Congresswoman shot in head
 

http://www.baltimoresun.com/sns-tucs...0,586240.story

:(

Most news outlets are now reporting that she has died.

http://twitter.com/SarahHoyeCNN

Her press sec. says she is still alive in surgery. Let's hope this is true and that she comes thru it well.

From here:
and

She was one of the Democratic representatives targeted by Palin's PAC's infamous gun-sight ad.

However, Chief Judge Roll of the District of Arizona is apparently dead.

What a nutjob. Seriously folks.

Apparently the 9 year old girl who was killed was born on 9/11/01.

She also happened to be the daughter of a scout for the Dodgers, granddaughter of major league manager Dallas Green.

The guy seems to have been a legitimately crazy nutjob (duh), with a rather unbalanced form of extremist political "views". I haven't cared to spend too much time absorbing all of his craziness, but the bits and pieces I've come across are all over the place. From right wing "the government is trying to take over our lives" nutjobbery, to listing Mein Kompf and the Communist Manifesto as favorite books. A purported high school acquaintance described him, in high school, as radically left wing and a believer in 2012 prophecy.

Nut. Job.

Yeah... It doesn't sound like he had any particular political agenda. Mein Kompf and the Communist Manifesto are at complete opposite ends of the political spectrum. He's just your garden variety insane.

However, that hasn't stopped people from both sides of the political fence from proclaiming him a believer of the other side's.

He listed all sorts of books as favorites - including Alice in Wonderland. But, his statement about the government wanting to control our minds through grammar is a bit odd, to say the least.

Some are saying he was a follower of this guy.

I'm getting sick and tired of the right claiming Loughner was a "leftie" because he read Mein Kampf! Nazi's were right-wing! What uninformed idiots!

I'm sick and tired of anyone making this a political issue: it was a mass murder. Yes, some ties can be made to political issues, but first and foremost, this guy is a nutjob and just killed six and wounded 14.

This is not about politics - it is about mental illness.

I completely agree. The Nazi thing is just one of my historical pet peeves.

I agree, but also find there is political enough of an angle to perhaps have some good come out of it, hopefully in terms of lowering the temperature of political rhetoric. I mean, you can hardly imagine Sharon Angle speaking of "2nd Amendment remedies" tomorrow, huh? Or Sarah Palin now posting Congressperson's names along with a map of cross-hairs, and tweeting "Resist and Reload."

Not surprisingly, I suppose, I completely agree with every word of this rather brilliant rant.

This article on Stochastic Terrorism might be of interest.

I also would like to point out, that Obama himself did some of this boneheaded, ugly stuff by saying "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun"

This guy was a nutjob- just like Oswald, just like Bremer, just like Hinckley.

Is that really the best the right can come up with? Really?

He was quoting from the movie The Untouchables. He was using it as a metaphor on how to counter Republican vitriol and attack ads. A metaphor that no one on the left took literally. It is nowhere near the same as using gun cross-hairs on a map targeting specific people; Sharon Angle's "Second Amendment Remedies; or countless other examples of violent right-wing rhetoric that is cheered and applauded by millions of gun, flag, and sign waiving Republicans.

God, I hate false equivalencies!

All I'm saying is there's stupid rhetoric from BOTH sides of the political spectrum...

Yes, but the vast majority is coming from the right.

Yes, but there is a significant imbalance in where violent, gun-based rhetoric comes from. Neither side is squeaky clean, but one side has a clear lead in the race.

Out of curiosity, if Sarah Palin had quoted The Untouchables similarly, would you give her the same pass?

To me, the responsibility rhetoric has here is much like the responsibility the manufacturers of a mild carcinogen have. In the general population, 15 people out of a thousand will get earlobe cancer. Among users of Product X, 17 people will get earlobe cancer.

I use Product X and get earlobe cancer. How responsible is Product X for this? Full responsibility? 12% responsibility? No responsibility? The cancer either was or wasn't caused by Product X but it is impossible to know which.

The problem with blaming rhetoric for the actions of crazy people is that there's no predicting crazy. Simple oppositional language could trigger a crazy person to violence. So yes, it is possible that the general tone provided this crazy person with a target but I don't really care since anything could have provided this crazy person with a target.

I care when generally rational people are moved to violence by rhetoric.

I don't think anyone's placing direct blame in a straight causational line, Alex. But some are alleging that pundits have known for quite a while, and are certainly now put on notice, that their insanity-appealing rhetoric will, sooner or later, but undoubtedly, appeal to the insane to carry out the violence they directly and specifically promote with such rhetoric.

Others, such as I (for example), believe many of these pundits are indeed purposeful and knowing Stochastic Terrorists of the bin Laden ilk, who are conducting a planned reign of terrorism behind the cowardice of plausible deniability.

If it was used in the same way, yes. The problem is that Palin and the others have made careers out of inciting violence and hatred. Obama made one comment. The right would have you think that this makes him just as bad as they are. Sorry, I don't buy it.

