While those of us on the left side of the blogosphere have been obsessing about Iraq, Al Qaeda making a comeback and the latest Bush effort to turn Congress into nothing more than a debating society, I have to give credit to the right for focusing on what really matters: the incredible, fantastic and horrific story of a soldier deliberately shot by an allegedly traitorous violent antiwar leftist Islamocommiefascist scumbag on July 4th.
It really is a shame that their outrage du jour had no basis in reality whatsoever (h/t to the field negro):
Air Force Senior Airman Jonathan Schrieken was casually unpacking his car in front of his Willingboro house on the evening of July 4. A moment later, he was fighting for his life.
Out of nowhere, an attacker leveled a handgun at him and fired point blank into his chest, before turning the gun on himself and taking his own life. […]
The incident quickly became a cause celebre, fanned by a host of conservative and military bloggers across the country as well as national columnist Michelle Malkin, who claimed that Schrieken had been targeted by an antiwar zealot. […]
Within days of the incident, cyberspace was burning with criticism of the media for underplaying the story and failing to report the reason for the shooting.
Bloggers cited two notes left by Marren – in his car and at home – that reportedly blasted the government and military. The general content was revealed by Marren’s Trion, Ga., aunt in a story on the Web site PhillyBurbs.com. The aunt said he “wanted to make a statement” on Independence Day.
“Now, imagine the scenario flipped: What if a soldier had attempted to murder a peace activist over the holidays in order to ‘make a statement?’ ” wrote Malkin in a July 11 piece titled “When Peaceniks Attack, Journalists Snooze” on Townhall.com. “The [New York] Times would be holding a front-page vigil, and Katie Couric’s brow would be furrowed for a week.”
The Little Green Footballs … blog ran a July 10 posting that said “authorities and media are doing their best to downplay and cover up the shooter’s motivation.”
Another blog, baldilocks, (http://baldilocks.typepad.com/) said in a July 8 posting called “Dropping the Mask”: “I guess that ‘supporting the troops’ is starting to become difficult to pull off.”[…]
Burlington County and Willingboro authorities said yesterday they may never reveal the text of the Marren notes, but that its content did not support the picture presented by bloggers.
Investigators point out that the 22-year-old Schrieken did not know the gunman, was not in uniform at the time of the incident, and would not have been an obvious target for someone trying to kill a soldier.
They also said the text of Marren’s notes was indicative of someone with mental-health problems.
Of course, I fully understand the wingnuts rush to judgment in this case. After all, the only people who would even think of murdering a man dressed in civilian clothes in his own driveway are crazed anti-war peaceniks. Everyone knows that.
But seriously …
… how often do we have to go down this path with rightwing bloggers? They consistently fabricate or conflate stories to fit a pre-conceived storyline, one in which liberals are EVIL, RUTHLESS AMERICA HATERS WHO CONTROL THE MEDIA. Facts? Those pesky little things can’t be bothered with, not when they have a chance to bash the 70% of the fellow Americans who just want to get our troops out of Iraq. And it isn’t a surprise that Michelle Malkin, “Our Lady of the Ginned-up Controversy” would be leading the charge on this less than thinly sourced story about a mentally disturbed man who unfortunately had access to a gun. A man who decided to kill a total stranger, and then himself, for reasons that probably only he could understand.
But it is tragic that this poor airman who was shot has now, unintentionally, become entangled in the latest wave of internet generated bloviation and hatred from the right wing universe. He has become another victim of the right wing’s need to find martyrs for their cause, as well as evidence for their paranoid delusion that liberals and anti-war supporters hate and despise the troops. Of course, we just want to bring them home safely to their families from the clusterfuck that is our 5 year occupation of Iraq. The right only wants to keep them patrolling the mean streets and killing fields of Anbar, Baghdad, Tikrit, Tal Afar, etc. until God knows when.
So, naturally its the left that hates the troops and wants them dead. And if they have to, the wingnuts will just continue to make shit up to prove they’re — well — right. If their delusions didn’t have real world consequences for thousands of people, it would be laughable. But all it does is leave another bad taste in my mouth for people who are this irrational and obsessed with their own falsified version of “reality.”
