US Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords shot (other persons killed or injured)

Another foreign paper calling it like it is:

http://www.smh.com.au/world/anger-hatred-bigotry-20110109-19jy0.html

Although the gunman's motives were unclear, video postings allegedly made by Mr Loughner on YouTube indicated an incoherent mind. He speaks of dreaming and a ''new currency'', while expressing anti-government sentiments.

Despicable.

"The hard left is going to try and silence the Tea Party movement by blaming us for this," he wrote. Clinton used the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing to "blame conservative talk radio, especially Rush Limbaugh" and "The tactic worked then, backing conservatives off and possibly helping to ensure a second Clinton term."

"The left is coming and will hit us hard on this. We need to push back harder with the simple truth. The shooter was a liberal lunatic. Emphasis on both words," he wrote.

TPN founder Judson Phillips, in an article linked off the e-mail "The shooting of Gabrielle Giffords and the left's attack on the Tea Party movement," described the shooter as "a leftist lunatic" and Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik as a "leftist sheriff" who "was one of the first to start in on the liberal attack." Phillips urged tea party supporters to blame liberals for the attack on centrist Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, who was shot through the head and is now fighting for her life, as a means of defending the tea party movement's recent electoral gains.

^This link requires registration.

Wait for "liberal lunatic" meme to become the words on Fox and talk radio.

seaner wrote: »

The fact that Ms Palin and her associates decided to use a graphic with crosshairs is disgusting and to be fair they and she should be held accountable to the actions that happened of late. Regardless of his mental state, dont you think they in some way he would be influenced by mainstream politics. They are using horrible, nasty tactics to get across their message and then when someone acts out they say, oh no, we're not accountable for someone who's mentally unstable.
I say, you put up a graphic like that, you'll influence those, mentally stable or not.

Its ridiculous how far people and politics will go to in the US. It doesn't help that anyone and their mother can legally own a weapon. What the hell are we coming to? Its not like this in Ireland but by God, we look to the US for alot and I only hope we can draw a line on their stance on owning weapons.


Palin is a god damn idiot who should be straight jacketed. Seriously, how people manage to think she's a message and want to follow, emulate her? Its almost laughable. How?

I'm not big into US polictics but how can a healthcare system that claims to cater for all be so wrong? It works in the UK. It works in australia. Why such a big deal in the US? Please someone tell me.

About Palin: agreed.

About health reform, that is something I could not sum up easily for you. There is a deep rooted mistrust of government in The US and there is a media led perception that it is universally inefficient and incapable of delivering the service. This despite the fact that medicare has a 4% admin cost and private insurance has 30%.

The pro-private side just parrot the meme that they "have the best healthcare in the world"-which is false-and offer no solutions to the 40million uninsured who are leeching from those who are paying. In short, they are trying their damndest to protect the massive profits they make on a yearly basis and The Republicans are only too happy to listen to their paymasters.

GuanYin wrote: »

Confirmed that Giffords was the target. No doubt about that now the FBI have confirmed it. A letter was found in a safe in Loughner's home with "My assasination", "I planned ahead" and "Giffords" written on it.

Interesting that he lived "close" to the Safeway but got a taxi there.

Yes, I remarked on that also.

He does not look like the type of guy who couldn't manage a walk, nor does he look like someone who only ate BigMacs.

steelcityblues wrote: »

Word of note to kaisersauze and a few others:

I remember when I was over in America in late 2002 - the story dominating the news was that of the infamous DC sniper - later to be identified as John Allen Muhammad, who was on his shooting spree.

Several leading commentators/politicians/reporters all lined up to speculate that he must have been a right-wing militia type, at boiling point with the US government. When it later emerged he was a radical islamist, once associated with the Nation, the same 'experts' were left from serious egg on their faces.

In short, stop endlessley speculating in this thread about an unfortunate incident just to suit your political narrative.

Really? Any source for this?

What you posted next when someone else asked you for proof was anything but evidence of your actual claim.

I remember the general sense being that their was a mad man on the lose, a serial killer.

WASHINGTON -- Some of the most pointed comments in the wake of Saturday's tragic shooting in Arizona regarding the dangers of vitriolic political discourse have come from Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik, who said his state has "become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry." As a consequence of speaking out, Dupnik is now coming under attack, with a talk radio host even calling for his resignation.

"When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government," said Dupnik at a press conference Saturday. "The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry."

In an interview with CBS's "Face the Nation," Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said Dupnik's comments were inappropriate and nothing more than "speculation."

"First, I didn't really think that that had any part in a law enforcement briefing last night. It was speculation. I don't think we should rush to speculate. I thought that the report that we just saw from Tucson seems to have it about right: We really don't know what motivated this young person except to know he was very mentally unstable as was pointed out in the piece. It's probably giving him too much credit to ascribe a coherent political philosophy to him. We just have to acknowledge that there are mentally unstable people in this country. Who knows what motivates them to do what they do? Then they commit terrible crimes like this. I would just note Gabrielle Giffords, a fine representative from Tucson, I think would be the first to say don't rush to judgment here."

That's true.

It's also wrong to ascribe a coherent political philosophy to your average Rush listener, Beck watcher, Palin lover. A very large segment of the "Conservative" base can't be defined by Conservatism, but rather by their demented hatreds, their confused thinking and yes for a significant minority of them, their mental illness.

