Charlie Kirk was murdered at a campus event. That alone should have brought a moment of silence from every corner of American media. Instead, MSNBC invited Matthew Dowd on air—and he turned a national tragedy into a smug lecture aimed at the right.

During the segment, Dowd mused aloud about scenarios that deflected blame from the assassin and smeared Kirk’s movement, indulging in the pundit class’s favorite hobbyhorse: that the right’s words cause violence. He even floated the idea that it might have been some sort of celebratory gunfire, as if the scene were a tailgate party and not a crime scene. It was ghoulish and unserious.

Viewers noticed. So did the internet. Within minutes, clips of the appearance rocketed across social media. People weren’t confused by what they saw; they were disgusted. You don’t need a journalism degree to understand that when a young father is shot for speaking, you don’t start spitballing partisan narratives while his blood is still on the ground.

MSNBC tried to get ahead of the firestorm with a tight, sanitized condemnation of the comments. That didn’t cut it. The wave kept building, and soon the network did what it should have done immediately: severed ties. Firing Dowd doesn’t undo the damage, but it at least acknowledges a line was crossed.

Let’s be honest about why this hit a nerve. For years, corporate media have treated conservative speech as suspect, conservative figures as fair game, and conservative grief as optional. When tragedy strikes on the right, the reflex is to rationalize it away or, worse, weaponize it. That’s exactly what Dowd did—right up until the moment HR informed him the segment wasn’t “brave” or “nuanced.” It was career-ending.

This isn’t complicated. We can debate policy with intensity and still agree that political assassination is evil. We can argue about immigration, spending, and schools and still share a baseline rule: you don’t try to score points while a family is planning a funeral. That’s not civility. That’s basic humanity.

Firing one pundit won’t fix a culture that rewards sneering over sympathy. But it sends a message to every greenroom in Manhattan: if you treat conservative lives as props, you might finally pay a price. Good. More of that, please.

Charlie Kirk inspired millions of young Americans to speak without fear. He did it with clarity, faith, and courage. If there’s any silver lining in this awful week, it’s that his example is already exposing who’s clinging to decency—and who’s clinging to their narrative no matter who gets hurt.

Pray for Erika and the kids. Honor Charlie by refusing to be cowed. And hold every powerful institution to the same standard: when a conservative is gunned down, the only decent first response is compassion, not spin.