Shocked . . . but not Surprised

I just heard the horrible news that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D. AZ) has been shot and killed at a constituent event in Tucson.  Evidently five four people have been killed in the same incident, and seven others wounded.  (Updated: Although CNN reported that Giffords was dead, they appear to have walked that back.  They are now saying that she was shot and is in surgery.)  

Details are unknown at this point -- there is some talk that the assailant is a 21-year old male -- but I think it's fair to say that an environment in which it is acceptable for people to openly carry weapons at political events is one in which this sort of thing is bound to happen.

I am going to bite my tongue and learn more facts before I say more, although I have a gut reaction about the kinds of influences likely to have motivated the shooter to exercise his Second Amendment remedies  

This is really horrible news.  Our thoughts go out to the families of all of the victims.   

 

Comments

[Lisa Simeone]

Horrible.

And from the NYT:

She has held several events since first taking office in January 2007. At one such event in 2009, a protester was removed by police when his pistol fell on the supermarket floor.

[beckya57]

TPM is saying the hospital is saying she's still alive and in surgery. All we can do is hope and pray. I'm having all the same thoughts about both our idiotic lack of gun control and also about all the overheated rhetoric of the last few years. David Neiwart, who knows a lot more about this stuff than just about anyone else, keeps referring to a lot of the talk as "eliminationist," and I'm hard put to disagree with him.

[Lisa Simeone]

From a commenter at HuffPo, and go over to see the image he/she has reproduced of this wretched ad:

2:30 PM ET Chilling
While there is no hard evidence at this point to suggest that the shooting was politically motivated, Matt Yglesias points out that an anti-Giffords event was held in June with the billing: "Get on Target for Victory in November. Help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office. Shoot a fully automatic M16 with Jesse Kelly."
Rep. Giffords was also on Sarah Palin's "target list."
As noted earlier, a gun was dropped at a Giffords event in 2009, and her office was vandalized in March.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/08/gabrielle-giffords-dead-dies_n_806220.html#22_chilling

[Lisa Simeone]

Again, from the NYT article, updated:

Dr. Steven Rayle, a former emergency room doctor who now works in a hospice, said that he had witnessed the shootings. He said the congresswoman was standing behind a table outside the Safeway greeting passersby when the gunman approached her from behind, held a gun about a foot from her head and began firing.

. “He must have got off 20 rounds,” he said. Ms. Giffords slumped to the ground and staff members immediately rushed to her aid, Dr. Rayle said.

Dr. Rayle said he performed CPR on some of the victims. He said one of the victims was a young child and appeared to be in critical condition with a gunshot wound.

He said that one of the staffers tackled the gunman and that he and others helped detain the suspect. The doctor described the gunman as a white male in his mid-20s with short hair and “dressed in a shabby manner.”

[Sir Charles]

The irresponsible and eliminationist rhetoric from the right has been deeply disturbing -- especially since the 2008 election.

I want to see who the shooter was though before getting too far down this road. Again, I have a gut feeling, but I am trying to exercise restraint.

[Lisa Simeone]

Just updated on the NYT 2 mins ago (and sorry I forgot to italicize other quotation above):

Ms. Giffords, 40, was shot in the head, the witnesses said. She was taken to the University Medical Center in Tucson, where a spokeswoman, Darci Slaten, said around 1 p.m. local time that she was in surgery. At a news conference several hours later, an official with the Pima County Sheriff’s Department said that six people had been killed and 18 wounded in the shooting. Among the six dead was a child, but officials did not comment on Ms. Giffords’s condition.

Richard Kastigar, a supervisor with the sheriff’s department, identified the gunman as a 22-year-old “with limited law enforcement experience.”

Witnesses said Ms. Giffords was speaking to constituents when a man ran up and began firing. He then tried to escape on foot but was tackled by a bystander and taken into custody by the police.

[Lisa Simeone]

AP sources: Ariz. gunman ID’ed as Jared Laughner

Read more: http://www.sunherald.com/2011/01/07/2762087/ap-sources-ariz-gunman-ided-as.html#ixzz1ATtwZAGQ

[Sir Charles]

Thanks Lisa.

[oddjob]

Associated Press story on the shooting.

[Corvus]

Just read the AP article oddjob linked to. (Thanks oddjob). It sounds like it was definitely an assassination attempt, but based on the quotes from the gunman, it sounds like he may have been schizophrenic (or maybe just talking in hyperbole).

