And (go figure), he has been ranting about how there is a vast right-wing conspiracy throughout the world. Specifically, he believes there are spies in the United Kingdom infiltrating liberal groups because they have nothing better to do/are evil.
It should come at no surprise that he has decided to now link the murderer Anders Behring Breivik to the American Tea Party (even though Breivik is Norwegian). His proof: someone named Anders Behring posted a link to Atlas Shrugs two years ago.
Could the link have been posted by the shooter? Maybe, possibly probably. Of course there are dozens (if not hundreds) of people with that specific name in Norway, but let's just say that it was posted by the man in question. How does that link Breivik to the Tea Party, exactly? Well, it doesn't, but I'll go ahead and list some common sense reasons why (that it appears Murray intentionally left out).
1. How many times have you linked to a website? Have you sent an email to a friend recently? A news article, perhaps? If that article was about President Obama, let's say, does that link you to the President? If you post a link to Daily Kos, does that make you a liberal? I hope not. Does linking to Drudge make you conservative? No.
2. Have you ever written anything that you later go back and wonder, "What was I thinking?" In the internet age, if you write anything online, chances are it exists today in one form or another. So Breivik posted a link somewhere... two years ago. And that connects him to the Tea Party?
3. The article Breivik linked to was about rioting in France. Not the Tea Party. Let me repeat: riots in France have absolutely nothing to do with the Tea Party.
4. Just because Breivik posted a link to Atlas Shrugs doesn't mean he believes everything that was ever written on that website, particularly if it has nothing to do with the same subject. How you feel about riots in France does not necessarily influence how you feel about taxes in the United States. An even better example: your mother or your father (if they're still around)... I assume that you agree with them on a lot of things, right? Does that mean you automatically agree with everything they have ever said and ever will say? The answer is no, obviously.
5. Murray mentions 11 articles written by Pamela Geller, the owner of Atlas Shrugs, over the course of five years that happen to mention Norway. That's one article every six months or so. In none of them does she promote violence. Let me say that again: Ms. Geller rarely mentioned Norway and never incited violence. How does Murray tie this to the Tea Party?
6. On Breivik's Facebook profile, he wrote that he likes World of Warcraft. Are we honestly in a world that, based on one flimsy connection, we're going to say that all WoW players want to kill people? I hope to God we are not.
Look, I know that in today's political climate everyone really wants to jump on a terrible story and scream that the other side caused it. For example, hundreds of liberal websites blamed the terrible shootings in Arizona in January on the Tea Party and Sarah Palin. Eventually, it came out that Jared Loughner was simply insane and deranged. His friends stated that he was liberal:
But I'm certainly not going to say that liberals are blood-thirsty savages.
Likewise with Breivik. He's an insane psycho that killed innocents. What evidence we have tying him to any political spectrum is flimsy (if you rely on Murray). He's crazy. That's it. Blaming one side or another is irresponsible and dishonest.
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