In a press conference Sunday, Dupnik stood by his remarks about dangerous political rhetoric. When asked about his comments from the day before, he replied, "I think that when the rhetoric about hatred, about mistrust of government, about paranoia of how government operates and to try to inflame the public on a daily basis, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, has impact on people especially who are unbalanced personalities to begin with."

Dupnik also had harsh words on his state's gun laws, which allow individuals to carry concealed weapons without a permit. (Gov. Jan Brewer signed the legislation into law in April.)

"Well, I think we're the tombstone of the United States of America," he said, adding, "I have never been a proponent of letting everybody in this state carry weapons under any circumstances that they want, and that's almost where we are."

Wonder what the response from the Tea Party hate Coalition will be? More hate, off course.

The Atlantic reports that Tea Party Nation, led by Judson Phillips, is joining in the criticism: "TPN founder Judson Phillips, in an article linked off the e-mail 'The shooting of Gabrielle Giffords and the left's attack on the Tea Party movement,' described the shooter as 'a leftist lunatic' and Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik as a 'leftist sheriff' who 'was one of the first to start in on the liberal attack.' Phillips urged tea party supporters to blame liberals for the attack on centrist Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, who was shot through the head and is now fighting for her life, as a means of defending the tea party movement's recent electoral gains."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/09/clarence-dupnik-arizona-sheriff_n_806440.html

Manic Moran wrote: »

Utter BS.

You are so consumed with your hatred of the opposition that you are not realising the daft lengths you're attempting to go to to link anything which could possibly be turned to look bad. The exact same affliction you're accusing the opposition of having. (Which they have, in fairness). And precisely the sort of hatred that the Sherrif mentioned.

Of course there are crosshairs, what better symbol can be used to get the point across? Are you seriously going to tell me that no Democrat candidate ever used the phrase 'We have our sights set on' or 'we are targetting'? There lots of symbology and phrases in common usage in the English language which are based upon firearms. If a candidate for Senate shoots a rifle in a TV advert at a piece of legislation proposed by Obama, are you going to suggest that it is a metaphor for advocating his assasination? What if the candidate were a Republican?



I don't even know why it's an issue. I'm quite happy to accept it's not a photoshop, they're called 'Machinegun Socials' and they're not uncommon. This is a country where some car dealers give out semi-auto AK-47s with every car, of course politicians are going to host events which relate to things that their prospective electors are going to be interested in, and that includes shooting events. Due to the restrictions of the law, full-auto or select-fire weapons are rare and expensive, so there is quite an appeal to such events. Such things are quite popular with tourists as well, as it happens.

NTM

Manic, I'm not going to blame Palin for this shooting. The guy was obviously deranged. But you have to be living under a rock not to notice that the level of political discourse in America has reached new levels of divisiveness and vitriol, and much of it is spread by extreme rightwing groups on the fringe of the Republican party. The GOP used to be a big tent movement, but increasingly moderates are being squeezed out. Twenty years ago, I would most likely have identified as a Regan Republican, but now I look at the GOP and I shudder.

There was an excellent article by Andrew Sullivan in today's Sunday Times, where he described how the Republican governor of Indiana, a man with impeccable Conservative credentials, has been shunned by fellow Republicans for the heresy of suggesting some tax increases. One prominent Conservative opinion maker wrote that the only explanation for such a sugggestion from a Republican must be crystal meth addiction! It's just another example of how tightly focused and intolerant the Republican ideology has become.

What's worrying though is not that Republicans ostracise their own members who advocate once acceptable views now considered beyond the pale, but that such people as hold contrary views are treated as the enemy. Thus, at a McCain rally in the election, supporters were heard to chant for Obama's death. Thus there's been a surge in militia activity in the past two years. Thus Gifford's offices were attacked last year, and several democratic congresspeople received threats, and had their offices and homes vandalised. IIRC, bullets were sent to some of those who voted for healthcare reform.

The political scene in America has become poisonous, and whilst Democrats are not saints by any means, the violent vitriol and intolerance seems to be mostly espoused by Republicans. Before Christmas, several prominent GOP members of Congress stated quite baldly that their legislative priority was not economic growth or success in Afghanistan, but rather denying Obama a second term, and thus all their efforts would be focused on obstructing initiatives and hindering, rather than being part of governance. That was both a shocking and a telling admission, and one that is borne out by the fact that there have been more filibusters since Obama came to office than at any other time in American history. And, IMO, it's another sign of Republican intransigence and intolerance. It's noteworthy that the Democrats never set their stall out in such a way under Bush.

That's quite a shocking indictment, I think, of Republican thinking at the moment. They seem consumed by a hatred of those who disagree with them. Not all republicans by any means, not even a majority. But even the moderates are increasingly drifting to the right in order to protect their flanks from the Tea Party, and thus the party becomes less tolerant as it panders to the vocal and extreme minority. As I think is clear from my posts in Politics and elsewhere, I'm not the Irish equivalent of a West coast liberal by any means, but I have a major concern over the direction the GOP is taking, and what that means for American politics, and indeed America in general. And I think it says a lot that, regardless of the motivations of the gunman, few people were altogether surprised at this assassination attempt.