US Congresswoman Shot In Arizona

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Shot In Arizona

NPR
January 8, 2011

U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot outside a grocery store in Tucson while holding a public event, Arizona Public Media reported Saturday.

Giffords, who was re-elected to her third term in November, was hosting her first "Congress on Your Corner” event at the Safeway in northwest Tucson when a gunman ran up and started shooting. At least five other people, including members of her staff, were hurt, according to Peter Michaels, news director of Arizona Public Media.

Giffords was transported to University Medical Center in Tucson. Her condition was not immediately known.

Michaels said Giffords was talking to a couple when the man ran up, firing indiscriminately, and then ran off. He was tackled by a bystander.

More details to come.

Reportedly shot in the head at point blank range.

It's now being reported that the gunman is in custody.

Yeah, it'll be awhile before much more comes to light. I can guarantee you one thing.... this will be another one of those stories that folks run away with on conspiracy theories before all the facts are out. One trip to HuffPo will confirm that.

TexasBlue wrote:Yeah, it'll be awhile before much more comes to light. I can guarantee you one thing.... this will be another one of those stories that folks run away with on conspiracy theories before all the facts are out. One trip to HuffPo will confirm that.

Sad but true. There are always those on either extreme only to ready to exploit something like this long before the actual facts are known - and often times well after that.

Well, the woman is a Democrat. That's all I know. So, I'm sure there's going to be the age old thing of a crazy right wing gun nut.

I prefer to wait and see who it is that they got in custody. We'll know much more in a few hours. If this kook is indeed one of those crazy gun nutz, then the shit's going to be insane for the next several days on the internet.

No matter how much I may dislike a person (or their political views/policies), I can't even begin to make an excuse for this kind of behavior.

Gonna go watch a bit of this and then take a nap. I got up too early today. Had to throw mail around.

FNC doing a standup job of processing/reporting this story. I never heard of the gal before. She was a moderate Dem, pro-life, pro-gun and wanted the border sealed shut from what I've been able to gleam from all this so far.

Also, there was someone in the crowd who started shooting at this gun man after he started this bullshit.

They had earlier reported that she had died, only to correct that about 10 or so minutes later.

And yes, she is a moderate blue-dog Democrat according to the coverage I've watched.

The gunman is 22 yrs old. Heard his name but forgot it already. I'm sure the FBI will have a treasure trove of info before too long. They took control of this case.

I'm very offended by this. Nobody shoots a congress person. Nobody shoots the president. To me, it's an insult.

Giffords Shooting Prompts Bipartisan Show of Support and Grief

Fox News
January 08, 2011

The shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Saturday has prompted a massive bipartisan outpouring of support and grief for the Arizona Democrat and her family as the U.S. Capitol Police advised lawmakers and their aides to be cautious.

At a news conference, President Obama said he has spoken to Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer and offered her the full resources of the federal government. He also said he is sending FBI Director Robert Mueller to oversee the investigation of the shooting.

Giffords is in an intensive care unit following surgery for a gunshot wound in the head at close range. At least 19 people were shot at Giffords' "Congress on Your Corner" event, including three of the congresswoman's staff in Arizona. Five have died, including one of Giffords' aides, and nine are in critical condition at the University of Arizona Medical Center.

Obama said he wasn't surprised that Giffords was meeting with her constituents, "listening to the hopes and prayers of her neighbors."

"That is why this more than a tragedy for those involved," he said. "It's a tragedy for Arizona and a tragedy for our entire country."

Hospital: Rep. Giffords expected to recover from Tucson shooting that killed six including a child and federal judge

Shailagh Murray, David Fahrenthold and Clarence Williams
Washington Post
January 8, 2011

The surgeon who operated on Arizona Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords said he was "optimistic" she would recover from being shot in the head by a man with a semi-automatic weapon outside a grocery store.

Six others at the congressional outreach event did not.

Federal law enforcement sources said that John M. Roll, the senior U.S. District judge in Arizona, was shot and killed in the incident. The Pima County Sheriff's office said that five others including a nine-year-old child had died, and a total of 18 people were injured.

In brief public remarks, President Obama said he had dispatched F.B.I. director Robert Mueller to the scene.

A 22-year old man was taken into custody after being tackled by people in the small crowd after the shooting. One pistol was recovered and it had what police described as "an extended clip."

