"Political violence"

It’s probably far too late to hope to stamp this out, but there’s a meme involved here that I wish we could tamp down: the notion that Loughner’s murders were political violence.

The best as anyone can tell right now, to the extent he had any politics at all, they were leftish, and by the time this happened, his thoughts were so disordered, literally disordered, that claiming any coherent political views is a mistake.  It just happens that his delusions happened to focus on a political figure.

Saying this was political violence is as silly as claiming that John Lennon’s murder was musical violence.