




"Fake tits are like Kevlar. They don't guarantee your chances of survival but they sure as hell improve it."
Tempest
This whole thing infuriates me to no end.




The Pima County Sheriff's office listed the dead as:
John M. Roll, 63, a federal district court judge.
Gabriel Zimmerman, 30, Giffords' director of community outreach.
Dorwin Stoddard, 76, a pastor at Mountain Ave. Church of Christ.
Christina-Taylor Green, 9, a student at Mesa Verde Elementary.
Dorthy Morris, 76.
Phyllis Schneck, 79.
I agree, its infuriating.
She is one of the candidates Sarah Palin had marked with crosshairs on her "don't retreat, reload!" campaign. Her tea party opponent during the election had a "shooting party" fundraiser. You encourage ignorant redneck fucks to use "second amendment solutions" and this is the result.





Agreed. Normally I would say that whatever political opinion someone has that's their opinion. However, with the type of scum Palin is attracting they think they have the right to kill someone for disagreeing. Before anyone accuses me of bashing conservatives, I'm not bashing normal ones (which most are). However, yes I blame the Palin nuts for this. She is a dangerous person and I pray she never gets close to the Oval Office.




I saw a purported youtube account for this guy, if it was actually his, he was nuts 6 ways to sunday. Talking about government mind control and creating a new currency and all kinds of other insane shit.
So right now it was a complete nutjob killing people, incluing a NINE YEAR OLD. Don't try and polticize that. It's pathetic. Not to mention you have no idea why this guy did it. From the looks of his youtube, he was totally nuts.





She is one of the candidates Sarah Palin had marked with crosshairs on her "don't retreat, reload!" campaign. Her tea party opponent during the election had a "shooting party" fundraiser. You encourage ignorant redneck fucks to use "second amendment solutions" and this is the result.So right now it was a complete nutjob killing people, incluing a NINE YEAR OLD. Don't try and polticize that
I've held my tongue on this issue even though it is now running rampant in the world press. All I would say in regard to any attempts to politicize the despicable act of a lone nutcase is the same thing that some of the foreign media are speculating about. Ask yourself who really stands to gain if in fact there is some 'conspiracy' behind this shooting ...
- there will be zero change in house of representatives vote outcomes if a single democrat doesn't vote
- the illegal immigrant civil damages case against the US border rancher will go forward because the ( murdered ) judge already ruled the case can proceed
- the aftermath of this incident is likely to prompt calls for official suppression of 'certain kinds' of free speech ... most likely covering the likes of Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh etc.
- the aftermath of this incident is likely to prompt calls for new handgun sales restrictions, reversing a recent trend of court decisions respecting the 2nd amendment
- the aftermath of this incident is likely to result in politicians being far LESS accessible, and therefore less accountable to their constituents, via the imposition of new security measures
- the immediate result has been to drop the scheduled house vote for repeal of Obamacare and all other house legislative business this coming week, breaking republican momentum towards budget-cutting and reductions in the size of gov't ... and most likely bringing into the spotlight first and second amendment restricting new legislation in response to this tragic incident that will deflect time / energy / news coverage away from proposals re budget-cutting and reductions in the size of gov't.
Personally, and contrary to my suspicious nature, the high probability is that the perp is a lone nutcase. But if there IS some conspiratorial aspect, it would certainly appear that it was NOT conservatives or the tea party that will benefit.
I can't stand Palin, but I'm finding it a stretch to literally blame Palin for this terrible event on some nut cracker (yet unproven as far as I know) literal interpretation of her idiotic message.
A nut is a nut. He could have locked onto anything as a seriously mentally imbalanced person and decided it was a message for him to kill a bunch of people.
Lets blame the nut and realize idiots like Pallin will always exist.
A cunning linguist...





The only reason I blame Palin is because of the photos she had on her site and the words she used. I would hope she didn't mean it but she really is a nut.
These are all things I fear too. Regarding free speech though, the problem I'm finding out is if one has a more conservative view on certain issues they are often attacked. I've been banned from events because I oppose single parenthood, but of course if I didn't no problem.




People need to remember words have power, and while he seems to be a total whackjob, he was living in a state where he was exposed to a lot of highly charged antigov't rhetoric.
In other fucked up news: Westboro Baptist Church plans to picket the funerals of the victims, thanking God on their website for sending the shooter to AZ.



