Unlike MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and CNN's Rick Sanchez who are disgracefully claiming Saturday's murder of three Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, police officers was caused by Fox News's Glenn Beck, the Washington Post surprisingly added some much-needed sanity to the debate Wednesday.

Practically mimicking Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign theme, the Post stated what should be obvious to all rational beings on the planet: It's the Economy, Stupid!

You mean it's NOT because conservative talkers don't agree with the policies of President Obama (see related NewsBusters posts here and here)?

Apparently not according to the Post (file photo):

The carnage that occurred during less than 48 hours last week capped a recent string of unusually brazen mass killings, which crime experts say have touched more people and occurred in more public settings than in any time in recent memory. Comparative statistics are difficult to come by, but during the past month alone, at least eight mass homicides in this country have claimed the lives of 57 people. Just yesterday, four people were discovered shot to death in a modest wood-frame home in a remote Alabama town.

The factor underlying the violence, some experts think, is the dismal state of the nation's economy. Criminologists theorize that the epidemic of layoffs, the meltdown of storied American corporations and the uncertainty of recovery have stoked fear, anxiety and desperation across society and unnerved its most vulnerable and dangerous.

Hmmm. You mean someone's personal finances might lead him or her to violence? Nooooo:

The simple fact, criminologist James Alan Fox said, is that more Americans are struggling.

"The American dream to them is a nightmare, and the land of opportunity is but a cruel joke," said Fox, also of Northeastern, who has been dubbed the "dean of death" for his analysis of mass murders. "The economic pie is shrinking to the point where it looks more like a Pop Tart and some feel all they're getting is the crumbs. There's a combination of feeling despair and hopelessness at the same time as a certain degree of anger and blame."

And, what folks like Olbermann and Sanchez don't want to share with their viewers is that most of these acts are typically revenge oriented:

Experts agree that most mass murderers share one trait: a traumatic event such as a layoff, divorce or separation that sets off an internal rage and a desire for revenge.

"It could be the loss of a job, the loss of a lot of money in the stock market, the loss of a relationship as in a nasty separation or divorce, the loss of a child who is in a child custody battle," [said Jack Levin, a noted criminologist at Northeastern University who has authored or co-authored eight books on mass murder]. "There are just simply more catastrophic losses than there were when the economy was in good shape."

Hmmm. Didn't the Pittsburgh police killer Richard Poplawski recently lose his job? And didn't he just have a fight with his mother who called the cops to have him removed from HER apartment? And wasn't this an extremely paranoid and unstable person who got kicked out of the Marines for throwing a food tray at his drill sergeant?

Yeah, but none of that matters as much as him recently posting at a white supremacist website a video of Glenn Beck discussing FEMA camps with Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tx.).

Somehow the Post skipped that integral part of the equation.

Shame on them for not being able to connect the dots like Olbermann and Sanchez.

—Noel Sheppard is the Associate Editor of NewsBusters. Follow him at Facebook and Twitter.