[Sir Charles]

Guy sounds like a nut job based on the stuff I've seen at both Josh Marshall's and Sully's.

[beckya57]

I looked at the article too, and there are hints of a possible psychotic process in his statements, but obviously one can't diagnosis based on a few quotes (I'm a mental health professional). I find the fact that one of the victims was a judge who was involved in immigration cases very disturbing, along with the congresswoman's apparent advocacy against the new Arizona immigration law. The rhetoric in that part of the country on those issues has been very overheated for a while now, IMHO.

[oddjob]

Guy sounds like a nut job based on the stuff I've seen at both Josh Marshall's and Sully's.

I haven't yet gone to TPM, but just came from Sully's live blogging and was going to say the same. I'm reminded not so much of Timothy McVeigh as I am of John Hinckley, Jr. (who tried to assassinate Ronald Reagan in an attempt to impress Jody Foster - because he was insane and so didn't realize assassinating the US president wouldn't achieve that goal).

[Corvus]

I just read the latest updates at Sully's place (he's always at his best in liveblogging mode), and I came away with the impression that while the guy is plainly crazy, the brands of far-right rhetoric have had a huge influence on his recent thinking. Lots of quotes about gold and silver and rejection federalism but look at the constitution. He looks like someone who is just influenced by parnoid extremist talk, whether it's right or left (Communist Manifesto among his favorite books). But right now, far-right is the variety of extremist talk in the air, so that's what he went for.

The reason you don't talk like Sarah Palin talks is because of the kind of influence it has on people like this.

[Corvus]

Also, a nine year old girl. Jesus.

[kathy a.]

wow, this is horrible. was out of touch for a while today, and when i got off the train, it was hard to tell what happened from the radio news. there was some talk of things he had posted on "social media" indicating mental imbalance.

i share concerns that this congresswoman may have been picked as a target because of political issues that, as becky noted, have had superheated rhetoric recently. it's impossible to know right now if the judge was also a target or was a bystander. the sheer number of shooting victims is really horrifying.

also, i hate guns, and this is one reason why. why would civilians need a semi-automatic with an extended clip, capable of doing this much damage so very fast?

[Sir Charles]

Becky and Corvus,

I think there is no doubt that all of the overheated rhetoric from the right is dangerous and could induce the not quite right in the head to this sort of thing.

I'd like to see someone ask that asshole Sharron Angle if this is what she had in mind when using the phrase "Second Amendment remedies."

The whole thing is really sad and sickening.

[Sir Charles]

kathy,

There's no reason anyone needs a gun in my mind -- and especially these semi-automatic pistols with oversized clips that are capable of doing all kinds of carnage.

[oddjob]

Now that she's not running for office I think Sharon might feel more comfortable in acknowledging her thoughts about such matters, assuming she got to say them in front of a sympathetic audience.

[ballgame]

Good coverage of this at FDL, including a post with an MSNBC interview of Giffords (from early last year) discussing her office being vandalized.

[kathy a.]

ballgame, that is a great interview in the FDL link.

[litbrit]

Only now hearing about this, having been offline all afternoon and evening.

My heart goes out to the victims' families. I wish them justice forthwith. And some sort of peace, one day.

We will no doubt learn about this man's background soon enough; what I've read already does not surprise me. A few years ago, I wrote Treating the numbers, not the soldiers, a post about the staggering actual numbers of the cases of PTSD among veterans of these two recent wars in the Middle East, and how soldiers presenting as clearly disturbed and in need of help were instead cleared for repeated deployments.

According to the author of the article from which I quoted, the chronically under-reported numbers belie a darker reality in which many veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and their families, do not fare very well in the years following their combat service. Some have committed suicide; others have beaten and abused their spouses or committed other violent crimes, and/or fallen into addictions, often abusing a variety of substances in their quest to forget and obliterate.

And a few became murderers.

Via my friend Michael, here is an article in the Arizona Daily Star which features a photo of the gunman at a book festival, of all things.

