Shooting Spree in Arizona

[Faldur]

The secret service doesn't carry 30 round clips, and there is a good reason for it. Its clumsy, makes the weapon un-balanced, is very difficult to conceal and is very difficult to deploy quickly.


Anyone who has spent anytime at a range and studied to be proficient in fire arm use would prefer the standard 10 round clip. I'm slow and i can reload in a little over 2 seconds.

[onmyknees]

It’s been at least a day and a half now since Congress-woman Gabrielle Giffords was shot through the brain. She and seventeen other people were targeted by an apparently crazed gunman with a semi-automatic hand gun. She and the others were participating in a political event at a Tuscon box store. I waited to start this thread, because I thought that perhaps one or more of our conservative contributors would want to be first to express their regrets for the occurrence of this tragic event.

There has been a lot of discussion, not only in the media, but at kitchen tables, water coolers, bars and coffee houses about the “cause” of the shooting. The immediate cause is of course clear: the shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, arrived with a glock, aimed and squeezed the trigger. But why? Mr. Loughner was not of sound mind. He was expelled from the local community college for repeated disturbances. He was told he’d have to pass a psychiatric examination if he wished to re-enroll. He was a loner and all who met him say he is obviously disturbed. Yet Mr. Loughner didn’t need to pass a psychiatric examination to purchase a firearm. Was the shooting “caused” by Arizona’s famously lax firearms policy? Of course not. Laws don’t “cause” events to happen, they just provide the opportunity for events to happen.

Representative Giffords was “targeted” (shown as a bullseye in the cross-hairs of a rife-scope) by Sarah Palin on a map which, until the shooting, you could find it on Palin’s web-site. Why are Giffords and others in Palin’s cross-hairs? The Palin fan-base needs to know who the enemy is. Did Mr. Loughner see Palin’s map on her website or on the various news channels which periodically broadcast the map? Did Palin’s targeting of Giffords “cause” Loughner to deliberately kill and maim eighteen people in cold blood? Of course not. Palin didn’t pay him or engage him in any way. Palin had never intended (so we’re told) to instigate a political assassination. After all, if a Muslim cleric had exactly such a map with cross-hairs on his website and one of the targeted persons wound up being assassinated by a crazed fundamentalist, we wouldn’t hold the cleric in any way responsible....would we?

How about Sharron Angle suggesting Second Amendment Remedies are not beyond rational consideration? Was Loughner persuaded by Sharron Angle’s rhetoric to pursue a second amendment remedy for whatever political complaints troubled his sick mind? Of course not. Sharron Angle never meant for anyone (so we’re told) to attempt a political assassination.

No, ultimately the blame lies squarely on Mr. Loughner’s shoulders. Still one has the uneasy feeling that the verbal invocations of violence and the easy means Arizona provides to carry out violence conspired create the perfect storm of rage and lead.

I knew you would go there...What you've done Trish, albeit eloquent in places, and subtle in others is completely out of line in my opinion. By you raising the name Sarah Palin in the very discussion, you attempt to tie the two completely unrelated events together. It's unseemly frankly and it's like throwing chum in the water to hungry sharks. It's exactly what the Congressional Black Caucus did to the Tea Party. It's like playing word association and it's intellectually dishonest. You seek to tie the two ( Palin and Loughner) together and then when the right wing rebels you can say...."well of course there's no cause and effect, I was just sayin'" !! What happened in the days following the tragedy was a national disgrace . When the left isn't engaging in class warfare, they're playing the race card, and now this. Paul Krugman wet himself he was so excited about attempting to make the connection. Then the incompetent sheriff jumped onboard and the rest of the left was off to the races. My god...can we grieve this little child before you blame Pailn? In the coming days, I'm sure this Sheriff will be expose for the incompetent buffoon he is. He is far more responsible for this than Palin....or as an NYU Psychology Professor said on Night Line last night...John Lennon has as about as much culpability to what happen as Palin.

I can fill 40 pages to fill with more incendiary language by the dunces on MSNBC than anything Palin ever said. All this might be a constructive debate in the abstract, but we haven't even had the fucking funerals yet.

[onmyknees]

Seems like eveybody has an opinion on the Arizona tradgey...Here Spike Lee, brilliant filmaker, avid NY Knicks fan, and political moron adds his two cents..."The Most Violent Country in The History of the World" !! Really Spike??


http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=hd6UqGSUpr

[trish]

Though it is not causal, the connection is obvious to everyone. That's why Sarah took down her targets. That's why the right, usually the first to politicize every event, immediate cried, "Please don't politicize this." The "this" they're referring to was an botched political assassination that ended in disaster for twenty people. The tragedy was the confluence of he solicitous speech of Palin, Angle and others, the call to brings firearms to town meetings and political gatherings, the virtual non-existence of gun laws in the U.S. and especially in Arizona, and one lunatic web surfer. We all knew something like this was going to happen. It was just a matter of where and when.

[Faldur]

Ya Democrats never use targets for anything like Sarah.


