It sure doesn’t take folks long to flock to tragedy these days – folks who like to twist it to serve their political purposes or bend it to make a partisan point.

I know that, and I should have shut the computer and the television off shortly after the shootings today at Fort Hood. You can bet I will next time, if for no other reason than to spare myself the inanities – and worse:

U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul takes less than an hour to declare the shootings “a coordinated attack against our military.” Because he’s the ranking Republican on the House Committee of Homeland Security, the statement carries more weight than it should.

At the same time, officials at Fort Hood were saying there’s no evidence it’s a terrorist attack, though it will take an investigation to officially rule that out. Reasonable enough, but somehow that gets twisted into a “sleeper cell” responsible for the massacre.

A military wife, a blogger who’s also involved in Republican politics at the state level, sees in the shooting a chance to take another dig at the president, calling his statement “severely mishandled” due to his lack of leadership experience. Shame on the president for not having a better “in case our soldiers get massacred” speech stored on his Blackberry. No, shame on the blogger for being so grotesquely crass.

When the suspect’s name – Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan – is released, eyes light up among the true whack jobs on the extreme right. Ah, there it is! Proof of the sleeper cell! Why else would anyone with a Middle Eastern name join the military? Gee, could you manage a little less glee? People are dead.

Meanwhile, people on the left hone in on the fact that Hasan was a psychiatrist and think it’s odd that the shootings occur just as the Defense Department is asking for additional money for counseling and psychiatric help for personnel. As if someone would plan this as part of a lobbying campaign?

What happened today was horrific – soldiers felled by one of their own. An officer, too. Someone who’s supposed to be a leader. Not that it would be understandable if the shooter had been an enlisted soldier.

The reaction to it, though, was nauseating on so many fronts.

Just shut the hell up, people. You’re dishonoring those who died and making a mockery of the free speech rights they took an oath to defend.

Copyright 2009 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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