Attack prompts jolting retreat to civility

By Richard McGregor and Tom Braithwaite in Washington

Published: January 9 2011 20:15 | Last updated: January 9 2011 20:15

The mass shooting in Arizona at a community meeting convened by a Democratic congresswoman prompted a jolting retreat to political civility in Washington after a lengthy period of acrimonious attacks on the governing establishment.

All sides of politics rushed to condemn the grave wounding of Gabrielle Giffords, 40, and the deaths of six others, including a nine-year-old child and a judge, and the wounding of 14 people.

Political combat was stayed, with the new Republican leaders in Congress announcing they would delay a vote this week on the administration’s healthcare legislation, an event to be staged to highlight their new conservative agenda. But simmering barely beneath the surface were suggestions the shooting could be tied to the vituperative rhetoric directed at the Obama administration in the past 24 months by the Tea Party and its loose band of acolytes.

The Tea Party has relentlessly attacked politicians of all stripes but most of its energies have aimed at displacing Democratic supporters of President Obama over issues such as healthcare and government spending. Ms Giffords was one of 20 members of Congress singled out last year by Sarah Palin, the Tea Party icon, for defeat in the then upcoming elections, with each of their districts displayed as targets in crosshairs. The posting was accompanied by the words: “Don’t retreat. Instead – RELOAD!”

Dick Durbin, a Democratic senator from Illinois, cited Ms Palin’s comments, without mentioning her by name, in calling the shootings a moment for politicians to tone down attacks on political opponents.

“These sorts of things, I think, invite the kind of toxic rhetoric that can lead unstable people to believe this is an acceptable response,” he told CNN.

The New York Daily News was not so restrained, with a columnist charging that Ms Palin had added to the “climate of violence” and may have blood on her hands.

A spokeswoman for Ms Palin denounced attempts to tie her to the shootings as “obscene”. In a television interview, Rebecca Mansour said: “We never ever, ever intended [the crosshairs] to be gun sights.”

Many Republicans, who see Ms Palin as a potential rival for the party’s 2012 presidential nomination, also have an interest in using the incident to discredit the former Alaska governor. But few were taking aim at her on Sunday.

“What we know about this individual is that he read Karl Marx and Hitler and burnt the American flag. That is not the profile of a typical Tea Party member,” said Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican senator.

The web postings of the 22-year-old who is being held over the shooting reveal an apparently deeply disturbed individual. Jared Lee Loughner branded himself a “terrorist”, rejected the authority of government and professed to enjoy books by Hitler and Marx.

Mr Loughner is so far declining to talk to police, citing his right to remain silent, US media reported. But the lack of knowledge of any motive is also restraining commentators from attributing a direct political link to the shootings.

“Most of his comments were gibberish,” said Thomas Fuentes, a former FBI agent. “He might just be someone who just wanted to take out a celebrity.”

Jerrold Post, director of political psychology at George Washington University and author of Political Paranoia, said the alleged mental instability of the suspect did not mean that vitriolic political rhetoric played no part.

“It was intended to be metaphoric. Having said that, there may be an emotionally unstable person who takes that quite literally,” he said.

Dr Post, who worked on political violence at the CIA, said violence could be triggered by the broader atmosphere of heightened rhetoric and those Tea Party activists who carried weapons at rallies to show their literal adherence to the second amendment defence of gun rights.

“Although the acts and the costumes, including carrying weapons, is meant to be symbolic … the audience is very heterogeneous,” he said. “And within that audience is going to be some who can be incited to carry out that act, particularly if their own life is falling apart.”

Spencer Giffords, the congresswoman’s father, was asked by the New York Post whether his daughter had any enemies. “Yeah,” he said, as he approached the hospital. “The whole Tea Party.”