An October 23, quote from Rep. Paul Kanjorski - D Pa. "That Scott down there that's running for governor of Florida," Mr. Kanjorski said. "Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him."

* Obama: “They Bring a Knife…We Bring a Gun”
** Obama to His Followers: “Get in Their Faces!”
** Obama on ACORN Mobs: “I don’t want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry! I’m angry!”
** Obama to His Mercenary Army: “Hit Back Twice As Hard”
** Obama on the private sector: “We talk to these folks… so I know whose ass to kick.“
** Obama to voters: Republican victory would mean “hand to hand combat”
** Obama to lib supporters: “It’s time to Fight for it.”
** Obama to Latino supporters: “Punish your enemies.”
** Obama to democrats: “I’m itching for a fight.”

New Hampshire Democratic State Representative Timothy Horrigan posted on Facebook his wish Sarah Palin and Levy Johnson would have been onboard the airplane crash that killed former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens. Horrigan wrote "a dead Palin would be even more dangerous than a live one...she is all about her myth" and if she was dead, she wouldn't the target of the liberals attempting to embarrass her.

And nobody seemed to want to touch the movie "Death of a President", how would democrats react if there was a movie out there depicting the assassination of Barak Obama? Everyone seemed to turn a blind eye when it was George W. Bush. And how about a book entitled "The Assassination of Barack Obama"? Would that disturb any of you liberals? How about Nicholson Baker's book, "Checkpoint", (but it was Nicholson Baker's Checkpoint, in which one the characters is obsessed with the idea of assassinating sitting president George jr. Bush, that provoked the strongest reactions and greatest outrage). You seem to ignore these items as if Bush deserved death? And you have the audacity to talk about hate speech? Lets address some of the things you completely turned your back to in the past.

[onmyknees]

<B>

This morning on “Good Morning America,” ABC’s Ashleigh Banfield sat down with Zach Osler, a high school friend of Jared Loughner, the suspect in the Tucson massacre.
Osler says his friend wasn’t shooting at people, “he was shooting at the world.” Regarding the high-pitched talk radio and cable news political rhetoric, Osler says his friend didn’t even watch the news.

He did not watch TV. He disliked the news. He didn’t listen to political radio. He didn’t take sides. He wasn’t on the left. He wasn’t on the right.


Good Move Sheriff Boob-Nick. Make false outrageous accusations and enflame passions to suit your political agenda.

</B>

[onmyknees]

Paul Krugman NY Times/ Premier left wing flame thrower was the first to use this tradgey for his own sick, twisted ajenda.

Posted at 6:27 pm by Glenn Reynolds


HAVE YOU NO DECENCY, SIR?

I also agree that this may be a tipping point in Krugman’s disgraceful career as a columnist. For one thing, he is intellectually lazy and seems to operate on the principle that a Krugman assertion is, ipso facto, an established fact. He rarely buttresses his assertions with evidence. His one bit of evidence that ”eliminationist rhetoric” in American political life is overwhelmingly on the right was to quote Rep. Michelle Bachmann as saying that people who oppose the Obama agenda should be “armed and dangerous.”
Far worse, however, he is intellectually dishonest. Even the Times’s first public editor, Daniel Okrent, said that Krugman has a “disturbing habit of shaping, slicing and selectively citing numbers in a fashion that pleases his acolytes but leaves him open to substantive assaults.” He is no less cavalier with quotes. As John Hinderaker at Power Line shows, complete with a recording of the entire interview, Michelle Bachmann was merely using a metaphor. She was holding a town hall meeting with constituents regarding the cap-and-trade bill and said, “I’m going to have materials for people when they leave. I want people armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax, because we need to fight back.” She was arming them with information, not bullets, so they could successfully oppose a terrible bill, not shoot politicians.
On June 19, 1954, Joseph Welch asked Senator Joe McCarthy, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?” It turned out to be the tipping point in McCarthy’s career, the moment when public opinion turned decisively against him. By the end of the year, he had been censured by the Senate. He died a few years later, the object of public scorn, which he remains for most.
I hope that Krugman’s column on Monday, when he shamelessly used a tragedy to smear his political opponents, will be his have-you-no-decency-sir moment. He deserves one. He is the Joe McCarthy of our times.

[onmyknees]

Though it is not causal, the connection is obvious to everyone. That's why Sarah took down her targets. That's why the right, usually the first to politicize every event, immediate cried, "Please don't politicize this." The "this" they're referring to was an botched political assassination that ended in disaster for twenty people. The tragedy was the confluence of he solicitous speech of Palin, Angle and others, the call to brings firearms to town meetings and political gatherings, the virtual non-existence of gun laws in the U.S. and especially in Arizona, and one lunatic web surfer. We all knew something like this was going to happen. It was just a matter of where and when.