[kathy a.]

i lost a post, with links and everything. but it was about something now widely reported, i think -- the vote on health care repeal scheduled for this week has been suspended. rep. giffords was the subject of threats and an attack on her office, immediately following her vote for health care reform.

stephen -- reponding to your later post -- there is not enough to prosecute the loudmouths for using violent rhetoric. but this horrible event should certainly make us all pause and consider. sure, he might be a seriously mentally ill person who hasn't gotten care; but one is all it takes, and some people take rhetorical violence more literally than others.

there are already reports that this guy will be facing the death penalty. [potentially on both state and federal charges.] i think it is worthwhile to consider the implications before saying the loudmouths deserve the same or more -- i agree totally that those named were way out of line, that they are inflammatory and thoughtless. i think they should be run out of their power positions, and/or allowed to demonstrate their idiocy publicly. but i'd argue that we should be more careful with our words than they are with theirs.

litbrit, i'd urge caution on the reports of military service, since i ran across some different information in searches now lost -- that he tried to enlist in 2008 and was turned away for undisclosed reasons. i just don't know enough yet. initial reports of this story said that rep. giffords was dead, and that wasn't true.

this is just another heartbreaking day. my heart is with all those hurt and killed, with their families and friends. we need to find better ways to stop this senseless violence. i can't help but think that there are a number of paths we already know; and that harsher punishment has been proven ineffective in such cases.

[kathy a.]

here is commentary from a former aide of nancy pelosi, about the increase in extremist and hate speech.

there has been an increase in violent threats against lawmakers this past year. judges, too -- although they think the judge killed in this violent spree was not targeted, he just happened to be there to support his friend and congresswoman. either way -- how it is good that public officials are getting huge numbers of violent threats?

[oddjob]

kathy a., I haven't read your links, but your comment nonetheless reminds me of Sully's "Quote For The Day" for today, which I copy & paste here:

"In that third year of the Kennedy Presidency a kind of fever lay over Dallas County. Mad things happened. Huge billboards screamed “Impeach Earl Warren.” Jewish stores were smeared with crude swastikas. Fanatical young matrons swayed in public to the chant, “Stevenson’s going to die–his heart will stop, stop, stop and he will burn, burn burn!” Radical Right polemics were distributed in public schools; Kennedy’s name was booed in classrooms; junior executives were required to attend radical seminars. Dallas had become the mecca for medicine-show evangelists of the National Indignation Convention, the Christian Crusaders, the Minutemen, the John Birch and Patrick Henry societies . . .

In Dallas a retired major general flew the American flag upside down in front of his house, and when, on Labor Day of 1963, the Stars and Stripes were hoisted right side up outside his own home by County Treasurer Warren G. Harding–named by Democratic parents for a Republican President in an era when all Texas children were taught to respect the Presidency, regardless of party–Harding was accosted by a physician’s son, who remarked bitterly, “That’s the Democrat flag. Why not just run up the hammer and sickle while you’re at it?" - William Manchester, Death of a President.

[oddjob]

(Actually, it was for Jan. 8, '11, not Jan. 9, '11.)

[oddjob]

Regarding Rep. Giffords, apparently there is room for cautious optimism.

[Corvus]

I am feeling very optimistic for Giffords chances right now, but that is basically my version of sending out good thoughts (or prayers) into the world.

I am really, really hoping she makes it through this.

[Krubozumo Nyankoye]

What a difference a day makes.

I understand the reluctance to jump to conclusions about the specific motives of the assassin. Let's assume he was just mentally imbalanced and hateful enough to commit murder. But from what little I have been able to read and absorb about this event he chose his target with deliberation, undertook his crime with a weapon specially modified to achieve as much death and damage as possible in as short a time as possible and tried to get away.

Words matter. In the case of garden variety terrorism of flying airplanes into buildings we easily conclude that Osama bin Laden was responsible but the evidence is what exactly? And is it not tainted somewhat by the fact that said evidence was at least in part obtained by torture? Wasn't there also cited a lot of evidence to the effect that he (OBL) had a powerful accomplice, namely Saddam Hussein? How did that work out?

So how can we now conclude that the inciteful speech and deliberately provactive dehumanization of the present climate and this so-called "random act of violence" are totally disconnected?

This is terrorism as well and not just garden variety, it was incited by the actions and words of some in the US. What is the purpose of such terrorism? It seems rather obvious, to obstruct and if possible render impossible the function of democratic government. To instill such a climate of fear and intimidation that no sade person will dare take a political position that might garner such attention from some other random insane person.

I recall that during the 2008 campaign in response to Palin's invidious slanders of Obama at rallies audience members shouted out things like "kill him!". To my knowledge she never once admonished those overt cries for murder. To my knowledge hardly anyone in the Republican party even acknowledged that they occurred.

