This is terrible.
Congresswoman Shot in Tucson
by leavingwt 442 Replies latest social current
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mkr32208
Well ok maybe it's not Sarahs fault maybe this poor soul just needed to be seen by a Dr... Of course he may not have had insurance. Thank you very much republican douchebags. So maybe he should have gone to a public mental health facitlity? Oh yeah thats right St Reagan closed them all in the 1980's.
I don't care how you cut the cake the republicans still suck.
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darthfader
Great Article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599204144800
When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the handgun ban in the nation's capital in 2008, Representative Gabrielle Giffords applauded the ruling, calling gun ownership "an Arizona tradition." That she had co-signed a congressional amicus brief against the ban came as no surprise: she has always been pro-gun, and she represents a state with a history of proud gun ownership and lax gun laws.
So there is at least a touch of irony to the fact that her name is being invoked, following her attempted assassination on Saturday, in calls for tighter gun control. Paul Helmke, head of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, offered prayers for Giffords and decried "easy access to high-powered guns." New York Representative Carolyn McCarthy called the shooting "an illustration of why we must all work together to fight gun violence in America and keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of the wrong people."
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If there is anything that both sides should be able to agree on, it's that unstable individuals should not have access to any kind of weapon, much less the so-called fourth-generation semiautomatic Glock 19 that Loughner bought. This time, the price for bureaucratic torpor was too high
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Justitia Themis
I'm a Democrat, and I strongly feel this incident should not be used to table the gun control issue. Nor do I feel gun control would help. The problem is with Americans themselves. As a people, we seem to feel that arms are a legitimate way to solve problems, and we have neurotic fears about the government. We have a cowboy mentality that just is not found in other cultures.
The problem isn't guns. The problem is the fact that Americans have 'issues.' Since it is a mental/emotional problem, we will never be able to formulate a legislative solution.
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BizzyBee
The problem is a mentally unbalanced person being able to buy a semi-automatic weapon and take down 20-some people in a matter of seconds.
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NeckBeard
Like 40% of Democrats, Loughner was a 9/11 Truther
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NeckBeard
The progressive “climate of hate:” An illustrated primer, 2000-2010
Getty has since yanked the photo, but as one commenter who saw the photo at Getty’s site before it was yanked noted: “To see that image presented as if it were completely normal and purchasable was shocking.”
Flashback — trendy “ABORT Sarah Palin” stickers:
Flashback — Palin-hating artwork designating her an “M.I.L.P.” (Mother I’d Like to Punch). Hat tip: Edge of Forever:
Flashback — Palin Derangement Syndrome mobsters in Philly: “Let’s stone her, old school”
Flashback — Madonna bashing Sarah Palin and shrieking “I will kick her ass:”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBAAW2e3Z08
Flashback — Sandra Bernhard bashing Sarah Palin and cursing her head off with hate warping her crazed face:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN6TDGOd3Y8II. BUSH HATE
Flashback — anti-Bush assassination chic, covered extensively in Unhinged and on this blog:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPIP-i3sdVk
Flashback — deranged left-wing photographer Jill Greenberg sabotaging an Atlantic magazine photo shoot of John McCain and defacing the pictures on her website:
Flashback — “F**k the rich:” Class-war arsonist on the loose
Flashback — Anti-war, anti-Bush loons attack girl in wheelchair
Flashback — Gems from Journolist…“F—ing Nascar retards…”; “Sarah Spitz, producer of the KCRW public radio program ‘Left, Right and Center,’ which is heard on a number of NPR stations across the country, wrote on JournoList that if she witnessed Limbaugh dying of a heart attack, she would ‘laugh loudly like a maniac and watch his eyes bug out.’”
Flashback — “I hope Glenn Beck kills himself”
Flashback — The Democrat Rep. Pete Stark Raving Mad archive
Flashback — Malik Zulu Shabazz, “Prepare for war”
Flashback — 2007 New Black Panther Party block party rap: “bang for freedom,” “put the bang right into a cracker’s face,” and if you’re going to bang, bang for black power… hang a cracker [unintelligible] . . .if you’re going to bang, bang on the white devil. . . . burying him near the river bank with the right shovel. . . . community revolution in progress…. banging for crackers to go to hell, we don’t need em:”
Death of a PresidentIII. MISC. ANTI-TEA PARTY/GOP/CONSERVATIVE HATE
Flashback — Unhinged Perriello/Obama supporter rips up GOP signs, screams “You f**king House nigger white-black bitch!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SykRrQlpgLs
Flashback — The insane rage of the same-sex marriage mob
Before election day, national media hand-wringers forged a wildly popular narrative: The Right was, in the words of New York Times’ columnist Paul Krugman, gripped by “insane rage.” Outbreaks of incivility (some real, but mostly imagined) were proof positive of the extremist takeover of the Republican Party. The cluck-cluckers and tut-tutters shook in fear.