Inaccurate, Colossal Fail, Trish...The Right did not immediately cry "please don't politicize this"

The Facts For Your Information......A mere two hours after the shooting and about the same time the news outlets were sorting out the ever changing facts on the ground, Krugman posted his remarks. Three hours after the incident, Sheriff Dupnick took to the microphones at the first press conference . It was there he began his blame game. Check the time line Trish. The "progressives" shamefully and despicably went down this road, but none of us who pay attention were surprised. We know the tactis, they've been on display for several years now. Nothing new here.

[trish]

COLOSSAL FAIL, you just supported my claim...as the left began to politically analyze this obviously political tragedy (an attempted assassination of a Representative to Congress and a mass killing) the right was crying not to do so (knowing that no road was available to them but to pretend to take the high road).

FACT: More restrictive gun laws would have saved lives.
FACT: Politicians and pundits of both sides (but largely on the right) have been have been calling for armed revolution, secession, Second Amendment remedies and depicting their opponents as targets to be shot.
FACT: Just a few days ago the question asked by the GOP of all candidates for party leader was, "How many guns do you own?"
FACT: Six people were killed and many others wounded by an unbalanced individual who never should have been able to legally acquire a semi-automatic glock 19.

FACT: The Tucson tragedy is a confluence of irresponsible political messaging, lax firearm regulation that put a legal gun in Loughner's hand and ill-luck, as it could've happened anywhere.

[arnie666]

Though it is not causal, the connection is obvious to everyone. That's why Sarah took down her targets. That's why the right, usually the first to politicize every event, immediate cried, "Please don't politicize this." The "this" they're referring to was an botched political assassination that ended in disaster for twenty people. The tragedy was the confluence of he solicitous speech of Palin, Angle and others, the call to brings firearms to town meetings and political gatherings, the virtual non-existence of gun laws in the U.S. and especially in Arizona, and one lunatic web surfer. We all knew something like this was going to happen. It was just a matter of where and when.

If the likes of you want to end up with Palin as your next president,keep going.Palin ,the tea party, rush etc etc had absolutely nothing to do with this. I do think you people were rather quick to rush to this judgement before some time had gone by ,not only in case you got egg on your own faces in the aftermath but also because you wouldn't want to be accused of making political capital from the dead including a dead nine yr old.You should surely know by now that Palin has the annoying habit of becoming stronger from left attacks, and is best off leaving alone for her to put foot in mouth as she sometimes does. Big mistake trish and others.

Just think how this looks too people,and I don't mean politicos, or people with political agendas,I mean the ordinary 'folks'. You drew first blood over this, and the likes of Palin rush etc now are defending themselves. So any attempt they may make now to attack the left,democrats etc etc if some embarassing stuff comes out about this sheriff for instance, will be seen in this guise.

Now this is my feelings on this mess.There was not really a political motive at all. This assassination attempt and the other killings were the result of an obession of a man who was mentally ill . A deranged mind. This man had been obsessed with the congresswoman since 2007,while Palin was still in alaska persecuting homos and hanging niggers.This is not his first encounter with the congresswoman .In fact it is alleged that before this shooting spree he was extremely angry that the congresswoman has supposedly been saracastic to some degree when answering one of his insane questions. He said she was 'dead to him'. His class mates also refering to him as a left wing pot head.That isn't known as a fact as yet, but is interesting.

What is a fact ,is,that he has several convictions concerning pot use. It is proven that unstable people and pot do not go well together. It is also a fact, that several complaints had been made to local police about threats to other people before the shooting. Which were sat on by local law enforcement, for whatever reason. This might be why a democrat sheriff might be trying to pass the buck to other people.

I drew three conclusions from this.

1 I really do think America needs to find away to stop insane people having access to firearms. I disagree with mark levin actually I don't normally believe me. , if he had a knife or a bat,probably far less would have been killed or seriously injured,so mark is wrong about that. Being someone who has dealt with loons like him before. If this means more retrictive gunlaws for the mentally deranged then I think my conservative friends have to face it.

2 This doesn't just go for america but other countries in the west. We seriously do not look after the mentally ill well enough. What I mean is,this man belonged in an institution . Where was his family when he was building a devil worshipping shrine in his back yard,why didn't they know about his you tube page? Why didn't the police get him put into a state mental institution when he was making threats in the past.Or at least put him in front of a judge who could decide on what to do with him?

3 Finally, I for one am sick to death of both sides of the media and politics ,, and they are both now doing what the other side are accusing each other of over this.How the left can now ever complain about the likes of fox news or rush, after this I have no idea.We have democratic pundits openly talking about this being obamas opportunity. They know he is in trouble,they know it is unlikely he wiil get a second term.The man finds leadership difficult,he is put in the shade by clinton,his entire adminstration seems scared of fox news . Now I don't believe this constant baiting, had anything to do with this, but I do believe a strong pleasant america is more likely when both sides behave like gentlemen, It just makes people so apathetic when you have both sides behaving like 5 yr olds.

just too add, I don't think it is very wise for a sheriff, to be giving anything that a future lawyer could use to help in the lunatics defence. The sheriff should be strictly inpartial on this,whatever his personal opinions. This will not have gone unnoticed, by those at a much higher pay grade than him.Believe me.