So far as I can tell, there are other symptomatic traits about the whole right wing that make me suspect they can accept this type of violence because they themselves are cautious enough not to voice it directly, but with a wink and a nod say to themselves, but it works in my favor. One outstanding example is that violence goes hand in hand with propaganda, defined as big, constantly repeated, carefully constructed lies. Does Obama is not a citizen, Obama is a muslim, Obama is a communist, Obama wants to destroy America, compare with anything said by anyone on the left about anyone on the right?

So having the benefit of coming in late as usual, I have to say that this sad and singularly ugly thing was surely intended by all those who for over two years have coyly insinuated that it *should* happen. The lies from the right are almost ubiquitous. Social Security is responsible for the deficit. ACORN broke the law. ACORN was involved in voter fraud. Democrats steal elections. Taking tangible steps to internalize the true costs of burning 34 million barrells a day of expensive and precariously available oil is a global conspiracy among a few thousand climate geeks to get rich off government grants. Death Panels.

Every single success, small or large, emboldens the liars and terrorists. If we don't stand up to them and treat them for what they are, we are only in for more of the same, and worse. I have to agree with Stphen, there are people who bear responsibility, they must be named, they must be condemned, they must be marginalized, rendered toxic.

Those Republicans who trade on this sort of behavior in order to garner political power and advantage are not anti-democrat (to use one of their favorite slurs) they are anti-democracy.

One last thing, I have no recollection of any attempt in the US to assassinate a woman. I could certainly be wrong, I haven't encyclopedic knowledge.

I would go on, but I can't.

[Corvus]

One last thing, I have no recollection of any attempt in the US to assassinate a woman.

Holy shit, I have no recollection as well. In a weird, twisted, fuck-up way, I suppose that counts as a step forward. But, maybe it's just the chauvinist in me, but it feels like a step back as well.

[Corvus]

Well, shit. Italics.

[Stephen]

Got it.

[oddjob]

In the USA it is both a step forwards & backwards. It indicates women are now as fair game as men, under the right circumstances.

[litbrit]

i ran across some different information in searches now lost -- that he tried to enlist in 2008 and was turned away for undisclosed reasons.

kathy, I'm back online again, and yes, after hearing from several channels online and off that the gunman was a veteran, I then read what you've posted--that he was turned away from the military for "unspecified reasons" (per CNN).

The PTSD post to which I linked is relevant only if the gunman actually did serve in the armed forces. It appears he did not.

His motivations were clear in many respects, though: he set out with a weapon that, as KN says, is designed to take out as many victims in as short a time as possible. Robert tells me the Glock 19 can be fitted with a "plus 2" magazine, which, when you include the one in the chamber, means he had at least 22 bullets to work with, more if he had a second magazine on him. In my limited experience with Glocks, I found them to have an extremely light "trigger feel" compared to other handguns of the same caliber; they tend to rapid-fire.

One thing is certain: the gunman chose that weapon very deliberately. As to his other decisions, I agree: we need much more information.

[kathy a.]

so far, she has survived. there is a chance she will fully recover, but i'm heartsick about the chances her injuries are too severe for a full recovery. this wasn't a flesh wound. hoping for the best possible outcome.

there are reports today that he was attempting to load a second magazine when he was tackled by bystanders and disarmed.

oddjob -- thanks for that quote about the atmosphere leading up to kennedy's assassination.

[low-tech cyclist]

Arizona no longer requires a permit for either concealed or open carry.

For a couple of decades, at least, the gun nuts have been arguing that if carrying heat in public places is restricted to those who can demonstrate a need to carry, then only outlaws will be armed in public places.

When pretty much anyone can pack a weapon in public, they said, massacres like this will largely become a thing of the past because Joe Citizen will pull out his gun and shoot the crazy person before the crazy person shoots very many people.

That theory didn't work out particularly well in practice yesterday. Just sayin'.

[Sir Charles]

l-t c,

Yeah that's one of the more absurd theories I've ever heard. There is no acknowledgement of how quickly you can squeeze off shots with a Gloc or other similar hand gun nor of how difficult it is as an untrained civilian to step up in a situation like that and shoot the gun man rather than your fellow citizens.

Hell, plenty of cops panic and can't shoot straight in such circumstances.

[kathy a.]

it all happened so fast. what happened in reality, despite very liberal gun laws in AZ, is that by the time anyone could do anything, the first clip was finished and he was trying to reload. citizens wrestled him down and got the weapon and clip away from him.