RT Palin aide: targets really surveyor's symbols. Yes, that explains all her incendiary "latitude and longitude" rhetoric.
RT @MMFlint (Michael Moore) If a Detroit Muslim put a map on the web w/crosshairs on 20 pols, then 1 of them got shot, where would he b sitting right now? Just asking.
Considering the excess of guns in the United States, what surprises me isn't that politicians are shot now and again. What surprises me is that these kind of dreadful acts don't happen with more regularity.
What is clear is that only the right wing owns the rhetoric of calling its opponents "unAmerican" or suggesting the need to "take back the country," implying that those who disagree with them are outsiders, literally enemies of the nation.
That's because gun ownership rates have no bearings on such events. They don't leap off the ground and shoot on their own. Ergo, rates of violence are cultural, effected by socio economics, education levels, population density, and other variables, and will go up and and down with those variables. The tool used to kill you, not relevant: Timothy McVeigh killed 168 people using a very simple home made bomb.
It's easy to kill lots of people if one wants to sadly...
So, lets not turn this into a gun control thread.
A cunning linguist...



Agree, Will. I don't want to debate America's gun fetish here, and won't.





"Fake tits are like Kevlar. They don't guarantee your chances of survival but they sure as hell improve it."
Tempest









not wanting to say 'I told you so', but here it is not even 48 hours after the incident, and ...
(snip)One of the fiercest gun-control advocates in Congress, Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-N.Y.), pounced on the shooting massacre in Tucson Sunday, promising to introduce legislation as soon as Monday targeting the high-capacity ammunition the gunman used.
McCarthy ran for Congress after her husband was gunned down and her son seriously injured in a shooting in 1993 on a Long Island commuter train.
“My staff is working on looking at the different legislation fixes that we might be able to do and we might be able to introduce as early as tomorrow,” McCarthy told POLITICO in a Sunday afternoon phone interview.
Gun control activists cried it was time to reform weapons laws in the United States, almost immediately after a gunman killed six and injured 14 more, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, in Arizona on Saturday.(snip)
from
the difference of course is that the 'misguided' church group will draw press coverage and derision, while this congresswoman may succeed in restricting the constitutional rights of every American without actually doing anything to accomplish her stated objective. In addition, her new legislation will probably take precedence over, and thus break the momentum of, health care repeal legislation and other gov't spending cut legislation that was previously scheduled to be the first issues for discussion in the US House.
... and let us not forget an issue from a couple of months back ...
(snip)Mark Penn, Democratic strategist and former chief strategist for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, let out the kind of doozy, on last night’s Hardball, that must be seen to be believed. Comparing Obama’s current situation to the aftermath of the 1994 “Republican Revolution,” Penn noted that it took the Oklahoma City tragedy in order for President Clinton to “reconnect” with the American people.
He then stepped off the cliff by saying that President Obama needed a “similar event” to achieve that reconnection following his party’s midterm losses."(snip)
Again I'm still of the opinion that the shooter was yet another lone nut job. However, unlike the comparatively muted media and capitol hill reactions to the last lone nut job's Fort Hood shootings, this latest incident appears to be gaining momentum.
~
Last edited by Melonie; 01-10-2011 at 04:06 AM.





