Extreme irony

There's brief article worth reading in today's edition of the Knoxville News Sentinel. Asking the question, "It is safe to be a liberal?" writer Jack Lail surveys the irony captured in reactions to last week's shooting at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church.

If there's a flaw in Mr. Lail's piece, it's that his survey, like Americans' reactions, falls a bit short of perfect balance.

As an independent citizen-patriot, I see the enormous irony -- conservatives who mobilize to rid the entertainment media of sex, drugs, tobacco, violence and other "influences" on our society dismiss Knoxville shooter Adkisson as "crazy," along with suggestions that inflammatory right-wing rhetoric bears any responsibility for the shooting.

At the same time, however, liberals who campaign to "Hush Rush" and silence other conservative voices remain adamant that Hollywood's creative freedom to portray illegal and so-called "immoral" behavior be preserved.

It's the kind of nonsense typical of mindless ideologues and thoughtless extremists.

Either we value free speech or we don't.

Either we're accountable or we're not.

Best, I think, that we tell the truth, keep our promises and, if we make a mess of things, have the decency to clean it up.