<a href=http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-GOP-2016-Jindal/f3f8ed5af9b14421afbf2fb86e8376e5/12/0>Richard Shiro</a>/AP
If, after last week’s shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, you held the gunman responsible, Bobby Jindal thinks you’ve missed the mark.
On Tuesday afternoon, Gov. Jindal published a self-described “sermon” on his campaign website, addressing what he believes are the root causes of mass shootings. These causes include, but are not limited to, “cultural decay,” violent video games, absent fathers, and the general devaluing of human life.
“It’s the old computer axiom—garbage in, garbage out,” Jindal wrote. “We fill our culture with garbage, and we reap the result.”
Jindal also lashed out at the shooter’s father, who has called for gun control in the wake of his son’s rampage. “He’s a complete failure as a father, he should be embarrassed to even show his face in public,” Jindal wrote. “He’s the problem here.
Jindal’s response to this instance of gun violence is similar to his reaction to a shooting at a movie theater in Lafayette, Louisiana, in which three people (including the gunman) were killed. Shortly after that happened, Jindal offered condolences to the families, resisted discussing gun control reform in lieu of praying for the victims’ families, and even criticized President Barack Obama for “trying to score cheap political points.” However, after the shooting at an army recruiting station in Chattanooga, Tennessee, just days later, the Louisiana governor reacted quite differently. Jindal was quick to politicize the issue by pinning the shooting on radical Islamic terrorism, a problem that he alleges the White House has largely ignored.
“This shooting underscores the grave reality of the threat posed to us by Radical Islamic terrorism every single day,” Jindal said in an official statement after the Chattanooga shooting. “It’s time for the White House to wake up and tell the truth…and that truth is that Radical Islam is at war with us, and we must start by being honest about that.”
In the spirit of honesty, it should also be noted that Jindal’s own state has the second-highest rate of deaths by firearm per 100,000 people, second only to Alaska.