for anyone interested in an alternate viewpoint ...
(snip)"The Shameful Left And Revisionism
It took only a few hours for the radical left to literally infest the entire Huffington Post with what amount to a litany of lies.
Just a few....
Jeff Biggers:
"I don't believe this tragedy should be reduced to a debate over the disturbed shooter's motives."
Of course they should be. A man can commit a horrific amount of murder with a car or a gallon of gasoline.
Biggers goes on to cite:
"What is clear to me, at this chaotic moment, is that no one should be surprised by this turn of events. The bullets that were fired in Tucson this morning are the logical extension of every bit of partisan hatred that came spewing out during the last election, in which Gabrielle Giffords---a centrist, representing well and faithfully a centrist district---was vilified and demonized as a socialist, a communist, a fascist, a job-killer, a traitor, and more.
Anyone who uttered such words or paid for them to be uttered has his or her name etched on those bullets."
You mean like all the leftists who instantly tried to claim this was somehow "Tea Party" or "Right" related?
I'll get to that.
Gary Hart:
"Candidates are "targeted". An opponent is "in the crosshairs". Liberals have to be "eliminated". Opponents are "enemies". This kind of language eminates largely from those who claim to defend American democracy against those who would destroy it, who are evil, and who want to "take away our freedoms"."
Oh, and it's just those e-vile Republicans doing it, right? Ever read Daily Kos? They email me daily with their updates - and their rhetoric is just as vile and outrageous. If you wish to argue for more reason in our political discourse, you might start with your own side of the aisle.
As for "tolerating" such things, there's a long line of rhetoric about people being thrown down the stairs and similar things - from the left. During Bush's second election campaign there was an advertisement circulating on The Internet depicting him literally pushing a stick-figure granny down the stairs.
Or we can just look at our own President's speech:
That’s exactly what Barack Obama said he would do to counter Republican attacks “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun,” Obama said at a Philadelphia fundraiser Friday night. “Because from what I understand folks in Philly like a good brawl. I’ve seen Eagles fans.”
As a consequence I find it rather disturbing, to put it mildly, that The Left has suddenly grown a conscience - for others. Of course they are silent as regards their own sins......
Politics has always been a nasty sport; "Daisy" anyone? What's worse than insinuating that your opponent will literally lead the nation to be vaporized in a nuclear holocaust if he's elected? May I remind everyone that in point of fact this sort of rhetoric is nothing new, and in fact is about as old as politics itself - there were all sorts of "leaflet wars" in the early years of our nation with various scurrilous and outrageous charges leveled by people nailing flyers (anonymously at that) up on poles and similar.
We have a First Amendment for a reason. It protects the offensive speech of both the left and right.
So before you throw that stone, you better board up your own glass house. "(snip)
(snip)Finally, we have now-known (or at least available and claimed) facts on the alleged gunman.
Despite The Left's attempt to scrub the data, the facts are that this individual appears to have been a radical....... leftist. Not that I particularly like that site's attempted painting either - the person who they allegedly claimed was "maybe" involved over on Daily Kos appears to not have been (he claimed to have tried to kill himself by shooting himself in the mouth but failed to die, and there's nothing in the media suggesting that the suspect was missing half his face.)
That's right. He was quite-clearly not a Tea Party type, but more of a..... Communist? Maybe. His Youtube profile listed Mein Kampf and The Communist Manifesto as favorite books. The videos posted there were incoherent rants on alleged abuses of grammar and language - one could wonder if he was referring to President Clinton and his attempted redefinition of "is", but there wasn't enough mental focus there to know. The videos are laced with allegations that the government is engaged in "mind control" (although he never explains exactly what he's talking about in that regard.)
It gets better - he seemed to believe that the entirety of NASA's manned space program was a fraud. You know - we never really set foot on the moon (multiple times), we never really put men in space on the Shuttle, McAuliffe and crew didn't really die when Challenger blew up, the ISS doesn't exist, etc. Maybe that's the motive - the Congresswoman's husband is an astronaut.
We may never know for sure.
It would appear that the suspect is a bit delusional, I think. Add some paranoia to that and you got a bad - maybe lethal - combination.
Do we need to look further than that? Probably not when it comes to motive, but we do when it comes to law enforcement failures.
Again.
See, there are also, unfortunately, reports in the media that the suspect had expressed homicidal ideation - that is, a desire (or threat) to murder. That's in the press at this point, and it's a problem. If this was known to the local law enforcement community, why wasn't he evaluated with regard to his mental stability? That may explain why the Pima County Sheriff was talking trash yesterday - he knows he's got himself a bit of 'splaining to do once people figure out that they had this guy in custody at least once, knew he was potentially unstable and that he was a threat to others. If they had done their job perhaps this wouldn't have happened - you see, it is already illegal for someone who is mentally ill to purchase and/or own a firearm, which begs the question: did every opportunity exist to interdict this individual at some point in the last couple of years, including direct contact with law enforcement who were aware of homicidal threats and his behavior at his college, and yet either the procedures were not in place to refer him for evaluation or they were not followed?
We don't know - yet - but what's clear from his Youtube videos is that there's a complete lack of what would be thought of as "reason" among most of us.
Finally, the alleged shooter exposed what he thought of our government, our nation, and our laws through the video he "favorited" - and there was only one.
It depicted a hooded man (who appears to only have one arm), set to the song "Let The Bodies Hit The Floor", approaching and setting on fire a tattered American flag.
Right-wing Tea-Partier? Uh, no.
Irrational? Looks like it. Psychotic? Maybe. Schitzophrenic? Possibly. Bi-polar and unmedicated (except by self-medicating with pot, which he allegedly like to smoke)? Decent bet there. We'll find out, I suspect, as his mental status will obviously factor large in the upcoming trial.
But right-wing? Not a prayer in Hell.(snip)




