Again, Right Wing Extremism Is A Problem, But It Isn't This Problem

Good point by Brendan Nyhan:

People have been having a hard time holding two ideas in their head at the same time:

1. What Paul Krugman calls "eliminationist rhetoric" is bad.

2. Contrary to his suggestion, there is no evidence that such rhetoric caused Saturday's events. Even if such evidence is later found, it would not justify the evidence-free claims that have been made in the last 48 hours.

I wrote, "I don't believe that analogizing politics to combat encourages anybody, even the mentally ill, to take up violence. People use metaphors like this in all aspects of daily life -- sports, business, dating, and on and on." Rich Lowry pulls out a recent example:

Guns do kill people. But gun metaphors don't.