Wiretap: Celebritzing the shooters

 
Ezra Klein writes in Vox that we can’t give the killer in death the fame he wanted in life. Klein writes: “Unable to be the hero in his own story, he decided to become the villain in everyone else’s.” The media has made a real effort not to romanticize suicide because sociologists have shown that suicide can be contagious. Now there’s evidence that all the media attention on mass killings is having the same kind of effect.

What do you do when the mass murderer leaves a manifesto — one that he leaves to draw attention to himself as the killer? Via Washington Monthly.

Knowing war intimately: The Bedrooms of the Fallen. Via the New Yorker.

Tom Engelhardt on threats existent and nonexistent: “Of course, there was a weapon of mass destruction that could indeed do staggering damage to or someday simply drown New York City, Washington D.C., Miami, and other East coast cities. It had its own efficient delivery systems — no nonexistent drones or Islamic fanatics needed. And unlike the Iraqi, Iranian, or al-Qaeda bombs, it was guaranteed to be delivered to our shores unless preventive action was taken soon. No one needed to hunt for its secret facilities. It was a weapons system whose production plants sat in full view right here in the United States, as well as in Europe, China, and India, as well as in Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Venezuela, and other energy states.”

Doyle McManus says of Obama in wake of VA woes: Good politician, lousy manager. Via the Los Angeles Times.

In Politico, Todd Purdum makes the case that the way to victory for Republicans in 2014 may be the way to defeat in 2016.

Anti-immigrant fringe parties, mostly opposing the European Union, made large gains in European Parliamentary elections. The French prime minster calls it an earthquake. Via the New York Times.

[ Stalin with his sniper rifle, 1936, via Za Rodinu. ]

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