I watched Faux News' coverage Saturday evening and they had his "favorite" books listed constantly on a side graphic. Since then I've seen two republican congressman quoted in print parroting this factoid and I'm sure the right will continue to promote this piece of, if not misinformation, then at least not a fully accurate statement.
I read his list as stated on his youtube page and in addition to books we all read as kids, it also included Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, Animal Farm, We the Living, The Republic and Meno.
At least Fox can be comfortable in the knowledge that our republican politicians continue to use them as their sole source of information.





^^^ actually, many other media outlets have been providing additional information ... although admittedly MSNBC, CBS etc. have not been part of that group !
(snip)"A sinister shrine reveals a chilling occult dimension in the mind of the deranged gunman accused of shooting a member of Congress and 19 others.
Hidden within a camouflage tent behind Jared Lee Loughner's home sits an alarming altar with a skull sitting atop a pot filled with shriveled oranges.
A row of ceremonial candles and a bag of potting soil lay nearby, photos reveal.
Experts on Sunday said the elements are featured in the ceremonies of a number of occult groups.
Investigators have focused on Loughner's online anti-government ramblings as the chief motivation for the shooting Saturday of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).
The discovery of the shrine raises the possibility that Loughner, 22, may have been driven by other forces. Students and faculty at Pima Community College, which he attended until his suspension last summer, said Loughner was clearly at odds with the world.
"He was one of the last kids tocome in, and he sat down and almost immediately started laughing to himself in a way that was just kind of creepy," a classmate, Alex Kotonias, 20, told USA Today.
"As soon as the teacher started going over the syllabus, he had this outburst out of nowhere, didn't even raise his hand, and started asking the teacher some sort of weird questions about whether he believed in mind control."
Adjunct Prof. Ben McGahee, 28, worried about violence. "I remember going home and thinking to myself, 'Is he going to bring a weapon to class?'" he told USA Today.
Lynda Sorenson, 52, who was in McGahee's basic algebra class with Loughner, expressed similar fears in emails to friends, The Washington Post reports.
On June 14, she wrote: "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."
In September, college officials sent campus police officers to Loughner's home, where he lives with his parents, with a letter informing him he could not return without a mental health professional's written assurance that hispresence at college would "notpresent a danger to himself or others."
"It was obvious to everyone that Jared wasn't a normal guy,"said neighbor Anthony Woods, 19.
Loughner worked as a volunteer at the Pima Animal Care Center, where he walked dogs and cleaned cages. "He loved animals and was a good worker," said another volunteer.
Loughner had once tried to join the military but was deemed unsuitable, officials said.(snip)
Thus at the very least, public education officials and law enforcement officials were already aware that this guy represented a 'risk'. However, the question that is NOT being asked is why public education officials and law enforcement officials did not take some sort of further action as a result of the earlier situation.
That's because the most important person in existence was harmed according to politicians, which is another politician.
Had there been no politician involved, and just a nut who shot up a super market, it would get minimal to zero traction.
Politicians get very upset when the dangers others have to face effect them.
The response to this event so far only lowers my already low view of politicians in general.
The average store owner in a bad area, is still at far higher risk then most politicians, who can get security and or have such meetings at places (court houses, town halls, etc) where better security exists.
At her level, she's not given government security detail without some specific threat, but I believe they do get it at the state level via state police, etc if they request it. As I understand it, she had zero security, and had been threatened by said nut prior.
A cunning linguist...




