Gunman shoots eight, kills two at Unitarian church

Yesterday, Jim D. Adkisson allegedly walked into a performance of a children’s musical at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee and shot eight people, two of whom are now dead. Why?

According to a search warrant for Mr. Adkisson’s house filed by the police, during interrogation Mr. Adkisson admitted to the shooting and said “he had targeted the church because of its liberal leanings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country.”

Local news site Knoxnews.com says that police found books by Bill O’Reilly, Michael Savage, and Sean Hannity at Adkisson’s house. Of course, those authors right-wing nutjobs didn’t tell Adkisson to shoot Unitarians (at least, not having read their books or absorbed much of their radio and TV shows, I assume they didn’t) – they’ve only made their living comparing the political opposition to terrorists, despots, and the insane. They can’t be responsible for some crazy guy in Tennessee taking it all literally.

My self-righteous fulmination aside, I believe that the people of Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church would appreciate your thoughts and prayers.