But when the GOP took a beating on Nov. 4, no mass protests ensued. No nationwide boycotts erupted. Conservatives took their lumps and began the peaceful post-defeat process of self-flagellation, self-analysis, and self-autopsy. In fact, there’s only one angry mob gripped by “insane rage” in the wake of campaign 2008: The mob of left-wing, same-sex marriage activists incensed at their defeat in California. Voters there approved a traditional marriage initiative, Proposition 8, by 52-48.
Instead of introspection and self-criticism, however, the sore losers who opposed Prop. 8 have responded with threats, fists, and blacklists.
That’s right. Activists have published an “Anti-Gay Black List” of Prop. 8 donors on the Internet. If the tables had been turned and Prop. 8 proponents created such an enemies’ list, everyone in Hollywood would be screaming “McCarthyism” faster than you can count to eight. A Los Angeles restaurant whose manager made a small donation to the Prop. 8 campaign has been besieged nightly by hordes of protesters who have disrupted the business, intimidated patrons, and brought employees there to tears. In fear for their jobs and their lives, workers at El Coyote Mexican Café pooled together $500 to pay off the bullies.
Scott Eckern, a beleaguered artistic director at the California Musical Theatre, was forced to resign over his $1,000 donation to the Prop. 8 campaign. The director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, Rich Raddon , is next on the chopping block after the anti-Prop. 8 mob discovered that he had also contributed to the Yes on 8 campaign. Calls have been pouring in for his firing.
Over the past two weeks, anti-Prop. 8 organizers have targeted Mormon, Catholic, and evangelical churches. Sentiments like this one, found on the anti-Prop.8 website “JoeMyGod,” are common across the left-wing blogosphere: “Burn their f—ing churches to the ground, and then tax the charred timbers.” Thousands of gay-rights demonstrators stood in front of the Mormon temple in Los Angeles shouting “Mormon scum.” The Mormon headquarters in Salt Lake City received threatening letters containing an unidentified powder. Religious-bashing protesters filled with hate decried the “hate” at Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church in Orange County, Calif. Vandals defaced the Calvary Chapel in Chino Hills, Calif., because church members had collected Prop. 8 petitions. One worshiper’s car was keyed with the slogans “Gay sex is love” and “SEX;” another car’s antenna and windshield wipers were broken.
Anti-Prop. 8 radicals chase Christian evangelists out of San Francisco’s Castro district:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrRxFoBSPng
Anti-Prop. 8 radicals stomp on elderly Prop. 8 supporter’s cross:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmMpPS8IRT0
Flashback — Anti-Prop. 8 mob rings in 2009 with more church vandalism
Flashback — Climate of hate: More threats from the gay marriage mob
Flashback — NYTimes finally acknowledges that anti-Prop. 8 mob is harassing traditional marriage supporters
IV. ANTI-CONSERVATIVE FEMALE HATE
Flashback — The Playboy hatef**k list (screencapped in full here – NSFW)
Flashback — Sex, Violence and Hate: the Top 10 Most Disgusting Attacks on Conservative Women
Flashback — Montel Williams to GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann:
WILLIAMS (1:30:32): Michele, slit your wrist.
Go ahead… or, do us all a better thing [sic].
Move that knife up about two feet.
Start right at the collarbone.
Flashback — The four stages of conservative female abuse
Flashback — The Ladies of the Spew “bitch” and moan
Flashback — Laura Bush hatred at the SFChronicle
Flashback — Another day, another hate wish
Flashback — “The bitch is dead meat.”
