"Wonder which Journolist/cabalist wordsmith came up with the now viral 'vitriol' to tar Sarah & the Tea Party. John Podesta, EzraKlein?" we twittered this afternoon. The local sheriff was apparently the first to use the term in this context, but its ubiquity in the left's craven attempt to shape the narrative of the Saturday Night Massacre to blame the usual suspects suggested media-control mavens were on the case. "Broken Glass," above, references etymology of vitriol.
"People like that "are especially susceptible to vitriol," Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik told reporters at an Arizona Massacre news conference last night, uttering the word that would launch a thousand disingenuous news and opinion pieces. Google "vitriol giffords" and you get 14,722 related articles. Here's where it apparently all started:
Law enforcement officials continue to piece together the facts in Saturday's shooting rampage that left a federal judge dead and a congresswoman critically injured in Arizona, and some are questioning whether divisive political rhetoric may have played a role …
Dupnik … repeatedly cited what he characterized as the "vitriol" that has infected public discourse … There is reason to believe, he said, that the shooting suspect "may have a mental issue," adding that people like that "are especialy susceptible to vitriol"
Having been on twitter yesterday as the horrific news was breaking, we watched the sausage being made by those "some" who were "questioning whether divisive political rhetoric may have played a role," twitterers, bloggers, news reporters and opinionators picking up the "vitriol" narrative and running with it. Megyn Kelly took on the tendentious Sheriff Dupnik this evening. He's still sticking to the Journolist/Cabalist talking points. You know. "People like that" are "especially susceptible to vitriol." Megyn was polite, but she wasn't taking any prisoners:
There were madmen then, there are madmen now. Is it really the role of the sheriff to stir the pot? Sheriffs have a duty to speak to the facts of the case.
Professor Jacobson of Legal Insurrection was more direct:
Dupnik should resign - He held press conference and blamed right-wing rhetoric, not admit it's just his opinion.
A final note. Google "vitriol" without "giffords" and you get "Sulfuric acid; Cruel and bitter criticism," along with this ironic "usage example" from the Vitriolizer in Chief:
I do think that, as I said last night, we have to get to the point where we can have a conversation about big important issues that matter to the American people without vitriol, without name-calling, without the assumption of the worst of other …
Sep 10, 2009 - Barack Obama
We've been onto then-candidate Obama's con game since December of 2006, when he implied we were a racist for disagreeing with his statist politics. 'Wish they taught things like history and English in the schools today. Lots of folks who weren't paying attention bought candidate Obama's purple prose back then. Will they now fall for humorless progressives' bowldlerized evisceration of the metaphorically rich language that is our birthright? The inedible Mara Laisson on Fox News Sunday is pontificating that "It's going to make people think twice before using certain metaphors in politics." Not. Mara and her fellow travelers need to read between the lines of Dana Loesch's tweet:
I also denounce all metaphors because we as humans are apparently too susceptible and unintelligent to not take them literally.
Update: Oh, ick. Woman who helped squelch killer just told Shep it's evil for Republicans to cast Obamacare as job-killing law.
Crossposted at Riehl World View and Liberty Pundits.
What a joke those leftist slobs present. We can't suggest that terrorist attacks are made by Muslim fanatics, but it is fine for them to accuse Sarah of instigating mentally disturbed persons to murderous behavior.
Posted by: goomp | January 09, 2011 at 07:32 PM
SO3 + H2O ----> H2SO4
When oleum and water do mix they make vitriol.
Thank you Sissy.
Posted by: chickelit | January 09, 2011 at 07:58 PM
The lunatic (who apparently is enjoying his infamy way too much) had targeted Rep. Giffords in 2007, long before Sarah Palin's prominence began, long before the Tea Party, long before it was ever suspected that Barack Hussein Obama would win the presidency! Paranoid schizophrenics (which is what I suspect the shooter to be) are incited by the voices in their own heads!
Meanwhile, the dependably insane Fred Phelps and his merry band of lunatics plan to picket the funeral of the victims, particularly the funeral of the little 9-year old girl who was killed! What possible sin could this innocent child have ever committed that would justify - even in the minds of the deeply demented - this kind of pain being inflicted on her parents?
Seriously people, get a grip!
Posted by: Gayle Miller | January 11, 2011 at 10:21 AM
Skippy, here, cuts to the heart of the matter.
The political discourse in this country, flawed and unpleasant as it may be, is not the issue, and legislation to rein it in is a Big Mistake.
We should, however, have fewer compunctions about permanently removing Mad Dogs from our midst.
Posted by: Elisson | January 11, 2011 at 11:11 AM