No simple answers

As I sit here at work (trying to) write about landscape design, I keep losing my train of thought and find myself thinking about what happened in Arizona this past Saturday — six people died and 13 were wounded when Jared Loughner went on a shooting rampage at a town meeting. It reminds me of how I felt after 9/11. Angry, sad, worried, scared that being in the wrong place at the wrong time can cost innocent people our lives. Is nothing “safe” anymore? One minute these people were at a meet-and-greet at a Safeway; the next minute bullets were flying and people were dying. Those families will never ever be the same — they were robbed of future memories with their husbands, wives, moms, dads, brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, close friends — thanks to the actions of a fucked up idiot mentally unstable young man. So many questions; so much heartache.
And now the finger-pointing. To be honest, I’m a little sick of the political back-and-forth (from both parties) on the wake of this tragedy. I’ve read op-ed pieces about gun control and violent campaign rhetoric and a toxic environment teeming with hate speech; who or what is to blame for this senseless murder spree? What motivates a person to commit a heinous crime like this? The Left blames the Right, the Right blames the Left, and we go around and around and around and this poisonous political climate never changes.
Why do Americans insist on beating each other up for the tragedies we suffer? Isn’t this a red flag that our level of hostility has reached an all-time high? That we must return to civility in our public and private debates, open the lines of communication, and share a message of tolerance?