From the moment the recent tragic shooting of several people by Jared Lee Loughner, including U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, was first reported, there has been a massive attempt to lay blame at the feet of the Tea Party groups.
As fast as emerging facts showed a lack of any such link, the smears became even more intense and desperate - citing the use of phrases such as "targeting" and the image of crosshairs on political material from Sarah Palin and others as "evidence" of the right inciting violence. That such imagery and phrasing has been used for centuries by politicians of all stripes (as well as in business) without any known links to violent acts is desperately evaded.
Even a cursory look at the Tea Party movement across the United States quickly shows that any attempt to connect them with such violence is utterly devoid of any merit. First, while most tea-party members tend to lean far more to the right, that is not at all exclusive - in fact much of the thrust of the tea-party movement is as much against the current republican status-quo as it is against the democratic side.
There are many tea-party groups, a fact of their grass-roots origin. Some have merged into larger groups or linked together, but there are still many. And with that comes many variations. Some of these groups are made up of very religious, mostly Christian, members, and some are far more secular - a natural reflection of the people in the areas they formed. Some endorse Sarah Palin, many do not.
What all these groups share in common though is a desire to re-establish limits on government power as originally intended by the founders of the republic. They advocate a return to strict observance of the Constitution which was designed to constrain the government, not citizens. It's not simply about reducing taxes, or protecting the right to bear arms, those are simply logical consequences of desiring a limited government and maximum individual freedom.
Even the most religious of the tea-party groups, whether implicitly or explicitly, accept and uphold the separation of church and state necessary for freedom - including religious freedom; they are not advocating a theocracy.
Given their advocacy of individual rights - which start with the right to one's life - an attempt to link them to murder and other violence is absurd.
There are, sadly, some deranged individuals. One of those is responsible for this latest horrible incident. Such individuals will find motivation for their evil acts no matter what anyone else does or does not do. To suppose this one was motivated by the tea party movement, directly or indirectly, is to clutch at straws.
