Rev. Anne Howard, HuffPo: Elegy for Christina Taylor Green 9/11/01 -- 1/8/11

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Elegy for Christina Taylor Green 9/11/01 -- 1/8/11

Born on September 11, 2001, Christina Taylor Green died January 8, 2011, gunned down in a Tucson supermarket parking lot. Christina had just been elected to her school student council and was interested in politics, her family said. She wanted to meet her Congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords, and learn more about politics.

She did. She learned what no child should ever learn. She learned that politics in America, or rather, public life in America, has become a place fraught with violence.

Back in the campaign season, the violence was just words, clever phrases from media-savvy public speakers who said things like "don't retreat--reload!" We watched such public figures promote campaigns taking aim, with images of the cross hairs of a gun sight, at other public figures, one of whom was Gabrielle Giffords.

But now it's not just words. Words, as the good sheriff of Pima County Arizona told us, matter. "Vitriol has consequences," Sheriff Dupnik said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anne-howard/elegy-for-a-9yearold_b_806509.html

[kestrel91316]

1. "Vitriol has consequences" - we need a bumper sticker for this quote.