The man was identified as Jared Loughner, who appears to have left a trail of Internet postings, including some that express convoluted observations about government. Law enforcement officials said they believed he was a military veteran.

Giffords, who in November narrowly won reelection to a third term, was hosting her first "Congress on Your Corner" event when a gunman ran up and began shooting her and others in her entourage with a Glock handgun, according to law enforcement sources.

Eyewitness Steven Rayle, a Tucson doctor, said he saw a young man wearing sneakers and what appeared to be navy blue sweats approach Gifford with a semi-automatic handgun raised. The man shot Giffords once in the face, he said.

After Giffords fell, he said, a number of people near Giffords sought to flee but were trapped--hemmed in by the table and a concrete post. The gunman fired into the crowd, he said.

"It was so close, and sort of a tight thing, there was nowhere easy to run," Rayle said. "So most of the crowd got it, you know."

"People that were there were just sitting ducks," Rayle said. "I don't think he was even aiming. He was just firing at whatever."

After a few seconds, Rayle said, the man stopped shooting and tried to flee.

Earlier in the afternoon, CNN and NPR reported that she had died.

"We do not yet have all the answers. What we do know is that such a senseless and terrible act of violence has no place in a free society," Obama said. "I ask all Americans to join me and Michelle in keeping Representative Giffords, the victims of this tragedy, and their families in our prayers."

Last March, Giffords was one of ten House Democrats who were the subject of harassment over their support for the national health care overhaul. At the time, the front door of Giffords' Tucson office had been shattered in an early morning incident.

Giffords had been a top target by Republicans in the 2010 midterm elections, but managed to win a tough re-election battle against a tea party candidate.

The up-and-coming lawmaker, known as a moderate Democrat who paid close attention to constituent concerns, had been singled out by Sarah Palin's SarahPac as one of the 20 Democrats on the ballot in November who represented states that supported Sen. John McCain for president in 2008.

House Speaker John Boehner (R.Ohio) put out a statement saying: "I am horrified by the senseless attack on Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords... An attack on one who serves is an attack on all who serve. Acts and threats of violence against public officials have no place in our society."

Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi also said in a statement that "Congresswoman Giffords is a brilliant and courageous Member of Congress, bringing to Washington the views of a new generation of national leaders. It is especially tragic that she was attacked as she was meeting with her constituents whom she serves with such dedication and distinction."

NPR reported that Giffords was talking to a couple outside of a local Safeway when the suspect ran up and fired indiscriminately from about four feet away. The man, described by witnesses as in his late teens or early 20s, was tackled when he tried to flee the scene. Police confirmed that a young man was in custody in connection with the shooting.

The "Congress on Your Corner" program was popular among Democrats elected in recent years from swing districts, as a way of keeping in regular contact with local concerns. The event was the first of Giffords' third term; she took the oath of office for the 112th Congress on Tuesday.

Arizona has been a political hotbed in recent months, especially after the state approved last April restrictive immigration laws that became a conservative rallying cry.

Giffords is a member of the House Blue Dog Democrat coalition, a bloc of moderate and conservative Democrats whose ranks were ravaged by losses in November. Her husband is astronaut Mark E. Kelly.

Her 8th congressional district borders Mexico, and Giffords was judicious in her response to the Arizona immigration law, describing it as a "clear calling that the federal government needs to do a better job."

This was not the first time someone brought a gun to a Giffords event. A protester in August brought a gun to Giffords' Congress on Your Corner event in Douglas. Police were alerted after he dropped the firearm.

"When you represent a district that includes the home of the O.K. Corral and Tombstone, 'the Town Too Tough to Die,' nothing's a surprise out in Cochise County," Giffords, D-Ariz., said Tuesday in an interview with The Arizona Republic Editorial Board.

The man in question shouted "some pretty disparaging comments," Giffords said, but "at no point did I ever feel in danger and at no point did I ever feel there was a problem."

Giffords is a former Arizona state senate and house member who had previously served as president of a tire company founded by her father. She was a top recruit in 2006 by Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman Rahm Emanuel, viewed as the type of young, middle-of-the-road candidate with crossover appeal. She is a Spanish speaker whose hobbies include motorcycle racing.

