecting hate speech to mental illness igniting the fire of conviction in mind of the mentally ill shooter. To say that schizophrenia is a thought disorder means that it is a disruption in thinking. When a person with schizophrenia reads a webpage of someone who has certain persons depicted in the cross hairs of a target, then he is unlikely to interpret that image symbolically. Rather his brain is hardwired to interpret it literally this means that he would interpret literally the image of crosshairs over the district of Congresswoman Gifford and also the statement that "if ballots don't work we'll resort to bullets" as a directive to take out congresswoman Gifford. This is a perfectly reasonable conclusion in the mind of the individual with schizophrenia drawn from his readings of positions on the right. Literal thinking in place of abstract thinking means that killing agents of the government who are targets of his allies on the right is justified.

If we fail to correctly and carefully analyze the relationship between mental illness and hate speech and the mechanisms at work that contribute to the cycles of violence in this country we do so at our peril. We have to understand the nature of mental illness in order to think clearly about how to alter our rhetoric. This is so critical to understanding free speech; that the words we do really do matter when words fall upon the unhinged. He is both unhinged and politically motivated. It is critical that we stop using symbolic rhetoric that includes violence as the answer to honest disagreements as Paul Hemke said.

It is not the case that the left and right are equally at fault in this regard. The leaders on the left rarely if ever exhort followers to violence. They primarily attack institutions not people. On the left, ideas and lies are the target not human beings. There have not been leaders on the left exhorting their followers to "take out" conservative legislators, presidents, judges or citizens. It is a central principle of the radical right that gun violence is always an option. Until the right abandons the notion that the second amendment supports marshalling an unregulate renegate army separate from state government, or that cession from the union is an option, we can expect persons with mental illness to be misled and to misinterpret the intentions of these radicals.

It is important that commentators and public officials understand how these characteristics of mental illness combine to make hate speech the amunition for the weapons that exist in the minds and hands of some persons with schizophrenia.

Dr Eileen Jackson - While I agree with your statement we also need to look at the hard fact that this man is mentally ill and based on our current laws he was receiving no treatment or medication yet many people knew he was mentally ill and were afraid of him. I don't believe the issue is the rhetoric that has been said however much I dislike it. I think the issue is how do we as a country view and treat mental illness? We have school shootings, mass murderers, violent crimes being committed by people all the time that are known to be mentally ill - yet what do we do about it?

I have a mentally ill son who I have tried repeatedly to get him help - if I put him in a hospita -l my insurance would run out before he could be properly treated or he would behave is such a way to get kicked out. We tried to use the juvenile court system to get them to place him in long term treatment only for that not to happen (too costly).

So it doesn't matter what people say or do that fans the thoughts of the mentally ill as we as a country have decided that they aren't worth treating. Even if someone were to have stepped up and said Jared you need help where would he have gone? Would a 72 hr hold have been enough? Until that is changed this violence will continue to occur.

 Have a question, on Monday's show, RM stated that (repusive) smiling picture of the "perper" was NOT his official MUG shot...Basically seeing it EVERYWHERE, in print and on air and identified AS his mug shot...Woud appreciate an explanation that if this is NOT his mug shot, WHAT possessed them to release it far and wide for distribution ?

Find it a ghastly image , but far more importantly, can NOT imagine the pain it must cause those that were the victims or their families now having this image POP up continuously rubbing further disgust into their open raw wounds !!

WHY would law enforcement put out such an image..of this perp devilishly/maliciously ,sneerirngly smiling...It is contemptible on many levels.

Just a brief note on "mental health services." It may be that most of your viewers are not aware ( have, I hope, no reason to be aware) of the restrictions on mental-health and psychiatric intervention in the activities of troubled people. In most venues, mental-health personnel cannot intervene in the lives of troubled people in any involuntary way unless they have what amounts to their own eyewitness evaluation that the troubled person in question is, by reason of a diagnosed psychiatric disorder, imminently liable to harm self or others or utterly incapable to caring for him/her self (meaning hardly capable of lifting spoon to mouth). Psychiatrists and their assisting staff are not able to simply reach out and grab a troubled person by the collar, to yank them to safety before violence occurs. Even a psychotic person is deemed to have civil rights which cannot be violated without serious and confirmed cause. Reporting the Arizona gunman to, for instance, campus counseling services would have likely been of zero value. Even reporting his alleged statements to a psychiatrist would have likely had no practical value. The law now protects the "insane"--to a degree that most citizens would feel is excessive, even nonsensical, protecting "the right to sleep under bridges," and the right to spout crazy, even creepy rhetoric. You cannot easily detain any citrizen, including the most deranged, for what he "might" do.