In the wake of the attack on Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, Republicans have become especially sensitive to suggestions the conservative Tea Party movement, with its anti-government stances, was contributing to a more poisonous political environment. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., noted Sunday that the suspect in the Tucson rampage was connected to Internet postings that included Marxist and Nazi literature. “That’s not the profile of a typical tea party member, if that’s the inference that’s being made,” he said on CNN.

Well, excuse me Senator, but the Nazi movement was a conservative movement, in spite of what Glenn Beck, Limbaugh or Hannity say. Fascism is a right wing political movement, not a left one. And, oh by the way, weren’t those Tea Party members who beat a woman into the pavement, kicking her in the head at a campaign event last fall? You remember Senator. When they grabbed her and shoved her to the ground and gleefully stomped on her head, like some scene out of Schindler’s List. Yeah that would make the Tea Party, and the GOP which so ardently jumped into bed with it, akin to which former political party of Hitler’s Germany?

Not to be outdone, Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, who ran as a tea party favorite, said on “Meet the Press” on NBC: “I just hope we can have some civility and move forward. You have extremes on both sides; you have crazy people on both sides. Your job as a leader is to talk to people in a rational way. To bring down the rhetoric”.

Well, let’s see Congressman? Members from your beloved Tea Party beat up a woman during a campaign event in Virginia (see above), show up to rallies carrying pistols and assault rifles holding signs declaring that, “the Tree of Liberty” needs to be watered. Speakers at Tea Party rallies talk of revolution, and of “reloading”. Why would anyone think the Tea Party movement might have influenced what happened? Gee, I can’t imagine.

Of course the GOP and Tea Party don’t want to accept any responsibility! But if you spew violent rhetoric aimed at the government, and government officials, you own it when it happens! You can’t have your cake and eat it too!

And Congressman, this nonsense about, “You have extremes on both sides; you have crazy people on both sides,” is a crock of … Show me one instance of where any MSNBC host has ever talked about putting anyone in “cross hairs”, or “reloading” or acted out lighting a GOP leader on fire! Show me one instance of a Democratic Senate candidate saying if they lost then they’d turn to “2nd Amendment remedies”. You can’t, because it never happened. The responsibility for the rise in hate and violent “rhetoric” lies squarely at the feet of the conservatives in our country. You said it, you own the outcome. Words have meanings, and they also have consequences.