V. LEFT-WING MOB HATE — campus, anti-war radicals, ACORN, eco-extremists & unions
Left-wing mob shuts down speech at Columbia University…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuNXmy0e5fc&Left-wing mob shuts down speech at UNC-Chapel Hill…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaTkGgE-hXA
Left-wing mob blocks military shipments in Olympia, WA…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dM2tNL_roBY
Left-wing mob illegally trespasses and breaks into a home in Baltimore in the name of “social justice”…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRrHZGTdhKw
VIII. And finally, the ever-growing Unhinged Mugshot Collection
Gainsville, Fla., Democrat David P. McCally was charged with battery after he allegedly barged into a local GOP office, assaulted a cardboard cutout of President Bush, and punched a local Republican chairman in September 2004. (Credit: Alachua County Jail.)
In March 2004, Carol Lang, a campus secretary at City College in New York, reportedly assaulted a police officer trying to arrest unruly anti-war protesters. Police arrested Lang and charged her with second-degree assault, disorderly conduct, and obstructing governmental administration. (Credit: New York Police Department.)At the same protest at which Carol Lang was arrested, police arrested students Justin Rodriguez, left, and Nicholas Bergreen. They charged Rodriguez with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct. They charged Bergreen with assaulting a police officer. (Credit: New York Police Department.)
Police arrested Corey Robert Cooke of Ellicott City, Md., in September 2004 and charged him with malicious destruction of property after he allegedly used a power tool to cut down a Bush-Cheney sign. (Credit: Howard County Police Department.)Howard County, Md., police arrested Peter Lizon, left, and Stephanie Louise Lizon in October 2004 and charged them with malicious destruction of property. Mr. Lizon allegedly destroyed Bush-Cheney signs with a bayonet. His wife allegedly acted as the lookout. (Credit: Howard County Police.)
Nashville police arrested Andrew Thurman, left, and Frederick Stevenson in Septmeber 2004 and charged them with theft and unlawful weapons possession after they found guns and 71 Bush-Cheney signs in Thurman’s car. Policy say they stole the signs from Nashville, Tenn., yards because Thurman was angry at President Bush for sending his brother to Iraq. (Credit: Nashville Police Department.)
Nathan Winkler of Tampa, Fla., was arrested and charged with aggravated stalking in March 2005 for allegedly terrorizing a mother who had a Bush-Cheney bumper sticker on her car. Click on the video here to listen to an excerpt of the mother’s frantic call to 911. Winkler reportedly had a handmade sign in his window that read, “Never forget Bush’s illegal oil war murdered thousands in Iraq.” (Credit: Tampa Police Department.)
Florida Democrat Barry Seltzer allegedly tried to run down congresswoman Katherine Harris with his Cadillac as she was campaigning in Sarasota, Fla., in October 2004. See the arrest reporthere. (Credit: Sarasota Police Department via The Smoking Gun.)
In April 2005, Earlham College suspended Josh Medlin after he threw an ice cream pie at Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol. Medlin pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor battery charge two weeks ago. (Credit: Indianapolis Police Department.)
In March 2005, Western Michigan University police arrested Samuel Mesick and charged him with a misdemeanor charge of disturbing the peace after Mesick threw a cup of salad dressing on Pat Buchanan. Buchanan chose not to press felony assault charges. Click here to see video footage of the attack. (Credit: Kalamazoo Police Department.)
Police cited Bruce Charles of Portland for disorderly conduct after Charles threw a shoe at former Pentagon adviser Richard Perle in February 2005. (Credit: Portland Police Department.)
In April 2005, Indianapolis police arrested Joshua Miner of Danville, Ind., on charges of criminal mischief, a felony. Miner allegedly smashed glass panels at a monument to Medal of Honor recipients. (Credit: Indianapolis Police Department.)
In May 2005, police arrested Ajai Raj and charged him with disorderly conduct after he asked a vulgar question and made lewd hand gestures after a speech by conservative author Ann Coulter at the University of Texas at Austin. Read the arrest report here. (Credit: The Smoking Gun.)
Sowande Ajumoke Omokunde, son of congresswoman Gwen Moore (D-Milwaukee), was one of five paid Kerry campaign workers in Milwaukee who allegedly slashed the tires of 20 vans that had been rented by Wisconsin Republicans as part of their Election Day 2004 get-out-the-vote effort. (Credit: Milwaukee County Police.)
Michael Pratt, son of former Milwaukee mayor Marvin Pratt, is another alleged tire-slasher. (Credit: Milwaukee County Police.)Three other alleged tire-slashers: Lewis Caldwell (top-left), Justin Howell (top-right), and Lavelle Mohammed (bottom). (Credit: Milwaukee County Police.)
