NRA big shot blamed Charleston pastor for murders

Everything gets politicized these day. I know that.

Heck, I contribute to it.

But there are lines we must never, ever cross.

Like, for instance, blaming a murder victim for his own death, and the death of others.

That's what a board member of the National Rifle Association did following the massacre of nine people at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston, S.C., last week.

NRA board member Charles L. Cotton filed a post online about Reverend Clementa Pinckney, who was pastor of the church and also a member of the South Carolina legislature.

Pinckney supported enhanced gun safety provisions, like background checks.

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The NRA has a different point of view. I get that. The organization and its members have every right to advocate for their beliefs. The NRA spends millions on what may be the most successful lobbying effort in Washington, one in which lawmakers consistently ignore the feelings expressed by citizens in national polls.

That's how politics works.

We're not talking about advocacy, however. What the NRA's Cotton said wasn't advocacy. It was cruelty. It was ignorance.

Cotton wrote online: "He [Rev. Pinckney] voted against concealed-carry. Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead. Innocent people died because of his position on a political issue."

Cotton made his comments in an online forum. The comments were later purged, according to a Washington Post article.

Cotton tried to explain away his remarks by saying he was speaking as a private citizen, not as an NRA board member, and that it was part of a :"discussion we were having about so called gun-free zones."

As if an excuse like that matters.

On Wednesday Pinckney's casket will be in the state Capitol rotunda in South Carolina. His funeral is set for Friday.

In what universe is it okay -- ever -- to blame a pastor for his own murder because neither he nor any member of his prayer group were carrying a concealed weapon?

That's not just wrong.

It's sick.