OBSCURITY: NO CRUELER PUNISHMENT!

Ann Coulter goes after those in the media who believe that lack of fame is a kind of death. Many in the media, for whom fame is as necessary as air, seem to think that they are punishing mass murderers by not naming them. It’s projection. It’s the thing they fear the most and therefore they believe that making James Holmes name disappear is the greatest punishment.

What a strange concept.

Only people who are themselves obsessed with being famous could imagine that any kind of fame -- even infamy -- is some kind of a reward. Thus, President Barack Obama and MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell, among others, have vowed to punish the suspect by not mentioning his name.

If only we had thought of that with Adolf Hitler! Apparently, it wasn't Hitler's twisted Darwinian "master race" philosophy that led to the Holocaust. He just wanted to get his name in the paper. Say anything you want about how much I hate Jews -- just spell my name right!

... It's especially strange to assume that fame was the motive of alleged Colorado shooter James Holmes, inasmuch as the murders occurred at the premiere of a Batman movie; Holmes told the police he was "the Joker," Batman's frequent antagonist; Holmes has Batman posters in his apartment; and he had dyed his hair bright red, attempting to resemble the Joker. ...

The eternally fascinating question about mass murder is never the means. It is the psychosis behind the desire to do it. We don't need to know details about the guns, booby traps, bombs or fire starters. There will always be a way to commit mass murder. We want to know why.

But that is precisely the information these grandstanders in the media seek to withhold from the public with the pompous justification that they don't want to give the presumed killer attention. For once, the media could deliver information that is both fascinating and potentially useful: What created James Holmes?

But many in the media have taken it on themselves to censor the news as their personal act of retaliation. Not making James Holmes famous -- even famously evil -- is what people who make their living on TV see as the cruelest punishment they can inflict.