In March 2004, Claremont McKenna College visiting professor of psychology Kerri Dunn falsely claimed she discovered anti-Semitic, anti-black, anti-woman graffiti spray-painted on her 1992 Honda Civic. Dunn was convicted of two felony counts of attemped insurance fraud and one misdemeanor count of filing a false police report. (Credit: Claremont Police Department.)
Phillip Edgar Smith, left, and William Zachary Wolff were arrested after they threw custard cream pies at conservative author Ann Coulter during her speech at the University of Arizona in October 2004. Read the arrest report here. (Credit: Pima County Jail via The Smoking Gun.)
December 2009 – Palin-hater Jeremy Olson arrested for attempted assault and disorderly conduct after hurling two tomatoes at the Alaska governor from a second-floor mall balcony in Minnesota. He missed and hit a cop. Olson was cheered as a “hero” by Palin-haters.
August 2010 — Michael Enright, liberal interfaith film company volunteer, stabbed a Muslim NYC cabbie and faces trial this year.Liberals rushed to hang the entire Right for the crime.As I said last summer: “They cannot help themselves. Wasn’t it just a few hours ago that I blogged about another act of Democrat vandalism falsely blamed on the the Tea Party? Why yes, yes it was. From GOP fake hate crime hoaxer Ashley Todd to suicide census worker Bill Sparkman, there remains an unrestrained impulse among too many to falsely scream political violence when it doesn’t exist — and to ignore itwhere it does exist…But like I said just a few hours ago and like I’ll certainly have to say again and again and again in the future: Being a Tea Party-bashing liberal means never having to say you’re sorry for smearing conservative dissent.”
Flashback — Why Sarah Palin Incites Near-Violent Rage In Normally Reasonable Women.
Flashback — the Democratic Underground indulging in name-calling the MSM ignores:
Reader Monica M. sent me a link to the Democratic Underground’s latest thread for commenters to come up with nicknames and posters to slime GOP Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — and then to “spread [them] all over the ‘net.” There are now nearly 100 filthy, hate-filled responses and counting. Among the “nicer” entries: “Cruella,” “Gidget,” “Governor Jesus Camp,” “VPILF,” “Fertilla the Huntress,” “Iditabroad,” and “KILLER PYSCHO FUNDIE BITCH FROM HELL!!”
…Peer with me further into the liberal sinkhole again and behold P.D.S. in full bloom. Note that this site is raising money for Barack Obama and that an ad for their fundraiser appears at the top of the thread. Is Obama going to accept their cash? Know your enemy:
…The Photoshop entries getting thumbs up from DU commenters:
And the sickest attack of them all — mocking Palin for being anursing mom:
The Tuscon massacre ghouls who are now trying to criminalize conservatism have forced our hand.
They need to be reminded. You need to be reminded.
Confront them. Don’t be cowed into silence.
And don’t let the media whitewash the sins of the hypocritical Left in theirnaked attempt to suppress the law-abiding, constitutionally-protected, peaceful, vigorous political speech of the Right.
They want to play tu quo que in the middle of a national tragedy? They asked for it. They got it.
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The progressive climate of hate: A comprehensive illustrated primer in 8 parts:
I. PALIN HATE
II. BUSH HATE
III. MISC. TEA PARTY/GOP/ANTI-TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE HATE
IV. ANTI-CONSERVATIVE FEMALE HATE
V. LEFT-WING MOB HATE — campus, anti-war radicals, ACORN, eco-extremists, & unions
VI. OPEN-BORDERS HATE
VII. ANTI-MILITARY HATE
VIII. HATE: CRIMES — the ever-growing Unhinged Mugshot Collection***
I. PALIN HATEFlashback — pointing a fake gun at the head of a Sarah Palin likeness sitting next to a cardboard cutout of her daughter in a museum display:
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BurnTheShips
I'm a Democrat, and I strongly feel this incident should not be used to table the gun control issue. Nor do I feel gun control would help. The problem is with Americans themselves. As a people, we seem to feel that arms are a legitimate way to solve problems, and we have neurotic fears about the government. We have a cowboy mentality that just is not found in other cultures.
The problem isn't guns. The problem is the fact that Americans have 'issues.' Since it is a mental/emotional problem, we will never be able to formulate a legislative solution.
