Posted on 01/14/2011 4:10:10 AM PST by matt1234
It's well known that in March 1981, John Hinckley attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan. What's not well known is that several years later the life of President Reagan and the life of his vice president, George H.W. Bush, were threatened again. In fact, not just once.
"In the space of 18 months, four situations came to the attention of the Secret Service," says Robert Fein, who in the mid-1980s was working with the Secret Service as a psychologist.
--SNIP--
And so Fein and a Secret Service agent named Bryan Vossekuil undertook the most extensive study of assassins and would-be assassins ever done.
--SNIP--
The insights of this study are interesting to review in light of the Arizona shooting, though obviously we still don't know that much about Loughner himself. Perhaps the most interesting finding is that according to Fein and Vossekuil, assassinations of political figures were almost never for political reasons.
--SNIP--
What emerges from the study is that rather than being politically motivated, many of the assassins and would-be assassins simply felt invisible. In the year before their attacks, most struggled with acute reversals and disappointment in their lives. Which, the paper argues, was the true motive. They didn't want to see themselves as non-entities.
"They experienced failure after failure after failure, and decided that rather than being a 'nobody,' they wanted to be a 'somebody,'" Fein says.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
What happened to the assassins who would do it just because “they needed killin”?
The problem is that the cause of that feeling of invisibility is often grounded in mental illness rather than reality.
There are schizophrenics in loving families as well as inattentive families. No one can predict when and to whom this manifests itself. Usually tho it begins in late adolescence in males.
But I agree with your point. If an assassin has delusions, those might heighten his sense of invisibility and failure.
Why does the press call this an assassination?It was Not done for political reasons so it was a murder plus an attempted murder on a political figure.
The media always give more attention and coverage to the perpetrator and always ignores the victim. The perpetrator achieves instant fame and recognition and has the whole world listening to his rantings and ravings.
The media should not show the picture of the perpetrator, not print his “message” to the whole world, and pay more attention to the victim.
The use of the term is correct. The intended victims are usually, but not always politicians, the key element that makes “assassination” appropriate is that it is a planned surprise attack on a specific target. John Lennon would actually have been an example.
“They experienced failure after failure after failure, and decided that rather than being a ‘nobody,’ they wanted to be a ‘somebody,’” Fein says.
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That makes sense, considering this from a recent article about Jared and family.
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“Over the past two years, Loughner “was desperate to hang out with people,” Montanaro said. “He’d just show up at our houses, call us constantly and would even pay for us just to get us to chill with him. It was rather annoying.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/12/AR2011011206630.html?hpid=topnews
I heard this on NPR this morning...yes we listen to it early AM (although it does evoke some talking back to the radio, LOL.)
My take was NPR is trying to “tone down” or backpedal to a more neutral evaluation of the killer (i.e. he was not politically motivated.) Definitely breaking lockstep with other liberal views and outlets.
In evaluating the shooter's politics, here are the left's choices in their order of preference:
No one ascribed Reagan’s shooting to “rhetoric”.
Whether it’s the SLA, Zodiac, Son of Sam, Nightstalker, or AlQuaeda.
These psychopaths get off on the notoriety.
The zeal to give these subhumans cutsey names is disgusting and only feeds their need to get off on murdering others.
While the study has similarities, I would profile Loughner as a mass murderer. As one of his friends said: “He wasn’t shooting at people, he was shooting at the world.”
Interesting that the profile of a mass murderer includes rejection/failure in school. A trait Lougher shares with Charles Whitman. VaTech never released academic records of Cho, but he did change majors while he was at VaTech from Information Technology to English. Cho did have behavior problems reported by Professors as did Loughner.
Recently I saw a show about the SLA, particularly their shootout with the police. The SLA was a strange group. They did have marxist political motivations, and they were also adept at manipulating the media. They were delusional if they thought they could spark a revolution.
Yes these Marxist crazies and the plain ole crazies like Manson all have dillusions of granduer.
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