THE ADULTS MOVE IN – AT 9:23 A.M. ET:  Some of our best journalists, and there are few in that categroy, are speaking out about Arizona, and providing the kind of context that has been missing for day.  Michael Barone, who knows more about American political history than almost anyone, examines the real history of political assassinations.  Amazing what some facts will do.  From the Washington Examiner: 

Some broader perspective may be in order. The last congressman to be attacked by a gunman was California Rep. Leo Ryan, murdered at the Jonestown massacre in Guyana in 1978, 32 years ago.

In other words, this isn't exactly an everyday event, despite the impression given by some overwrought TV commentators.

How many times have member of Congress made announced appearances, without security personnel, over the past 32 years? How many thousands? Tens of thousands?

The answer is that this kind of attack is, thank goodness, exceedingly rare -- though not as rare as all decent people would like.

And...

Vitriolic rhetoric comes from all points on the political compass. But many in the media, when trying to assess blame for violent acts, have an impulse to look for it only on the right.

Yes, we've noticed.

Actually, we do know of societies where people on one side of the political divide encourage and sponsor assassinations of people whom they oppose.

This was Germany in the years after World War I, when those who thought Germany had been stabbed in the back hailed the assassination of the industrialist and moderate (Jewish) politician Walter Rathenau in 1922. Including a failed painter from Vienna named Adolf Hitler.

This was Japan in the 1930s, when advocates of military aggression systematically assassinated moderates who wanted their country to live in peace with its neighbors and not seek conquests abroad.

Or, to take an example from last week, Pakistan, where the governor of Punjab was assassinated. His offense: opposing blasphemy laws that carried a death penalty. Those who supported his assassination celebrated publicly and urged more such killings.

And...

Suggestions that the shooting in Arizona are of the same ilk as these examples is something of a blood libel against the politicians of all stripes in our country and of the American people. No American politician, no significant segment of any political movement, no statistically identifiable share of the American people wishes the violent death of its political opponents.

Obviously.  Fine words from a master.

I wish now we would have the kind of reporting that is so needed at a time like this:  What motivates some of those who hurl the blood libel?  Who influenced them?  Who taught them in college?  Who challenges them inside their organizations when they are way off base?

We await answers.  Indeed, we await the questions.

January 12, 2011