Apparently, you are ignorant of the violence taking place in Europe lately. America is not unique.
BTS
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beksbks
You don't see the difference in a heated protest by thousands of citizens, against a government action (which will always result in damage and injury at some level) and an individual that is so desperate/fearful/hopeless that they turn to mass murder and usually suicide?
You don't see the difference in this rhetoric coming from the R & F as opposed to the LEADERSHIP?
'THERE IS A NEED FOR SOME REFLECTION HERE'.... As the political world continues to monitor developments in Tucson, there have been some interesting responses from the right, beyond the condolences and well wishes.
There's a contingent that seems intent on trying to somehow characterize Jared Lee Loughner as some sort of liberal, as part of a he's-not-on-my-team instinct. There's a larger group that seems defensive about the very idea of associating rhetorical excesses on the right with political violence. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) was asked this morning by CNN's Candy Crowley about Sarah Palin's notorious "crosshairs" graphic, and he seemed rather annoyed about the question. Alexander concluded, "I think the way to get away from it is for you not to be talking about it."
But I noticed one Republican senator who took a more constructive line with Politico.
Others acknowledged what they called an unavoidable reality -- flamboyant or incendiary anti-government rhetoric of the sort used by many conservative politicians, commentators and tea party activists for the time being will carry a stigma.
A senior Republican senator, speaking anonymously in order to freely discuss the tragedy, told POLITICO that the Giffords shooting should be taken as a "cautionary tale" by Republicans.
"There is a need for some reflection here -- what is too far now?" said the senator. "What was too far when Oklahoma City happened is accepted now. There's been a desensitizing. These town halls and cable TV and talk radio, everybody's trying to outdo each other."
The vast majority of tea party activists, this senator said, ought not be impugned.
"They're talking about things most mainstream Americans are talking about, like spending and debt," the Republican said, before adding that politicians of all stripes need to emphasize in the coming days that "tone matters."
"And the Republican Party in particular needs to reinforce that," the senator said.
That seems like a fairly sensible approach.
But let's not lose sight of the context -- in the 21st century, a Republican senator who wants to convey a basic observation about rhetorical excesses, has to do so anonymously. We've reached the point at which a GOP senator wants to say that "tone matters," but can't quite bring himself/herself to say so on the record.
That, it seems to me, is about as significant as the sentiment itself.
"There is a need for some reflection here." Here's hoping the senator's wish comes true.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2011_01/027455.php
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BizzyBee
The false equivalency should be addressed if we are to make any progress. This is from Paul Krugman:
Where’s that toxic rhetoric coming from? Let’s not make a false pretense of balance: it’s coming, overwhelmingly, from the right. It’s hard to imagine a Democratic member of Congress urging constituents to be “armed and dangerous” without being ostracized; but Representative Michele Bachmann, who did just that, is a rising star in the G.O.P.
And there’s a huge contrast in the media. Listen to Rachel Maddow or Keith Olbermann, and you’ll hear a lot of caustic remarks and mockery aimed at Republicans. But you won’t hear jokes about shooting government officials or beheading a journalist at The Washington Post. [Or poisoning the Speaker of the House] Listen to Glenn Beck or Bill O’Reilly, and you will.
Of course, the likes of Mr. Beck and Mr. O’Reilly are responding to popular demand. Citizens of other democracies may marvel at the American psyche, at the way efforts by mildly liberal presidents to expand health coverage are met with cries of tyranny and talk of armed resistance. Still, that’s what happens whenever a Democrat occupies the White House, and there’s a market for anyone willing to stoke that anger.
But even if hate is what many want to hear, that doesn’t excuse those who pander to that desire. They should be shunned by all decent people.
Unfortunately, that hasn’t been happening: the purveyors of hate have been treated with respect, even deference, by the G.O.P. establishment. As David Frum, the former Bush speechwriter, has put it, “Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and now we’re discovering we work for Fox.”
So will the Arizona massacre make our discourse less toxic? It’s really up to G.O.P. leaders. Will they accept the reality of what’s happening to America, and take a stand against eliminationist rhetoric? Or will they try to dismiss the massacre as the mere act of a deranged individual, and go on as before?
If Arizona promotes some real soul-searching, it could prove a turning point. If it doesn’t, Saturday’s atrocity will be just the beginning.