I'm curious to know more about his parents, his upbringing, and his family's medical history. It's clear that this boy was mentally disturbed. The politics and beliefs were merely a vehicle, but not the root cause. I came across this article and his mother appears to be fairly normal and middle class. (Although, that's certainly no guarantee).
(snip)
"Loughner lived in a middle-class neighbourhood, only five minutes from the scene of the shooting. His mother was said to work for the Pima County board of supervisors, which oversees the local county court."
(snip)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti....html?ITO=1490
The article says nothing of his father though or of the family dynamics. I'm curious if there is a family history of mental illness or if there was more volatility in the home than it appears.
Here's another thing that stood out to me:
(snip)
"Goodbye friends. Please don't be mad at me. The literacy rate is below 5%. I haven't talked to one person who is literate. I want to make it out alive. The longest war in the history of the United States. Goodbye. I'm saddened with the current currency and job employment. I had a bully at school. Thank you. P.S. --plead the fifth!"
(snip)
http://www.kgun9.com/Global/story.asp?S=13809065





^^^ indeed, if the Daily Mail's implication is accurate, the shooter's mother was also potentially in a position to influence / limit follow-up actions by the local community college and local cops / courts ! If this turns out to be true, then the 'blame' for this tragic shooting incident can be laid at the feet of the Pima County Board of Supervisors member(s) abusing their political power for the supposed benefit of 'one of their own'. Also, it should be noted that Gabrielle Giffords was in fact a former member of this very board of supervisors.
also, in addition to new gun control legislation, Democrats are also now proposing new legislation which would make it a federal crime to speak out in certain ways against incumbent federal politicians ...
(snip)"Rep. Robert Brady (D-Pa.) reportedly plans to introduce legislation that would make it a federal crime to use language or symbols that could be perceived as threatening or inciting violence against a federal official or member of Congress.
Brady told CNN that he wants federal lawmakers and officials to have the same protections against threat currently provided to the president. His call comes one day after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) was shot, along with 19 other people, at a public event in Tucson. A suspect is currently in custody.
"The president is a federal official," Brady told CNN in a telephone interview. "You can't do it to him; you should not be able to do it to a congressman, senator or federal judge."
Among the six people killed was Federal Judge John Roll.
While it is unknown at this time whether the shooter was politically motivated, that has not prevented a vigorous debate about whether heated political rhetoric seen during the healthcare reform debate and during the 2010 campaign is inciting violence."(snip)
from
also, Democratic senator Clyburn, whose daughter was appointed to the FCC, is now calling for reinstatement of the 'Fairness Doctrine'
(snip)"The shooting is cause for the country to rethink parameters on free speech, Clyburn said from his office, just blocks from the South Carolina Statehouse. He wants standards put in place to guarantee balanced media coverage with a reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, in addition to calling on elected officials and media pundits to use 'better judgment.'
'Free speech is as free speech does,' he said. 'You cannot yell ‘fire' in a crowded theater and call it free speech and some of what I hear, and is being called free speech, is worse than that.'(snip)
as former white house official Rahm Emanuel is famously quoted as saying ... 'never let a good crisis go to waste' !
~
Last edited by Melonie; 01-10-2011 at 12:40 PM.
And the average citizen who does not get a security detail following them around? Oh wait, their expendable.
As mentioned, at her level, they don't get federal protection, but they do get state protection from the state police usually if they request it.
I have seen Barny Frank walking around in a mall in Boston with no security. I thought it was a poor idea at the time.
Even with threats to her person prior, she didn't appear to feel any security was needed.
A cunning linguist...




Very interesting. It makes me curious if this connection between his mother and Ms. Giffords might have played a role in why he selected her.^^^ indeed, if the Daily Mail's implication is accurate, the shooter's mother was also potentially in a position to influence / limit follow-up actions by the local community college and local cops / courts ! If this turns out to be true, then the 'blame' for this tragic shooting incident can be laid at the feet of the Pima County Board of Supervisors member(s) abusing their political power for the supposed benefit of 'one of their own'. Also, it should be noted that Gabrielle Giffords was in fact a former member of this very board of supervisors.
~
I also found another article offering more insight into his father's character:
(snip)
"By contrast, neighbors say Jared’s mother is very friendly and outgoing, although his father, Woods says, is “very aggressive, very angry all the time about petty things—like if the trash is out because the trash guys didn’t pick it up, he yells at us for it.”
(snip)
http://www.newsweek.com/2011/01/10/j...tal-state.html
Perhaps his anger towards government was misdirected anger towards his parents (one of which who happened to work for the government). Maybe Jared was angry at his mother for not protecting him from his father? And if we add mental illness (be it genetic or from a childhood brain injury).... that's a recipe for catastrophe.
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