by William Skink
Political partisans on both sides will quickly exploit any tragedy if it means furthering their agenda. For team blue, the El Paso shooting appears tailor-made to attack Trump and the alt-right he leads. The young man drove 60 miles to kill Mexicans at Walmart. The footage is terrifying and heartbreaking.
As I do on most Monday mornings, I make the rounds online to see what my regular clicks are saying. At The Montana Post there are already three posts up. The first one is from Don Pogreba, titled Empty Prayers from Empty Suits Won’t Wash the Blood from Their Hands. This was posted on August 3rd at 7:25pm, so before the second mass-shooting in Dayton, Ohio occurred (we’ll get to that shooting in a bit). The second post, written the next day at 9 in the morning by the same partisan author, is about the reprehensible Montana Shooting Sports Association. The third post, written a few hours later, again penned by Pogreba, is titled The Silence of Republican Candidates for Governor After El Paso and Dayton is Indefensible.
In the rush to launch political attacks at political adversaries after these two tragic mass-shootings over this past weekend, Pogreba must not have sought out any information on what may have motivated the second shooter to open fire in Ohio. Though I haven’t looked into this too closely, since it just happened less than 48 hours ago, one of my regular clicks has some indications the other polarized extreme of the political spectrum may have played a role:
And while the media was eager to quickly expose the El Paso shooter as a right-wing extremist with the implication that he is merely following Trump’s belligerent rhetoric, only few details had emerged about the Dayton, Ohio shooter although we certainly understand why the mainstream media may not have rushed to make these alleged details public – because according to Heavy.com, the Dayton shooter was an Elizabeth Warren (and Bernie Sanders) supporter who advocated for socialism, communism and supported Antifa.
I have no idea if this is true or not, but it highlights why one may want to more fully process tragic events before immediately exploiting them to further a political agenda. It’s disgusting when the right does it, and it’s disgusting when partisans like Pogreba do it.
The Dayton shooter, Connor Betts, has a Missoula connection. This deranged young man’s own sister was apparently a victim, and she had recently been working at the Missoula Smokejumper Center, according to the Missoula Current.
A little suggestion to the partisans who rush to their said little computers to exploit another tragic example of America’s deep-rooted sickness: you are a part of the problem, and I wish there was a 48 hour stfu rule about vomiting your political attacks so families can mourn their dead.