Giffords beat a crowded Democratic primary field in 2006, and won 54 percent of the vote in the general election against immigration opponent Randy Graf, to succeed retiring Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.). She easily won re-election in 2008.

But the immigration debate sparked by the legal crackdown in her home state became a defining issue in Giffords' campaign last year. She denounced the law as "extreme" and has supported legislation to provide a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrations. But she supported a Republican effort to add National Guard troops along the border, and opposed a crusade led by her homestate colleague Rep. Raul Grijalva (D) to boycott Arizona businesses, in protest of the state law.

Known to her colleagues as "Gabby, Giffords was sworn into a third term Wednesday after a grueling 2010 campaign that she won with less than 50 percent of the vote, by fewer than 4,000 votes.

The campaign was based almost entirely on the issue of illegal immigration in her southern Arizona district, which had become ground zero in the heated debate after her state approved a new law allowing local police to aggressively pursue suspected undocumented immigrants.

"We actually don't sit around talking about the national agenda," Giffords told the Washington Post in August, explaining how immigration dominated the debate. "A lot of the messaging that takes place in Washington doesn't make it 2,000 miles to Arizona."

The issue reached a crescendo when a deputy sheriff, Louie Puroll, was shot last April by suspected drug smugglers.

"What will it take? Who else will be shot? How much more violence must we endure," Giffords said in a statement at the time, accusing the federal government of not doing enough to secure the border from illegal immigrants and Mexican drug dealers. "Deputy Puroll is fortunate. His confrontation with drug smugglers didn't cost him his life."

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (Md.), who as 2010 chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee made her re-election a top priority, called her "one of our very brightest lights."

She chaired a subcommittee that oversaw NASA. Kelly, whom she married in November 2007, recently commanded the Space Shuttle Endeavor's trip to the international space station.

And now the usual "media" stuff begins...............

Is Violent Rhetoric Behind the Attack on Giffords?

Nathan Thornburgh
Time Magazine
Jan. 08, 2011

Sometimes, rumors of violence beget actual violence. Saturday's mass shooting at a Safeway on North Oracle Road in Tucson, which left Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in critical condition and at least nine others wounded, may well be one of those occasions.

It's impossible to know this early what the motivations for the attack were. Was the alleged shooter — who, according to the AP, has been identified as 20-something named Jared Laughner — angry about immigration? Or perhaps another hot-button issue? Last March, at the height of the health care reform battle, Giffords' office was vandalized. She mentioned in an MSNBC interview that a Sarah Palin mailer had depicted her district in the crosshair of a gun sight. "They've got to realize there are consequences to that," she said. "The rhetoric is incredibly heated." The corner next to her office had also become, she said, a popular spot for Tea Party protests.

Another shooting victim, a federal judge named John Roll, had been placed under 24-hour security in 2009 after ruling in favor of illegal immigrants in a high-profile case. It's unclear why he was at the supermarket event or whether the gunman was targeting him or Giffords. But for almost a year now, Arizona politicians have been grappling with anti-immigration sentiments, inflamed by reports of crossborder violence. National media attention, with its attendant voices of hysteria, only added to the churn. Pundits spoke gravely about a wave of violence, born in Mexico and now flooding Arizona. Arizona's two most famous politicians fueled the fury. Republican Senator John McCain, facing an unexpected reelection challenge from the right, ran a campaign obsessed with crossborder crime. And GOP Governor Jan Brewer, who invited the national spotlight by championing strict anti-illegal immigrant legislation, talked of beheadings in the desert.

The only problem with all this talk about a massive crossborder crime wave is that it wasn't true. Phoenix had not become one of the world's kidnapping capitals. Crime rates in Arizona had been steady or even fallen in some areas. There had been no beheadings in the desert. There were plenty of deaths there, but they were pathetic and meek tragedies: impoverished border-crossers, abandoned by their heartless guides, dying of exposure and dehydration.

But the idea of a state under siege took hold. When I was on the border last year reporting on the murder of rancher Rob Krentz, I talked to many who sincerely believed that they were under attack. Krentz's murder was a terrible event, but it was an isolated event. The relatively small number of home invasions, holdups and other crimes deeply disturbed border communities, but only because they had been living in such calm for so long. Their crime rates still don't match most cities in the states.

