House of Reps. member Giffords shot in Arizona today

During his campaign effort to unseat Giffords in November, Republican challenger Jesse Kelly held fundraisers where he urged supporters to help remove Giffords from office by joining him to shoot a fully loaded M-16 rifle. Kelly is a former Marine who served in Iraq and was pictured on his website in military gear holding his automatic weapon and promoting the event.

"I don't see the connection," between the fundraisers featuring weapons and Saturday's shooting, said John Ellinwood, Kelly's spokesman. "I don't know this person, we cannot find any records that he was associated with the campaign in any way. I just don't see the connection.

"Arizona is a state where people are firearms owners — this was just a deranged individual."

Law enforcement officials said members of Congress reported 42 cases of threats or violence in the first three months of 2010, nearly three times the 15 cases reported during the same period a year earlier. Nearly all dealt with the health care bill, and Giffords was among the targets.

I've been reading and thinking and fighting the urge to put up an angry post myself. That this deranged person could cause such suffering and death is beyond reason.

And to have people come on here and and try to say it has nothing to do with gun control or political rhetoric, simply too much to take.

I don't want you to loose your hunting rifles or bows and arrows, or even target pistols.

But why does the general population need to have access to semi-automatic weapons?

Who are you protecting yourself against?

And when your fellow gun owners use these weapons to kill innocent 9 year old girls,

please accept some responsibility.

There is a price to having these weapons so readily available.

If you can't see that or admit it, it is because of selective blindness or pure ignorance.

And the guy can't see the connection between him, wink-wink, having a bit of target practice during a political campaign and someone actually shooting an opponent, well, I don't think I want this asshole representing me.

Honest discourse is a necessary part of democracy. I think the honesty has gotten lost in this debate. Anger rules the day. It has with me. I am angry about these innocent people dying.


David, save your creative CAPS responses for someone who cares what you have to say.

Quote:

The 33 round Glock magazine is not extended

From advertisement:

Quote:

This magazine extends below the bottom of the pistol grip

I don't give a damn about gun lingo

The existence of the note is revealed in court papers filed after Loughner, 22, was charged on Sunday with murder and attempted assassination. The FBI document says that on an envelope Loughner wrote "I planned ahead", "My assassination" and "Giffords". He then signed the note.

The envelope was kept in a safe at Loughner's home alongside a letter from Giffords in 2007 thanking him for attending an earlier open air constituency meeting of the kind he attacked on Saturday.

The papers also reveal that Loughner bought the semi-automatic Glock pistol six weeks ago.

Giffords, 40, is in a critical condition after being shot in the head at close range. Loughner is expected to appear in court later today as the FBI continues to try to establish a motive for the attack.

The FBI director, Robert Mueller, who travelled to Tucson, Arizona, to take charge of the investigation, said that one focus of the inquiry is whether far-right organisations and websites played a role.

"The ubiquitous nature of the internet means that not only threats, but hate speech and other inciteful speech is much more readily available to individuals than quite clearly it was eight or 10 or 15 years ago," he said.

Investigators are exploring suspected links between Loughner and an online publication known for its strongly anti-immigrant stance, American Renaissance. It has denied any links to the accused killer.

The Southern Poverty Law Centre, one of America's leading trackers of hate crimes, said there are signs in some of Loughner's writings of far-right influence. Mark Potok, the director of research on hate groups at the centre, drew attention to Loughner's online ramblings that reject the US currency.

"At one point, Loughner refers disparagingly to 'currency that's not backed by gold or silver'. The idea that silver and gold are the only 'constitutional' money is widespread in the anti-government 'Patriot' movement that produced so much violence in the 1990s," he said.

Potok said the Patriot movement believes that paper money issued by the government is not legal tender. He said there were also clues to Loughner's thinking in his internet postings in which he accused the government of "mind control on the people by controlling grammar".

Potok said that fits with the theory of a Patriot conspiracy theorist who claims that the government uses grammar to "enslave" Americans.

On Loughner's first encounter with Giffords, at a constituency event in 2007, he is reported to have asked her: "How do you know words mean anything?"

A former friend told the Wall Street Journal that he became "aggravated" when Giffords responded in Spanish before moving on with the meeting.

Other organisations monitoring extremist groups have noted that Loughner spoke despairingly of a "second American constitution", a reference used by some extreme rightwingers to post-civil war constitutional amendments that ended slavery and gave former slaves citizenship.

