Obama Put Politics Aside in Arizona Address

Despite the pressure from some on the left to capitalize on the Tucson killings for political gain, and amid ocassional inappropriate cheering from the audience, President Obama acutely understood our collective need to heal when he addressed the nation on Wednesday night.

He also knew that anything else would have been downright petty and cynical. So, rather than search for political victims to chastise, he focused his speech on the victims of Saturday's rampage, eulogizing them with the kind of soaring oratory he first became famous for. Obama put politics aside and, like George W. Bush after 9/11 and Bill Clinton after Oklahoma City, he sought to revive our "instincts for empathy."

"At a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized, it's important that are talking to each other in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds," he reasoned.


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