Was the Arizona Shooting Sheriff Dupnik's Fault?

It's pretty clear at this point that Jared Loughner was the lone wolf shooter solely responsible for the carnage in Tuscon, Arizona on Saturday. But without a shred of evidence, liberals in this country try to blame the "usual suspects," including Sarah Palin, the tea partiers and conservative talk radio.

Let's cast the net wider.

On Saturday, we began asking pointed questions about Tucson Sheriff Clarence Dupnik:

A congresswoman got shot point-blank in the head in Pima County, Arizona today in broad daylight.

Maybe Pima County, Arizona would be a safe place to live if it had a sheriff who would enforce the law. Maybe the sheriff should spend less time trying to blame all the world's problems on talk radio and the Tea Party...

We should have seen this coming ― a complete meltdown of law and order in [a] county where the celebrity sheriff has very publicly flouted the law. How predictable...

Dupnik earned fifteen minutes of fame in June when he preemtively refused to enforce Arizona's new immigration law.

Now this anti-law enforcement sheriff is scrambling to explain why senseless violence has visited his left-leaning little utopia.

Dupnik has wagged his wretched little finger at Rush Limbaugh, the Chinese, guns, free speech, prejudice, bigotry (i.e. the Tea Party), Sharon Angle and Sarah Palin. But Dupnik admits he has no facts to back up his wild theories.

So why is Dupnik desperately pointing fingers instead of digging up facts?

One blogger presents a provocative possibility:

The sheriff has been editorializing and politicizing the event since he took the podium to report on the incident. His blaming of radio personalities and bloggers is a pre-emptive strike because Mr. Dupnik knows this tragedy lays at his feet and his office. Six people died on his watch and he could have prevented it. He needs to step up and start apologizing to the families of the victims instead of spinning this event to serve his own political agenda...

Jared Loughner has been making death threats by phone to many people in Pima County including staff of Pima Community College, radio personalities and local bloggers. When Pima County Sheriff’s Office was informed, his deputies assured the victims that he was being well managed by the mental health system. It was also suggested that further pressing of charges would be unnecessary and probably cause more problems than it solved as Jared Loughner has a family member that works for Pima County. Amy Loughner is a Natural Resource specialist for the Pima County Parks and Recreation.

Moe Lane's analysis:

...if it comes out that the Sheriff’s office was aware of the threats, and did not act on them, then Clarence Dupnik needs to stop blaming the Right for the murder of six people and start blaming himself. Because Sheriff Dupnik is not in office to, say, fight partisan battles over state immigration policy: he’s in office to keep the peace. If he’s forgotten that, the voters will be happy to remind him.

Ace:

...if you've dropped the ball, badly, and that's led to six murders and multiple grave injuries, damnit, you'd better start soliciting political allies and dreaming up faraway scapegoats.

X-posted

Memeorandum thread

Excerpts from the Mark Levin Show in which Levin discusses the stunning ways in which Clarence Dupnik is fumbling the case involving the attempted assassination of Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford... Levin builds a compelling argument culminating in a call for Dupnik to step down:

MORE

Right Wing News: Pima County Sheriff Jeopardizes Prosecution of Loughner and Must Resign Now

Doug Ross: Did Loughner's parents "pull strings" in local government to protect a troubled child?

Patterico: Forgive me if it sounds like I am co-opting the “we don’t know, but let’s raise this partisan non-sequitur anyway” format, but I have some questions about our friend Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik.

Wizbang: Did Dupnik give the shooter a pass?

Hennessey: Sheriff Dupnik’s Culpability

Loughner Family Blocked FBI Agents From Home