The supermarket meet-and-greet where Giffords was shot was actually a testimony to just how safe southern Arizona is. As a press release from her office last week put it, "'Congress on Your Corner' allows residents of Arizona's 8th Congressional District to meet their congresswoman one-on-one and discuss with her any issue, concern or problem involving the federal government." Not exactly the kind of event a politician would hold in a war zone.

It's true that Giffords was not a fan of the state's anti-immigration bill SB1070, but there were higher-profile opponents, such as her fellow Congressional Representative in Tuscon, Raul Grijalva. Yet the idea that Arizona is under attack has been pushed hard enough that it's very possible that whichever coward shot her (in the head, according to a Tucson paper) believed that the 40-year-old Democrat, who had been tarred by some as soft on immigration because she didn't support SB1070, was contributing to larger-scale violence against Arizonans.

If that is the case, it would only add to the tragedy. The fact is, that among all the overwrought promises and all the panic I heard last summer in Arizona, I found that Giffords was one of the few politicians offering concrete law enforcement steps that would actually work against the drug cartels and other smugglers. It's not just that she fought for more money and police for border protection, although she did that. She co-sponsored legislation last year with a California Republican that aimed to give law enforcement important new tools in cracking down on the cash cards that were a favored methods of money-laundering. It was one of the many sensible, pragmatic ideas she had for cracking down on crime.

Whatever dark fantasies drove someone to try to take her life, Giffords is a sensible politician who was likely shot because she dealt with Arizona's reality, not its rumors.

TexasBlue wrote:The shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Saturday has prompted a massive bipartisan outpouring of support

So a democrat gets shot and Republicans are showing support? Where is this togetherness when they need to work on issues and more importantly, why does it take terrible events to bring people together?

On the flip side, let's ask her if she still is "pro-gun" now.

TheNextPrez2012 wrote:So a democrat gets shot and Republicans are showing support? Where is this togetherness when they need to work on issues and more importantly, why does it take terrible events to bring people together?

On the flip side, let's ask her if she still is "pro-gun" now.

One is a political and ideological issue. The other is a humanitarian issue. I do not like Al Franken one single bit (he's my US Senator). But if this happened to him, I would feel immense compassion for the guy.

Maybe not. But then, if she took a bullet to her brain and it went thru and came out the other side (as has been reported), I highly doubt she'll recover to the point that she can resume her duties as a functioning congresswoman. Of course, that's all speculation. It's far too early with all the reports coming out so far.

The shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, is apparently a raving lunatic.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/jared-lee-loughner-arizona-shooter-appears-be-lunatic_526907.html

Check out his YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/user/Classitup10

kronos wrote:The shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, is apparently a raving lunatic.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/jared-lee-loughner-arizona-shooter-appears-be-lunatic_526907.html

Check out his YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/user/Classitup10

They were reading parts of those earlier today on the news. The guy is a card-carrying nut case for sure. Obviously this guy should have been institutionalized some time ago.

You guys been reading the comments on this story on various news (and NOT blogs) sites? The rhetoric is insane from both sides. Each side is trying to paint this guy into the other guys corner. Unreal. This is before all the facts come out on this guy, too. We'll know more by tomorrow, I'm sure, what this dude was all about.

If I find ANY major media trying to spin it different than what the FBI is is going to be saying, I'll be exposing that, too.

I never read the comments on a story on any news site I visit. I find the comments extremely ill informed and utterly useless.

dblboggie wrote:I never read the comments on a story on any news site I visit. I find the comments extremely ill informed and utterly useless.

Some of them are funny though. I "watch" as both sides go after each other with some of the dumbest rhetoric.

Isn't there some big college football game in Arizona on Monday?
I guess they'll add more security.

Not sure. I don't do college football. I know that a basketball game was postponed for today.

dblboggie wrote:I never read the comments on a story on any news site I visit. I find the comments extremely ill informed and utterly useless.

Amen. They might as well start betting as to what Party the guy voted for....

BubbleBliss wrote:

dblboggie wrote:I never read the comments on a story on any news site I visit. I find the comments extremely ill informed and utterly useless.

Amen. They might as well start betting as to what Party the guy voted for....

They already have. All day and this evening, both sides are convinced that this guy belongs to the other side.

Some of it is pretty nasty, too. Yeesh.