Last weekend, a 67 year-old Berkeley, California man calmly phoned the police, requesting protection from an aggressive trespasser that had confronted him and his wife in their garage.  The call was "queued for dispatch", but then ignored because the police were shorthanded at the time.  The San Francisco Chronicle explains why (emphasis added):

In a statement Tuesday, police Lt. Andrew Greenwood confirmed that "only criminal, in-progress emergency calls were to be dispatched, due to the reduction in officers available to handle calls for service" as a result of the Occupy protest. [On Wednesday, unnoted, the Chronicle removed the word "Occupy" from the online version of its story]

Sadly, less than 13 minutes after the police call, the mentally ill trespasser returned and attacked the man in front of his home, dragged him into the bushes and beat him with a large flowerpot, while the victim's wife watched helplessly.  The man died later.

Is it fair to blame the Occupy protestors for the man's death?  Probably not, though many did.  Others theorized that the Berkeley police were staging a slowdown, responding only to urgent calls in order to create a public outcry for more taxpayer funding.  Most likely, though, it was just fate.  According to the Chronicle story, "sources" said that it would have taken up to ten minutes for the police to arrive anyway, and by then it easily might have been too late.

The most intriguing aspect of the tragic story though, is the 250-plus comments.  Presumably, the Chronicle's audience consists primarily of demographically leftist Bay Area readers, so one might expect most of the comments to defend the leftist OWS movement.  According to my informal count, nearly a quarter (23 percent) of the comments blamed the Occupy protestors for the homicide.  In fact, more comments blamed the Occupy protestors than defended them.  Even more remarkable, 40 comments recommended that Chronicle readers arm themselves with guns to avoid a similar malady.

Granted, those results aren't statistically valid, as trolls might have flooded the story's comment section.  Still, according to the real polls, a negative view of the Occupy movement is growing nationally, so even leftist San Francisco might be disenchanted with OWS.  Last month Rasmussen reported that 51 percent of likely US voters think the movement is "a public nuisance".  Only 39 percent approve of it.

It seems likely then that Democrat politicians increasingly will distance themselves from this failed Astroturf fabrication.  Before it blew up on them, it apparently was part of the hateful class envy campaign that the Democrat Party is running against Mitt Romney.  But now that it repels a majority of voters, Republicans should seek to maintain public awareness of the linkage between Democrats and OWS, even if "one-percenter" Mr. Romney is the Republican presidential candidate.

For instance, Republicans should remind voters that Democrat Senatorial candidate Elizabeth Warren not only endorsed the Occupy hooligans; she also claimed credit for helping to fabricate the movement:

"I created much of the intellectual foundation for what they do," said Warren in an interview with the Daily Beast. "I support what they do."

Political pundits could ridicule her by asking facetiously, "Does that mean Ms. Warren supports murder, rape, and substance abuse?  Granted, she's running for Teddy Kennedy's old seat, but still..."

If Democrat operatives persist in diverting voter attention to religion and away from the dismal economy, why not remind voters that Democrat Nancy Pelosi invoked The Almighty in her gushing endorsement of OWS:

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi joined several Democrats in supporting the Occupy Wall Street protesters.  "God bless them," she said...

If the California Democrat attends the Berkeley victim's funeral, presumably she won't be asking God to bless the Occupy protestors.  That could be awkward, given that some attendees privately will blame the protestors for the man's death.

Even President Obama, also once a community agitator, agreed with his fellow Democrat politicians:

President Barack Obama told ABC's Jake Tapper that he "understands the frustrations" expressed by Occupy Wall Street protesters and that he "understands their struggles" and is "on their side."

Mr. Obama's senior adviser David Plouffe was more blunt:

The White House wants to make it clear that President Barack Obama is on the same side as the Occupy Wall Street protesters -- and that Republicans are not.

Conservative pundits might remind voters that the leftist Big Media linked Sarah Palin and the TEA Party to the Gabrielle Giffords shooting, even though the insane shooter loved Marx's Communist Manifesto and murdered a Republican judge at the same crime scene.  Applying that deranged leftist logic to this tragedy, is OWS promoter Barack Obama somehow responsible for a homicide?