And that's fine. And essentially irrelevant to the discussion of individual incidents, especially when the connection is made on essentially zero information about what media and messages this particular person had been consuming.

It looks as stupid, to me, as blaming a specific hurricane on global warming or using a specific snow storm to argue against it.

But outside the context of a specific event with no specific chain of causality I am all in favor of the discussion. Product X should be reformulated to not cause those two extra cancers if at all possible, but that doesn't mean I get to say it caused my cancer.

Really? Could you provide me the list of violence that Palin has incited? Ideally something that doesn't just rely on post hoc ergo proptor hoc reasoning.

So, can we say something else? That without equating all examples of needlessly violent speech, Obama's use of that quote also contributed to a needlessly violent rhetorical tone and, as with all of them, it would have been better had he not said it?

"Yeah, but when we do it it isn't as bad so it isn't worth commenting on" is just as lame (and here I am creating an equivalency) as "But you do it do so us doing it isn't worth commenting on."

The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence has a timeline with incidents and their context between June 2008 and now.

Do we get to call this a trend yet?

Well, two things come to mind off the top of my head; the cross-hairs poster and the time during the presidential campaign when she called for Obama's assasination. If you want, I can pull together a longer list later when I have time.

Sorry. No. Wrong. While there has been some violent rhetoric from the fringe left, it is in no way equal to the constant barrage coming from major players on the right - not just fringe right, mind you, but from their leaders. Yes, Obama made one ill-advised comment once, but it in no way makes him as bad as Palin, O'Reilly, Rush, Bachman, et al. There is no equivilency. Period.

No, that's a list of violent imagery. I'm asking about a list of violence she incited, which you said she has built her career on. By that criteria, Eli Roth has also built his career on inciting violence.



Edited this part, originally too mean. But, since in replying you show no sign of having actually read what I wrote, I guess there's no point in posting further.

"Blood Libel"
 

It turns out that the term "blood libel" has a sordid past.Giffords is Jewish. Why the choice of "blood libel" by Palin, do you think?

Yes.

She was within a hair's breath of saying something cogent, level-headed, and meaningful. Good thing she threw that in there to keep her track record in tact.

So, I listened to the memorial while I was in my truck earlier - WTF was with the whooping and hollering and cheering? Did no one tell these neanderthals that they were attending a MEMORIAL?

Arizona sucks.

Yeah, that was kinda odd. But it was in a college auditorium, and not a cemetery - and the President is kinda a rock star. But still, I found it a tad inappropriate.

That all stopped once Obama started speaking. I thought his remarks were pitch-perfect and typically wonderful. I cried like a baby during the segment where he detailed the lives and loves of the dead. If there were any more stringent points I'd like him to have made addressing violent political rhetoric, I understand him skirting the issue deftly and with the high-mindedness appropriate to the occasion and his own particular temperament.

Yet without stooping to the meanness of meaning to, he sure made mincemeat of Sarah Palin in yesterday's unofficial Statesmanship 101 face-off. :cool:


If only more of a presidency's success depended on being a wonderful orator, Obama would be one of the best pressies evar. Still, for the many times the job requires such soothing and inspiring speaking skills, we certainly elected the right man for the job.


I truly hope our country does one day meet our children's expectations, as the president so eloquently exhorted at his speech's end ... but I fear we don't have enough time left as a nation to achieve anything like that goal.

Still ... Obama's urgings to do the best we can were welcome reminders, and I hope some good may yet come from this terrible tragedy.

Well said, iSm. They were even clapping and cheering for Bible verses.

Was John McCain there? I didn't see him.

I'll admit that I find the entire idea of a mass gathering to allow for the public display of grieving by people who (mostly) didn't know any of the people being grieved to be an odd construct.

But since I seem to be alone in that I just assume that is my brokenness and odd relationship with death. So to me the standing ovations (I was watching at the gym with the sound off) didn't seem to stretch that much. it wasn't until I heard soundbites this morning that I realized just how much clapping there was. Did notice that from his pacing at least Obama's speech didn't seem to have been written with the expectation of there being applause lines.

I heard this morning that Loughner was stopped by police just before arriving at his shooting spree, for running a red light. Wow, that's some terrible irony there. You don't get hauled in for running a light, but woah ... he was technically in police quasi-custody for a moment there - - - before he killed 6 and wounded 20. Yikes.

Not sure what "right before" includes but it was not him on the way to shoot her, it was earlier in the morning. In between he went home and eventually took a cab to the Safeway.

But yeah, that Fish & Game officer but be wracking his brain on whether there was anything he missed that could have been an excuse to detain him.

A white guy with a shaved head? Naah. Now, if he'd had a Spanish accent . . .

He does kinda look like Uncle Fester on crystal meth. Surely that's an detaining offense, even in Arizona!

Not that I thought she was really gonna run (much more money in leaving that an open question), but here's some reasons why she now cannot.