"One thing that seems clear is that Giffords, who was terribly wounded but survived, was the nearest and most obvious representative of 'the government' that Loughner could find. Another is that he likely absorbed some of his anger from the vitriolic political atmosphere in the United States in general and Arizona in particular," said Potok.

Acquaintances of Loughner have related hearing him rant about issues such as the national currency and language control.

Lynda Sorenson, 52, who attended a community college algebra class with Loughner last year, wrote emails to friends describing him causing disruption and expressing fears that he might be dangerous.

"We do have one student in the class who was disruptive today, I'm not certain yet if he was on drugs (as one person surmised) or disturbed. He scares me a bit. The teacher tried to throw him out and he refused to go, so I talked to the teacher afterward. Hopefully he will be out of class very soon, and not come back with an automatic weapon," Sorenson wrote on 1 June.

A fortnight later, Sorenson said of Loughner: "We have a mentally unstable person in the class that scares the living crap out of me. He is one of those whose picture you see on the news, after he has come into class with an automatic weapon. Everyone interviewed would say, 'Yeah, he was in my math class and he was really weird.' I sit by the door with my purse handy. If you see it on the news one night, know that I got out fast …"

Loughner was later asked to leave the class.

Giffords's doctors say her chances of survival are good but have not said how complete her recovery will be. One of her surgeons, Dr Peter Rhee, has experience as a military doctor in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"I never thought I would experience something like this in my own backyard," he said.

The FBI director, Robert Mueller, who travelled to Tucson, Arizona, to take charge of the investigation, said that one focus of the inquiry is whether far-right organisations and websites played a role.

The main response to this weekends attack should be to reevaluate security needs
at these events/all events.

This was a security failure.

The FBI director, Robert Mueller, who travelled to Tucson, Arizona, to take charge of the investigation, said that one focus of the inquiry is whether far-right organisations and websites played a role.

"The ubiquitous nature of the internet means that not only threats, but hate speech and other inciteful speech is much more readily available to individuals than quite clearly it was eight or 10 or 15 years ago," he said.

I know there has been a climate of fear in America,
especially over the last year or so and in connection
with the health reforms.
Some have been inciting anger, hatred & bigotry with
their rhetoric. It's been sad & troublesome to watch.
But I read this morning that a certain Mrs Palin had
said & I quote

Quote:

"Common-sense conservatives and lovers
of America, don't retreat...instead reload".

Please tell me she didn't say this, surely not. Any intelligent
person should know that this kind of statement could incite a
more volatile or unbalanced person to violence.
Even Mrs Palin must know this.?

eurocelticyankee wrote:

I know there has been a climate of fear in America,
especially over the last year or so and in connection
with the health reforms.

I 've been here and I have not seen any such thing.
What u "know" is inconsistent with fact.

eurocelticyankee wrote:

Some have been inciting anger, hatred & bigotry with
their rhetoric. It's been sad & troublesome to watch.
But I read this morning that a certain Mrs Palin had
said & I quote

Quote:

"Common-sense conservatives and lovers
of America, don't retreat...instead reload".

Please tell me she didn't say this, surely not. Any intelligent
person should know that this kind of statement could incite a
more volatile or unbalanced person to violence.
Even Mrs Palin must know this.?

Nonsense; this is merely in your mind.





David

The main response to this weekends attack should be to reevaluate security needs at these events/all events.

This was a security failure.

H2O MAN wrote:

The main response to this weekends attack should be to reevaluate security needs at these events/all events.

This was a security failure.

They have made this problem and fed the hatred of the people... Will they now limit our freedom more terribly than they have so they can walk unafraid??? How can we walk unafraid??? How can we face the future unafraid??? They have led us into ruin and they want no consequences... Good luck with that..

An aide to Sarah Palin claims the crosshairs depicted in her now-infamous target list of Democrats were not actually gun-sights, and that it's "obscene" and "appalling" to blame Palin for the shooting.

"We never ever, ever intended it to be gun sights. It was simply cross-hairs like you'd see on maps," said Rebecca Mansour on the Tammy Bruce radio show. Moreover, there was "nothing irresponsible" about the image....

Let's not be coy. The piousness atmosphere in today's level of discourse comes by far from the right.